Unit – 2: Advertising Media and Media Planning

Q. What is advertising media? What are its various types? Explain the merits and demerits of various indoor and outdoor advertising media.   2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2020

Q. What factors would you consider while selecting an appropriate medium for advertising? Explain in detail the problems in selection of advertising media.       2018, 2019

Q. What is Meant by Media Planning? Explain the different steps involved in advertising planning and decision making.    2016, 2017, 2019

Q. What is meant by media planning? What issues are considered in the process of advertisement planning.      2022

Q. Discuss the major internal and external factors involve in advertising planning and decision making.    2018

Q. What is market segmentation? How does market segmentation help in advertisement?  2022

Q. Write Short notes on:

a) Outdoor media         2014

b) Indoor media            2015, 2018

c)       Internet as an advertising media      2014

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Advertisement Planning and Decision Making and its steps

Advertisers and advertising agencies believe that customers have needs and desires, which can be fulfilled through the purchase and use of products and services. Advertising works largely through appeal of emotions of envy, fear, anxiety, about one’s appearance and lack of status. It is widely assumed that advertising works if the AIDCA formulas are followed. The formula sums up the principles of advertising. The name of the formula is derived from the initial letters of the words: Attention, Interest, Desire, Conviction and Action. The formula suggests that the attention and interests of the customers must be gained first before the process of stimulating desire, imparting conviction and urging action in advertisements can bring about a change in the buying behaviors.

The Attention part is the banner or headline that makes an impressive benefit promise. Interest builds information in an interesting way, usually meaning that this must relate closely to the way that the reader thinks about the issues concerned. If you seek a response you must move then to create Desire, which relates benefits to the reader so that they will want them. Finally, you must prompt an Action, which may be to call a telephone number or to complete and send of a reply coupon. Advertising that does not prompt action is a wasted opportunity. The Planning process of Advertisements Campaigns include the following activities:

1. Situation Appraisal: Before planning any activity, one requires relevant information regarding the situation. For planning an Ad campaign, we require information about the target market or consumer, the company or product and the competition. The three important research areas are:

a) Consumer research and market research

b) Product and company research

c) Competitive research

2. Situation or SWOT Analysis: (analyzing strengths, weakness, opportunities and threats) From all the information collected, campaigns planners find out the strengths of the product. These strengths could be in any area. The strength often leads to new opportunities to be explored. Weaknesses make the product vulnerable to threats from others.

3. Structural or Strategic Planning: Advertising is an art and a science. While the art comes from writing, designing and producing exciting advertisements, the science comes from scientific methods of research and strategic planning. Strategic planning is the process of making intelligent decisions. It starts with finding out what to do, deciding how to accomplish the objectives. It also decides whom to address (the target audience), how to distinguish the product, how much to spend (budgeting), and how long to run the campaign.

4. Creative Planning: It includes developing a theme, the creative strategy and finally deciding the creative tactics. The theme needs to be a strong concept to be able to hold all there different and diverse ads together. A powerful theme brings about ‘synergy’ to the campaign. A theme must always relate to and reflect the campaign objectives. Another step of creative planning is finding the creative strategy. The creative strategy outlines the impressions the campaign wants to create. Some common creative strategies are:

a)      Generic Strategy- this is used by market leaders who ignore the presence of competitors

b)      Pre-emptive claim strategy- here the brand is the first to pick up a particular feature. In the minds of the people, it becomes associated with that brand.

c)       Unique selling proposition (USP) strategy- here the campaign talks about some features, which is unique to that advertised brand and is not available in others.

d)      Brand image strategy: when there are no strong differentiating features among the competitors, then branding try and create images.

e)      Product Positioning- some times products or brands are positioned different from competing brands.

5. Media Planning- the ultimate goal of advertising is to reach the target audience with the advertising message. Thus, the major decisions in media planning, which needs to be taken, are:

a) Which media to be used?

b) Where to advertise (geographic region)?

c) When to advertise (timing and scheduling)?

d) How intense the exposure should be (frequency)?

Media planning is a ‘behind the scene’ part of advertising. It plays an integral role in merging the science of marketing with the art of advertising. A media planner has to find out about the availability of various media, the media rates, their reaches and also analyze their effectiveness.

Factors affecting Advertisement Planning and Decision Making

Advertising planning and decision making depends on internal and external factors. Internal factors are situation analysis, the consumer and market analysis, competition research and the advertising plan. Advertising planning and decision making depends on internal and external factors. Internal factors are situation analysis, the marketing program, and the advertising plan. The three legs of advertising planning concern are the 

1.       Objective setting and target market identification,

2.       Message strategy and tactics, and

3.       Media strategy and tactics. 

The advertising plan should be developed in response to a situation analysis, based on research. Once developed, the advertising plan has to be implemented as an advertising campaign, in the context of social and legal constraints and with the involvement of various facilitating agencies.

Internal Factors:

1. Situation Analysis: It involves an analysis of all important factors operating in a particular situation. This means that new research studies will be undertaken on company history and experience. 

AT&T, for example, developed a new strategy for its long-distance telephone services – based on five year of research. The research encompassed market segmentation studies, concept testing, and a field experiment. The field experiment increased on testing a new advertising campaign called ‘Cost of Visit’. An existing ‘Reach Out’ campaign although successful, did not appear to get through to a large group of people who had reasons to call but were limiting their calls because of cost. Research based on annual surveys of 3,000 residential telephone users showed that most did not know the cost of a long-distance call or that it was possible to make less expensive calls in off-peak periods. 

Five copy alternatives were subsequently developed and tested, from which ‘Cost of Visit’ was chosen. This campaign was credited with persuading customers to call during times that were both cheaper for them and more profitable for AT&T and, overall, was more effective that the ‘Reach Out’ campaign. One estimate was that by switching 530 million in advertising from ‘Reach Out’ to ‘Cost of Visit’, an incremental gain in revenue of $22 million would result in the first year and would top $100 million over five years.  This example highlights that a complete situation analysis will cover all marketing components and involve finding answers to many questions about the nature and extent of demand, competition, environmental factors, product, costs, distribution, and the skills and financial resources of the from.

2. Consumer and Market Analysis.  Situation analysis begins by looking at the aggregate market for the product, service, or cause being advertised, the size of the market, its growth rate, seasonality, geographical distribution. Whereas Consumer and Market analysis is concerned with the following factors:

a) Nature of demand:

Ø  How do buyers (consumer and industrial) currently go about buying existing products or services?

Ø  Can the market be meaningfully segmented or broken into several homogeneous groups with in respect to “what they want” and “how they buy”?

b) Extent of demand:

Ø  What is the size of the market (units and dollars) now, and what will the future hold?

Ø  What are the current market shares, and what are the selective demand trends?

Ø  Is it best to analyze the market on an aggregate or on a segmented basis?

c) Name of competition:

Ø  What is the present and future structure of competition?

Ø  What are the current marketing programs of established competitors?

Ø  Why are they successful of unsuccessful?

Ø  Is there is opportunity for another competitor? Why?

Ø  What are the anticipated retaliatory moves of competitors?

Ø  Can they neutralize different marketing programs we might develop?

d) Environmental climate

Ø What are the relevant social, political, economic, and technological trends?

Ø How do you evaluate these trends? Do they represent opportunities or problem?

e) Stage of product life cycle

Ø  In what stage of the life cycle is the product category?

Ø  What market characteristics support your stage-of –life-cycle evaluation?

f) Cost structure of the industry

Ø  What is the amount and composition of the marginal or additional cost of supplying increased output?

g) Skills of the firm

Ø  Do we have the skills and experience to perform the functions necessary to be in the business?

Ø  How do our skills compare with those of competitors?

h) Financial resources of the firm

Ø  Do we have the funds to support an effective marketing program?

Ø  Where are the funds coming from, and when will they be available?

3. Competitive Analysis: Advertising planning and decision making are affected by competition and the competitive situation facing the advertiser. Competition is such a pervasive factor that it will occur as a consideration in all phases of the advertising planning and decision making process. It should include an analysis of what current share the brand now has, what shares its competitors have, what share of a market is possible, from which competitors the increased share of a market is possible? The planner also has to be aware of the relative strengths and weaknesses of the different competing companies and their objectives in the product category.  It is important to look at competition as a precursor to the planning process.

External Factors:

The external factors in the planning framework are environmental, social and legal considerations. To a considerable extent, these exist as constraints on the development of an advertising plan and decision making. In developing specific advertisement, there are certain legal constraints that must be considered. Deceptive advertising is forbidden by law. What is deceptive is often difficult, because different people can have different perceptions of the same advertisements. Thus, an advertiser who attempts to provide specific, relevant information must be well aware of what constitutes deception in a legal and ethical sense and of other aspects of advertising regulation.

Even more difficult consideration for people involved in the advertising effort is broad social and economic issues as stated below:

a) Does advertising raise prices or inhibit competition?

b) Is the use of fear factor is appropriate?

c) Women and minority groups are exploited in advertising by casting them in highly stereotyped roles.

d) Is it more irritating than entertaining?

e) Is an intrusion into an already excessively polluted environment? 

f) Is Advertising directed at children?

The advertising medium refers to the means through which the advertiser can convey his message to audience. Proper selection of the media enables the advertiser to achieve the desired results. Hence, advertising media selection is vital for the success of an advertising campaign. An advertising medium is any object or device that carries the advertising message. It should be capable of accomplishing following three objectives:

a) To reach the largest number of people possible.

b) To gain their attention.

c) To be less expensive.

The character of the medium is largely determined on the objective and factual basis such as whether the coverage of the medium should be national, regional or only local

Media Commonly used in Advertising

The major media commonly used for advertising requirement are divided into two categories which are listed below:

1) Indoor Advertising Media: It can be further classified as:

a) Print media like Newspapers, Magazines, Trade Journals and Direct Mail.

b) Audit/Visual/Audio-Visual/Electronic Media like Radio, T.V., Cinema, Cassettes-audio and video, Internet.

2) Outdoor advertising Media like Hoardings, Posters, Neon Signs and other illuminations, Transit advertising (Railways and other transport), fairs and exhibitions.

Indoor Media Advertising

1. Print media advertising: Print publications such as magazines, books, newspapers and Special Issue publications (such as annuals) offer a variety of advertising opportunities:

a)    Magazines, especially those that target specific niche or specialized interest areas, are more tightly targeted compared to broadcast media. Additionally, magazines offer the option of allowing marketers to present their message using high quality imagery (e.g., full color) and can also offer advertisers the ability to integrate interactive, tactile experiences through the use of scratch-it papers impregnated with scents (e.g., perfume).

b)      Newspapers have also incorporated color advertisements, though their main advantage rests with their ability to target local markets. For advertisers, the ability to insert catalogs or special promotional material into the newspaper is an advantage.

c)       Special Issue publications can offer very selective targeting since these often focus on extremely narrow topics (e.g., auto buying guide, tour guides, college and university ratings, etc.).

2. Television advertising: Television advertising offers the benefit of reaching large numbers in a single exposure. Yet because it is a mass medium capable of being seen by nearly anyone, television lacks the ability to deliver an advertisement to highly targeted customers compared to other media outlets. Television networks are attempting to improve their targeting efforts. In particular, networks operating in the pay-to-access arena, such as those with channels on cable and satellite television, are introducing more narrowly themed programming (i.e., TV shows geared to specific interest groups) designed to appeal to selective audiences. However, television remains an option that is best for products that targeted to a broad market. The geographic scope of television advertising may vary, from local or regional advertising through to national coverage, depending on whether public broadcasting or subscriber-based cable services are used.

3. Radio advertising: Promotion through radio has been a viable advertising option for over 80 years. Radio advertising is mostly local to the broadcast range of a radio station. In many countries there are radio networks that use many geographically distinct stations to broadcast simultaneously. In the United States such networks as Disney (children‘s programming) and ESPN (sports programming) broadcast nationally either through a group of company-owned stations or through a syndication arrangement (i.e., business agreement) with partner stations. In many ways radio suffers the same problems as television, namely, a mass medium that is not highly targeted and offers little opportunity to track responses. But unlike television, radio presents the additional disadvantage of limiting advertisers to audio-only advertising. For some products advertising without visual support is not effective.

4. Film/Cinema Advertising: Cinema is another important media of advertising. It is characterized by sound, motion, colour, vision, and timeliness. It is like a TV run on the enlarged screen for large audience. This audit visual medium has a wide range starting from an ordinary slide presentation to the ad films screening. This kind of publicity is popular among people of all ages, incomes, professions, cultural bend of mind and income groups because of the style of presentation.

5. Internet advertising: The fastest growing media outlet for advertising is the Internet. Compared to spending in other media, the rate of spending for Internet advertising is experiencing tremendous growth. Internet advertising‘s influence continues to expand and each year more major marketers shift a larger portion of their promotional budget to this medium. Two key reasons for this shift rest with the Internet‘s ability to:  narrowly target an advertising message and track user response to the advertiser‘s message. The Internet offers many advertising options with messages delivered through websites or by email:

a) Standard online advertising formats (e.g. Banner ads, interstitials.): A banner ad is a rectangular advertisement appearing at the top or bottom of a web-page. Banner ads are typically 468 X 60 pixels. An interstitial is an advertisement that interrupts the user. It may be a full page or a pop up window.

b) Rich media advertisements: Ads that incorporate a variety of technology components such as video and audio. Rich media ads are thought to deliver higher impact messages.

c) Paid search advertising: A method of placing online advertisements on web pages that show results from search engine queries. Through the same search-engine advertising services, ads can also be placed on Web pages with other published content.

d) Search Engine Marketing: A form of Internet marketing that involves the promotion of websites by increasing their visibility in search engine results pages (SERPs) primarily through paid advertising. SEM may incorporate search engine optimization (SEO), which adjusts or rewrites website content and site architecture to achieve a higher ranking in search engine results pages to enhance pay per click (PPC) listings.

e) Online video gaming: An online game is a video game that is either partially or primarily played through the Internet or another computer network. Advertisers can pay to have their messages or products incorporated into the sets of online games.

f) Paid inclusion Paid inclusion is a search engine marketing product where the search engine company charges fees related to inclusion of websites in their search index. The use of paid inclusion is controversial and paid inclusion’s popularity has decreased over time among search engines. 

g) Email advertising: Also known as internet direct marketing. Using email to deliver an advertisement affords marketers the advantage of low distribution cost and potentially high reach. In situations where the marketer possesses a highly targeted list, response rates to email advertisements may be quite high. Email advertisement can take the form of a regular email message or be presented within the context of more detailed content, such as an electronic newsletter. Delivery to a user‘s email address can be viewed as either plain text or can look more like a website using web coding (i.e., HTML). However, as most people are aware, there is significant downside to email advertising due to highly publicized issues related to abuse (i.e., spam).

h) Social media advertising – a collective term used to describe forms of online advertising that focus on social networking services such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram.

6. Mobile Device Advertising: Handheld devices, such as cell phones, personal digital assistants (PDAs) and other wireless devices, make up the growing mobile device market.  Such devices allow customers to stay informed, gather information and communicate with others without being tied to a physical location.  While the mobile device market is only beginning to become a viable advertising medium, it may soon offer significant opportunity for marketers to reach customers at anytime and anyplace. Also, with geographic positioning features included in newer mobile devices, the medium has the potential to provide marketers with the ability to target customers based on their geographic location. Currently, the most popular advertising delivery method to mobile devices is through plain text messaging, however, over the next few years multimedia advertisements are expected to become the dominant message format.

7. Sponsorships: A subtle method of advertising is an approach in which marketers pay, or offer resources and services, for the purpose of being seen as a supporter of an organization’s event, program or product offering (e.g., section of a website).  Sponsorships are intended not to be viewed a blatant advertisement and in this way may be appealing for marketers looking to establish credibility with a particular target market.  However, many sponsorship options lack the ability to tie spending directly to customer response.  Additionally, the visibility of the sponsorship may be limited to relatively small mentions especially if the marketer is sharing sponsorship with many other organizations.

8. Direct Mail: This method of advertising uses postal and other delivery services to ship advertising materials, including postcards, letters, brochures, catalogs and flyers, to a physical address of targeted customers.  Direct mail is most effective when it is designed in a way that makes it appear to be special to the customer.  For instance, a marketer using direct mail can personalize mailings by including a message recipient’s name on the address label or by inserting their name within the content of marketer’s message.  

Direct mail can be a very cost-effective method of advertising, especially if mailings contain printed material. This is due to cost advantages obtained by printing in high volume since the majority of printing costs are realized when a printing machine is initially setup to run a print job and not the because of the quantity of material printed. Consequently, the total cost of printing 50,000 postcards is only slightly higher than printing 20,000 postcards but when the total cost is divided by the number of cards printed the cost per-card drops dramatically as more pieces are printed.  Obviously there are other costs involved in direct mail, primarily postage expense. While direct mail can be seen as offering the benefit of a low cost-per-contact, the actual cost-per-impression can be quite high as large numbers of customers may discard the mailing before reading.  This has led many to refer to direct mail as “junk mail” and due to the name some marketers view the approach as ineffective. However, direct mail, when well-targeted, can be an extremely effective promotional tool.

9. Outdoor advertising: Outdoor advertising is a reminder that catches the sight of people within a split of second’s time of moving population, without any spending on their part. Here, the advertising message is not delivered to the audience like print, broadcasting or internet media, rather the advertising messages are placed in strategic locations where there are exposed to audiences on the move. Outdoor advertising consists of vehicles like posters, displays, electric signs, sky writing etc.

a) Poster. Poster is the single largest form of outdoor media accounting for 75% of total outdoor advertising. A poster is a sheet of paper pasted on a wooden card or metal board reflecting the advertising message. The poster can be of standardized size or non-standardized size. The success of advertising through posters is largely dependent upon the design of the message and the location/site of the poster.

b) Electrical Signs. It is a non-standardized form of poster that makes use of elaborate light and action effects. These are most abvious vehicles in the outdoor media and are used to attract the largest number of passersby, particularly during night-time. These are made of steel beams, metal sheets, plastic using bright and flash lights, animation movies, neon signs and colors.

c) Painted Displays: These are the painted bulletins and wall paintings. It is a metal sheet of a rectangular shape of standard size, erected at heights to allow visibility from distance. These bulletins are illuminated for the night traffic. These bulletin boards have enlarged cutouts, such as a package or a trade mark displayd in brilliant lights, extending beyond the board itself, 3-dimensional structures made of Styrofoam are in common use to keep the message moving with the moving population.

d) Sky-writing: Advertising industry is using every space available whether on land or in sky. Air advertising is gaining popularity among advertisers. Sky writing is the kind of publicity where message is spread in the sky in one form or the other. Smoke writing by planes, sky-balloons, giant kites and search lights are some forms of sky-writing.

e) Sandwich men: It is an oldest and funniest medium of outdoor advertising. The advertiser hires a few men known as sandwich men to spread advertising message on the busy streets or in stadiums where there is a lot of gathering or any other place where there is a lot of crowd. This method of advertising works well in rural areas on the eventful occasions and it quite popular among children.

f) Exhibition and Trade fairs: Trade fairs and exhibition constitute an important vehicle of outdoor advertising. Exhibition is a huge gathering of manufacturers for the purpose of displaying, demonstrating and booking orders for their latest products. Exhibitions are usually organized by the trade association and chamber of commerce. The main aim of these exhibitions is to attract dealers and consumers towards the latest products in the line by giving detailed information and demonstration of the product.

The success of these exhibitions and trade fairs depend to a large extent on sound preplanning and planning as to its size, design of exhibition spot, technical and sales staff, sales literature and the display and demonstration styles adopted.

1. Newspapers: The newspapers are one of the most popular print media available to the advertisers.

Advantages of Newspapers

a) Newspapers offers mass coverage or reach. Newspapers like Hindustan Times, Times of India enjoy circulation in lacs.

b) Because of large circulation average cost per paper becomes very low.

c) Messages given in newspaper tend to be more believable by customers.

d) Newspaper allows flexibility in message and design etc.

Drawbacks of Newspaper

a) The advertisement of newspapers has very short life of one day only.

b) Through newspaper firms can reach literate customers only.

c) The production and print quality of newspaper is poor.

2. Magazines and journals

Advantages of Magazine Advertisements

a) The life of advertisement is longer.

b) Audience spend more time in reading advertisement in magazines.

c) Magazines add creditability to the message because of their reputation.

Drawbacks of Magazine Advertisement

a) Magazines have less frequency.

b) Magazines offer less flexibility in message.

c) Dramatization like visual media is not possible in magazines.

3. Television

The television is the latest and most popular medium of mass communication.

Advantages of Television Advertisement

a) This medium is audio visual which combines sight, sound and motion.

b) Great dramatization is possible.

c) It has high reach.

d) Television advertisement has catching power and better impact on customers.

Drawbacks of Television Advertisement

a) It involves high cost.

b) The advertisements are shown for a short span only.

4. Radio

This medium of advertising has been very popular till the middle of last century because of its mass reach.

Advantages of Radio Medium

a) Messages could reach the remotest area.

b) Cost is low.

c) Suitable for illiterate customers also.

Drawbacks of Radio

a) It has only audio effect so less attention is grabbed.

b) Noise and disturbance bring interruption in message.

c) It has short message life and leaves less impact.

5. Outdoor

This medium includes banners, hoardings, bill boards in open spaces, the hoardings etc. are usually seen around traffic signals, highways etc.

Advantages of Outdoor Advertisement

a) Some of the hoardings are very attractive when designed with electric display.

b) They are eye catchy and leave impact over the minds of customers.

c) Offer benefit of repeated exposures.

d) High visibility and lower cost.

Drawbacks of Outdoor Media

a) Limited audience.

b) Short attention span.

c) Limited creativity.

6. Advantages and Disadvantages of Internet Advertising:

Advantages of Internet Advertising

1. Internet advertising allows for specific prospect targeting: Mass marketing is easier with internet advertising, but so is sending a message to a specific population demographic as well. Brands are able to identify the traits of their key customers and clone them into their advertising campaign. 

2. There are numerous price points to consider: Everyone from the sole proprietor to the large multinational organization has a chance to expand their customer base thanks to internet advertising. Niche sites offer advantageous solutions to small businesses that are industry-related, while mass marketing can attract all demographics across several different platforms simultaneously.

3. Internet advertising is more responsive to changing conditions: Printed media has to be changed every time the marketing environment evolves or adjusts. These costs begin to add up quickly with traditional media and there is a time gap between each evolutionary period. With internet advertising, responsive changes can happen almost instantaneously. 

4. It is easier to test different demographics without as much risk: If a brand is thinking about entering into a new demographic for prospects, then extensive testing is typically required. Interviews, product testing, samples, and shows are all a common part of the traditional testing process. With internet advertising, a brand can put all of this into the hands of the people to do all the work. 

5. Multiple creatives can be uploaded at once: A simple tweak of a sentence is often enough to change a bad advertising campaign into a good one. Internet advertising allows a brand to upload multiple versions of an ad so that the best possible outcome can be achieved. Different ads can be tested against each other to determine their effectiveness, changes can be made almost instantly, and bad ads can be scrapped before too much damage is achieved. No other advertising method offers this unique set of specific benefits.

6. It provides for a system of instant gratification: Prospects are more likely to turn into customers if they have the chance to experience something instantly and in a first-hand way. Internet advertising allows this to happen. All it may take is a click for a customer to discover more information about what is being advertised. 

7. Internet advertising is on full-time: There aren’t any off hours when it comes to internet advertising. It is on every hour of every day of every year. It is even on when someone might click on an advertisement and then decide not to purchase something thanks to follow along advertising. This allows prospects to research your brand’s opportunities on their own time so they don’t feel as pressured to purchase or sign up for something.

Disadvantages of Internet Advertising

1. There is a healthy amount of competition: There are many prospects that can be found on the internet, but that isn’t a secret that only a select few know about. Everyone realizes that there is a lot of potential with internet advertising and they are thinking about getting involved just like you may be. There are plenty of businesses already running an internet advertising campaign as well. The market is saturated to the point that any industry-related advertising will likely be displayed next to a direct competitor. If your product’s value proposition doesn’t stand out from the rest of the pack, then people won’t inspect your offer.

2. It is incredibly easy for internet users to block advertising: All current Internet browsers have options available which block all advertising. It’s not just the pop-up ads we’re talking about here. Banner advertising, link advertising, affiliate efforts – they can all be blocked. The browser extensions are so good that even when advertising agencies attempt a work-around, the browser is able to adapt to it. This means there will always be a core group of people who will never see an internet advertising campaign, no matter what it is you may choose to do.

3. It creates a moment of distraction: The problem with internet advertising is that it distracts people from what their ultimate purpose for being online happened to be. Most people don’t log onto a website that offers free dinner recipes and expect to see an advertisement that they’ll want to click on, right? They’re looking for a new way to make one of their favorite dishes. That moment of distraction may seem like a good thing, but it really is not. When people shift their perspective to a new task, there is an attention deficit which occurs. It may take someone up to 15 minutes to recover their faculties. This means even clicks on an internet ad may not be as effective as they could be.

4. Advertising analytics can be difficult to understand: To know how effect an internet advertising campaign happens to be, a general awareness of what the analytical information being collected by that campaign is required. For those new to internet advertising, this is a crash course learning curve that doesn’t always produce quality results. Good data can be misinterpreted as bad and the reverse is also true. The end result is a campaign that is less effective because its operations are not fully understood.

5. Not all of the information gathered is usable information: A brand is forced to decide which information is the most important information to focus on when running an internet advertising campaign. Should total impressions be the focus? What about the click through rate? Should the effectiveness of an advertising campaign be measured on the amount of sales it can generate only? Many brands don’t even think about these questions as they begin advertising, which makes it easier to misinterpret results.

6. It doesn’t reach all potential prospects: There growth of the internet has been exponential, but it hasn’t achieved 100% saturation anywhere in the world. Even in the United States, there are at least 1 in 10 households that have no internet access in their homes at all. Rural prospects are much more likely to be without internet access than urban customers. Because of this, not every brand may fully benefit from an investment into internet advertising.

Selection of a suitable medium for advertising is really a complex problem to the advertiser. There are a number of kinds and classes of media in the modern advertising. Hence, the advertising media selection means not only the choice of the right classes of media out also the individual medium within the class or classes. Besides there is no single medium that is best suited for all advertisers. In reality, a medium which is best suited for one may be almost useless for another. The medium once employed for advertising a particular product itself may be found unsuited subsequently. Therefore, the right choice of a medium calls for a careful analysis. If the medium is unsuited the whole amount of money spent on the advertising campaign shall turn to be a waste. The advertiser, therefore, while selecting the media, should consider the following factors:

1) Class of the audience: Firstly, the advertiser must note the class of the audience to be influenced by the medium. The audience can be classified into different groups by their social status, age, income, educational standard, religion, cultural interests. They may also be divided into men and women.

2) Extent of coverage: Secondly, the advertiser must consider the number of audience to be covered by the medium. Every media has a general as well as an effective circulation. The general circulation is made up of the total number of people who read or subscribe to the media. The effective circulation is the number prospective customers who read it and the number of those who influences sales, though they may not buy for themselves. Effective circulation must be considered while estimating the number of people to be covered. The extent to which the medium reaches the same audience as that covered by some other media i.e., the percentage of over-lapping must also be taken into account.

3) Nature of the product: Nature of the product itself is a principal factor governing the selection of the medium. Products can be classified into various kinds – consumer‘s products and manufacturer‘s products etc.

4) Nature of the competition: The nature of the competition has greater influence of the selection of the media. If the competition is stiff utmost care is needed in the selection of medium and a larger advertising budget is also required. In many cases, where the advertising copy is similar or the choice of the media solely determines the effectiveness of the campaign as compared with that of the other competitors.

5) Reputation of the medium: Newspapers and magazines can offer a beautiful illustration for the reputation of the media. There are a few newspapers and magazines which have international reputation with a high readership. Advertisements in such magazines and newspapers are generally recognized and believed as true. Such advertisements also add prestige to the product.

6) Cost of the media: Cost of the medium in most cases, is an important factor in the selection of the medium. Advertisements in certain media are expensive, for instance, TV and Radio advertisements. Magazines and newspaper advertisements are generally considered as less expensive. Yet, certain magazines and newspapers, having larger circulation and high reputation charge higher rates. The rates also differ depending upon the space occupied and the preferential positions. The first page of a newspaper is rarely missed by the reader. Hence they have more attention value, than the advertisements presented anywhere inside the newspaper.

7) Time and location of buying decisions: The location of the audience and the time by which it should reach them must also be looked into. This consideration also enables the advertiser to keep his retail outlets in the proximity of the customers.

8) Trade Acceptance: The degree of acceptance that a medium can generate among the advertiser’s intermediaries such as wholesale and retailers would generate more favourable effect. Accordingly, the message and the media should be such that these intermediaries are enthusiastic about it. For example, an advertisement placed in a trade journal which is popular among intermediaries will have a positive effect on them which would in turn be carried to consumers.

Difficulties/issues in Media Selection

1) Audience Measurement: Audience measurement in the broadcast media is not as precise as the advertisers want. Moreover, audience measurement is done only at specific times of the year and this information is then generalized to succeeding months. Thus, future planning based on past data fails to reflect current behavior. This information collection is more of a problem with small advertisers who may not be in position to afford the purchase of such information.

2) Multiplicity of options: Today, there are a number of options available before the advertisers. This abundance of options in itself is the basic challenge in media choice. It is difficult for an advertiser to calculated the cost per media. There is a cost per thousand concepts in every medium type-but the basic unit varies, sometimes being cost per thousand homes or thousand viewers, sometimes cost being per thousand passersby and sometimes cost being per thousand copies sold. There is no uniformity in comparing  the value of a thousand pages in a publication with a thousand member of a broadcast audience. This difficulty in cost comparison makes the media selection difficult.

3) Proliferation of channels/programmes render TV rating difficult: After 1990-91, there has been an exponential expansion of the medium, with multiple channel options from DD, Cable and Satellite TV. The expansion of channel options is accompanied by a proliferation of programme in each channel. The combined effect of this multiplicity of channels and programmes has been segmentation of audience and irregular viewership of programmes. This has further rendered programme rating and programme choice rather difficult. Not only this, a given channel or programme rarely maintains the same reach or efficiency over time.

4) Problem of light view ring/Low involvement viewers: The problem of right viewers in TV in assuming great significance these days. More and more viewers have come into the category of low intensity viewers or light viewers who view a little of each channel. There are some programmes with high television rating points like hind film but such programmes were accompanied with low involvement of the viewers.

5) Overcrowding and cluttering issues: The numbers of products/brands advertised on various channels are increasing at a phenomenal rate resulting in overcrowding and cluttering of TV advertising. The problem is further glorified by the concentration of advertisements during specific times and around specific programmes.

6) Intelligent media buying: Due to the problem of proliferation of channels/programmes, low involvement viewers and overcrowding and cluttering of advertisements, ad advertiser has to spend more to reach same percentage of audience. Gone are the days when, with one spot in a single programme like Ramayana or Mahabharata, over 80% of the TV Viewers could be reached at one stroke.

Market segmentation is the sub- dividing of market into homogeneous sub section of customers, where any sub section may conceivable be selected as a market target to be reached with a distinct market mix. The marketer has to identify his targeted customers (segments). For example, a motorcycle manufacturing company has to identify their market segments, like female officers, teenage college students, and middle aged customers. After identifying the segments, the marketer (manufacturer) has to understand their tastes and expectations. In the case of female customers, they need not use much power full vehicles, like that the teenagers demand most powerful and stylish vehicles and the middle aged customers need vehicles having more mileage.

In terms of advertising, marketing segmentation can help in a number of ways:

1. Targeted messaging: By segmenting the market, businesses can create ads that are more relevant and appealing to specific groups of consumers. For example, a business selling baby products might create ads that are targeted at new parents, rather than trying to appeal to all consumers.

2. Greater efficiency: By targeting specific segments of the market, businesses can save money on their advertising efforts by reaching only the consumers who are most likely to be interested in their products or services.

3. Increased effectiveness: By creating ads that are more relevant and appealing to specific segments of the market, businesses can increase the chances that their ads will be noticed and remembered by the intended audience.

4. Improved targeting: By segmenting the market, businesses can identify the specific needs and characteristics of different groups of consumers, which can help them to better target their advertising efforts. For example, if a business is selling outdoor gear, they might create ads targeted at outdoor enthusiasts, rather than trying to appeal to all consumers.

5. Personalization: By segmenting the market, businesses can create personalized ads that speak directly to the needs and interests of specific groups of consumers. This can be particularly effective for digital advertising, which can be customized to display different messages or offers to different segments of the market.

6. Greater ROI: By creating more targeted and personalized ads, businesses can increase the chances of generating a positive return on investment (ROI) from their advertising efforts. This is because the ads are more likely to be noticed and acted upon by the intended audience, which can lead to increased sales and revenue.

7. Increased customer loyalty: By creating ads that are tailored to the needs and interests of specific groups of consumers, businesses can build stronger relationships with their target audience and increase customer loyalty. This is because the ads are more relevant and meaningful to the consumer, which can lead to increased brand loyalty and repeat business.

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