5 min read
What is an advertising plan?
An effective advertising plan allows brands to carry out a successful communication strategy. But how to achieve an effective advertising strategy and good management and optimization of the resources invested in it? With a measurable return beyond sales, that is, taking into account the voice of the consumer, hence the relevance of including market research in the advertising plan.
Calculating the return is an objective and operational measurement tool that allows us to analyze the results and determine the return on communication actions and, therefore, to know if they meet the objectives in the advertising plan. Find out in this article the importance of data in an advertising plan!
The advertising plan is the tool that allows you to design, analyze and select the actions and channels through which the desired information will be transmitted to the target audience. Thus, it is key for brands to make their advertising campaigns reach the consumer, achieving both sales and the different objectives established by the brand.
An effective advertising plan achieves the following:
- Brand awareness
- Work on the brand image and brand health
- Capture the attention of potential customers
- Build consumer loyalty
- Increase sales
Given that the advertising plan represents a high proportion of the advertising budget, it is necessary to manage and optimize the resources invested. Hence the importance of basing your advertising and marketing strategies on data.
Why base your advertising plan on data?
Having objective and operational data allows brands to optimize the effectiveness of their advertising plan and ensure the return on their actions. Advertising research enables data analysis beyond sales, providing access to information on campaign impact and performance. In this way, it can be determined whether the investment has achieved the objectives set out in the marketing plan.
Brands that make data-driven decisions reduce costs and increase profits. However, while 91% of companies say that data-driven decision-making is important to their brand growth, only 57% say they base their business decisions on data.
How does market research help brands understand their consumers?
Given the overexposure of consumers to brands and products or services, as well as the diversification of consumption, it is necessary to know the consumer to gain insights to communicate relevant and impactful ideas that generate sales.
To this end, market research allows the collection of information before and after the execution of the advertising plan. In this way, companies can have data that will enable them to design, analyze and select the actions and channels through which the desired information will be transmitted to the target audience.
Since the objective of any advertising action is to have an impact, communicate and persuade, it is essential to measure the effectiveness and performance of the campaign. This data can be gathered and analyzed through advertising research based on how the advertisement performs in relation to each of the key indicators: awareness, communication, evaluation of the advertisement, brand image, and persuasion.
Therefore, advertising research makes it possible to identify whether the communication strategies have worked on brand awareness and whether they have communicated or reinforced its image, generating a good opinion and predisposition to purchase the brand. However, it is surprising that there are brands that base their decision-making on intuition.
Types of research that can be made to develop an advertising plan
Research is key both for the preliminary step of designing the advertising plan and for the follow-up of the actions established in the plan. To this end, the following can be carried out:
1. Exploratory research
Makes it possible to identify and specify future actions, i.e. to determine the maximum information about the market and the consumer, thus enabling the understanding and optimization of the design of strategies, activities, and means of communication.
2. Advertising research
Uses advertising tests to measure the performance of a campaign, as well as its suitability for different media. Research that focuses on the before, during, and after the launch of the campaign, specifically:
- Pre-Test: A study to identify the effectiveness and possible optimizations before the launch of a campaign (this can be done with the creativity already finalized or with an outline).
- Post-Test: A study to measure the impact and performance of an advertising campaign on air or already completed, by collecting data on awareness, recall, persuasion, as well as evaluation of the advertisement).
- Ad Tracking: continuous measurement study that monitors different communication actions, thus providing evolving data on the impact and effectiveness of the communication campaigns. Information can be collected on a one-off basis (Pulsed Tracking) or continuously (Continuous Tracking).
Do you want to base your advertising strategy on data? Try Zinklar and discover all the possibilities offered by the platform for your advertising plan.
