5 years or so ago, I wouldn’t have believed you if you told me my career would turn into me obsessing over millions of dollars in monthly budgets across different brands.
Big ones that my mom would know, how sick is that?
I got my start in ads a few years ago at a subscription brand. There were a few different responsibilities for my big bad Marketing Assistant role, but the thing that really hooked me was the ~$10,000 a month Facebook ads budget.
I was obsessed with ads (like, freakishly obsessed). I’d work all day, come home, and put YouTube videos on about... ads. Hours and hours of research on campaign setups, creative strategy, and anything else I could find.
Looking back, that sponge period was the foundation of what made me the strategist I am today.
But it took me forever to figure out what a “Media Buyer” or “Growth Strategist” actually was, especially coming from a small town (shoutout Culpeper, VA) without many examples of it.
So, I’m going to explain what a media buyer actually does today, from my POV after managing 8-figures in ad spend.
Hopefully well enough that I have a link to send the next person who asks “what do you do?”, because MAN is it hard to describe.
Level 1: Media Buying (Running Ads)
Mind-blowing stuff for Level 1: You can’t be a media buyer… without knowing how to media buy.
There’s a lot of value (aka salaries to be collected) in knowing how ad platforms work, and how to make them do what you want.
For most DTC brands, paid media tends to live in two big “branches”: paid search and paid social.
For paid social, you’re running ads on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat and so on to show up in your customers’ timelines.
For paid search, you have your Googles and Bings of the world where you’re running campaigns largely based on what people are searching.
Most media buyers I know have a similar skillset: very strong on paid social, and a bit lighter on the search side.
You’re ready to move on to Level 2 when you can consistently operate the platforms you’re buying on with less and less human error.
Level 2: Analysis & Communication (Understanding and Explaining Results)
A good media buyer has to know how to understand and explain a few things:
What is working?
What is not?
Why? (The answer may just be a theory!)
What are we doing next?
Here’s what that could sound like:
“We launched a batch of ads on the new landing page and saw a higher ROAS than our product page. This week we’re sending more ads to that page.”
“Our hoodies campaign is outperforming the pants campaign this week, so I shifted $200/day out of pants and into the hoodies campaign.”
You can move on to Level 3 when you’re operating the machine, analyzing the data, and cooking up new tests to launch.
Level 3: Creative Strategy (Making Better Ads)
A good media buyer doesn’t have to be an A+ creative strategist, but it’s in their best interest to be at least B-level and understand “good” creative.
Every great media buyer I know knows which kind of ads, messages, and offers tend to work for the brand they’re working on.
I’ve been a terrible creative strategist myself, and struggled to scale accounts (got a lil better, thank God)
It’s literally hilarious how much easier the media buyer’s job is when the ads being sent to them convert. (Shoutout Elmo Fire Team)
It’s also the biggest adrenaline rush for lil keyboard clicking caffeine fiends like me when we take an ad from $100/day to $1k/day and beyond.
Today, media buyers have to bring ideas to the creative folks working on their account based on what’s working or what’s missing.
That can be as simple as “The new UGC video we launched is doing great, let’s get 3 new hooks for it” or “We don’t have many testimonials in any of our ads, can we get more made this week?”
When you feel like you’re one with your ad accounts, and you’re helping the creative team decide what ads to make next, you’re ready for Level 4.
Level 4: Conversion Rate Optimization (Making the Website Sell Better)
At this level, you can’t just assume the website is working well. Plus, things can always be improved, or new ideas for the site can get tested.
I think about CRO in two ways.
(1) First is a daily temp check while you analyze your campaigns.
What does conversion rate look like today vs our usual performance?
What does cost per add to cart look like?
How about cost per checkout initiated?
These three metrics alone have helped me so freakin’ much with catching a broken checkout, a sold-out product, or a landing-page error.
(2) Second is testing new offers and landing pages.
I keep an eye out for ways my clients can improve their pages, and bring them up on our weekly call to test.
OR I’ll bring a new idea to test. Here are a few examples I’ve actually suggested to clients:
A “5 Reasons Why Page” to educate people before they see the product page.
A “Buy X For $X” offer to see if we can reduce CAC/raise AOV instead of selling one product at retail price.
Adding Gifts with Purchase to increase CVR (more value = better deal = more folks wanna buy)
After a while, you start seeing patterns like “Oh, CPG Brand? We should do X, Y, and Z” which is why I consider this a later-level activity for most media buyers.
So if you’ve reached this point in your media buying career, you:
Know how to reliably launch and manage new campaigns and ads
Report like a mad scientist and find new things to test
Have a solid grasp on the creative workflow of the brand(s) you work with
Have your finger on the pulse of the pages you’re running traffic to
And if all of the above is checked, you’re ready for Level 5.
Level 5: Growth Strategy / Business Economics (Making the Business Math Work)
Level 5 is when you start to look at the whole business, instead of just zooming into ad accounts.
In my day-to-day now, I think more and more about bigger business questions for my clients like:
Can we pay more for a new customer now that more of them are coming back for a second order?
If we spend $20k on this offer next month, how much revenue can we expect from the customers we get over the next few months compared to our other offers?
Where should our next dollar of paid media spend go?
Is paid media even the thing that’s holding back growth right now?
And above all:
I spend time asking if there’s anything I can do or suggest that will put more money in my clients’ bank accounts, rather than solely reacting to the data in their ad accounts.
At this stage, media buying becomes more about moving money and resources to the right places, instead of just changing settings changes and tweaking campaigns. (Even though those are always important!)
The Future of Media Buying
Media buyers are very much a weird mix of quarterback and finance manager at a high level.
I can see a future where a great media buyer can handle much more of the five levels we’ve yapped through today, mostly because of AI.
What happens when I can analyze data faster than ever before, and can do whatever needs to happen in a few prompts?
That could make me 10x more efficient, produce 10x more value for my clients, all while having 10x the fun doing it like Iron Man and Jarvis.
Now, you know what a media buyer does.
I wrote this post for three purposes:
Selfishly, as I said earlier, to answer the question “what do you do?”
As a resource for the young buyers that hit me up for advice. If you know one, send them this!
If you’re hiring a media buyer, set your expectations based on this. You might only need a Level 2 media buyer right now, or you might need a Level 5. It just depends on how matur your brand is. (I’ll let you in on a secret: the higher the level, the more expensive they will be.)
Leave a comment if you have any questions or feedback if I missed anything, thanks for reading!
Peace and Love,
Travis
In your opinion which is more effective at earning new customers paid search or paid socials? Also, is it possible that a good ad campaign can create buyers for a mediocre product? Or is product always king?