A media buyer is a person who acts as a link between a company and various marketing media. For example, you might develop an advertising campaign for a business with limited marketing knowledge. Success in this career generally requires someone with excellent interpersonal skills, a strong business sense, and marketing experience.

In most cases, a media buyer will have at least a bachelor’s degree in business, marketing, or a related field. Common duties of this job include establishing a client’s marketing needs, developing a marketing strategy, implementing that strategy, and tracking results.

What does a media buyer do?

Before any other actions can be taken, a customer’s marketing needs must first be established. To accomplish this, a media buyer will typically meet with a client in person or via teleconference.

The information you’ll need to obtain typically includes your client’s target audience, products or services offered, and budget. In addition, you will often discuss with your client any other details necessary to make the marketing campaign a success.

After a media buyer thoroughly understands their client’s needs, they will develop a marketing strategy. The exact strategy you choose may differ between clients and may involve one or more mediums.

For example, you might decide that a strictly online campaign is better for one client and mixing online advertising with TV and magazines is better for another. When determining possible strategies, a media buyer needs to consider the target audience they are trying to reach. Consequently, you need to have in-depth knowledge of various marketing techniques and conduct background research on specific target markets.

Once they have determined a clear marketing strategy, a media buyer will take the necessary steps to implement that strategy. For example, you could set up an online advertising campaign to be shown to a client’s target audience or set up social media accounts. In other cases, you can arrange for TV commercials to be shown at a certain time and on specific channels. This practice requires a media buyer to be aware of their client’s budget and to communicate clearly with media representatives.

Additionally, it is usually necessary for a media buyer to track the results of each marketing campaign. For online advertising, you can implement an analytics program where you can determine how much traffic your client’s website has received. Along with this, you are likely to contact your customer to find out if sales have increased and if so, by how much.

Professional skills of a media buyer

A media buyer must be:

• A highly skilled negotiator, capable of achieving successful advertising campaigns at the lowest possible price.
• Able to work under pressure.
• Well organized and able to prioritize tasks.
• Able to keep accurate records.
• Up to date on media developments.
• Able to work within a limited budget.

Should have:

• Interpersonal and verbal communication skills.
• Self-confidence and security
• ICT and numeracy skills.

Competencies of a media buyer

• Verbal communication skills.
• Record-keeping skills.
• Well organized.
• Good deal on the phone.
• Ability to prioritize tasks.
• Able to keep updated information about the media.
• Able to work under pressure.
• Able to work on a budget.
• Buy advertising space in online media and other digital and interactive media.
• Buy advertising space in newspapers and magazines, on panels.
• Buy advertising time on television and radio.
• Decisive.
• Computer skills.
• Establishes good relationships with media agency teams.
• Skill for negotiation.
• Skill for numbers.
• Interpersonal skills.
• Keep records accurately.
• Negotiate the best deals for your clients.
• Work under a fixed budget.

Main functions of the Media Buyer

• Plan strategies

Before launching a network of campaigns and native ads, you must first define what the purpose of these ads is. That is, what we want with the campaign: increase traffic to a destination, more subscriptions, downloads, registrations, purchases, etc.

• Segment the audience

At this point, the first thing to clarify is the buyer and the brand’s target clientele; in this way we can have the most appropriate segmentations. Of course, you must have several segmentations and analyze which is the most effective.

• Create media plans and campaigns.

Creating a media campaign isn’t just about posting eye-catching text, a winning image, and a big budget. In fact, creating medium plans means designing a complete and very detailed plan for the person who clicks on the ad to achieve the final conversion.

This also includes finding the spaces relevant to the brand’s audience. For example, if the audience is determined to be on Instagram and Facebook, why buy space on YouTube?

• Analyze metrics

All these functions of the media buyer are fundamental, not less important than the others. And it is that, thanks to the analysis of metrics and results, you can take the necessary measures to optimize the campaign and obtain the best results.

Some of the aspects to analyze in advertising campaigns are: the segmentation that works best, the locations with the best results, the ads with the best CTR, among others. Therefore, to have more precise and detailed information, it is recommended to use different segmentations; hence, different creatives and ad sets; in this case, A/B ads are very useful.

• Optimize campaigns

Once you have detailed and relevant information, it is time to optimize the campaigns to make them evolve. Two things can happen at this point: first, which ad, ad set, or creative was found to have the best result; and there more budget is invested and the others are eliminated. Or new ads are tested by mixing the best elements of the analysis.

• Report the results or make reports

As its name indicates, in this function the media buyer must make reports highlighting the results, progress and achievements of the campaign; they are important so that the entire team is aligned, both in strategy and in results.

Media Buyer Education

Some of the studies that allow this profession to be practiced are listed below. Keep in mind that, depending on the field of specialization, you may have to complement the training with other more specific courses in the sector. Continuous training is a key aspect for professional improvement.

• Training in Advertising
• Degree in Commerce and Marketing
• Degree in Communication and Public Relations
• Degree in Marketing
• Degree in Marketing and Digital Communication
• Degree in Marketing and Business Communication
• Degree in Marketing and Digital Communities
• Degree in Advertising
• Degree in Advertising and Public Relations

Average Salary for a Media Buyer

Media buyers earn an average salary of about $55,000 a year in the United States of America. But depending on the position, the city, the agency, it can go down or up.

It may be possible to increase profits by moving between agencies or targeting sales. The highest average salaries are found at the largest agencies. Some agencies may offer other benefits for example bonuses, private health care insurance, and gym memberships.