Media buying is the process of buying ad space and engaging directly with advertising channels to allocate the budget cost-effectively. This often involves monopolizing underserved channels or collaborating with media vendors to strike the best possible deal.
There are different types of media buying, each aiming to deliver relevant, targeted ads that meet the campaign goals such as increasing conversion rates, boosting sales, and strengthening brand awareness.
Let’s discuss the different media buying types for businesses, their importance, and tips for negotiating digital media buying.
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What Are the Types of Media Buying?
The types of media buying refer to the different ad placements available for media buyers. Media buyers can choose from both traditional and digital channels. Digital or programmatic advertising encompasses a broader and more versatile range of ad opportunities. These types of media buying include ads such as:
- Display ads
- Mobile ads
- Paid search
- Social media ads
- Video ads
- Digital Out of Home (OOH) ads
The Digital OOH ads are an exciting option for media buyers since they offer multiple opportunities to leverage the platform. With Digital OOH, you can create interactive, memorable, and immersive campaigns. For example, elevator advertising is a popular medium of Digital OOH.
On the other hand, media buying also encompasses conventional channels, such as:
- TV ads
- Print ads in magazines and newspapers
- Radio ads
- Out of Home (OOH) ads
- Any non-digital advertisements
Overall, digital ad placements provide opportunities for more targeted campaigns, while traditional ads are generally better for awareness-building efforts. The most suitable medium for your business's campaign will depend on your budget, goals, and target audience.
Why Is Media Buying Important for Businesses?
Media buying is just about paying for ad space; its ultimate goal is to forge strong and meaningful relationships with media channels.
Here are some of the most prominent benefits of media buying to consider:
Access to Inventory Slots
The Digital 2024 Global Overview report showed that search engines (31.9%), TV (30.9%), and social media (28.7%) are the top three brand discovery channels. Since media buyers know the channels and slots that offer the best engagement and understand how external events affect ad placement and costs, they can optimally spend your ad budget.
When you work with white-label ad tech software to buy inventory slots, you become the platform owner. This implies your media buyer can also access the direct publisher placements via an ad server or connect to a custom supply platform in place of pre-defined traffic sources.
Easy Negotiation of Deals
Media buyers are experts in negotiating and have extensive networks of contacts across the media space. Thus, they enjoy greater exposure to brand ads at lower costs while working directly with the publishers.
In programmatic advertising, the success of the deals depends largely on optimization. The DSP platforms feature algorithms like bidding autopilot, which enables setting bidding rules and multipliers for campaigns.
These algorithms adjust the bids automatically, increasing win rates and smartly adapting the bidding strategy per the received metrics. Overall, it reduces your ad spend per conversion in the long run.
Improved Brand Awareness and Quality Leads
Media buying, when implemented right, brings the best leads. You can fine-tune your buyer's profile precisely with the help of granular targeting. This type of targeting allows you to use custom parameters based on the audience data generated by the publishers.
Digital media buying offers unlimited supply, primarily when using a white-label DSP. Here, you can set up custom traffic sources and gain a better understanding of the quality of your conversions through real-time analytics.
How To Plan and Launch Impressive Ads?
Media buying is an integral part of a successful advertising campaign. However, to deliver a memorable message, you must follow these tips:
- You must choose targeted placements, not just high-traffic ones. While it’s satisfying for many people to see your ad, these viewers must be part of your target audience. Therefore, relevance is essential when choosing your ad space.
- Put your early market research to use and let your audience know that you understand them and their requirements. It's also a good idea to get help with communicating these sentiments from a professional PR agency.
- Create an attention-grabbing headline, as it can make or break your ad.
- Make sure your creativity matches your brand image. Imagery that connects with your brand is remembered by people long after they have walked away from it.
- Include a call-to-action or CTA to let your audience know the next step they need to take for more information. The CTA must align with the ad campaign or public relations strategy.
- New ad technologies and platforms will keep coming, but these tried-and-true ways are imperative to make the most of your ad.
5 Tips for Negotiating Digital Media Buying
Negotiation is an integral part of the online media buying process. Here are five essential tips for making good media buys:
1. Have a Clear Goal
The first key to choosing suitable media buys for your campaign is identifying and understanding what you want each media buy to achieve. A clear and precise goal will let you target marketing channels and avoid mistakes. You will also get a baseline for later determining your media buys' success.
2. Stay Aware of Your Context
It is crucial to be aware of not just the campaign's content but also its context. Keeping an eye on the cultural landscape surrounding your advertisements is vital for optimizing your campaign and avoiding mistakes.
Staying aware of the context gives you a more comprehensive perspective on your media mix, which directly benefits your individual media buys.
3. Mix It Up
Usually, an ad campaign is not limited to a single marketing channel. The most pertinent question is not how TV media buying or digital media buying works but how these types of media buys can work together.
When brands mix up their individual media buys, they support one another as a team and work towards achieving the campaign's goals. A good mix of media buys offers a broader range of strategic buying options, ultimately putting businesses in a better position for individual negotiations.
4. Consider Your Budget
If you have ever worked in any part of the advertising industry, you know how important it is to consider the budget. While making media buys, it is essential to know the price points and start negotiating well below them. A media buy that blows up your budget is not desirable at all.
5. Get What Is Paid for
You must ensure the market channel offers you precisely agreed-upon services when it comes to marketing and advertising.
Contracts play a critical role in both traditional and online media buying. When you sign a contract for a media buy, be sure that it states all the terms and conditions of the purchase. Doing this early on will protect you before, during, and after the advertisement is put in place.
Takeaways on Types of Media Buying
The landscape of conventional and digital media buying is continually evolving, bringing in unique marketing channels and innovative media buying practices. This, however, will not change the goal of media buying.
A good purchase through the right channel will expose your brand to the right people in the right light and foster a meaningful relationship between you and your audience.
