Developing advertising campaigns
Category: Marketing
The following must be considered when developing an advertising campaign:
1. Advertising Objectives The basic advertising objectives can be considered as being to inform, persuade, or remind. In addition advertising objectives might be categorised as:
Sales objectives e.g. to increase sales by 10% in 3 months. A problem with sales objectives is that it is difficult to relate an adverts effectiveness to sales levels since so many factors have an impact on sales besides advertising e.g.: competitors activities.
Communications objectives. Russell Colley’s DAGMAR «hierarchy of effects» model shows levels of understanding gone through before a purchase:
Awareness of existance of a brand or company.
Comprehension of what a product is and what it will do.
Conviction to buy the product.
Action e.g. purchase.
Thus, an advertising objective relating to the above might be to move the target market from a position where 50% of them are unaware of the existence of a brand, to the position where within a period of 6 months 70% of them are aware of the existence of the brand.
In general terms the tasks of advertising might include announcing product changes, creating a brand or company image, aiding entry into a new market and so on.
2. The Target Audience
Companies may wish to appeal to particular segments of a market e.g. the teenage segment.
3. The Advertising Message
A good message is memorable and might be one that gets Attention, holds Interest, arouses Desire and obtains Action (AIDA). In generating a message the following steps are involved:
Message generation. This involves developing messages which will help the product achieve its desired positioning in the market e.g.: «Have a Coke and a smile».
Message evaluation and selection. A message could be assessed on the basis of:
Desirability. Something desirable or interesting should be said about the product, in addition, the source of the communication e.g. an actor on a TV commercial should be attractive in some way.
Exclusiveness. That which is said about the product should be distinctive. The message may contain a Unique Selling Proposition e.g.: «the toothpaste with fluoride in the stripes». This, it is argued, makes advertisements more effective.
Believable. The message should be believable or provable.
Understandability. The message must for example use language that the target audience understands.
c) Message execution. Advertising messages may be put across using particular:
Styles. For example fantasy might be used in advertising, as might testimonial evidence, or the use of personalities such as well-known sportsmen.
Tones. For example humour or fear might be used in advertising to sell products.
Words. They should be attention getting and memorable.
Format factors. This involves a consideration of size, colour, use of cartoons, and so on.
Message structure. The message should be considered in terms of:
Polarity e.g.: whether the message is one sided and solely mentions the plus points of the product or whether a two sided approach is best in order perhaps to make the advert more believable.
Order e.g.: whether to put the best argument at the beginning or end of the advertisement.
Completion i.e.: do we draw specific conclusions such as «Buy now» or leave the conclusions more open ended in our approach.
4. Media
In determining media to be used the following would be considerations.
Reach or Coverage. This is the number of people in the target audience to be exposed to the advertising campaign during the specified time e.g.: 50% of the target audience in 3 months. To improve reach, more media may be used.
Frequency. The number of times the average person in the target audience should be exposed to the message in the specified time e.g.: 3 times.
Impact. This relates to the ability to stimulate and is often measured by the extent of recall, attitude change, and strength of desire to buy. A half page press advertisement would have less impact than a full page one.
Continuity. Consumers may forget if advertising is not continuous. There may be continuity problems due to the expense of e.g.: TV advertising. The ideal is to deliver the greatest number of effective advertising messages to the greatest number of people in the target market at the lowest cost and with maximum impact.
Media planners make their choice among the major media types such as press, TV, outdoor etc.. taking into account the following:
Reach, frequency, impact and continuity.
Lead time. This varies and can be short for daily newspapers, but long for magazines, which are only published monthly. Also, particular media may be ‘fully booked’ in terms of advertising space, resulting in a waiting list.
Target audience media habits.
The product Particular media may be superior in terms of their potential for visualisation, demonstration and colour (TV is good in these areas). Microwave ovens cannot be effectively demonstrated on radio.
Regionality. The ability to advertise mainly or solely in a particular geographic area.
The message. Long advertising copy containing a lot of technical data might not be appropriate for TV advertising.
The environment of the medium e.g.: cinema might be described as escapist and for the young.
h) Cost. Discounts may be given to regular advertisers. Advertising on TV isgenerally considered expensive.
i) Objectives of the campaign e.g.: it might be appropriate to advertise inHomes and Gardens if the objective of advertising is to position theproduct as an up market product for higher socio-economic groups.
j) Activities of competitors e.g.: in order to defend market share it might be
considered appropriate to use the same media as the competition. k) The law. It is, for example, illegal to advertise cigarettes on TV. l) Experience. Knowledge of what has worked well in the past.
In selecting specific media vehicles e.g.: Jackie, Oh Boy! etc. within each media type the factors mentioned above would be taken into account as would the Cost Per Thousand Persons Reached criteria.
The CPT approach has the following drawbacks:
Not all users of a medium may see the advert and in addition not all users of a medium may be interested in the product. The advertiser is really paying for «opportunities to see».
It does not take into account factors such as colour re- production, and the prestige associated with particular media vehicles.
5. Media Scheduling