National Media Forum on Highway Safety

National Media Forum on Highway Safety
Glossary of Terms for Marketing and Communications

AAA
American Academy of Advertising. An association of educators and students in the advertising field.

AAAA
American Association of Advertising Agencies. An association whose members are ad agencies.

AD COPY
The actual text used for an ad campaign.

AD INVENTORY
The total available inventory to sell in a given period.

AD IMPRESSION
One person viewing one ad.

ADVERTISING PLAN
An outline of what goals an advertising campaign should achieve, how to accomplish those goals, and how to determine whether the campaign was successful in obtaining those goals.

AIDA
This stands for “Attention, Interest, Desire, and Action.” This is a historical model of how advertising works, by first getting the consumers’ attention, then their interest, etc.

ARBITRON (ARB)
A media research company that uses the “diary method” to accumulate data on radio use and to provide ratings on audience size and composition for radio stations in a given market (DMA).

ASSIGNMENT EDITOR
The staff member of a television or radio news team responsible for judging appropriateness of story ideas and assigning reporters to cover.

AUDIENCE SEGMENTATION
The process of dividing up or grouping a target audience based on common characteristics related to behaviors or predictors of behavior, such as geographic region, demographics, psychographics, and product usage. Audience segmentation helps to target media messages and key strategies.

BILLBOARD (BB)
In broadcast, airtime (generally 2-10 seconds in length), given to an advertiser, generally to the ones who purchase multiple commercials within a program.

BODY COPY
The text within a print advertisement that helps qualify or further explain the headlines or sub-headlines.

BONUS SPOT
A free announcement or commercial provided by a TV or radio station to an advertiser as value-added for running a paid schedule with the station.

BROADCAST MEDIA
Television or radio.

BROADCAST TV
Programming broadcast by TV networks (ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox, WB, and UPN, etc.) that people without cable can receive over-the-air.

BOILERPLATE
A paragraph or paragraphs stating who you are, what you do, and how you do it, usually used as the first paragraph in a biography or last paragraph in a news release.

BOOKER
The staff person at a TV, radio, or cable program who responds to pitch letters when an appearance needs to be arranged or “booked.”

BUS KING/QUEEN
A type of outdoor transit advertising designed for the outside of buses. As the names imply, a king is a larger ad than a queen.

CALL TO ACTION
A statement, usually at the end of a marketing piece, encouraging the reader/viewer/listener to take the action that is the objective of the piece. This action may be buying the company’s product or service, or simply taking the next step in the sales cycle, such as arranging for a product demonstration.

CAMERA-READY
An ad, art, copy text or graphic ready for inclusion in publications without need for further in-house preparation by the publication. In the modern computer era, cameras are often no longer used, but the phrase remains.

CLICK-THROUGH
The opportunity for a Web site visitor to be transferred to another location or Web site by clicking on an advertisement, as recorded by the server.

CLICK-THROUGH RATE (CTR)
It is computed by taking the number of clicks that a given campaign received, divided by the total impressions bought. Ex: Client buys 100,000 impressions, gets 1,000 click-throughs, therefore the CTR is 1 percent.

COLOR PROOF
An early full-color print of a finished advertisement, used to evaluate or adjust the ad’s final appearance.

COLUMN-INCH
A common unit of measure by newspapers, whereby ad space is purchased by the width, in columns, and the depth, in inches. For example, a print ad that is three standard columns wide and 5 inches tall (or deep) would be 15 column-inches.

COMBINATION RATE
A special media pricing arrangement that involves purchasing space or time on more than one vehicle, in a package deal. This is frequently offered where different vehicles share a common owner.

COMMERCIAL LENGTH
The duration of a TV/radio commercial expressed in seconds – e.g., :10, :15, :30, etc.

COMPARATIVE ADVERTISING
An advertising approach that directly compares one product brand to a competing brand.

COMPETITIVE PARITY
A method of determining an advertising budget, designed to maintain the current “share of voice.”

COMPREHENSIVE LAYOUT
A rough layout of an ad designed for presentation only, but so detailed as to appear very much like the finished ad will look.

CONTROLLED CIRCULATION
Publications, generally business-oriented, that are delivered only to readers who meet some qualifications. Generally, these publications are free to the qualified recipients.

CONCEPT STORY
Feature story designed to pique the interest of a certain demographic audience.

COST PER CLICK (CPC)
Very rarely used, but still often requested. Ex: A $5 CPC means that for every click advertisers receives on their online ad, they are paying $5 for it. Calculated by taking the cost of the ad divided by the number of clicks on the ad. A $5,000 ad clicked 1,000 times = $5 CPC.

COST PER RATING POINT (CPP)
The cost to reach one percent of a speci.ed target audience (i.e. men 18-34) with an ad in a given broadcast media vehicle.

COST PER THOUSAND (CPM)
A cost-effciency comparison and measure that indicates the cost of reaching 1,000 readers, viewers, or listeners through an advertisement.

CREATIVE
Refers to the broadcast spot, commercial or print ad unit to be used in/on any given advertising medium.

DAGMAR
This acronym refers to a process of establishing goals for an ad campaign such that it is possible to determine whether or not the goals have been met. It stands for Defining Advertising Goals for Measured Advertising Results.

DAYPART
Time periods of the broadcast day – e.g., Daytime, Early Fringe, Prime Time, etc., for television and Morning Drive, Midday, Afternoon Drive, etc., for radio.

DAYTIME
The television daypart that falls between early morning news and Early Fringe, generally, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.

DEMOGRAPHICS
The characteristics which, from a marketing standpoint, de.ne a person or a market segment. Typical representative characteristics include age, sex, income, education, marital status, home ownership, family size, etc.

DIGIBETA VIDEOTAPE
Beta (also called Beta SP) is the videotape format most widely used for television broadcast and high-quality video production. Digibeta is a newer digital form of Beta tape that is increasingly being used.

DMA
Designated market area: The geographic area surrounding a city in which the broadcasting stations based in that city account for a greater share of the listening or viewing households than do broadcasting stations based in other nearby cities.

DRIVE TIME
The peak periods for radio listenership. Drive time is normally between 6-10 a.m. and 3-7 p.m., when people are driving to and from work.

DUB
One or more copies of an audio or video recording.

EARLY FRINGE
The television daypart between daytime and prime time, generally 4-6 p.m.

EARNED RATE
A discounted media rate, based on volume or frequency of media placement.

EDITORIAL CALENDAR
The listing of specific times a publication will feature special topics, sections or news reporting.

EXECUTION
A specific advertisement. (Note: there may be several different executions within the same advertising strategy.)

EXECUTION STYLE
Tone of the advertisement (e.g., humorous, serious, etc.).

FCC
Federal Communications Commission. The Federal agency responsible for regulating broadcast and electronic communications.

FIXED-SUM-PER-UNIT METHOD
A method of determining an advertising budget, which is based directly on the number of units sold.

FLAT RATE
A uniform charge for advertising space or time, with no discounts for volume or frequency.

FLIGHT
A period of time during which commercials or ads are scheduled and run.

FREQUENCY
The number of times people (or homes) are exposed to an advertising message or campaign, typically measured over a four-week period.

G

GHOSTWRITER
Person writing articles, “op-eds” (opinion columns) or speeches for another person who claims authorship.

GROSS AUDIENCE
The audience of all vehicles or media in a campaign, combined. Some or much of the gross audience may actually represent duplicated audience.

GROSS IMPRESSIONS
Total number of people or households delivered by a given media schedule without regard to duplication.

GROSS RATING POINTS (GRP’S)
Ratings are an estimate of the percentage of individuals or households who will be exposed to a television or radio commercial. Each TV program or radio daypart delivers a specified number of rating points. GRP’s are the sum (total) of all ratings delivered by a given media buy or schedule.

GUARANTEED CIRCULATION
A minimum circulation level guaranteed by print publications.

HALF RUN
Placement of a transit advertisement in every other car of the transit system. Also referred to as a “half showing.”

HEAVY UP
To increase advertising delivery above the average level during a specific period of an extended campaign.

HOLDING FEES
In paid broadcast and cable television advertising, fees paid to retain principal performers in commercials. These are paid in 13-week cycles, regardless of whether the commercials are actually aired. There are no holding fees for radio.

HOLDING POWER
The ability to keep audiences throughout a broadcast, rather than having them change channels. It is represented as a percent of the total audience.

HOLDOVER AUDIENCE
The percent of a program’s audience who watched or listened to the immediately preceding program on the same station. Also called “inherited audience.”

HOUSEHOLDS USING TELEVISION (HUT)
The number of households in a given market watching television at a certain time. This term is used by Nielsen Media Research.

I

INFOMERCIAL
A paid commercial that is very similar in appearance to a news program, talk show, or other non-advertising program content. The broadcast version of an ”advertorial.”

INSERTION ORDER (IO)
The contract between a media buyer and the media property selling the advertising.

INSERTED MARKETING COMMUNICATION (IMC)
(More commonly referred to as Integrated Marketing Communications)
A management concept designed to make all aspects of marketing communication (e.g., advertising, sales promotion, public relations, and direct marketing) work together as a unified force, rather than permitting each to work in isolation.

ISCI CODE
Acronym for International Standard Commercial Identification. Now called Ad Codes, these are letters and numbers labeling the physical tape, slate and box of a commercial. These codes are imperative in trafficking commercials to TV and radio stations.

KERNING
Spacing between the letters of a word.

KEY MESSAGE
The main idea the advertisement is intended to convey.

KEY LINE
In artwork, an outline drawing of finished art to indicate the exact shape, position, and size for such elements as halftones, line sketches, etc.

KILL DATE
The expiration date of advertising materials. Kill dates notify media outlets that an advertisement should not be broadcast or placed after that date.

LATE FRINGE
The television time period that immediately follows the late news, generally 11:30 p.m. to 1 a.m .

LEAD TIME
The time period between when an ad is required to be submitted to the media outlet and when it actually runs.

LEADING
The space between the lines of body copy in a print ad or brochure (pronounced ledding rather than leeding, so named because the spacing was once made out of lead strips inserted between lines of type).

LINER
A :10-to :20-second pre-recorded or live on-air mention on radio of an advertiser’s product/service, usually tied to a promotion.

LIVE-ANNOUNCER SPOTS
A type of radio advertising in which the sponsor (advertiser) supplies a script to be read live on the air by the station announcer or radio personality.

LIVE-ANNOUNCER TAG
A disc jockey or announcer from the radio station comes “on the air” and reads your tag, live, after the produced spot has played.

LOYALTY INDEX
Frequency of listenership of a particular broadcast station.

MAKE-GOOD
Replacement of a TV or radio spot missed or mis-scheduled, with a spot of equal or better value.

MARKETING
The process of packaging, advertising, selling, and distributing your products or services, as well as the public relations used to support this process.

MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS
All strategies, tactics, and activities involved in getting the desired marketing messages to intended target markets, regardless of the media used.

MECHANICAL
A term for a camera-ready paste-up of artwork. It includes type, photos, line art, overlays, etc., all on one piece of art board.

MEDIA PLAN
A plan that states the media strategies and executions to meet the marketing objectives.

MEDIA OUTLET
A publication or broadcast station that transmits news, entertainment, and information to the public.

MEDIA STRATEGY
A plan of action by an advertiser for bringing advertising messages to the attention of consumers through the use of appropriate media.

MEDIUM
The singular of media. Many people now use “media” as a singular collective; rightly or wrongly, it is increasingly accepted.

METRO AREA
The central metropolitan core of a market, equivalent to the Standard Metropolitan Area (SMA) as de.ned by the U.S. Government.

MILLINE RATE
Not a very mainstream term, this is used to determine the cost effectiveness of advertising in a newspaper, reached by multiplying the cost per agate line by one million, then dividing by the circulation. Also referred to as Milline.

MOTIVATION RESEARCH
Used to investigate the psychological reasons why individuals buy specific types of merchandise, or why they respond to specific advertising appeals, to determine the base of brand choices and product preferences.

NAD
National Advertising Division of the Council of Better Business Bureaus. This organization serves as a major self-regulatory mechanism for advertising.

NARROWCASTING
Used to describe local, special-interest programming which is designed for small, select audiences.

NETWORK
Known as national media outlets whose audiences are nationwide.

NET UNDUPLICATED AUDIENCE
The combined cumulative audience exposed to an advertisement.

NIELSEN RATINGS
A.C. Nielsen is a marketing/media research company that conducts diary surveys to measure national and local TV viewing habits.

OP-ED PIECE
Article written by an expert that is positioned on the page opposite the editorial page, where most opinion and commentary articles are usually placed. Not to be confused with Letters to the Editor.

OPEN END
(1) Time left at the end of a commercial or program which is provided for the use of local advertising or station identification.
(2) A radio or television program with no specific time to end.

OPT-IN
Means that a person is “opting in” or agreeing to receive information or advertising via e-mail.

PASS-ALONG READERS
Readers of a publication who are not the primary readers who originally purchased or received the publication.

PENETRATION
The extent to which a newspaper advertisement reaches a particular audience. Usually expressed as a percentage of the total population.

PERMISSION-BASED MARKETING
When people give their permission to receive information or advertising.

PERSONS USING TELEVISION (PUT)
A percentage of all persons in a certain viewing area who are viewing television during a specific time period. Used by Nielsen Media Research.

PHOTO BOARD
A sheet containing a number of frames and the script from a television commercial. Also known as a story board.

POST ANALYSIS (POST BUYS)
An analysis of a media schedule after it runs – generally based on physical evidence of its running that identi.es the exact times, dates, programs, and estimated dollar value of the airtime in which the advertisers’ commercials were broadcast. It usually incorporates audience delivery estimates based on the time the schedule ran.

PREFERRED POSITION
An advertising position within a publication or within a block of television ads for which the advertiser may pay a premium price. For instance, the back cover, inside back cover and inside front cover of a magazine are typically preferred positions.

PRIME ACCESS
The television time period that falls between the evening news and prime time, generally 7 p.m. to 8 p.m.

PRIME TIME
The television time period each night that typically reaches the broadest number of TV viewers, generally 8-11 p.m. Monday to Saturday and 7-11 p.m. on Sunday.

PUBLIC RELATIONS (“PR”)
Communication with various sectors of the public to influence their attitudes and opinions in the interest of promoting a person, product, or idea.

PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT OR ADVERTISEMENT (PSA)
A commercial or liner that promotes programs, activities or services regarded as serving community interests. Generally sponsored by a non-profit institution, civic group, religious organization, trade association, or political group. PSA’s are mostly carried by stations free of charge, but only at times determined by the station.

PUPILOMETRICS
Another not-very-mainstream term, this is a method of advertising research in which a study is conducted on the relationship between a viewer’s pupil dilation and the interest factor of visual stimuli.

RANKER
A computer-generated report ranking each radio station in a market, by daypart, from highest to lowest for selected demographic audiences. For television, individual programs are ranked, by daypart for specified demographic audiences.

REACH
The number or percentage of a population (demographic) group exposed to a media schedule within a given period of time in a specified geographic area.

READERS PER COPY (RPC)
The number of individuals who read a single copy of a publication, since a publication in a single household or workplace may have multiple readers.

REINSTATEMENT
Once a commercial has been released and the client decides they want to use the commercial again, the commercial must then be “reinstated.” A reinstatement requires the minimum of two back holding fees, only one of which can be applied to use. However, the agents usually try to negotiate for more.

RESIDUALS
Fees paid to talent for continued use of a commercial after the session fee payment.

RETURN ON INVESTMENT (ROI)
Generally refers to advertisers’ desire to have measurable return (i.e. sales, increased safety belt usage, etc.) on the advertising funds they invested.

ROTATORS
A rotator (advertisement) covers a prescribed period of time, but does not indicate any specific programming. For example, cable TV is often sold on daypart rotators such as Monday – Friday 4 p.m.- midnight. It is not unusual to allocate a portion of your buy to a rotator. When your agency receives the affidavit, make sure it checks for an even distribution of spots over this time period. You may find your spots were clustered from 4-5 p.m. and from 11 p.m.-midnight with very few running in prime time (8 p.m.-11 p.m.) If you discover this has happened and bring it to the station’s attention you will find your next rotation distributed far more equitably.

RUN OF SITE (ROS)
When advertisers buy an ROS package on a Web site, their ads will rotate throughout different sections of the site.

RUN OF STATION (ROS)
When advertisers buy an ROS package on a TV or radio station, their spots will rotate in different dayparts throughout the day.

ROUGH CUT
A preliminary arrangement of film or tape shots that are roughly edited together, sometimes without voice-over or music for evaluation in the early stages of editing.

SESSION FEE
Initial payment to the talent for work performed for a specific purpose and period of time. It is paid by the day or by the hour, depending on the type of employment.

SHARE-OF-AUDIENCE
The percent of audiences that are tuned into a particular medium at a given time, e.g., the number of people watching television on a particular station between the hours of 8 p.m. to 11 p.m.

SHARE OF VOICE (SOV)
This tells advertisers their percent or share of the total advertising (dollars) for their particular category during a certain period of time in a given market, i.e., in the Quick-service Restaurant (QSR) category, if McDonald’s is spending $20,000 per week and the total dollars spent for all QSR’s is $100,000, then McDonald’s share of voice would be 20 percent. Also referred to as Share of Spending.

SIGNATORY
Any entity that employs union talent and has signed union letters of agreement to abide by regulations stipulated in specific union contracts.

SOCIAL MARKETING
Marketing that attempts to induce social change.

SPECIALIZED PUBLICATION
Industry-specific trade or professional publication (manufacturing, insurance, telecommunications, etc.).

SPOT
A radio or TV commercial, :10, :15, :30, or :60 seconds in length.

SPILL IN
Are people in the market you are budgeting for exposed to advertising from another market? People living in one market may receive a portion of their media delivery from another market. One of the major reasons for this not all network TV affiliates are always present in each market, and therefore people from one market need to watch the affiliate from another to view the desired programs. Hyphenated when used as a noun (the “spill-in”) or adjective (“the spill-in factor”).

SWEEP PERIODS
Usually called “sweeps” or “sweeps weeks.” The survey periods during which local audience levels are officially measured (by A.C. Nielsen or Arbitron) for TV and radio ratings.

TAG
The sponsor’s identification, and in some cases, contact information.

TAGLINE
A slogan or phrase that visually conveys the most important product, attribute, or benefit the advertiser wishes to convey. Generally, a theme to a campaign.

TARGET AUDIENCE
The population segment (demographic group) identified as the most appropriate audience for a particular advertising campaign. That is, the audience the advertiser would most like to reach with a message, the brand, product or service offered.

TESTING/RESEARCH
Results from focus groups and other market research to gauge the potential effectiveness of a message, concept or advertisement.

TRAFFIC
If you are running more than one spot and instruct the station on the correct rotation of those spots, the affidavit will let you know the exact rotation of the spots that ran.

TRAFFICKING
Coordinating and processing the delivery of creative materials to the advertising medium. This process includes printed instructions given to a medium on how creative materials should be inserted into the medium – e.g., instructions as to which commercial should air in which program at what time.

UNIVERSE
All people or target audiences who are prospects for a specific product, service, or message.

UPGRADE
When commercials air during higher rated viewing dayparts instead of during the lower-rated dayparts as purchased.

USE CYCLES
Cable Use: Any use on cable stations.
Internet Use: Commercials used on a website or on the Internet.
Network Use: Use bought on a TV network and usually edited into a network show.
Public Use: Use of a commercial in a public place, such as in a stadium, a bank, on “Diamondvision,” or in taxicabs.
Wild Spot Use: Use bought for airing in individual markets or non-interconnected stations.

USAGE FEE
The practice of assigning each city in the U.S. points abased on population. An actor’s residuals on television commercials are calculated based on the accumulation of these points in 13-week cycles.

VALUE-ADDED
Any promotion or advertising unit (program sponsorships, liners, no-charge spots, print ads in a station’s promotional materials, etc.) where the cost is more-or-less absorbed in the media buy. Value-added promotions or units are usually o.ered as a reward to good advertisers and provided at no additional cost.

VALUES AND LIFESTYLES (VALS) RESEARCH
A research method which psychologically groups consumers based on certain characteristics such as their values, lifestyles, and demographics.

WAVE SCHEDULING
An advertising strategy that consists of scheduling space in the media in intermittent periods, e.g., two weeks on, two weeks off

WEAR-OUT
The point reached when an advertising campaign loses its effectiveness due to the repeated overplay or over-saturation of the ads.

WIRE SERVICE
News stories, features, etc., sent by direct line to subscribing or member newspapers and radio and television stations. For instance, Reuters and AP (Associated Press) are major wire services.