Darren Herman

We’ve covered some pretty fundamental topics here for Marketing Wednesdays including The Chief Marketing Officer, The Marketing Plan, and previously, the Agency 101.  Today, we’re going to cover a very broad topic:  media.

History

Way back when, we used to divide media between Above the Line and Below the Line (ATL/BTL).  Above the Line was typically “brand” advertising which included print and television amongst others.  Below the Line was the non-sexy stuff such as direct mail and even today, most of the Internet.

We then went into an offline/online world; this was primarily from the 1990s thru today.

And now, we talk about media within the POEM construct:  paid, owned, and earned media.

• Paid media is what you buy.  It’s a big billboard.  A 300X250 on Buzzfeed.  A captcha via solvemedia.
• Owned media is what you own.  It’s your brand’s website.  It’s your Facebook page.  It’s your store windows.
• Earned media is what gets amplified.  It’s the re-tweets.  It’s the check-ins.  It’s the word of mouth referrals.

Todays modern communications plans require thinking across the entire media landscape.  If you view slide 15 of our public Media Kitchen credentials presentation, you’ll see how we talk about this thinking.

I believe that the best marketing experiences play to POEM all in one.  It’s the future.  However, to deliver on tomorrow’s media opportunities, many folks will have to re-tool and re-structure.

I also believe that the way we purchase media will be re-tooled, to go from a human led and optimized process to a hybrid process of using technology where possible, not just for procurement but for optimization and insights.  We have invested in many of those companies here, but the entire media space is ripe for innovation.  This post is not about marketing technology, but about media, so I’ll stop there from a tech speak.

Buying

Many vendors sell media.  The way that agencies or marketers purchase media from vendors are on different cost basis:  CPM (cost per thousand impressions), CPC (cost per click), CPL (cost per lead), CPE (cost per engagement), ratings points (for TV), CPA (cost per acquisition), and others.  Each cost basis can “back into” others and savvy media buyers know how to work the numbers to make them work for individual clients.

If a vendor fails to deliver whatever is contracted, it’s common for make-goods to be delivered.  These make-goods are essentially exactly what they sound like: additional inventory to make up for missed performance.

When purchasing media, sometimes media properties bundle in “added value” which is essentially additional opportunities surrounding a core purchase that helps make the idea bigger and/or bring down the cost.  When a media vendor sells a package, the purchaser buys the specific package at a specific rate, but the added value is on top of it, which brings down the final cost-per metrics.  This is very common in the offline world and I’ve seen it often when buying site-direct sponsorship opportunities (online).

Media is also a big part of the agency world.  There are buying agencies, planning agencies, and integrated agencies.  I happen to work at an integrated agency where planning & buying are together (I can’t imagine them separate).  Agencies charge clients largely based on planning fees (based on time & materials) and buying commissions (relative to the media channel they are purchasing).  Some agencies put a % of their fee at risk so they can get a bonus based on performance.

Many people believe that the media agency model need to change, but I’ve not seen another model put forth which is the “golden” model.  All of the new models I’ve seen put too much risk on any one side of the equation.