Media Planning and Buying – Procurement Best Practices & Sourcing Strategies

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Media Planning and Buying Market Size 

According to the media planning and buying procurement market research report, the global demand forecast is strong and ranges from USD 520-550 billion with a dynamic landscape. It is a rising trend for the media planning and buying market that shows resilience, with a growth projection of a 3-5% CAGR in 2023. The statistics underline an industry with unstoppable momentum amidst a shifting consumer behavioral paradigm and relentless technological advancement, the search for new strategies to engage audiences from a crowded media landscape. It brings a better explanation to this growing need of the hour—media planning and buying are at the core of the modern marketing ecosystem through which a brand can find effective ways to communicate and resonate with its target audiences.

Development in the media planning and buying market is intrinsically related to the proliferation of digital platforms, which has revolutionized advertising paradigms. In this space, the transformation trends come from social media, digital streaming services, and digitized content consumption habits. It means that even more aggressively, the developed market is dominated in targeting, engaging, and reaching new audiences by complex, data-rich approaches, such as programmatic advertising, analytics of data, and AI-driven insights. Media planning and buying agencies are now taking up a step-up role with the enhanced complexities of omnichannel marketing.

Market Definition

Media planning denotes an applied strategy in the preference and arrangement of the delivery of marketing communications in the media at the lowest cost possible for the marketing objectives set. It includes research, target audience analysis, and choice of the channel to use by basing it on the different underlying factors such as demographics, psychographics, and media consumption habits, among other factors. 

Media Planning and Buying Market Drivers

1. Digital Transformation: Evolution in establishing digital platforms and technologies revolutionized media and information management, presenting numerous platforms for advertising. 

1. Multi-Channel Integration: Since consumers are now getting involved through more than one platform and device, multi-channel integration and harmonization come into play. 

Media Planning and Buying Market Challenges 

1. Ad Blocking and Ad Fraud: A rise in ad blockers and fraudulent activities challenges media planning and buying, thus cutting down advertising campaigns’ reach and effectiveness. 

1. Pricing Pressures: In the market, pricing pressures are usually high due to the prevailing competitiveness. It is generally bound to squeeze the profit margins of an agency. 

Media Planning and Buying Market Opportunities 

1. Programmatic Advertising: Increased adoption of programmatic advertising offers automation and optimization capabilities towards media buying processes. 

1. Cross-Platform Measurement Standards: Due to the developments of cross-platform advertising, standardized metrics, and measurement tools allow better and easier evaluation of campaign performances and return on investments.

Media Planning and Buying Market Segmentation 

1. Channel Type: The segmentation of media channels, such as TV, digital, print, radio, and out-of-home, will enable more specialized planning and buying strategies attuned to the unique attributes of these channels.

1. Industry Vertical: With retail, healthcare, automotive, or financial services, the media planning and buying requirements keep varying with the changing dimensions of these industry verticals. 

1. Budget Size: Media planning agencies must segment the clients by budget sizes to provide scalable solutions and services customized to individual client needs and resource constraints.

1. Geographic Region: This includes regional segmentation of consumers based on cultural peculiarities, prevailing market dynamics, and behavioral patterns about the consumer, which differ across different geographic regions.

Regional Outlook of the Media Planning and Buying Market 

The media planning and buying market landscape keeps changing with distinct trends and disparities across the various regions. The geographical front shows North America is topping the list, whereas Asia has it at 3-5% and the EU at 2-3%. Changes in media consumption and advertising dynamics in such parts of the world result from growth due to evolving technologies, changing consumers, and economic conditions. In supplier power, North America and the EU show high levels, possibly high infrastructure and dominance in offering services like media planning and buying. 

In exploring buyer power dynamics further, North America and the EU equally denote medium levels of influence, which states that buyers are moderately potent and sellers balanced well within the media planning and buying market. By comparison, Asia presents a scenario of high buyer power, potentially attributed to the diversity of consumer preferences, regulatory frameworks, and the sheer number of emerging markets in different stages of maturity. With the changing nature of the industry, businesses must understand these regional behaviors and trends well to drive and leverage the emerging trends effectively.

Impactful Cost Component in the Media Planning and Buying Market 

One of the most profound elements within the dynamic media planning and buying landscape relates to the cost that is involved with labor. Most of the time, the cost of labor contributes on a larger scale because it comprises 65% to 73% of the overall expenses incurred in media planning and buying activities done internationally. In other words, this indicates a significant reliance on skilled human resources to grapple with the intricacies of media strategies and negotiations down to the campaign rollouts. North America’s labor costs are expected to rise in the 1-3% range as per the 2022 price outlook, somewhat in line with the continued demand for specialized skills in the media segment. On the same note, the European Union foresees a slight uptick in labor expenses ranging between 0.5% to 1% increase. 

Pricing Outlook of the Media Planning and Buying Market 

The pricing outlook for the market in 2022 is different according to the territories: in North America, it grew by 1-3%; in the European Union, by 0.5-1%; and in Asia, by 2-3%. Such variations necessitate a good deal of tailor-made pricing strategy. The industry’s predominant pricing models of payments include fixed fees, transparency and predictability, and commission-based models aligning agency incentives with client outcomes. 

Contract Period in the Media Planning and Buying Market 

The contractual period shapes the strategies and outcomes in the dynamic domain of media planning and buying. The industry norms and practices followed in the contract structure ensure mutual benefit and clarity for the parties. In the domain, such contracts are typically reviewed annually, and this means that they are prone to be changed and, at the same time, optimized concerning the changing trends of the market and the business goals. Furthermore, one can generally get 2- or 3-year contracts, which offer stability and ease in planning and buying media initiatives. 

Negotiation Factors in the Media Planning and Buying Market 

In today’s media landscape, agencies are recalibrating their roles as the Agency of Record (AOR) in keeping with changed client needs and market dynamics. Where the latter was traditionally responsible for a brand’s advertising requirements, modern AORs leverage insights and analytics powered by data and increasingly shift towards more targeted and personalized solutions. In other words, turning the traditional ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach into a more agile model means working closely with clients to develop integrated campaigns running across various platforms and reaching diverse audiences. Brands are diversifying their partnerships, establishing rosters of specialized agencies—from the traditional to the digital, from media buying to creative boutiques. 

Leading Players in the Media Planning and Buying Market 

The prominent industry players are Starcom, OMD and MediaCom, Wavemaker, Havas, WundermanThomson, AKQA, Wieden+Kennedy, Tech and Soul, Horizon Media, and Dentsu. The wide variety of service providers opens a window of golden opportunity for clients to pick solutions tailor-made for their particular objectives and target audiences.