If you’re looking to shift your marketing budget and dive into the chaotic world of digital advertising, you should probably get in touch with a highly crafty digital media buyer. In a world where most of our attention is being captured by all things digital, a digital media buyer lies at the intersection of strategy and ad optimization. This group of dedicated professionals put your money and brand where it matters, analyze your numbers 24/7, and the best ones, don’t let their emotions get in the way of optimizing an ad campaign. A digital media buyer’s strategic path usually goes like this: market research, state goals, identify platforms and channels, analyze, optimize, test and learn. We asked our team of digital media buyers that have worked with budgets ranging from 5K-1.5 million a month – what separates the best digital media buyers from average ones? Here are the results…
Data Talks
If you’re like most media buyers, most spend their time tinkering with ad dashboards; analyzing and interpreting data to ultimately make decisions based on the numbers. The best media buyers have an instinct – which comes as a byproduct of years working in the industry – to realize when to stop or to continue scaling campaigns. After hours of spending their time testing new strategies, media buyers even recognize patterns that provide them with the intuition to make decisions. Blue Onion Media states – when working with data – media buyers should ask questions like:
- What concrete data do you and your client have to make strategic decisions?
- Based on the data, which channels can my client and I optimize?
- Are we hitting our KPI’s(key performance indicators)? If not, what can we change to get on the right path?
Let the data speak for itself. If you have 10 minutes and want the exact formula our team at Voy Media uses to scale ad campaigns, listen to this episode of Digital Marketing Fastlane.
Creative Angles
Our senior media buyer, Eric Philippou, says good media buyers know how to leverage basic consumer/marketing psychology to get the best possible results for their ad creatives. To maximize creatives, media buyers must first research and understand the client’s habits, tastes, and interests. In the initial phases of creating the strongest ad strategy, media buyers must be willing to invest their time using tools like Audience Insights on Facebook, Instagram hashtags, and any other form of market research.
What are the most common creative mistakes brands are making today? Listen to this episode of Digital Marketing Fastlane: 6 Biggest Creative Mistakes Brands Are Making Today
Continuous Learning
It turns out, media buyers can also teach us a fundamental life lesson – a continuous learning mentality. With the digital atmosphere always changing, the great media buyers are specific with strategizing, and flexible when new technologies come to rise. By simply staying up-to-date with industry changes and reading books in your spare time, your campaigns will never fall behind.
In a clever Slideshare of Facebook’s historical changes over time, Hubspot tracks every important change since Facebook’s launch. Though it is not necessary for you to read all 101 slides, we must acknowledge that the willingness to adapt to the constant change in these platforms is key to being a great media buyer.
Conclusion
The smartest and most profitable media buyers do three things well: knowing how to analyze and interpret data, understanding user psychology to build outstanding creatives, and the curiosity to stay on top of industry changes.
If you’re looking to connect with our team of media buyers to scale your campaigns, reach out to our CEO, Kevin Urrutia: [email protected]
