What is the difference between Creative and Media in Advertising?
As you have seen from the marketing fundamentals chart, creative and media combine to form advertisements. Creative refers to the artwork and message of an advertisement, while media refers to space that it is featured on. In short, creative determines what is seen, and media determines where it is seen and consequently who sees it.
The importance of planning Creative and Media together
Both creative and media are equally important and need to work in harmony. There is no point having the perfect ad message and artwork, only for the wrong people to see it, or reaching the right audience with a poorly executed creative.
Further to this, it is crucial that the creative fits the medium. It would be a poor ad experience for the audience if the creative was not customised to the media channel that they are on. To ensure that the creative is tailored to the medium, you will need to consider the formatting of the creative (i.e. size, orientation, resolution etc.) as well as the message delivery (i.e. story arc for video, positioning of key information, visibility of call to action etc.)
Formatting example: Placing a video or image in landscape orientation on Instagram stories can result in a poor user experience as the ad might not be visible or engaging. The expectation is that Instagram stories delivers full screen portrait (vertical) content. So seeing ads in landscape on Instagram stories might result in an immediate skip or poor brand perception.
Message delivery example: You wouldn't use a TV ad on YouTube as the mindset of the audience is different on each medium. People are usually more passive or "leaned back" in the TV viewing experience, but are generally more active or "leaned forward" on YouTube. So, you could apply a traditional story arch to your TV ad where you build up to a climax and resolution with your brand being revealed at the end, but on YouTube you would need the hook and brand reveal to be much earlier as users can skip the ad after 5 seconds.
Personalisation
The winning combination in advertising involves delivering the right message to the right audience at the right place and time. Customising the ad creative to each individual is referred to as personalisation. The aim here is to ensure that your message is most relevant to the person you are talking to. For example, a car brand might highlight some of the machine specifications in its ads to a car enthusiast. However, the same car brand might highlight safety features in its ads to new parents or young families.
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