Advertising Media Planner Job Description – Salary, Education and Career Guide for Becoming a Media Planner

Companies realize that one of the best ways to increase their business is through advertising. Some businesses have entire teams devoted to the creation and running of their ads, either within the company or from an outside agency.
 
Advertising teams research the best way to sell a product to potential customers. They produce ads in the form of a sidebar on a website, a full-page ad in a glossy magazine, postings in a newspaper or a television commercial.

Job Description

One of the key players on the advertising team is the media planner. The advertising media planner is responsible for conducting research on the public’s viewing habits and evaluating content or programming to see the potential use of particular media.
 
Advertising media planners are the people on whom advertisers depend to calculate numbers and determine the types of people who are reached by various media outlets. In short, media planners make certain that their client’s ads appear in the right places at the right times.
 
For example, if a media planner’s client is a toy company that wants an ad campaign on multiple media outlets, the media planner first figures out the target audience for this product. If the target age range is eight through twelve, the media planner determines when children in this age group primarily watch television.
 
The media planner might arrange for advertisements during weekday afternoon shows, as well as Saturday morning cartoons. Other outlets might include young people’s magazines and web sites frequented by children. The goal is for those audiences to see the product and influence their parents to become buyers.
 
Not only do media planners ensure that the right advertisements are seen by the right people at the right time, they also have to negotiate with media buyers so that their client pays the lowest price possible. This requires another set of skills that can be honed with experience.

Salary Guide

Entry level media planners can expect to make about $35,000 per year. After one to four years, the salary increases to about $40,000. In five to nine years, salaries rise to about $42,859. After 10 to 19 years, pay is estimated at $55,000.

Education and Training

Even though no specified training or graduate degree is required to become a media planner, most agencies who are in need of planners prefer to hire those with a bachelor’s degree in liberal arts. Several online universities offer an academic equivalent.
 
Since a media planner should be skilled in the art of negotiation, having some sort of business education helps when pursuing this type of career. Classes on marketing, applied statistics and business analysis also benefit the prospective media planner.

Prior Work Experience

An employee starting out as an advertising media planner usually begins in account management or some type of media department. Those without prior experience might demonstrate their creative and communication skills and problem solving ability in order to stand out as good candidates for media planning positions.

Career Advancement

Career media planners are uncommon. Most media planners move to other positions in their particular work setting. Promotion is the key, and if a media planner is good at handling a small ad campaign project, he or she can easily advance to managing bigger projects. Eventually, that media planner may be asked to supervise other media planners. Increased salaries come with the increased responsibilities.

Related Associations and Groups

Media Planning and Buying agencies are numerous. The following is a list of those that are global.
  • Carat
  • Initiative
  • Mindshare
  • OMD
  • Starcom
  • ZenithOptimedia.
 
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