While Excel is a versatile program that can be utilized for many tasks, it may no longer be the best fit for media planning. Given the challenges of buying media today, there are software solutions to streamline media planning and buying to increase productivity moving forward. This an important stage of your clients’ advertising strategy, as it lays the foundation for their media campaigns. Employing software that is specifically designed for developing media plans is the most efficient way to serve your clients. Not only can this save you time, but it can also save your clients money since you’ll be working more efficiently. Here are a few signs that your Excel media planning needs a makeover.
You’re Using One Too Many Worksheets
Media planning via Excel might mean that a client’s media buys are spread out over several spreadsheets. While this may be doable, it is not the most efficient way to handle the media planning for your clients. Upgrading to software designed for media planning will keep your workflow organized and comprehensive, allowing you to plan and buy multiple media types on a single worksheet. Completing this task with Excel spreadsheets and multiple tabs is becoming outdated; it might be time for a change.
You Can’t Access Your Media Plans from Anywhere
Excel media planning is not friendly to those who would like to edit a client’s media plans from virtually anywhere. Rather than having to send files and download to servers, the most advanced media planning software is web-based, meaning you can access your client’s media plans remotely. This will also improve multi-user strategies, such as permission level administration. For example, an admin account can allow or restrict certain users from accessing particular insertion orders.
Your Worksheets Don’t Integrate with Nielsen Ratings
Choosing Excel to plan your client’s media buys won’t allow for seamless integration with a ratings service, such as Nielsen. For agencies that subscribe to this service, being able to tie into their ratings accounts during the media planning process is very useful. Making the switch to media planning software will grant you the ability to average and project television and radio ratings within a single worksheet.
Upgrade Your Excel Planning Software to GaleForceMedia
If you’re ready to give your Excel media planning a 21st century makeover, upgrade to GaleForceMedia, the advanced media planning software from GaleForce Digital. This versatile, web-based solution takes your media planning to a completely new level by streamlining the process from start to finish. Plan and buy all mass media types in once place, work remotely and even handle your clients’ digital campaigns with GaleForceMedia. To update your media planning to GaleForceMedia, visit our contact page today or give us a call at (866) 233-8499.