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LESSON 7- PLANNING

Learning Objectives
After studying this chapter, students should be able to
1. Differentiate business plan, marketing plan from IMC plan
2. Design and develop a campaign plan
3. Explain account planning
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STRATEGIC PLANNING
For marketing communication, strategic planning is the process of identifying a
problem that can be solved with marketing communication, then determining objectives
(what you want to accomplish), deciding on strategies (how to accomplish the
objectives), and implementing the tactics (actions that make the plan come to life). This
process occurs within a specified time frame. 
Even those experienced in advertising sometimes have a hard time telling the
difference between an objective and a strategy. Remember, an objective is a goal to be
accomplished; in advertising, objectives are determined by the affects you want to
achieve, as explained in Chapter 4. A strategy is the means, the design or plan by
which the objective is accomplished--the advertising message and media strategies, for
example. In advertising, tactics are the way the ads and other marketing communication
efforts are executed how they are designed and what they say. 
In the Kodak case, the objective was to reposition the brand from film to photos.
The strategy was to focus on Kodak as a gallery, a place and system by which people
could keep their favorite photos. The tactic included establishment of an online Easy
Share gallery tied in to the brand's new Easy Share digital camera line, printers,
accessories, software, and in store kiosks, ultimately creating a whole Easy Share
system. 
To sort out the difference between objectives, strategies, and tactics, consider a
hypothetical situation: If a marketer's objective is to reinforce brand loyalty for its
product, its planners could use any number of strategies. They could set up a frequent
buyer club. They could use direct marketing to reach customers individually. They could
use advertising to remind customers to repurchase the brand, or they could use sales
promotion to encourage buyers to repurchase. A different set of tactics would be
needed to implement each strategy. Before we develop the idea of advertising planning,
let's review the basics of business and marketing planning, which are also concerned
with objectives, strategies, and tactics. 
According to Root, Strategic planning provides a blueprint for achieving
organization’s goals. When creating a strategic plan, there are certain objectives that
the organization is trying to satisfy during the execution of the strategic plan.
Understanding the organizational objectives of a strategic corporate plan will help to
create efficient plans to guide organization’s growth. A strategic plan is a document
used to communicate with the organization the organizations goals, the actions needed
to achieve those goals and all of the other critical elements developed during the
planning exercise. However, strategic planning is an organizational management
activity that is used to set priorities, focus energy and resources, strengthen operations,
ensure that employees and other stakeholders are working toward common goals, and
establish agreement around intended outcomes/results, and assess and adjust the
organization’s direction in response to a changing environment. It is a disciplined
effort that produces fundamental decisions and actions that shape and guide what an
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organization is, who it serves, what it does, and why it does it, with a focus on the
future. Effective strategic planning articulates not only where an organization is going
and the actions needed to make progress, but also how it will know if it is successful.

There are many different frameworks and methodologies for strategic planning
and management, however one should note that there is no fixed rules regarding
the right framework most follow a similar pattern and have common attributes. Many
frameworks cycle through some variation on some very basic phases:
 Analysis or assessment, where an understanding of the current internal and
external environments is developed;
 Strategy formulation, where high level strategy is developed and a basic
organization level strategic plan is documented;
 Strategy execution, where the high level plan is translated into more
operational planning and action items, and
 Evaluation or sustainment / management phase, where ongoing refinement
and evaluation of performance, culture, communications, data reporting, and
other strategic management issues occurs.

The Strategic Planning Process

Strategic planning is one of the most important responsibilities of the senior
management of an organization. It is the vehicle that senior management should use to
set the organizational vision, determine the strategies required to achieve that vision,
make the resource deployment decisions to achieve the selected strategies, and build
alignment to the vision and strategic direction throughout all levels of the organization.
Unfortunately, strategic planning is also one of the most misunderstood and
poorly used tools in many organizations. Strategic plans are often large documents with
detailed plans created arduously over months at great effort...only to gather dust and
languish after they have been duly acknowledged and then filed away.
There are several reasons why strategic plans are not developed properly, or not
implemented properly. Among the most common are:
 Senior management does not follow a defined process to accomplish this task.
As a consequence, months of effort are wasted in creating reams of paper that
do not have strategic import.
 The process is delegated to a planning group, or assigned to the various
functional leaders to complete for their respective areas. If completed in
individual functional areas, the plan may work for individual departments, but is
likely to sub-optimize the whole organization. If assigned to a planning group, the
result is often not truly embraced and endorsed by senior leadership.
 Senior management does not set aside the time to develop the strategic plan as
a collective team work product.
 The organization does not understand what a strategic plan is actually designed
to provide. Therefore, the strategic plan is a tactical business plan with
multiple year extrapolations. There is very little about it that addresses actual
strategic direction.
 Senior management does to follow a defined process or methodology that will
result in a strategic plan in a timely and efficient yet comprehensive manner.
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 The plan is developed but there is no process to communicate it

throughout the organization and build organization-wide alignment to its
implementation.
 The plan is developed with no implementation guidelines at all. At best, it is
implemented in pieces. At worst, it is unfunded and ignored.
This does not have to become the reality. Strategic plans can be developed in an
efficient and timely manner as long as the senior management team of an organization
is committed to meeting and working together over a period of several months to
develop it.

Benefits of Strategic Planning

The strategic planning process can take some time, but it’s beneficial for
everyone involved. As the small business owner, you’ll have a better idea of the goals
and objectives you want to accomplish and a path to do that. For your employees, the
process can foster an increase in productivity—contributing to the success of the
business.
Communicating Your Strategic Plan
The strategic planning process should involve your employees. Your employees
are involved in the day-to-day operations and can provide you with a unique view of the
company. Employees can share with you what they think is and isn’t working with the
business today, which can inform your planning for the future.
In addition to your employees, it’s beneficial to reach out to people outside of
your company to get their opinions. Like your employees, vendors have a unique
perspective on your industry. Talk to them about the business, and get their thoughts on
how they think the business landscape can change in the future.
The U.S. Small Business Administration recommends that the strategic planning
process be a flexible one. When you meet with your employees and any people outside
of the company, remember that the discussions should encourage new ideas and
thoughts.
Increase Productivity
Involving your employees in the strategic planning process also means they
receive a sense of accountability that can increase productivity. Whether they
contributed in the process or were informed of the business’s goals and objectives after
the strategic plan was created, they’ll be more likely to want to help you achieve those
targets.
Identifying Strengths and Weaknesses
As part of the strategic planning process, you’ll examine and analyze your entire
business. You’ll take a look at what your business does well and the areas where it still
needs to improve. By identifying your business’s current strengths and weaknesses, the
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process gives you and your employees an opportunity to improve in the future and
become a durable business by minimizing risks.
Although you may have a good idea about what your business excels at and
areas that need to be improved upon, don’t forget to involve your employees. They may
tell you something you didn’t think of.
Setting the Direction of the Business and Fostering a Proactive Business
By the end of the strategic planning process, you and your employees should
have a clear direction of where you want the business to go in the future. These
discussions and the planning process itself help put the business in the best position to
succeed in the future.
Strategic planning gives you and your business time to figure out how to grow
over the next few years and how to address new opportunities and challenges. Think
about the challenges or issues your business may face in four or five years and plan
accordingly, so your business doesn’t stumble down the road.
Strategic Planning Misconceptions
There are many strategic planning misconceptions. From not having enough time
or thinking it only benefits larger businesses, to fearing you’ll put your business on the
wrong path, there are a variety of reasons why business owners may be wary of
strategic planning. But don’t be alarmed; strategic planning can help your business—big
or small—and the benefits far outweigh any perceived negatives.
Regardless of the size of your business, a strategic plan is beneficial. Whether
you are a small business or a large corporation with hundreds or thousands of
employees, strategic planning helps you make sure the company is headed in the right
direction.
But how do you know if you’re steering the company in the right direction? The
beginning phases of strategic planning focus on research and discussions. The
decisions you make during strategic planning aren’t based on assumptions; they’re
based on research and information you’ve gathered while talking with your employees
and people outside of your company.
The strategic planning process may seem daunting at first, but when you
understand what’s involved and how to do it, it’s not that complicated. It takes time, but
the amount you invest in the process pays off when everyone in your company works
toward accomplishing the goals and objectives you’ve laid out.
The process doesn’t stymie creativity either. When you meet with your
employees for strategic planning, you’re asking everyone to have a discussion and
brainstorm ideas. The strategic planning process puts everyone’s minds together to
think of creative ideas.
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If you go through the strategic planning process once, don’t think you won’t have
to do it again. The strategic plan is a living document; it should change over time. It’s
not uncommon for business owners to create a strategic plan with their employees and
rarely—or never—revisit the document. Reviewing and evaluating your strategic plan
regularly will help keep you accountable and on track to achieve your goals and
objectives.
The Business Plan
Strategic planning is a three-tiered process that starts with the business plan and
then moves to functional areas of the company such as marketing where a marketing
plan is developed that outlines objectives, strategies, and tactics for all areas of the
marketing mix. As illustrated in Figure 7.1, both the business plan and the marketing
plan provide direction to specific plans for specialist areas, such as advertising and
other areas of marketing communication. 
A business plan may cover a specific division of the company or a strategic
business unit (SBU), which is a line of products or all the offerings under a single
brand name. These divisions, or SBUs, share a common set of problems and factors.
Figure 7.2 depicts a widely used framework for the strategic planning process in
business. The objectives for planning at this level tend to focus on maximizing profit and
return on investment (ROI). ROI is a measurement that shows whether, in general,
the costs of conducting the business—the investment--are more than matched by the
revenue produced in return. The revenue above and beyond the costs is where profit
lies. 
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FIGURE 7.1
Strategic Planning from Top to Bottom
Note that the business planning process starts with a business mission
statement, a concise expression of the broad goals and policies of the business unit.
The mission statement is unique, focused, and differentiating. Toms of Maine states its
mission clearly on its Web site: 
"Through the years, we have been guided by one simple notion--do what is right,
for our customers, employees, communities, and environment. We call this Natural
Care-a philosophy that guides what we make and all that we do." 

FIGURE 7.2
Steps in the Development of a Business Plan

The Marketing Plan

A marketing plan is developed for a brand or product line and evaluated
annually, although sections dealing with long-term goals might operate for a number of
years. To a large extent, the marketing plan mirrors the company's business strategic
plan and contains many of the same components, although they are focused on a
specific brand rather than the larger organization or corporation. Figure 7.3 illustrates
the steps involved in creating a marketing plan. 
A market situation analysis assesses the external and internal environments
that affect marketing operations—the company's history, products, and brands, as well
as the competitive environment, consumer trends, and other marketplace trends that
have some impact on the product category. A set of "what's going on" questions help
structure this market analysis. 
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Answers to these questions help define the marketing problem and, ultimately,
the area of message opportunity. 
• What is happening with the brand and the category? 
• How is it happening? 
• Where is it happening? 
• When is it happening? 
• To whom is it happening? 
We could answer those questions for Kodak by summarizing the market situation
as a radically different marketplace that was in the process of making Kodak, or at least
its film based consumer business, largely irrelevant. 
The objectives at the marketing level tend to be focused on sales levels and
share of market, measurements referring to the percentage of the category purchases
that are made by Rockport the brand's customers. Other objectives deal with specific
areas of the marketing mix, such as distribution, where an objective might detail how a
company will open a new territory. 
For advertising managers, the most important part of the marketing plan is the
marketing mix strategy. This links the overall strategic business plan with specific
marketing programs, including advertising and other IMC areas. 
Whether to use a frequency club, an advertising campaign, or a sales promotion
strategy to increase brand loyalty is a marketing communication decision that supports
marketing strategies. 

FIGURE 7.3
Steps in the Development of a Marketing Plan

Strategic Market Planning

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A Strategic marketing plan is an outline of the methods and resources required to

achieve organizational goals within a specific target market(s). "Describes the direction
[an organization] will pursue within its chosen environment and guides the allocation of
resources and effort" - Peter Bennett, Dictionary of Marketing Terms, AMA 1988
Strategic planning requires a general marketing orientation rather than a narrow
functional orientation. According to Prof. Mohan Kuruvilla, visiting professor IIM (B) - All
functional areas must include marketing and must be coordinated to reach
organizational goals. It is a hierarchal process, from companywide to marketing specific.
(Marketing concept, implemented from top down.) A firm can be broken down into
several strategic business units. Each Strategic Business Units (SBU) is a division,
product line, or other profit center within the parent company. An SBU has its own
strategic plan and can be considered a separate business entity competing with other
SBU's for corporate resources.
The strategic market planning process is based on the establishment of
organizational goals and it must stay within the broader limits of the organizations
mission, which is developed taking into consideration the environmental opportunities
and threats and the companies ‘resources and distinct competencies.
A firm can then assess its opportunities and develop a corporate strategy.
Marketing objectives must be designed so that they can be accomplished through
efficient use of the firm‘s resources.
Corporate strategy is concerned with issues such as diversification,
competition, differentiation, interrelationships between business units and environmental
issues. It attempts to match the resources of the organization with the opportunities and
risks of the environment (SWOT). Corporate strategy is also concerned with defining the
scope and roles of the SBU's of the firm so that they are coordinated to reach the ends
desired.
Types of marketing strategies
Every marketing strategy is unique, but if we abstract from the individualizing
details, each can be reduced into a generic marketing strategy. There are a number of
ways of categorizing these generic strategies. A brief description of the most common
categorizing schemes is presented below:
Strategies based on market dominance - Market dominance is a measure of
the strength of a brand, product, service, or firm, relative to competitive offerings. There
is often a geographic element to the competitive landscape. In defining market
dominance, you must see to what extent a product, brand, or firm controls a product
category in a given geographic area.
There are several ways of calculating market dominance. The most direct is
market share. This is the percentage of the total market serviced by a firm or brand. In
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this scheme, firms are classified based on their market share or dominance of an
industry. Typically there are four types of market dominance strategies:
 Leader - The market leader is dominant in its industry. It has substantial
market share and often extensive distribution arrangements with retailers.
It typically is the industry leader in developing innovative new business
models and new products (although not always). It tends to be on the
cutting edge of new technologies and new production processes. It
sometimes has some market power in determining either price or output.
Of the four dominance strategies, it has the most flexibility in crafting
strategy. – Eg. Colgate dental care products
 Challenger - A market challenger is a firm in a strong, but not dominant
position that is following an aggressive strategy of trying to gain market
share. It typically targets the industry leader (for example, Pepsi targets
Coke), but it could also target smaller, more vulnerable competitors. The
fundamental principles involved are:
 Assess the strength of the target competitor. Consider the amount
of support that the target might muster from allies.
 Choose only one target at a time.
 Find a weakness in the target‘s position. Attack at this point.
Consider how long it will take for the target to realign their resources so as
to reinforce this weak spot.
 Launch the attack on as narrow a front as possible. Whereas a
defender must defend all their borders, an attacker has the advantage of
being able to concentrate their forces at one place.
 Launch the attack quickly, then consolidate.
 Follower – A market follower is a firm in a strong, but not dominant
position that is content to stay at that position. The rationale is that by
developing strategies that are parallel to those of the market leader, they
will gain much of the market from the leader while being exposed to very
little risk. This ―play it safe‖ strategy is how Burger King retains its
position behind McDonalds. The advantages of this strategy are:
 No expensive R&D failures
 No risk of bad business model
 “Best practices” are already established
 Able to capitalize on the promotional activities of the market
leader  No risk of government anti-combines actions
 Minimal risk of competitive attacks
 Don‘t waste money in a head-on battle with the market leader
 Nicher - In this niche strategy the firm concentrates on a select few target
markets. It is also called a focus strategy. It is hoped that by focusing ones
marketing efforts on one or two narrow market segments and tailoring
your marketing mix to these specialized markets, you can better meet the
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needs of that target market. The niche should be large enough to be

profitable, but small enough to be ignored by the major industry players.
Profit margins are emphasized rather than revenue or market share. The
firm typically looks to gain a competitive advantage through effectiveness
rather than efficiency. It is most suitable for relatively small firms and has
much in common with guerrilla marketing warfare strategies. The most
successful nichers tend to have the following characteristics:
 They tend to be in high value added industries and are able to
obtain high margins.
 They tend to be highly focused on a specific market segment.
 They tend to market high end products or services, and are able
to use a premium pricing strategy.
 They tend to keep their operating expenses down by spending
less on R&D, advertising, and personal selling
 Eg. Mercedes Benz
 Porter generic strategies - Michael Porter assessed strategy on the
dimensions of strategic scope and strategic strength. Strategic scope
refers to the breadth of market penetration while strategic strength refers
to the firm‘s sustainable competitive advantage. He felt three types were
important:
 Cost leadership
 Product differentiation
 Market segmentation
In this strategy the firm concentrates on a select few target markets. It is also
called a focus strategy or niche strategy. It is hoped that by focusing your marketing
efforts on one or two narrow market segments and tailoring your marketing mix to these
specialized markets, you can better meet the needs of that target market. The firm
typically looks to gain a competitive advantage through effectiveness rather than
efficiency. It is most suitable for relatively small firms but can be used by any company.
As a focus strategy it may be used to select targets that are less vulnerable to
substitutes or where a competition is weakest to earn above-average return on
investments.
 Innovation strategies - This deals with the firm's rate of new product
development and business model innovation. It asks whether the
company is on the cutting edge of technology and business innovation.
There are three types:
 Pioneers
 Close followers
 Late followers
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 Growth strategies - In this scheme we ask the question, “How should the
firm grow?” There are a number of different ways of answering that
question, but the most common gives four answers:
 Horizontal integration - In microeconomics and strategic
management, the term horizontal integration describes a type of
ownership and control. It is a strategy used by a business or
corporation that seeks to sell a type of product in numerous
markets. To get this market coverage, several small subsidiary
companies are created. Each markets the product to a different
market segment or to a different geographical area. This is
sometimes referred to as the horizontal integration of marketing.
The horizontal integration of production exists when a firm
has plants in several locations producing similar products.
Horizontal integration in marketing is much more common than
horizontal integration in production. It is contrasted with vertical
integration
 Vertical integration - In microeconomics and strategic
management, the term vertical integration describes a style of
ownership and control. Vertically integrated companies are united
through a hierarchy and share a common owner. Usually each
member of the hierarchy produces a different product or service,
and the products combine to satisfy a common need. It is
contrasted with horizontal integration. Vertical integration is one
method of avoiding the hold-up problem.
One of the earliest, largest and most famous examples of
vertical integration was the Carnegie Steel company. The company
controlled not only the mills where the steel was manufactured, but
the mines where the iron ore was extracted, the coal mines that
supplied the coal, the ships that transported the iron ore and the
railroads that transported the coal to the factory, the coke ovens
where the coal was coked, etc.
 Diversification (or conglomeration) - Diversification is a means
whereby a business builds up its revenue by recognizing chances
to create or obtain businesses that are not precisely linked to the
company‘s existing businesses. There are three main types of
diversification: concentric, horizontal and conglomerate.
Concentric diversification results in new product lines or
services that have technological and/or marketing synergies with
already accessible product lines, even though the products may
attract a new customer base.
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Horizontal diversification happens when the company

develops new products that could attract its present customer
groups even though those new products may be technologically
unconnected to the existing product lines.
Conglomerate diversification happens where there is neither
technological nor marketing synergy and required reaching new
customer groups and individuals.
 Intensification
 Aggressiveness strategies – Business strategies can be
categorized in many ways. One popular method is to assess
strategies based on their degree of aggressiveness.
Aggressiveness strategies are rated according to their marketing
assertiveness, their risk propensity, financial leverage, product
innovation, speed of decision making, and other measures of
business aggressiveness. Typically the range of aggressiveness
strategies is classified into four categories: prospector, defender,
analyzer, and reactor.
o Prospector - This is the most aggressive of the four
strategies. It typically involves active programs to expand
into new markets and stimulate new opportunities. New
product development is vigorously pursued and attacks on
competitors are a common way of obtaining additional
market share. They respond quickly to any signs of market
opportunity, and do so with little research or analysis. A large
proportion of their revenue comes from new products or new
markets
o Defender - This strategy entails a decision not to
aggressively pursue markets. As a result, they tend to do
none of the things prospectors do. A defender strategy
entails finding, and maintaining a secure and relatively stable
market. Rather than being on the cutting edge of
technological innovation, product development, and market
dynamics, a defender tries to insulate themselves from
changes wherever possible. In their attempt to secure this
stable market they either keep prices low, keep advertising
and other promotional costs low, engage in vertical
integration, offer a limited range of products or offer better
quality or service. They tend to be slower in making
decisions and will only commit to a change after extensive
research and analysis.
o Analyzer - The analyzer is in between the defender and
prospector. They take less risk and make less mistakes than
a prospector, but are less committed to stability than
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defenders. Most firms are analyzers. They are seldom a first

mover in an industry but are often second or third place
entrants. They tend to expand into areas close to their
existing core competency. Rather than develop wholly new
products, they make incremental improvements in existing
products. Rather than expand into wholly new markets, they
gradually expand existing markets. They try to maintain a
balanced portfolio of products with some stable income
generators and some potential winners. They watch closely
the developments in their industry but don‘t act until they are
sure that the time is right.
o Reactor - A reactor has no proactive strategy. They react to
events as they occur. They respond only when they are
forced to by macro environmental pressures. This is the
least effective of the four strategies. It is without direction or
focus.

 Warfare based strategies - are a type of strategies, used in business and

marketing, that try to draw parallels between business and warfare, and then
apply the principles of military strategy to business situations. In business we do
not have enemies, but we do have competitors; and we do not fight for land, but
we do compete for market share. It is argued that, in mature, low-growth
markets, and when real GDP growth is negative or low, business operates as a
zero-sum game. One person‘s gain is possible only at another person‘s expense.
Success depends on battling competitors for market share. This scheme draws
parallels between marketing strategies and military strategies. There are many
types of marketing warfare strategies, but they can be grouped into:
 Offensive marketing warfare strategies - Attack the target competitor
with an objective such as ―liberating‖ some of its market share
 Defensive marketing warfare strategies - Strategies intended to
maintain your market share, profitability, sales revenue, or some other objective.
 Flanking marketing warfare strategies - Operate in areas of little
importance to the competitor.
 Guerrilla marketing warfare strategies - Attack, retreat, hide, then do it
again, and again, until the competitor moves on to other markets. A basic tenet
underlying marketing strategy is that there are distinct market segments each of
which has its own needs, wants, desires, and interests.
The Advertising or IMC Plan
Advertising and marketing communication planning operates with the same
concern for objectives, strategies, and tactics that we've outlined for business and
marketing plans. The focus, however, is on the communication program sup porting a
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brand. It outlines all the communication activities in terms of the objectives, strategies,
tactics, timing, costs, and evaluation. 
An example of how all these elements come together in a plan comes from
Rockport, a maker of comfortable walking shoes. After doing research on existing
customers, the company concluded that Rockport users are actively seeking comfort on
every level: physical, emotional, and spiritual. The core Rockport strategy emphasized
the need for comfort by challenging the consumer: If you compromise your com fort, you
compromise yourself. Rockport's agency invented a rallying cry, “Uncompromised," and
launched an integrated marketing communication plan featuring print and TV
advertising that used the umbrella theme of "Be comfortable, uncompromised. Start with
your feet.” 
Let's now look at how an advertising or marketing communication plan is
developed. The following discussion outlines the basic steps in planning a campaign, as
well as the critical strategic decisions planners must make. 
A CAMPAIGN PLAN 
In addition to or instead of an annual plan, a firm may develop a campaign plan
that is more tightly focused on solving a particular marketing communication problem in
a specified time. Such a plan typically includes a variety of marketing communication
(marcom) messages carried in different media and sometimes targeted to different
audiences. The following outline traces the steps, and the decisions they represent, in a
typical campaign plan.
Typical Campaign Plan Outline 
I. Situation Analysis 
 Background research 
 SWOTs: strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats 
 Key advertising problem(s) to be solved
II. Key Strategic Campaign Decisions 
 Objectives 
 Target audience (or stakeholder targets in an IMC plan) 
 Brand position: Product features and competitive advantage 
 Campaign strategy: Key strategic approach and marcom tools
III. Media Strategy (or Points of Contact in an IMC Plan) 
 Media objectives 
 Media selection 
 Media planning and buying: 
o Vehicle selection 
o Budget allocation 
o Scheduling
IV. Message Strategy 
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 Key consumer insight (brand relationship insight in IMC) 

 Message objectives 
 Selling premise 
 Big idea 
 Message design and executions
V. Other Marcom Tools Used in Support 
 Sales promotion 
 Public relations 
 Direct marketing 
 Personal selling 
 Sponsorships, merchandising, packaging, point-of-purchase 
 Integration strategy (maximize synergy)
VI. Campaign Management 
 Evaluation of effectiveness 
 Campaign budget 
The outline is useful as a guide for the planning document, but more importantly,
it identifies the key strategic decisions that guide various sections of a campaign plan.
They include (1) identifying the key problems and opportunities, (2) stating objectives,
(3) targeting the audience, (4) creating or reinforcing a position, (5) identifying the key
strategic approach that will deliver the objectives, and (6) using management controls to
determine efficiency in budgeting and effectiveness through evaluation. Let's look at
these strategic planning decisions in more detail. 
Situation Analysis
The first step in developing an advertising plan, just as in a marketing plan, is not
planning but backgrounding-researching and reviewing the current state of the business
that is relevant to the brand and gathering all pertinent information. As discussed in
Chapter 6, advertising planning is preceded by market, product/company, and
consumer research. After the research is compiled, planners try to make sense of the
findings, a process sometimes referred to as a situation analysis. Planners collect and
analyze information about the company, brand, and competition, along with consumers
in general and the brand's customers specifically 
The goal is to identify a problem that can be solved with communication. As
Fallon and Senn explained in their "Juicing the Orange" story in the Part II Introduction,
you have to start by simplifying the problem. The information collection will probably be
huge, but the problem statement should simplify the task. 
For example, the DDB agency searches for “Barriers to Purchase," which are
reasons why people do not buy any or enough of a product. These barriers create an
opportunity for advertising. The American Dairy Association asked DDB to find out why
cheese consumption was declining. A study identified one barrier that was most easily
correctable through an advertising message: the absence of simple cheese recipes for
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home cooks. Ads and the association's Web site (http://www.ilovecheese.com) offer
many such recipes.
SWOT Analysis The primary tool used to make sense of the information gathered and
identify a key problem is a SWOT analysis, which stands for strengths, weaknesses,
opportunities, and threats. The strengths and weaknesses are internally focused, and
the opportunities and threats lie in the external marketing environment. In strategic
planning the idea is to leverage the strengths and opportunities and address the
weaknesses and threats, which is how the key problems and opportunities are
identified. 
 The strengths of a business are its positive traits, conditions, and good
situations. For instance, being in a growth industry is a strength. Planners ask
how they can leverage this strength in the brand's advertising.
 The weaknesses of a business are traits, conditions, and situations that are
perceived as negatives. Losing market share is a weakness. If this is an
important weakness, then planners ask how they can address it with advertising.
 An opportunity is an area in which the company could develop an advantage
over its competition. Often, one company's weakness is another company's
opportunity. Planners strive to identify these opportunities and leverage them in
the brand's advertising.
 A threat is a trend or development in the environment that will erode business
unless the company takes action. Competition is a common threat. Advertising
planners ask themselves how they can address a threat if it is a critical factor
affecting the success of the brand. 
In the Kodak case, the strength of the brand lies in its ownership of memories
recorded photographically as a brand experience labeled a "Kodak Moment." The
opportunity ex-listed to transfer the brand identification with all its rich emotion to a new
line of digital Kodak products. The threat came from all the competitors that had entered
this market with new digital products and from the difficulty in trying to attach the digital
position to a company that had been the leader in the film market. 
Key Problems and Opportunities. The key word in the title of this section is analysis,
or making sense of all the data collected and figuring out what the information means
for the future success of the brand. Advertising planners must analyze the market
situation for communication problems that affect the successful marketing of a product,
as well as opportunities the advertising can create or exploit. Analyzing the SWOTs and
identifying any problems that can be solved with an advertising message are at the
heart of strategic planning. An example of locating a timing opportunity is explained in
The Inside Story. 
Advertising can solve only message-related problems such as image, attitude,
perception, and knowledge or information. It cannot solve problems related to price,
availability, or quality, although it can address the perception of these marketing mix
 18

factors. For example, a message can speak to the perception that the price is too high,
or it can portray a product with limited distribution as exclusive. In other words,
advertising can affect the way consumers perceive price, availability, and quality. 
Objectives
After planners have examined the external and internal environment and defined
the critical areas that need to be addressed, they can develop specific objectives to be
accomplished during a specified time period. Remember from Chapter 4 the six
categories in the Facets Model of Advertising Effects: perception, emotion, cognition,
persuasion, association, and behavior. These main effects also can be used to identify
the most common consumer focused objectives.
Although a rule of thumb for advertising is that it should be single-minded, we
also know from Chapter 4 that multiple effects are often needed to create the desired
impact. Some ads may use an emotional strategy while others are informational, but
sometimes the message needs to speak to both the head and the heart. That was
particularly true for the Kodak campaign: Customers need to understand the new digital
position while still associating the brand with the rich emotions embedded in the “Kodak
moment" big idea. 
The Logic of Objectives. Given the huge amounts of money spent on advertising, it is
important for advertisers to know what to expect from a campaign or ad. The categories
of main effects also can be used as a template for setting advertising objectives, as
Table 7.1 shows. Objectives are formal statements of the goals of the advertising or
other marketing communication. They outline what the message is designed to achieve
and how it will be measured. Note that some objectives are tightly focused on one
particular effect, but others, such as brand loyalty, call for a more complex set of effects.
To create brand loyalty, for example, an advertising campaign must have both cognitive
(rational) and affective (emotional) effects, and it must move people to repeat buying.
That's one reason brand loyalty is considered a type of long-term impact developed
over time from many experiences that a consumer has with a brand and brand
messages. 
The advertiser's basic assumption is that the campaign works if it creates an
impression, influences people to respond, and separates the brand from the
competition. Note also that communication objectives may be important, even if they
aren't focused directly on sale. For example, Expedia.com, a travel consulting company,
and views its advertising as way to draw attention to itself, create name recognition, and
create understanding of the products and services it sells. 
Measurable Objectives. We cannot overstate the importance of delineating specific
advertising objectives. Every campaign, and the ads in it, must be guided by specific,
clear, and measurable objectives. We say measurable objectives because that's how
the effective ness of advertising is determined. It is critical that an objective statement
 19

be specific, quantified, and benchmarked, which means using a comparable effort to

predict a logical goal. A measurable objective includes five requirements: 
1. A specific effect that can be measured
2. A time frame
3. A baseline (where we are or where we begin)
4. The goal (a realistic estimate of the change the campaign can create; benchmarking
is used to justify the projected goal)
5. Percentage change (subtract the baseline from the goal; divide the difference by
the baseline) 

Targeting
We ended Chapter 6 with a discussion of targeting and segmenting. These are
strategic decisions made possible because of a deep knowledge of consumers. In
particular, this research-based knowledge identifies what makes specific groups of
consumers different from people in other groups. These characteristics also identify how
consumers are similar to others in ways that characterize a specific type of viewpoint or
lifestyle. As we discussed in that chapter, segmenting is important to marketing, but
marketing communication strategy is based on accurately targeting an audience who
will be responsive to a particular type of message, one that meets the advertising
objectives. 
There is more to targeting than just identifying and profiling a possible audience.
Advertising planners also want to know what's going on in people's heads and hearts--
what motivates them to attend to a message and respond to it. Getting deeper insight
into consumers is the responsibility of the account planning function. We'll return to that
role later in this chapter. 
We want to emphasize that understanding a target audience demands an
appreciation of diversity--the ways people are different from one another-and empathy.
Professor Peggy Kreshel explains in the Matter of Principle feature why an appreciation
of diversity is essential for everyone who works in advertising. 
Positioning
Another reason we revisit targeting here is because understanding the target is
the first step in understanding the brand's position within the competitive marketplace.
The objective is to establish in the consumer's mind what the product offers and how it
compares with the competition. A position, then, is a place in consumers' minds where
the product or brand stands in comparison to its competitors. A position is usually based
 20

on a particular feature or attribute (Holiday Inn Express---showerheads), although it can

be psychological, such as heritage (Kodak), or both (Dove). The target decision is the
starting point because the brand position is determined by how customers see the
brand in the marketplace. 
Consider, for example, the case of Haggar clothing, which is a distant competitor
to Levi Strauss's Dockers. Haggar has been searching for a strategy that involves
figuring out its target market and then its position. Realizing that its previous youth-
oriented strategy was going nowhere and a high-fashion position would never fly, the
brand's planners finally realized that it serves an average, middle-aged male audience
that cares little about the latest fashion trends. Its previous campaign used buff, 20-
something male models; this new campaign features ordinary-looking men in their 30s
and 40s. This is a major strategic shift for an apparel marketer as most clothing brands
are focused on capturing, or at least depicting, young consumers because they believe
older audience members still identify with younger images. 
Haggar's planners realized that roughly one-third of the population will be over
age 50 by 2010, so there is a big opportunity to position the brand for that market.
Haggar's agency, Crispin Porter + Bogusky, sent staff members into men's homes to go
through their closets and talk to them about their shopping habits. They found out that
older men care less about clothing brand names or fashion trends. So the new
antifashion campaign focused on quality--unbreakable and unreadable buttons, zippers,
and pockets--as well as the humorous situations these men endure in their daily lives. 
Another starting point for positioning is the product itself and its heritage. As the
opening story explained, Kodak has always stood for pictures and over the years has
owned the moment of capturing an image with a photo. But Kodak also stands for film,
and that was the reason for its problems. Positioning is about locking the brand in the
mind based on some quality relevant to consumers. If that point of relevance changes,
then the position may need to be adjusted.
To better understand positioning strategy, consider related concepts used to
define the competitive situation product features and attributes, differentiation, and
competitive advantage. Then we'll return to how advertising establishes a position in a
competitive marketplace. 
Product Features and Attributes. An initial step in crafting a position is to identify the
features of the brand, as well as those of the competition, to determine where the brand
has an advantage over its competitors. That means a marketer carefully evaluates the
product's tangible features (such as size, color, and ease of use) and other intangible
attributes (such as quality, status, value, fashion, and safety) to identify the relevant
dimensions of the product that make it different from its competitors. 
For example, super-premium dog food maker Eukanuba has launched a new
product line that offers breed-specific formulas and targets the line to the pet-specialty
shopper, Revamping the brand position began with a massive nutritional effort to
 21

identify the needs of various breeds and then develop formulas for such breeds as
retrievers, German shepherds, dachshunds, boxers, and Yorkshire terriers. The
campaign's Web site (http://www.beautyofthebreeds. com) also features an online
beauty contest where people can enter their dogs. The winners were featured in dog
magazines in “most beautiful dog" issues.4 
A technique called feature analysis helps structure an assessment of features
relative to competitors’ products. First, make a chart of the product and competitors'
products, listing each product's relevant features, as Table 7.2 illustrates. For example,
nutrition, price, and availability are important for pet food. Then evaluate how well the
product and the competitors' products perform on those features. What are the brand's
strong points or weak points? Next, evaluate how important each feature is to the target
audience based on primary research. In other words, how much do consumers care
about various features and which ones are most important to them? 
Competitive Advantage. Using the two factors of importance and performance,
competitive advantage is found where (1) the prod uct has a strong feature (2) in an
area that is important to the target and (3) where the competition is weaker. The product
in Table 7.2 would compete well on both price and style against X, on price against
competitor Y, and on style against competitor Z. Competitor X seems the most
vulnerable on two features, price and style, that consumer’s rate as most important
decision points. 
Differentiation. Most markets involve a high level of competition. How does a company
compete in a crowded market? It uses product differentiation, a strategy designed to
focus attention on product differences that distinguish the company's product from all
others in the eyes of consumers. Those perceived differences may be tangible (design,
price) or intangible (quality, status). We refer to products that really are the same
(examples include milk, unleaded gas, and over-the-counter drugs), as undifferentiated
or parity products. For these products marketers often promote intangible, or
psychological, differences. 
Branding, the creation of a unique image for a product, is the most obvious way
to differentiate one product from another. The popular Swatch watch, for example,
differentiates itself as a reasonably priced watch that makes a fashion statement. New
Internet-based Mozilla, a Web site containing classified ads and reader forums for 450
cities worldwide, and Craigslist, the maker of a popular Web browser, are small
companies but big brands. They have created strong brands because they have the
support of dedicated users. The customer-brand relationship reflects a leadership
position, a brand that has defined or created its category. But it's not just hot Internet
companies that have achieved this type of leadership. For example, Mellhenny's
Tabasco Sauce, which was launched in 1868, created and still owns the hot sauce
category.
 22

Locating the Brand Position. Let's return now to the concept of a position to see how
it is created. Positions are difficult to establish and are created over time. Once
established, they are difficult to change, as Kodak discovered. Two factors can be used
to locate a position for a brand. 
 Psychological factors. Jack Trout, one of the founders of the position
concept, suggests that positioning is easy if something is faster, fancier, safer, or
newer, but often brands are designed around no product differences. For
psychological positions, consider these examples: Volvo owns the safety
position; Coke owns a position of authenticity for colas ("It's the real thing");
Hallmark greeting cards a quality position ("When you care enough to send the
very best"); and the auto-rental company Avis an underdog position (“We try
harder").
 Consumer decision factors. A position is often based on the key factors---
usually features or attributes-consumers use to make a decision, such as fashion
(high, low) or price (high, low). We've been talking about a position as a point in a
consumer's mind, so think of a map-in fact, the way planners compare positions
is by using a technique called a perceptual map that plots all the competitors on
a matrix based on the two most important consumer decision factors. Figure 7.5
illustrates how positions can be mapped for automobiles. Many ad campaigns
are designed to establish the brand's position by giving the right set of cues
about these decision factors to help place the brand in the consumer's mind.
 23

FIGURE 7.5
A Perceptual Map for Automobiles

Repositioning. Another objective for advertising strategy is to reposition a brand, which

is the objective of the Kodak story. Positioning experts Al and Laura Reis recommend
repositioning when the market changes. Kodak, for example, has always stood for
photos, but in this digital age, the brand is being repositioned as a source of digital
cameras and imaging equipment. Repositioning, in the view if these researchers, can
only work if the new position is related to the brand's core concept. Ogilvy & Mather
hoped to keep the connection alive through an emphasis on pictures. Reis and Reis are
wary of this move and believe that the link between the Kodak brand and film is too
strong to stretch to digital products. Instead, they recommend using a new brand name
for the line of digital products. It will be interesting to see how this repositioning strategy
turns out and if Kodak's position is defined more by pictures or film. 
For an example of an effective repositioning effort, Reis and Reis point to IBM as
a company that repositioned itself from a computer manufacturer to a provider of
services. Even though the market for mainframe computers has been declining, they
observe that the connection with IBM's brand essence is still there in IBM's new position
as a global computer service company. 
Advertising shapes the position, but personal experiences anchor it in the target
audience's mind. The role of the advertising strategy, then, is to relate the product's
position to the target market's life experience and associations. In fact, positioning
represents one of advertising's most critical tasks. The challenge to reposition and still
retain the brand essence is explained in the Matter of Practice story about a classic
example of an effective repositioning campaign. 
Brand Communication Strategy
In addition to brand position, let's also consider how consumer response to a
message creates a brand perception. Brand managers use many terms to explain how
they think branding works, but they all relate in some way to communication. To better
understand how a brand can be linked to a perception, we propose an outline of the
communication dimensions of branding using the same six effects we presented in the
Facets Model. 
Consumer's Response Advertiser's Objective
Perceive Create brand identity
Feel  Cue brand personality
Think  Cue brand position
Associate  Cue brand image
Believe  Create brand promise and brand preference
 24

Do  Inspire brand loyalty 

 Brand identity. A brand identity must be distinctive. In other words it only
represents one particular product within a category, and it must be recognizable
and, therefore, memorable. Recognizing the brand means that the consumer
knows the brand's identification markers--name, logo, colors, typeface, design,
and slogan-and can connect those marks with a past experience or message. All
of these can be controlled by the advertiser.
 Brand personality. Brand personality--the idea that a brand takes on familiar
human characteristics, such as loving (Hallmark, Kodak), competent (IBM),
trustworthy (Volvo, Michelin), or sophisticated (Mercedes, Hermes, Rolex)--
contributes an affective dimension to the meaning of a brand. Green Giant, for
example, built its franchise on the personality of the friendly giant who watches
over his valley and makes sure that Green Giant vegetables are fresh, tasty,
nutritious, and appealing to kids. Kelley and Jugenheimer explain that it is
important to measure the way these personality traits are associated with a brand
or a competitor's brand. They observe, "Sometimes it is as important to
understand what your brand isn't as much as what it is." There are other
methods, such as photo sorts and brand storytelling, but the point is to profile the
brand as if it were a person.
 Brand position. What does it stand for? Brand strategists sometimes focus on
the soul or essence of the brand. This is related to position, but it goes deeper
into the question of what makes the brand distinctive. As Jack Trout explained,
"You have to stand for something," and it has to be something that matters to
consumers.8 Kodak is a classic example of a brand with a soul, one deeply
embedded in personal pictures and memories. Hallmark's soul is found in the
expression of sentiment. Brand essence is also apparent when a brand
dominates or defines its category. Category leadership often comes from being
the first brand in the market--and with that comes an ownership position. The
cable TV channel ESPN, for example, owns sports information, Silk is the soy
milk drink, Starbucks created the high-end coffeehouse, Google is the search
engine, and eBay owns the world of online auctions.
 Brand image. Understanding brand meaning involves understanding the
symbolism and associations that create brand image, the mental impression
consumers construct for a product. The richness of the brand image determines
the quality of the relationship and the strength of the associations and emotional
connections that link a customer to a brand. Advertising researchers call this
brand linkage.
 Brand promise and brand preference. A brand is sometimes defined as a
promise because it establishes an expectation based on familiarity, consistency,
and predictability. And believing the brand promise leads to brand preference
and intention to buy. That's what has driven McDonald's to its position as a
worldwide leader in the fast-food category. You know what to expect when you
 25

walk into a McDonald's anywhere in the world-quality fast food at a reasonable

price.
 Brand loyalty. A personal experience with a brand can develop into a brand
relationship, which is a connection over time that results in customers preferring
the brand—thus brand loyalty-and buying it over and over. People have unique
relationships with the brands they buy and use regularly, and this is what makes
them brand loyal. The company's attitude toward its customers is another factor
in loyalty. 
To put all this together, a brand perception is created by a number of different
fragments of information, feelings, and personal experiences with a brand. You could
say that a brand is an integrated perception in other words, all these different aspects of
brand communication work together to create brand meaning. In the best of all worlds,
these meanings would be consistent from one customer to another, but because of the
vagaries of personal experience, different people have different impressions of a brand.
The challenge to advertisers is to manage their communication efforts so the fragments
fit together to form a coherent impression. 
Campaign Strategic Approach
According to Wells, Once the situation has been analyzed and the objectives
stated, planners decide how to achieve the objectives. That calls for a general
statement of strategy. The general strategy that guides a campaign can be described in
several ways. For example a strategy can focus on branding, positioning, countering the
competition, or creating category dominance. Maybe the strategy is designed to change
consumers' perception of the brand's price or price-value relationship. It may also seek
to increase what marketers call "share of wallet," or the amount customers spend on the
brand, by using such promotions as "buy four and get one free." Other marketing efforts
might involve launching a new brand or a brand ex tension or moving the brand into a
new market. 
Sometimes a strategy is designed to support some other marketing
communication effort. For example, advertising might be used to create excitement
about a sales promotion. Of course, marketing communications strategies are designed
to create specific types of consumer responses. Using the Facets Model again, consider
how the facets can be used to identify various types of strategies and the objectives that
define consumer response to the campaign. A perception strategy focuses on building
awareness. An emotional strategy hopes to touch people's feelings. Influencing what
people think and know about a brand calls for a cognitive strategy, while an association
strategy seeks to build a personality for a brand or cue the brand's position by
associating it with a certain lifestyle or symbols. A persuasion strategy may change
people's beliefs or attitudes, while a behavioral strategy aims to get people to act in a
certain way. 
 26

American Express, for example, sponsored a four-minute humorous online

commercial featuring comedian Jerry Seinfeld and an animated Superman that was
designed to create brand liking. The two sidekicks play the role of neurotic New Yorkers
complaining about such earth-shaking topics as the amount of mayonnaise on their tuna
sandwiches. They also relate the benefits of using an American Express card. The
message is soft sell and embedded in a gag, which makes the commercial feel more
like cinema than advertising. Seinfeld jokes that it isn't going to be interrupted with a
commercial because it is a commercial. 
Campaign Implementation and Management
According to Wells, Once the strategies have been identified, the next step is
implementation. The various media and message chapters that follow explore how the
campaign direction is implemented through specific decisions in those areas. But before
moving to those specific areas, let's first consider two critical details that are included in
a campaign plan-budgeting and campaign evaluation. 
Budgeting
According to Mitchell, the budget is a critical part of planning an advertising
campaign. A €30,000 budget will only stretch so far and probably will not be enough to
cover the costs of television advertising in most markets. The budget also determines
how many targets and multiple campaign plans a company or brand can support and
the length of time the campaign can run. 
Determining the total appropriation allocated to advertising is not an easy task.
Typically, an amount of money, say €250,000, is budgeted for advertising during the
budget planning process (just before the end of the fiscal year). The big budgeting
question at the marketing mix and marketing communication mix level is: How much do
we need to spend? Let's examine five common budgeting methods used to answer that
question. 
 Historical method. Historical information is the source for this common
budgeting method. A budget may simply be based on last year's budget, with a
percentage increase for inflation or some other marketplace factor. This method,
although easy to calculate, has little to do with reaching advertising objectives.
 Objective-task method. The objective-task method looks at the objectives for
each activity and determines the cost of accomplishing each objective. For
example, what will it cost to make 50 percent of the people in the market aware
of this product? This method's advantage is that it develops the budget from the
ground up so that objectives are the starting point. 
 Percentage-of-sales method. The percentage-of-sales method compares the
total sales with the total advertising (or marketing communication) budget during
the previous year or the average of several years to compute a percentage. This
technique can also be used across an industry to compare the expenditures of
different product categories on advertising. For example, if a company had sales
 27

of $5 million last year and an advertising budget of $1 million, then the ratio of
advertising to sales would be 20 percent. If the marketing manager predicts sales
of $6 million for next year, then the ad budget would be $1.2 million. How can we
calculate the percentage of sales and apply it to a budget? Follow these two
steps: 
Step 1: past advertising  =% of sales
past sales 
Step 2: % of sales X next year's sales forecast = new advertising budget
 Competitive budgets. This method uses competitors' budgets as benchmarks
and relates the amount invested in advertising to the product's share of market.
This suggests that the advertiser's share-of-advertising voice that is, the
advertiser's media presence--affects the share of attention the brand will receive,
and that, in turn, affects the market share the brand can obtain. Here's a
depiction of these relationships: 

Share of = Share of = Market

Media voice consumer mind share

Keep in mind that the relationships depicted here are only a guide for
budgeting. The actual relationship between share-of-media voice (an indication
of advertising expenditures) and share of mind or share of market depends to a
great extent on factors such as the creativity of the message and the amount of
clutter in the marketplace.
 All you can afford. When a company allocates whatever is left over to
advertising, it is using the “all you can afford" budgeting method. It's really not a
method, but rather a philosophy about advertising. Companies using this
approach, such as high-tech startups driven by product innovation, don't value
advertising as a strategic imperative. For example, a company that allocates a
large amount of its budget to research and has a superior product may find the
amount spent on advertising is less important.
Evaluation: Determining Effectiveness. Evaluation is an important section in an
advertising plan because it is the process of determining the effectiveness of the
campaign. Evaluation is impossible if the campaign has not established measurable
objectives, so this section of the campaign plan specifies how exactly those objectives
will be measured. In effect, this section is a research proposal. All of these procedures
and techniques for post campaign evaluation will be discussed in more detail in Chapter
19. 
ACCOUNT PLANNING: WHAT IS IT?
 28

When the Eight O’clock coffee brand wanted to know more about its audience to
better target its message, it used videotaped observational research to identify key
insights into how people relate to coffee. Rather than a rosy sunrise, the tapes showed
that it was a struggle to get moving. “In real life," the strategic planner concluded,
"people stumble around, trying to get kids out of bed. Coffee is the fuel that gets them
dressed, fed, and out the door." On other tapes, it also showed that coffee was the
reward for mom after the kids are out the door. “I have my cup of coffee when the kids
leave," one mom observed. "It's my first moment to take a breather. And it gives me
energy." Account planning is the tool that analyzes the research to uncover these
consumer insights. 
In general, an advertising plan seeks to match the right audience to the right
message and present the message in the right medium to reach that audience. These
three elements audience insight, message, and medium-are at the heart of an
advertising plan. Note that this planning begins with audience insight, which is always
based on some kind of consumer research. As in the Eight O’clock coffee example, the
planner struck gold by finding out that coffee is the fuel that gets adults, particularly
moms, through the morning rush-and it's also the reward for surviving that busy routine.
From this insight comes clues about how and when to reach the target audience and
what to say to her. Here's the planner's mission: 
 Who? Who are you trying to reach and what insight do you have about how
they think, feel, and act? How should they respond to your advertising message?
 What? What do you say to them? What directions from the consumer research
are useful to the creative team?
 Where? How and where will you reach them? What directions from the consumer
research are useful to the media team? 
The account planning function develops the advertising strategy with other members
of the agency and client team and guides its implementation in the creative work and
media planning. Account planning is the research and analysis process used to gain
knowledge of the consumer, understanding that is expressed as a key consumer insight
about how people relate to a brand or product. An account planner, then, is a person in
an agency who uses this disciplined system to research a brand and its customer
relationships to devise advertising (and other marketing communication) message
strategies that are effective in ad dressing consumer needs and wants. Here's an
example from Dunkin' Donuts provided by Regina Lewis, former Vice President of
Strategic Insights.
We heard through Dunkin' Donuts' research that people wanted to try espresso
drinks like lattes and cappuccinos, but they were intimidated and thought such fancy
coffee drinks were an ordeal to order. Dunkin' Donuts, of course, is known for its coffee
and we felt that to be a great coffee player, we had to have an espresso line. It's now
the cost of entry in the coffee category. But our brand has always been hot regular
 29

coffee for average "Joe". We needed to know how to launch espresso and be
successful. 
We did a lot of studies-looked at secondary data and did positioning focus groups.
What we realized was that there was a place in the marketplace for espresso-based
drinks for everybody. It doesn't have to be a fancy treat. We learned that a lot of people
like the milky steamed beverages, but they were intimidated by whether they would
know how to order them. We just use small, medium, and large. We simplified it. 
We also developed push-button espresso machines-very fast and easy. We created
a world where you can get espresso through the drive-through in less than two
minutes. 
When we launched our new line, we used the positioning umbrella of the
democratization of espresso. We talked about it much more simply and dramatically
changed the way our customers view a latte-we eliminated the whole barista thing. We
made espresso available for everybody and we also priced our drinks under Starbucks.
We launched with a big public relations campaign titled the Espresso Revolution. 
In contrast to account managers who are seen as the voice of the client, account
planners are described as the voice of the consumer. As London's Account Planning
Group (APG) explains it, “The job is to ensure than an understanding of consumer
attitudes and behavior is brought to bear at every stage of communications
development via continuous involvement in the process."
Account planners don't design the creative strategy for an ad, as this is usually a
team process with the participation of the creative people. Rather, the planner evaluates
consumers' relationships with the brand to determine the kind of message to which they
might respond. Ultimately, the objective is to help the creative team come up with a
better idea making their discovery process easier and faster. Susan Mendelsohn, a
leader in the U.S. account planning industry, explains the account planner's task as the
following:
1. Understand the meaning of the brand.
2. Understand the target audience's relationship to the brand.
3. Articulate communication strategies.
4. Prepare creative briefs based on understanding of the consumer and brand.
5. Evaluate the effectiveness of the communication in terms of how the target
reacts to it (so that planners can keep learning more about consumers and brand
communication). 
The Research Foundation
As we said at the beginning of this chapter, understanding begins with consumer
research, which is at the core of account planning. Account planners use consumer
research particularly qualitative research-to get inside the targets' heads, hearts, and
lives. Some advertisers, such as Johnson & Johnson, insist that consumer researchers
 30

and creative teams need to work closely together. That is the role, if not the goal, of
most account planners. 
As Fallon and Senn outlined in one of their principles in the Part II Introduction,
the key to effective advertising is a powerful consumer insight, a central emotional truth
about a customer's relationship with a brand. The importance of consumer research
leading to this insight is illustrated in the Crest Whitestrips ad. 
As discussed in Chapter 6, planners use a wide variety of research tools—from
primary research to secondary sources—to do "insight mining." They are particularly
interested, however, in applying innovative qualitative research tools that provide
methods for deep probing into consumer attitudes and motivations. In a sense they are
social anthropologists who are in touch with cultural and social trends and understand
how they take on relevance in people's lives. To do that, the account planner is an
integrator (who brings all the information together) and a synthesizer (who expresses
what it all means in one startlingly simple statement). 

Consumer Insight: The Fuel of Big Ideas

Advertising is sometimes thought to be an idea factory, but account planners look
at advertising as an insight factory. As Mendelsohn says, “Behind every famously great
idea, there is a perhaps less flashy, but immensely powerful insight.” Insights are the
fuel that fires the ideas. A great insight always intersects with the interests of the
consumer and the features of the brand, as the Practical Tips box explains, by
identifying the value that the brand has for the consumer. 
Through the process of strategic and critical thinking, the planner interprets the
consumer research in terms of a key consumer insight that uncovers the relevance
factor--the reason why consumers care about a brand message. Consumer insights
reveal the inner nature of consumers' thinking, including such things as mind-sets,
moods, motivations, de sires, aspirations, and motives that trigger their attitudes and
actions. 
Insight Mining
Finding the "a-ha" in a stack of research reports, data, and transcripts, which is referred
to as insight mining, is the greatest challenge for an account planner. The Account
Planning Group (APG) association describes this process on its Web site
(http://www.apg.org.uk) as no into nooks and crannies without losing sight of the big
picture in order to identity a key insight that can transform a client's business." 
Mendelsohn describes insight mining as "a deep dive into the meaning of a brand
looking for “major truths." She explains that the planner engages in unship (if there is
any) that a target audience has with a brand or pre brand plays in their lives.
Understanding the brand/consumer relationship is important because account planners
 31

are taking on the position of the agency's brand steward. As Abigail Hirschhorn, Chief
Strategic Planning Officer at DDB explains, "Our work puts our clients in touch with the
souls of their brands.
The account planning toolkit is made up of questions that lead to useful insights
culled from research. Here is a set of questions that can lead to useful insights:
 What is a realistic response objective (perception, knowledge, feelings,
attitudes, symbolic meanings, behavior) for this target group? 
 What are the causes of their lack of response? 
 What are the barriers to the desired response? 
 What could motivate them to respond in the desired way?
 What is the role of each element in the communication mix to motivate them
or remove a barrier? 40 Sweet ‘n Crunchy (your main competitor) 
The Communication Brief
The outcome of strategic research usually reaches agency creative departments
in the form of a strategy document called a communication brief or creative brief, which
explains the consumer insight and summarizes the basic strategy decisions. Although
the exact form of this document differs from agency to agency and from advertiser to
advertiser, the brief is an outline of the message strategy that guides the creative team
and helps keep its ideas strategically sound. As the planner's main product, it should be
clear, logical, and focused. Here is an outline of a typical communication brief. 
Communication Brief Outline 
 Problem. What's the problem that communication can solve? (Establish position,
reposition, increase loyalty, get people involved, increase liking, etc.) 
 Target audience. To whom do we want to speak? (Brand loyal, heavy users,
infrequent users, competition's users, etc.)
 Consumer insights. What motivates the target? What are the "major truths"
about the target's relationship to the product category or brand? 
 Brand imperatives. What are the important features? What's the point of
competitive advantage? What's the brand's position relative to the competition?
Also, what's the brand essence, personality, and/or image? Ogilvy & Mather
says, "What is the unique personality for the brand? People use products, but
they have relationships with brands." 
 Communication objectives. What do we want customers to do in response to
our messages? (perception, knowledge, feelings, symbolic meanings, attitudes
and conviction, action)
 The proposition or selling idea. What is the single thought that the
communication will bring to life in a provocative way?
 Support. What is the reason to believe the proposition? Ogilvy & Mather
explains, “We need to give consumers 'permission to believe'--something that
 32

allows them to rationalize, whether to themselves or others, what is in reality an

emotionally driven brand decision. The support should be focused on the insight
or proposition, the truths that make the brand benefit indisputable.” 
 Creative direction. How can we best stimulate the desired response? How can
we best say it? 
 Media imperatives. Where and when should we say it? 
The brief is strategic, but it also should be inspirational. It is designed to ignite the
creative team and give a spark to their idea process. A good brief doesn't set up
limitations and boundaries but rather serves as a springboard. It is the first step in the
creative process. Charlie Robertson, an account planner and brand consultant, likens
the brief to a fire starter: “The match is the brief, the ignition is the inspiring dialogue [in
the briefing), and the flare is the creative. 
PLANNING FOR IMC 
An IMC plan follows the same basic outline as an advertising plan. The
difference, however, lies with the scope of the plan and the variety of marketing
communication areas involved in the effort. The more tools used, the harder it is to
coordinate their efforts and maintain consistency across a variety of messages. The
objective in IMC planning is to make the most effective use of all marketing
communication functions and to influence or control the impact of other communication
elements. 
Effective IMC plans lead to profitable long-term brand relationships. The
emphasis on brand building is one reason account planning is moving beyond
advertising and being used in IMC campaign planning. Jon Steel, author of a book on
advertising and account planning, says planning works best as it is integrated into the
entire communication mix.
Differences in IMC Strategic Planning
The three main areas where an IMC plan differs from an advertising plan are
stakeholders, contact points, and objectives.
 Stakeholders. The target market in an IMC plan includes more than just
consumers. Stakeholder refers to any group of people who have a stake in the
success of a company or brand. These audiences include all those who might
influence the purchase of products and the success of a company's marketing
program, as Table 7.3 shows. Employees are particularly important and their
support or buy-in for marketing, advertising, and marketing communication
programs is managed through an activity called internal marketing, 
An important thing to remember is that stakeholder groups overlap. Employees, for
example, may also be customers, shareholders, and members of the local community,
perhaps even elected officials. This fact complicates message strategy and demands
that there be a certain core level of consistency in all messages. 
 33

 Contact points. IMC programs are designed to maximize all the contacts that a
consumer and other stakeholders might have with a brand. Contact points, also
called touch points, are all the ways and places where a person can come into
contact with a brand, all the points where a message is delivered about the
brand. Remember that everything a brand does, and sometimes what it doesn't
do, delivers a message.
 IMC objectives. IMC objectives are tied to the effects created by the various
forms of marketing communication. All marketing communication tools have
strengths and weaknesses. You use public relations, for example, to announce
something that is newsworthy, while you use sales promotion to drive immediate
action. Therefore, an IMC plan operates with a set of interrelated objectives that
specify the strategies for all the different tools.

EXERCISES

TRUE OR FALSE
Instructions. Please write TRUE if the statement is correct and write FALSE if
otherwise, in the space provided before the number.

_________1. For business planning, strategic planning is the process of identifying a

problem that can be solved with marketing communication, then determining objectives
(what you want to accomplish), deciding on strategies (how to accomplish the
objectives), and implementing the tactics (actions that make the plan come to life). F
_________2. Note that the business planning process starts with a business mission
statement, a concise expression of the broad goals and policies of the business unit. T
_________3. Advertising and marketing communication planning operates with the
same concern for objectives, strategies, and tactics that we've outlined for business and
marketing plans. T
 34

_________4. The first step in developing an advertising plan, just as in a marketing

plan, is not planning but backgrounding-researching and reviewing the current state of
the business that is relevant to the brand and gathering all pertinent information. T
_________5. The opportunities of a business are traits, conditions, and situations that
are perceived as negatives. F
_________6. Advertising can solve only message-related problems such as image,
attitude, perception, and knowledge or information. T
_________7. The advertiser's basic assumption is that the campaign works if it creates
an impression, influences people to respond, and separates the brand from the
competition. T
_________8. Another reason we revisit targeting here is because understanding the
target is the last step in understanding the brand's position within the competitive
marketplace. F
__________9. An initial step in crafting a position is to identify the differentiation of the
brand, as well as those of the competition, to determine where the brand has an
advantage over its competitors. F
__________10. Advertising shapes the position, but personal experiences anchor it in
the target audience's mind. T
__________11. A brand personality must be distinctive. In other words it only
represents one particular product within a category, and it must be recognizable and,
therefore, memorable. F
__________12. The objective-task method looks at the objectives for each activity and
determines the cost of accomplishing each objective. T
__________13. An advertising plan seeks to match the right audience to the right
message and present the message in the right medium to reach that audience. T
__________14. Account planners don't design the creative strategy for an ad, as this is
usually a team process with the participation of the creative people. T
__________15. Through the process of strategic and critical thinking, the planner
interprets the consumer research in terms of a key consumer insight that uncovers the
relevance factor--the reason why consumers care about a brand message.T

MULTIPLE CHOICE.
Instructions. Please choose the best answer to the following question.
 35

1. A three-tiered process that starts with the business plan and then moves to
functional areas of the company such as marketing where a marketing plan is
developed that outlines objectives, strategies, and tactics for all areas of the
marketing mix.
a. The Business Plan c. Marketing Research
b. Strategic planning d. Strategic business unit
2. A line of products or all the offerings under a single brand name.
a. The Business Plan c. Marketing Research
b. Strategic planning d. Strategic business unit
3. Developed for a brand or product line and evaluated annually, although sections
dealing with long-term goals might operate for a number of years.
a. Market situation analysis c. Marketing Research
b. Marketing plan d. The Business Plan
4. Assesses the external and internal environments that affect marketing operations
—the company's history, products, and brands, as well as the competitive
environment, consumer trends, and other marketplace trends that have some
impact on the product category.
a. Market situation analysis c. Marketing Research
b. Marketing plan d. The Business Plan
5. Planners collect and analyze information about the company, brand, and
competition, along with consumers in general and the brand's customers
specifically.
a. SWOT Analysis  c. Situation Analysis
b. Campaign Plan d. Market situation analysis
6. Using a comparable effort to predict a logical goal.
a. Targeting c. Positioning
b. Measurable Objectives d. Benchmarked
7. A place in consumers' minds where the product or brand stands in comparison to
its competitors.
a. Targeting c. Positioning
b. Measurable Objectives d. Benchmarked
8. Helps structure an assessment of features relative to competitors’ products.
a. Competitive Advantage c. Feature analysis
b. Differentiation d. Branding
9. The idea that a brand takes on familiar human characteristics, such as loving
(Hallmark, Kodak), competent (IBM), trustworthy (Volvo, Michelin), or
sophisticated (Mercedes, Hermes, Rolex)--contributes an affective dimension to
the meaning of a brand.
a. Brand identity c. Brand position
b. Brand personality d. Brand image
10. A personal experience with a brand can develop into a brand relationship, which
is a connection over time that results in customers preferring the brand.
a. Brand loyalty c. Brand image
 36

b. Brand image d. Brand preference

11. Compares the total sales with the total advertising (or marketing communication)
budget during the previous year or the average of several years to compute a
percentage.
a. Historical method c. Percentage-of-sales method
b. Objective-task method d. Competitive budgets
12. An important section in an advertising plan because it is the process of
determining the effectiveness of the campaign.
a. Effectiveness c. Budgeting
b. Evaluation d. Monitoring
13. Finding the "a-ha" in a stack of research reports, data, and transcripts.
a. Insight Mining c. Consumer insights
b. Communication Brief d. The proposition
14. Refers to any group of people who have a stake in the success of a company or
brand.
a. Shareholders c. Top Management
b. Managers d. Stakeholders
15. All the ways and places where a person can come into contact with a brand, all
the points where a message is delivered about the brand.
a. Synergy c. Contact points
b. IMC objectives d. Internal marketing

ACTIVITY

1. Look for two print ads, one for a consumer product and one for a business-to-
business product. Working from the ads, determine as best you can the target
audience, the brand position, and the competitive advantage. What do you
believe were the objectives for the two ads? How would you determine if the
objectives were achieved?
2. Assume that you are a product manager of Universal Robina Corporation. Think
of a new product, design and develop its features and create a campaign plan for
the product to be launched. Create a strategic planning process in conducting the
campaign plan for the developed new product.