Creating a Media Plan for Your Brand

Making a media plan before a product launch or while rebranding will help you focus on your overall message so your presence is consistent, wherever your audience sees it. A media plan encompasses every outlet you’re planning to use during a campaign, from organic to paid.

Follow along as we show you exactly how we create our media plans so you can create some brand-building magic yourself.

Who Can Use a Media Plan?

Everyone! Media plans are an ideal way to organize all media outlets while preparing for product launches, new campaigns, and general strategy changes. These plans help keep everyone aligned before content creation and any paid media spend begins.

Above All, Remember Your Goal

Before making any firm plans, know your goal. Your KPIs will determine how you use each platform, so don’t skip it. Do you want to increase awareness or grow your Instagram engagement by a certain percentage? Increase sales to X amount each month?

Whatever your goal is, solidify it before moving on to the actual plan. It’s worth it. If you don’t, you risk wasting resources on a plan that won’t produce a return on the investment.

How to Make a Media Plan

These are the key outlets needed for a media plan. If you aren’t using one of these platforms or outlets, feel free to skip it. Depending on your requirements and budget, fewer platforms used well can offer better results than a mediocre presence on all of them.

Your brand may perform best on Instagram and Pinterest, with lackluster results on Twitter. In your media plan, then, you’ll want to focus on content for the former rather than the latter.

Your plan will likely look very different from another company’s, and that’s a good thing. You’re customizing to your own needs and focusing on what will serve your company best.

Social Media

Your media plan should include both organic and paid social, each platform your brand is on, and the types of content you’re planning on producing. By creating this comprehensive approach, you can ensure there’s cohesive messaging that will engage your audience regardless of platform.

This is particularly important for organic and paid posts. They should have the same branding and messaging so your presence looks cohesive. You want your ad to reach an interested user, then head to your profile and enjoy the organic posts. Without cohesive content, this is less likely to occur. Your brand’s social media plan covers organic posts, and your ads are within paid media.

Paid Media

This includes paid social and paid search (e.g., Google Ads). While Facebook Ads is one of the most prolific pieces of paid social, don’t forget about Twitter, Pinterest, and even LinkedIn. Each of these offers extended reach and traffic for brands that find their audiences on the platform.

Facebook offers their Campaign Planner, which is, you guessed it, a way to plan anticipated reach and frequency based on different targeting and budget options. It’s only available to advertisers who have used the Reach and Frequency buying option and is accessed by clicking the three stacked horizontal lines in the upper-righthand corner, going to All Tools, then Campaign Planner under the Plan column.

LinkedIn Advertising used to be the black sheep of paid social. Now it’s more… grey. The platform is still a little clunky and doesn’t quite have the capabilities of Facebook or Twitter, but if your audience is on LinkedIn, it’s definitely worth testing out.

Google Ads (formerly AdWords) offers in-search ads that increase awareness around your brand. From search results to their display network, there are options that can help your brand. During planning, make sure you have your chosen list of keywords, trackable links, and goals so everything is aligned before starting.

Email Marketing

Email marketing is another critical piece of your media plan, and it includes both newsletters and product announcements and deals. We recommend sending two emails a month to your list, but if you have enough great content to send weekly emails that customers want to open, then plan weekly newsletters.

Don’t have an email list yet? Don’t wait! Start building now. Lead form ads on Facebook as well as content offers like a coupon or free eBook act as an enticement for interested users to share their email and can start building a valuable email list.

We believe in small yet mighty. Your email list may not have 10,000 email addresses, but if the email addresses you do have are engaging with your content? That’s gold.

Print Media

Some may say print is dead, but we disagree. Mostly. In order to make the most out of investments in print media, it needs to be done right. Print media encompasses local papers and magazines as well as national magazines. These print ads can promote an event, location opening, or raise awareness around a new product.

If you’re investing a significant amount of money into this campaign, you want it to work, plain and simple. Similar to creating thumb-stopping ads online, you want these ads to be eye-catching. Use high-quality images, concise text, and a clean design to stand out on the page.

Because you can’t track clicks directly from the ad, you’ll need a custom URL that’s easy to remember. If your primary domain name is companyname.com, purchase one to three additional domain names like liveatcompanyname.com or visitcompanyname.com.

We’ve seen success with print advertising for real estate developments, though there are other industries that can also benefit. It’s important to weigh the cost and potential rewards when choosing any advertising avenue but specifically print due to limited tracking, high cost, and limited circulation.

Influencers & Sponsorships

Influencer marketing and sponsorships are also considered a part of your media plan. Even with its extreme growth over the past few years, it’s not quite at saturation and is a valuable way to increase awareness around your product or service.

How to Pick the Perfect Influencer:

• Search by niche hashtags with 50,000–100,000 uses rather than a highly popular one like #blogger, making it easier to find influencers who will fit your campaign criteria.
• Does their engagement match their follower count? Aim for 3–6% engagement. If they don’t meet this guideline, then it means they may have bought followers and/or likes.
• Work with influencers with a similar aesthetic, so photos will appear natural on their feed as well as yours.
• Consider working with micro-influencers, or those with 10,000 to 50,000 followers. This maximizes your budget rather than macro-influencers, who will typically require a more significant level of partnership.

We recommend reaching out via Instagram DM regarding potential partnerships. We’ve seen much better results through DM than email, even if the influencer’s email is listed in their profile.

A media plan is more than a list of content you want to make. It’s your secret to successful and consistent on-brand content your audience will love. The next time you’re planning a product launch or beginning a rebranding effort, make sure to add a media plan to your list so you can start strong and continue on.