If you were asked to think about "television advertising" you might recall the Nissan commercial you saw during Friends. If asked to think about "newspaper advertising" you might remember Macy's sale ad in yesterday's paper. And, if asked to think about yellow pages advertising and you might envision the ads you read when looking for a restaurant or auto repair facility or you might think about the ads shown in the search results from an online yellow pages directory.

While all of these responses would be correct, it is important to note that all represent the end result of the media planning process. Many media decisions are made before you and other individuals have the opportunity to see these ads.

The advertising media planning process begins with an advertiser deciding that a particular medium (e. g., yellow pages, radio or newspaper) is likely to be an effective way to reach his/her target audience. Once a medium is selected, the advertiser then selects the specific vehicle within that medium (e.g., a specific yellow pages directory, radio station/time, or television program) in which to place the advertising. Two underlying principles of this process are that:

• each individual advertising medium competes with all other media in an effort to convince advertisers of the relative merits of that medium.

• different advertising vehicles within a medium compete to increase their competitive position and attract advertisers. Once an advertiser is convinced of a medium's merits, advertiser-directed advertising might be used to convince advertisers that a specific media vehicle is the best option (for example, one of the two competing print directories within a market). Additionally, consumer-directed advertising might be placed into the market in an attempt to increase consumer usage of that specific vehicle (for example, advertising designed to encourage consumers to use yellow pages Directory A versus Directory B).

This chapter explores these aspects of media and media vehicle promotion.

Every advertising medium in the United States has an association or organization that is responsible for the promotion of that medium, for example:

Organizations and associations promote their media in two main ways: research and advertising.

Research

Media organizations and associations conduct research on an ongoing basis. Research provides insights into the advertising and consumer dynamics of that medium and collect information that can be used to position a medium against competitive media. Research findings are communicated to advertisers in an effort to convince them of the relative advantages of advertising in that particular medium.

Two important areas of media research relate to the notions of media "value" and "return on investment." Advertisers are increasingly concerned with making certain that their advertising in a particular medium has strong potential to reach and influence the target ("value") in a way that is economically sound (i.e., provides a positive "return on investment").

Value

Media value is typically defined in terms of reach.

The concept of "media reach" can be operationalized several ways. One common way is to define "reach" as the total number of individuals exposed to a particular medium at a given time. Here,"number of individuals" reflects the dynamics of the medium, for example, the number of people watching a television program or the circulation of a newspaper or magazine. From this perspective, media which accumulate larger audiences are considered to have greater reach.

It is the case, however, that most individuals are exposed to an advertiser's message in multiple media. As a result, "reach" can also be defined in terms of the number of people exposed to an advertiser's message exclusively by a single medium and by that medium in conjunction with other media. Consider, for example, the two scenarios shown below.

Both tables show the reach of two media. Both Medium A and Medium B reach 30% of the target audience. In the table on the left, however, media overlap is 25%, meaning that 25% of the target audience is reached by both media. Given this high overlap (duplication of reach), the net percent of the target reached by both media is only slightly higher than that reached by either medium alone. In essence, an advertiser in this situation can place his/her advertising in either medium (but not both) without a significant loss in reach. The table on the right shows the opposite situation. Again, both Medium A and B reach 30% of the target audience, but few individuals (5%) are exposed to messages in both media. As a result, the two media work together, and the placement of advertising in both media significantly extends the advertiser's reach.

Net reach figures, such as those above, tell you the total number of people exposed to a message. But, the figures do not tell you whether individuals, once exposed, paid attention to the message or incorporated the message into their purchase consideration. After all, it is not productive to reach individuals who are inclined to ignore your message.

The Yellow Pages Association has conducted research that examines this aspect of reach. The Association commissioned NFO InCom to determine, across 155 product categories (as represented in directory headings), the extent to which individuals considered information in various media. The results are shown in the tables below.

Yellow Pages and Direct Mail Percent of Target Considering Information in Medium Direct Mail 18.6 Yellow Pages 21.1 Subtotal 39.7 Media overlap 3.5 Net percent reached by both direct mail and yellow pages 36.2

Yellow Pages and Newspapers Percent of Target Considering Information in Medium Newspapers 16.0 Yellow Pages 21.1 Subtotal 38.1 Media overlap 4.7 Net percent reached by both newspaper and yellow pages 33.4

Yellow Pages and Television Percent of Target Considering Information in Medium Television 7.7 Yellow Pages 21.1 Subtotal 28.8 Media overlap 1.9 Net percent reached by both television and yellow pages 26.9

Yellow Pages and Online Percent of Target Considering Information in Medium Online 6.1 Yellow Pages 21.1 Subtotal 27.2 Media overlap 1.8 Net percent reached by both online and yellow pages 25.4

Yellow Pages and Magazines Percent of Target Considering Information in Medium Magazines 4.1 Yellow Pages 21.1 Subtotal 25.2 Media overlap 1.0 Net percent reached by both magazines and yellow pages 24.2

Yellow Pages and Radio Percent of Target Considering Information in Medium Radio 3.5 Yellow Pages 21.1 Subtotal 24.6 Media overlap 1.2 Net percent reached by both radio and yellow pages 23.4

The data clearly show that when reach is defined from this perspective, the yellow pages extends the reach of all other media. Specifically, the "yellow pages by themselves reach 21.1% of consumers who say they 'consider' various media prior to purchasing a product or service. But when the contribution to reach is compared with other media options, yellow pages also proved to add the most complementary and incremental reach." (Source: Joe Mandese, MediaPost, 12/11/03)

Return on Investment

Return on investment is a simple concept. A positive return on investment (ROI) means that an investment (in this case, paid advertising) brings you more sales than the actual dollars you invested in the advertising.

Advertisers are increasingly becoming concerned with their return on investment from advertising in all media.

A recent Ad Age article (Ad Age, 10/13/03) provided this insight: "Media advertising does the worst job of any marketing discipline in proving return on investment and network TV is the worst of those media, according to an exclusive survey of leading advertisers. Media advertising was cited by more than one in four respondents as the worst for proving ROI, followed by public relations, at 25%. Product placement was third with 13%. Overwhelmingly seen as best medium for proving ROI is direct mail, cited by 42% of respondents, more than a 2-to-1 ratio over the second-best medium, the Internet, at 19%." (Yellow Pages were not included in this survey.)

While ROI is a simple concept, it is a difficult number to obtain for most media. The Ad Age article notes that "two of three respondents said the current measurement tools are inadequate to prove ROI, with larger marketers tending to express more dissatisfaction than smaller ones."

ROI is difficult to measure in broadcast media, for example, because of consumers' exposure to the same message in multiple media and an indirect and delayed response between advertising exposure and brand choice or purchase. An individual may see a McDonald's television ad on Monday, hear a radio ad on Tuesday, talk to his friends about McDonald's on Wednesday, and then decide to eat at McDonald's on Thursday . The task of allocating this brand decision (and profit from purchase) to the advertising in general, and to each specific medium's advertising in particular, is a complex and daunting task.

The yellow pages, however, provide a straightforward way of determining an advertiser's yellow pages ROI. This process, which uses a technique known as remote call forwarding (RCF), allows a yellow pages advertiser to precisely know the effectiveness of his/her ad and that ad's contribution to ROI. The process works as follows:

A specialized research company, such as DCCI, works with the yellow pages advertiser and directory publisher to obtain a unique telephone number that will appear in the yellow pages ad. This telephone number is published only in the ad to be tracked. The advertiser's regular number is used in the White Pages and any other advertising such as billboards, direct mail, or other media. Therefore, only calls from those consumers who have used the Yellow Pages to find the telephone number of the business will be tracked and counted.

Next, when a consumer places a call (using the special number in the yellow pages ad) the call is seamlessly transferred to the regular business number of the advertiser, and is handled in the usual way. Neither the consumer calling in, nor the person at the business answering the call, are aware that the call is being measured.

However, in the process of transferring the call, call-specific information is recorded and compiled by DCCI's computer system. Importantly, the privacy of the caller is respected. Calls tracked by remote call forwarding are not recorded and no one listens in. The only information that RCF provides is: a) time of the call b) length of the call c) time the call ended and d) where available, the name and address of the caller. The actual conversation that takes place remains private.

Finally, data are compiled and summarized. Monthly reports are made available to the advertiser in both print and online form.

As a result, yellow pages advertisers can track the number of calls generated by an ad and then, through the use of a ROI calculator (see example to the right), determine the ROI on their yellow pages advertising.

Paid Advertising

Each advertising medium has determined its primary strengths versus other media. In many cases, advertiser-directed campaigns are created to make certain that these strengths are understood by advertising decision-makers. Radio, for example, has chosen to promote its reach and has created radio spots to communicate this perceived strength. (The radio promotional advertising campaign, "Radio Gets Results," can be found here.) Newspaper has taken a different approach to promotion. Here, a series of newspaper ads were commissioned with the goal of "convincing artists, copywriters, [and] creative directors that creating advertising for newspapers can be exciting, stimulating, challenging [and] cool." (The newspaper campaign, "How to Write a Newspaper Ad" can be found here.) Finally, the Interactive Advertising Bureau has developed a campaign to promote Internet advertising, using the tag line "Interactive in the Active Ingredient in the Marketing Mix."

The radio and newspaper campaigns, while different in approach, share one important characteristic: both campaigns appear within the medium which they were designed to promote - the radio campaign used radio spots, the newspaper campaign used newspaper ads and the Internet campaign used space donated by Internet web sites.

Print yellow pages, in its prior advertising campaign, took a different approach to the promotion of their medium - advertising for the medium took place outside of the media being promoted in advertising and media trade magazines. The yellow pages' prior promotional campaign focused on one of its primary benefits: it places an advertiser's message in front of consumers at or near the time they are ready to make their purchase decision. This proximity to purchase is unique to the yellow pages and, as a consequence, was how the yellow pages decided to position itself versus competitive media.

Once an advertiser has decided that a particular advertising medium will help him/her effectively reach the target audience, the next step is to identify the specific vehicles within that medium that best deliver the target audience, where "best" is typically defined in terms the cost to deliver a set number of the target audience.

This section looks at media vehicle promotion for both traditional and online media.

Traditional Media

Audience delivery can be operationalized in terms of total number of individuals delivered by a media vehicle (for example, newspaper or magazine circulation) or in terms of competitive audience strength (for example, a television rating). In markets where there is only one media vehicle (for example, one newspaper) or when circulation is of prime importance, as is generally the case for magazines, total audience delivery is a reasonable descriptor. However, in markets where there are multiple media vehicle options (for example, multiple yellow pages directories in a single market or multiple television stations), the relative measure of "rating" is generally more useful to advertisers.

Perhaps the most well known rating is the Nielsen television rating collected by Nielsen Media Research. Nielsen collects national television ratings as follows:

"Nationally, there are 5,000 television households in which electronic meters (called People Meters) are attached to every TV set, VCR, cable converter box, satellite dish or other video equipment in the home. The meters continually record all set tuning. In addition we ask each member of the household to let us know when they are watching by pressing a pre-assigned button on the People Meter which is also present. By matching this button activity to the demographic information (age/gender) we collect at the time the meters are installed, we can match the set tuning - what is being watched - with who is watching. All these data are transmitted to Nielsen Media Research's computers where they are processed and released to our customers each day." (Source, Nielsen Media Research)

The outcome of this procedure is the rating, an estimate of a program's audience size expressed as the percentage of the total possible audience watching a particular program, where "total possible audience" is typically operationalized as households with television. For example, assume that there are 100,000,000 households with televisions in the United States. (The actual number is slightly higher.) If 30,000,000 households are watching CSI, then CSI's rating would be 30 (30,000,000/100,000,000=30). (For a more in-depth discussion of television ratings visit the Museum of Broadcast Communication.)

Since one national television rating point always means the same thing (currently about 1.1 million households) programs with higher ratings deliver larger audiences and the audience delivery of two programs can be directly compared. Television networks and radio stations therefore use ratings to communicate the potential strength of different media vehicles. A television program with a "15" rating, for example, delivers three times the audience of a program with a rating of "5." The larger audience delivered by the "15" rating also means that the network or station can charge more for commercial time within that higher rated program. (Click here to see the current Nielsen ratings.)

Print Yellow Pages Directory Promotion

Yellow pages print directories also use ratings to competitively position themselves, although ratings in this context have a slightly different meaning. Print directory ratings are calculated to reflect a directory's share of usage in the area in which it is distributed.

Imagine, for example, that there are three directories distributed in a particular market. Because the areas of distribution are generally equivalent, their circulation would be comparable, as shown below.

Each directory charges a different price for a full page ad. The cost of each ad is shown below.

It might seem that Directory B is the best buy. It delivers the greatest amount of people for the lowest cost. Circulation, however, just tells us that a directory has been sent to a home. It does not tell us whether or not that directory is being used. This is where ratings come into play.

Added to the table below are the total number of references and the percentage of all references (the rating) for each directory over the prior twelve months.

Clearly, Directory A is the most referenced directory in the market, accounting for three in every four references.

The table below takes the ratings into account as the relative pricing of the three directories is reexamined. The last column provides the cost to an advertiser for each directory reference (versus the prior chart that looked at ad cost in terms of circulation).

As you can see, even though Directory A has the highest ad cost in an absolute sense, it is still the best value because of its low cost per reference.

Directory ratings are therefore very important to directory publishers. Similar to television and radio stations, higher ratings mean that a print directory can charge more for advertising space. Given this, print directory publishers develop and place advertising to encourage use of their specific directories, knowing that if the advertising is successful their ratings (share of usage) will increase and, as a consequence, so will their advertising revenues.

Consumer-focused directory advertising is typically designed to promote a directory's advantages versus competitive directories in terms of completeness, ease of use, quality of advertisers or unique features. Directory advertisers will also promote their directory by pointing out problems that might arise if a competitive directory is used.

At the same time, print directory publishers also develop and place advertising designed to convince business advertisers that their directories are the best yellow pages in the market. These business-focused ads typically promote the positive business results obtained through advertising in that particular directory.

Internet Yellow Pages Directory Promotion

No ratings are yet available for Internet yellow pages directories, so these directories generally position themselves based on the relative size (and in some cases the perceived quality) of audience delivery. In spite of the lack of ratings, however, the logic that underlies print directory promotion also underlies the promotion of Internet yellow pages directories. Internet yellow pages directory sites develop and place advertising in an attempt to increase traffic and to influence advertisers' perceptions of directory value.

• Switchboard.com, for example, developed the "Electrified" campaign that attempted to position itself as the successor to the off-line yellow pages. (The tag line for the campaign was "the yellow pages, electrified.") "But while the ads will seek to grab consumers' attention, the ultimate target is advertisers .... So by attracting users with a promise of helpful, easy-to-use information, Switchboard is banking that greater numbers of advertisers will follow." (Source, Christopher Saunders, IAR, 9/4/2001)

Similar to traditional media, Internet yellow pages directories also attempt to influence advertisers through the use of detailed media kits, the highlights of which are made available on each directory's web site. You can review Internet directory media kits by clicking on any of the following links.

Click on any of the phrases below to find them within this section.