The reason to use a media planning agency is fairly simple. Why do all the hard work when somebody else can do it for you. There is another reason and that’s trust – a TV agency offer a level of impartiality.
When it comes to advertising on TV, with either linear TV or video on demand (VOD) you have so many options to choose from and there are so many channels.
The first question is do you want linear or VOD. The reality is that they work differently because of the audience sizes. When it comes to linear TV you have the opportunity to reach much larger audiences. With VOD the audience size means that you require more targeting to ensure that the smaller audience reached is more targeted.
The linear TV stations have slightly different audiences from one another and those audiences will differ throughout the day. This is where an agency comes into their own. They will consider things such as your target audience and budget to find the best time and platform to reach your ideal audience.
There are a multitude of facts and figures that a planning agency will have an understanding of. This saves you having to leaf through media packs or have an in-depth knowledge of consumption habits to get an understanding of how to reach your audience.
Speaking of media packs this leads on to looking at impartiality. The media packs provided by the stations are fantastic resources which provide accurate information but they are only giving you the benefits of their own particular platforms, understandably.
These sales tools will naturally have a bias towards the product they’re promoting. Because a media planning agency isn’t aligned to any particular channel, they are able to offer a balanced view on which platform to use.
That impartiality also has the added benefit of reduced effort for you because you can let someone else do all of the hard work. You don’t need to go to the trouble of comparing the various options and working out which is best because you can rely on the recommendations of your agency.