WHAT IS AN AD
CAMPAIGN?
An Ad campaign is a series of ads of a brand that are related because they
all have the same central idea and are running during the same time period.
For instance, for the International Women’s Day in the year 2017, Levi’s
brought the ‘#IShapeMyWorld’campaign to India that celebrated different
women who inspired the world.
The advertising campaign spoke about the judgemental Indian society,
body-shaming, diversity among women, gender and societal norms and
most importantly, how these women rose above it all.
Creative
Execution
RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN PRICE,
RELATIVE QUALITY AND RELATIVE
ADVERTISING
Farris and Reibstein derived the following results after examining the Relationships
between price, relative quality and relative advertising for 227 consumer business from the
Profit Impact of Marketing Strategies (PIMS):
Brands with average relative quality but high relative advertising budgets were able to charge
premium prices
Brands with high relative quality and high relative advertising were able to charge the highest
prices
Brands with low quality and low advertising charged the lowest prices.
Consumers were willing to pay higher for known products than for
unknown products
The positive relationship between high prices and high advertising was
the strongest in the later stages of the PLC, for market leaders and for
low cost products.
PLANNING ADVERTISING
CAMPAIGNS
Brand positioning is the single most important objective of advertising.
Every agency evolves a unique planning model but the basic essence
remains the same.
The credit for making the most scientific model with textbook precision
goes to the advertising agency James Walter Thompson.
The model known as the T plan, has been adapted by many agencies,
and is taught by practitioners in various management schools (Jones
1989)
PLANNING ADVERTISING
CAMPAIGN
Where are we in the minds of:
a. Consumers
b. Market
Why are we here?
It is essential to know the reasons for the current market standing or the lack of it,
distribution problems, competitor’s better pricing strategy, brand image, corporate
image, consumer’s reactions to the product and the reason for the same and the
factors that have contributed to the brand personality and positioning.
Build and evaluate hypotheses to seek answers to the question, ‘why are we here?’
Constant probing and honest analysis will provide enough cues to work on.
Where do we go from here?: It is important to determine not just ‘where would it be
desirable to be’, but also ‘where we could realistically be.’ once that is worked out,
establish the communication objectives, which in fact must emanate from the
marketing objectives.
For example, if the market objective of a company is to expand the market from the
metros to the mini metro towns, the communication objective will be to identify the
prospective buyers in the mini metros, their communication habits and the media
accessibility.
How do we get there? : The ‘How to’, in fact is the most crucial part of the plan – the
strategy to achieve the objective, the intended route to fulfill the aim. Strategy must
cover both creative and media planning, including the economics of the exercise.
A creative brief addresses the following questions:
❖What is the problem/opportunity?
❖What is the role of advertising?
❖Who are we talking to?
❖What is the desired key response?
❖What is the personality of the proposed advertising?
The strategy for deciding upon the most useful media should ideally cover the following three
criteria.
1. Medium as message: Determine which medium will contribute the most just by its nature
and associations; how people use the media – for how long, with whom, when and where.
2. Medium as medium: determine what medium is the best suited for the target responses
and in creative expressions to achieve those responses. Colour, sound, movement, ability to
demonstrate and the ability to use extended argument will be some of the considerations.
3. Medium as vehicle: a vehicle is a part of a particular medium. For example, various
channels, such as MTV, Star TV, Doordarshan are vehicles of television, but each one
caters to various tastes of different target audience. Similarly, there are thousands of
newspapers and magazines in the print medium. The vehicle/medium is right when it
reaches the right target audience. The media considerations would address issues relating
to coverage, frequency, costs etc.
What single, benefit do we want to convey? : Each piece of effective
communication must convey a thought. Similarly, the bottom line in all product
advertising is to enhance sales.
Hence, it is very important to convey a benefit, a value, to the advertisement
viewer/listener/reader. In order to achieve that, advertisers need to work on the
positioning aspect.
What consumer response do we want to elicit? :
Advertising must work from the point of view of the receiver of the message to elicit the
‘desired response’. The role of brand personality and the brand positioning of a product are
of importance here.
In order to work on the brand personality, a few choices, depending on the product and its
usage would be – individual appeals, appeal to senses, reason, emotion and appeal to
non-functional values.
The other alternative could be projecting the brand as a whole – personality,
characteristics, perceived uses, style, association etc. the consideration for brand positioning
would include the brand’s market position – leader, second, minor or specialist; and scope –
international, national and local.
