A media buyer is a person, who is responsible for the ad placements. A media buyer has to provide all media inventory purchased within budget. Media buyers earn money every time, when the offer that is promoted by them receives some action, for instance, a registration or a sign up.
What does a media buyer do?
So, as you can see, here is a person, who buys ad spaces online. A media buyer must analyze the best placements for a specific offer that could reach the target audience. He acts within the client's budget and gets detailed information of prices and delivery goals.
Media buyers interact with media representatives and negotiate the prices for buy. They are searching for the best price for their clients and trying to find added value for free advertising.
It is important to track the buy during the campaign in order to evaluate the effectiveness of ads. It could be done through the operating systems.
A media buyer controls the campaign to ensure delivery and stay under the budget.
What it takes to become a media buyer: top skills
According to the abilities and duties of a media buyer we can allocate the necessary skills to become a media buyer:
- Analytical skills. Analytical ability is a vital skill of successful media buyers. Why? Because all the effectiveness of the campaign will depend on your analyzing process. What should you analyze? At first you need to take into account targeting and segment of the campaign, and then if your campaign works well you are going to set all the data and optimize the process. But if you will make a mistake at the first step and choose the wrong target market all of your following work will be useless.
- A streamlined approach. What does it mean? You have to be rational. You are not allowed to make emotionally clouded decisions. The campaign could be not so predictable. If your competitors are pretty strong or your margins start to decrease, you should keep calm and continue to operate within your plan. It’s fine when you spend some money when launching a new campaign in a new segment. You should be able to assess the benefits of it.
- Focus on details. You have to take into account every detail when you are analyzing the statistics. There are many points to be concerned about: browser, OS, device brand or even browser’s version for more advanced platforms. When you are working with the stats you need to pay attention to details. This information could be multi-leveled and you need to be highly focused.
- Knowledge. Deep knowledge about the market and technology is a must of being a media buyer. You have to understand how the business ecosystem works. There are many players on the market. These are operators, aggregators, traffic sources. The key point is to understand their interaction. Also you should be aware of all the new trends in technology to make your campaigns work in the best way. The knowledge about the new functions, features or blocking software will be quite useful for you. Following the emerging developments will be a big part of your future success.
- Think like a user. Can you imagine yourself as a target customer? You definitely should be able to do it! You build your campaign like a user thinking about the users’ behavior and trying to understand their thoughts. You should have an ability to predict users’ actions by acting like a user yourself. And thereby you are ready to make decisions about what kind of ad would you choose etc.
- Use problem-solving skills. It’s effective to solve any problem in a timely manner.
Psychological Qualities to Become the Best
Not every person may become a media buyer. Why? Because of fundamental personality traits. What kind of person do you have to be to become a successful media buyer? There is a list of characteristics below.
- Be positive. Even if you can’t totally control all the processes. Don’t think about all the unpleasant situations that could happen with you. Be ready to be best among the competitors. Understand your advantages and use them. Only using the positive attitude you can predict some issues that could happen and you will be prepared. But if you give up at the very beginning you have no chance to win.
- Be able to study. To be open to new knowledge is very important. Willingness of learning for something new is the best way to be in touch. You can find useful tips anywhere, but you should want this to work.
- Be resistant. To learn through your mistakes is really a great skill. While you are able not to give up when you fail, you are open to new great ideas and challenges. To do better tomorrow must be your motto. If you made a mistake it means that you will not repeat it the next day.
- Be disciplined. That is to say: work every single day and do your best to realize your strategy.
- Be interpersonal. Be able to communicate with multiple people regarding your ideas and feedback.
Media Buyer Career Paths
To move up in your career ladder you will meet a number of steps that you can start with. For instance, you can start as an Assistant Media Buyer. An Assistant Media Buyer should have organizational, interpersonal and problem-solving skills.
For example, if you started out from the position of an Assistant, then you become a Media Buyer. After this you might progress to a role such as Account Executive. As for the position of Account Executive you will probably be in a process of finding new clients, serving existing customers and nailing the sale deal on the head. Here you need to have analytical, communication and customer-service skills. How can you progress? Within the role of Account Manager and even end up with Group Account Director.
Also it is possible to progress like a Sales Manager. And after that you can reach the position of Regional or even National Sales Manager.
Media Buyer Education
An average Media Buyer probably has a bachelor’s degree. But it’s also possible to get this job when you have only a high school degree or GED.
Usually they used to get Business or Communication degrees. Marketing or Advertising degrees are also common.
Average Salary for a Media Buyer
Media Buyers in America make an average salary of 55, 000 $ per year or 26$ per hour. But it is possible to earn even more! Approximately 10 percent of the top makes over 84000$ per year. But don’t forget that there is a bottom level, when you earn less than an average. If so it will be under 35000$ per year.
What Is It Like To Work as a Media Buyer
Actually to be a media buyer means to be multitasking. There are quite many responsibilities and duties during a usual working day.
Everyday routine could consist of managing day to day performance expectation of SEO, SEM, and outside vendors, purchasing and evaluating commercial airtime on Internet, negotiating prices, market conditions or rate history, conducting media buying on various channels including web banners, emails and editorials based on CPM, CPA and CPC models, analyzing results, tracking media buy delivery on a daily basis to ensure weekly and quarterly GP etc. Also a media buyer often attends meetings with clients, where they are planning the brand. For sure it is not a full list of the media buyer responsibilities.
To sum up all the information above we want to say that being patient, calm and open-minded is your step to success in becoming a media buyer. Always be prepared for unfortunate circumstances. Work smart and look out for market trends. Be curious and you will become a great media buyer.
