Launch an Advertising Campaign

You have a range of different media available to you; each has its own characteristics. Now you have to figure out how you're going to use them.

You will determine each channel's best approach with these four key factors: format, timing, frequency, multi-channel.

Determine Your Format

There are many formats to deliver a message, such as:

• A large billboard. 

• A bus stop ad.

• A single page ad or double page spread (DPS) in a magazine.

• A wide range of digital formats.

• A social media post.

• A TV commercial or pre-launch video on YouTube.

• A radio commercial.

Dove's Campaign for Real Beauty was launched with posters in 2003 in Canada and the U.K., encouraging passersby to vote using text messages and online. Engaging audiences to give reactions, this campaign became AdAge's pick for the best campaign of the 21st Century and expanded across a wide range of media across the world.

Determine How Your Timing Will Impact You

Consider everything from time of day, day of the week, the season (Summer? Christmas?).

Determine in advance the time frame for broadcasting the message, depending on the product purchases' seasonality.

For the last few years in the U.K., John Lewis (a department store) has dominated the Christmas advertising scene with a series of beautifully crafted TV commercials, backed up with ads in other media and even products being created to support them. This 2012 example even spawned a children's book.

Determine Your Ideal Frequency

How often do you want your audience to see (or hear) your advertising? Getting the right frequency has been an ever-changing discussion in the ad industry. If you show it too often, you risk alienating your audience; not often enough, and they might not recall the ads at all.

Frequency is determined by the messages' rhythm while considering the audience's renewal and the repetition of the same audience. 

Oasis, a soft drinks brand, played with the idea of seeing ads too often being a turnoff with this campaign that promised to remove advertising if sales went up.

Determine if You Want to Run a Multi-Channel Campaign

When combing media, you have to define if you're going to use them simultaneously and in a complementary manner or spread out to have more extended coverage and a more prolonged presence for your brand. 

Greggs is a bakery chain with, as Marketing Director Hannah Squirrell puts it, "...a pretty small marketing budget (that) forces it to look at ways to cut through and do things differently." To do this, they spotted a trend in the rise of vegan eating, particularly in the first month of the year. So in 2019, they decided to "own" Veganuary.  A TV campaign and smart, witty use of social media allowed them to use earned media and paid media to leapfrog competitors into the number two breakfast food spot in the U.K.

Let's Recap!

• There any many possible uses of the various media, which vary according to four key factors:

  • Format

  • Timing

  • Frequency

  • Media complementarity

• By thinking about these four key factors, you can plan your campaign and how to make sure you get the right message through to your audience.

The final chapter of Part 2 will help you understand the role of agencies and how they might help you with your advertising strategy.