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From its beginnings in the late 1960's, account planning has developed into a job function which exists in the majority of significant London advertising agencies. The discipline has been adopted by some agencies outside London and, more recently, has been transplanted from the U.K. to advertising agencies in other countries.

The purpose of this booklet is to describe briefly the role of account planning as practised in advertising agencies in the U.K.. In the various sections we attempt to answer some of the most frequently asked questions about account planning, or "Planning" to which it is commonly abbreviated.

1. Introducing the Account Planner

When asked at a party what he/she does in an advertising agency, the account planner would probably say, "I'm the consumer's representative". In a nutshell the planner ensures that an understanding of consumer attitudes and reactions is brought to bear at every stage of advertising development. This means that the planner is a fully integrated member of the account team working on a continuously involved basis; bringing a consumer perspective to strategy development, creative development, pre-testing of ads. and tracking of the brand's progress.

Why do ad agencies have planners?

First, the people who market products and create ads. are not necessarily representative of the people at whom those products and ads. are aimed. Moreover, the consumer doesn't always take out what the advertiser is trying to put across. Planners are there to keep in touch with consumers.

Then, every agency needs a disciplined system for devising advertising strategy and producing creative work that will be effective in the market place. The planner uses market and research data to guide this process.

Finally, from a creative point of view, there is a suspicion that research which plays back the consumer's innate conservatism will stifle anything unconventional. The planner's role in this situation is to bring skilful and sensitive interpretation of research and to spot openings for development.

2. Account Planning in the UK: How it evolved. What it has achieved.

Today most agencies have account planners. It would be fair to say that the way planning works varies from agency to agency, and even within an agency, from planner to planner. So much depends on the particular environment and the skills of the individuals concerned.

The initial concept was invented in 1965 by the late Stanley Pollitt. He felt that, as more data was becoming available to agencies, it was being used incompetently or expediently by account managers. This came about largely because the traditional researcher was a backroom guru who wasn't involved in major decisions. So he suggested that a specially trained researcher should work with the account manager as an equal partner. In 1968 the J. Walter Thompson agency established a new department called 'Account Planning'. Also in 1968, when the Boasse Massimi Pollitt agency was formed, Stanley Pollitt introduced his concept there, slightly revised.

JWT and BMP were therefore founders of account planning and, although their basic principles were similar, their methods of working differed. Today most planners will have been trained in one or the other schools of planning, but the differences in working have become increasingly blurred as established, traditionally-structured agencies have found ways of taking planners on board.

It is interesting to trace the changes that have taken place in the marketing and advertising environment which have boosted the considerable growth of planning in agencies.

(i) Client's expectations from their agency changed

In the 1950's, advertising agencies were the main pioneers for market research programmes. The '60's brought dramatic changes. More and more clients were restructured along marketing lines, and part of this was to have their own market research departments. They looked to agencies for specialist research advice on advertising matters.

Agencies therefore had to concentrate more specifically on the professional development of ads.. So the effect of increased client sophistication was:

decreased need for agency as market consultant

increased demand for distinctive agency discipline

In a sense therefore, planning became to advertising in agencies what marketing became to sales in the client companies. The planner was charged with ensuring that all the data relevant to key advertising decisions should be properly analysed, complemented with new research,and brought to bear on judgements of the creative strategy and appraisal of the ads.. Her role as an active part of the team, involved with the central issues of strategy and creative development, became a crucial one in the agency's learning process.

(ii) Consumer attitudes were constantly changing

Technology, work ethics, role of women in society, leisure, lifestyle, social values, catering patterns, racial issues, attitudes to fitness and health and general mood of the times were all constantly changing.

Creative people needed to keep in touch. Monitoring cultural and social trends became a specialist task, and the findings needed to be fed in at an early stage of developing new brands as well as new advertisements.

(iii) Brand images became more important

Social anthropologists say that brands are like people: there is a practical side and an emotional side bringing out personality, images and feelings.

All consumer behaviour is an expressive gesture of some sort, and brand symbolism is a special form of language. Whether advertising creates or reflects the images doesn't matter; what is important is that the meaning, sometimes the myth and mystique, behind the brand is understood. To do this, planners have resorted to inventive ways of eliciting consumer attitudes in order to understand the richness of a brand, and how consumers relate to it.

Also, as markets became more competitive, brands had to become more sophisticated. Threats like new technology, product parity and own-label brands put more pressure on premium brands to differentiate themselves.

The growth of the lager market in the U.K. is a classic example of the development of brand identities. And planning had its part to play.

(iv) The advertising environment has changed

Advertising is a means of contributing meaning and values that are necessary and useful to people in structuring their lives, their social relationships and their rituals. There is no doubt that consumers are now more knowledgeable about advertising and more interested in it than ever before. U.K. consumers will typically say that, compared to the past, ads. these days are: "more entertaining, more cleverly devised, more original, less insulting, less patronising and more imaginative."

It is interesting to contrast public attitude to advertising in the U.K., where there is a high degree of approval of and liking for it, with the situation in the U.S., where the majority feel advertising insults the intelligence of the average consumer. Not only are people in the U.K. enjoying advertising more, they are becoming more skilled at judging it. In qualitative group discussions when consumers like a piece of advertising, they have to be restrained from casting and directing the commercial.

In relation to advertising, consumers are not learning machines - despite what some (usually American) hard-sell advertisers might think. People have come a long way since Vance Packard's "Hidden Persuaders" and Rosser Reeves' "USP". It is now more a question of what people do with advertising, interacting with it and producing an outcome that is often greater than the sum of the elements put in. It needs an expert to understand the consumer relationship to advertising.

It follows therefore that the devices used for measuring advertising effects have to be sensitive to these changes. General attitudinal models and mechanistic research measures have no role to play in modern advertising culture because they're too blunt an instrument. A famous U.K. researcher likened the housewife in the supermarket to the driver of a motor car, making hundreds of decisions (mostly sub-conscious) in response to various triggers. Qualitative research has taken on greater significance in understanding the way advertising works on consumers. The planner ensures that all interpretations are sound and relevant.

So much for evolution, but what has planning achieved?

In assessing what account planning has achieved in the U.K. agencies, the following judgements can be made:

Having a planner on an account has led to more integration within the agency and better teamwork in trying to combine the needs of the client, the demands of the market, and the expectations of the consumer.

The planner has brought an added dimension of understanding to the process of developing ads. by stimulating discussion about: purchasing decisions, the brand-consumer relationship and how the advertising is working in specific circumstances.

Helping to win new business: by instilling confidence in the prospective client as a result of a comprehensive and disciplined approach.

Defining more tightly-focussed strategies: the result of an enhanced understanding of the consumer.

Stimulating creative development: the result of more productive contact between the creative department and the consumer.

Helping to sell the ads: by explaining the way they work.

The quality and creativity of advertising in the U.K. has grown in line with account planning, thus proving that the function has helped, rather than hindered this trend.

3. The role of Account Planning

When one tries to define what an Account Planner does, it usually results in responses like: "I thought Researchers did that" or "I thought Account Managers did that". It is much easier to define the role of planning in an agency, and to say that the planner ensures that it takes place.

Relationships within the agency

Producing ads is essentially a team effort, and the way the planner relates to the account director on the one hand and the creative team on the other hand, is worth explaining.

The planner works alongside the account director/manager. While each person has his own area of expertise and experience, there is a substantial area of overlap where the two, working together, can create something where the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. Leadership and co-ordination are the primary skills for account management They still orchestrate the whole advertising development process, and have ultimate responsibility for the strategy and creative brief. But now they have skilled help from the planner, who brings greater understanding of the consumer relationship and more analytical depth to the proceedings. The relationship between planner and account director is one of equal status, with merit determined by the ability to make a useful contribution.

What about the planner's relationship with the creative team?

Creative people want a simple, single-minded directional brief, not a bland statement. The best planners are pithy.

Most good creative teams want to know the consumer beyond a mere demographic definition. They want to know about the kind of attitudes held - to the product category, to the brand, to advertising in this market. They want to know what the consumer wants, rather than what the client wants. The good planner brings this sharply into focus - like an expressive photograph.

The planner can provide a better service in this context than the account director, who is less skilled at originating and interpreting research; or the independent research supplier who lacks an intimate knowledge of the account and the kind of advertising the agency stands for. Too much objectivity in advertising research is not conductive to the early stage of creative development which requires sympathetic handling. A mechanistic approach to research can lead to ads which have impeccable relevance but no originality or impact.

However the positive and constructive use of diagnostic research in establishing a dialogue between the creative team and the consumer is one of the most valuable contributions a planner can make to the process of producing ads. Their sympathy with the creative process can stimulate and discipline creative thinking; their research skill can interpret consumer response with sensitivity and foresight.

4. Defining the Account Planner's Job

A typical planning cycle will consist of:

*studying the brief from the client and analysing existing data, which might consist of: published market reports, distribution data like Nielsen, usage and attitude surveys, awareness tracking studies, advertising research etc.

* commissioning more research if necessary in order to define the strategy. There might be several strategic options open for development which concept research can help to finalise.

*briefing the creative team for the task, having had the client's input and agreed the strategic course for the brand.

*commissioning/doing diagnostic research on initial creative ideas, to determine what effect the advertising is having on attitudes to the brand, and how individual elements are working.

*discussing implications with the creative team in terms of how any weak aspects in communication or desired effect can be dealt with.

*helping to rationalise the thinking behind the advertising so that the client will approve the work.

*supervising any pre-testing of the ads. to ensure that branding and message recall are at satisfactory levels.

*tracking the results of the advertising in terms of sales, awareness and image so that modifications can be made to subsequent campaigns.

In all these stages the planner will work with other members of the agency team, the client's research department and research suppliers.

The best way to define the job is as follows:

(1) In an overall sense:

The planner will be concerned with the relevance of the advertising to the target audience, and its effectiveness in the market.

This is done by bringing a consumer perspective to the advertising in order that the brand and the consumer are drawn together.

Client says : "My Product".

Account Director says : "My Client".

Creative Director says : "My Ad".

Planner says : "My Consumer".

The planner implements a disciplined and systematic approach to the creation of ads.

(2) In the Strategy Development Stage:

The planner will collect and synthesise data to guide strategic development. This is done by understanding attitudes and behaviour of people; and gaining insight into the consumer relationship with the brand and the advertising. Then the planner will define the positioning and relevant proposition that encapsulates the rational and emotional appeals of the brand.

(3) In the Creative Development Stage:

The planner will commission diagnostic research on rough ads to check whether the advertising is achieving the desired responses. Feedback will be gained on how the ad is working and what effect it is having. Ad responses will be interpreted with sensitivity in order to stimulate the creative process further.

(4) In the Approval Stage:

Bold or original work, that goes against conventions, sometimes has a rough ride. Objective justification can help to win the case. The planner will help to provide reassurance on how and why the particular piece of advertising will work for the brand.

(5) In the Post-Campaign Stage:

The planner will commission and use research to track the progress of the brand. Questions that need to be answered are:

*Is the strategy working?

*Are the objectives being met?

*Do the ads need developing?

*How should they be developed?

5. What Makes A Good Planner?

*Having a passion for advertising and a sensitivity to the creative process.

*Having an intuitive curiosity about consumers, and an understanding of human relationships.

*Being an able and inspiring communicator.

*Being skilled at using marketing and research data.

*Being numerate and imaginative in order to translate research results into advertising action.

*Having credibility and authority in the context of research and advertising judgements.

*Having a strategic and visionary mind to create openings after brilliant detective work.

*Having a desire to be continuously involved as an integrated member of the account team.

*Maintaining a balance between theory and pragmatism concerning how ads work.

6. In Conclusion

Account Planning is not an end in itself. Outstanding ads were and are done without it! Hopefully account planning adds context, perspective, guidance and opinion to advertising development. Consequently the chances of getting the advertising right first time are increased. However in the advertising world no one has monopoly over wisdom or ideas; an agency consists of a group of people with different skills, abilities, experience and personalities trying very hard to get the best possible advertising for their clients. Account Planning is central to long-term brand building and business success. If the goal is to produce better, more effective advertising, then the combination of imaginative planning and creative excellence is the means of achieving this. The planner ensures that the advertising works in a relevant and distinctive way.