23 tasks, each one witnessed by the sources that watched the job — and behind every one, a prompt you can use tonight.
You start by checking campaign dashboards in Google Analytics or Google Looker Analytics for traffic, conversions, and any sudden drops. Morning tasks often include reviewing SEO KPIs, running a quick site health audit, and scanning paid channels like Facebook or programmatic reports.
Afternoons go to meetings: coordinating with content, design, product teams, and sometimes an ad agency to approve ad copy or creative. You’ll also run keyword research, tweak bids, or set up automated rules in marketing automation tools like Marketo or HubSpot. Expect interruptions for vendor calls or customer service escalations tied to product availability.
Start with Google Analytics (or Google Looker Analytics) and Facebook Ads manager because they show campaign performance and audience data you’ll report on daily. Learn basic Excel or Microsoft Access for data cleanup and reporting.
Next, practice HubSpot or Marketo for email and marketing automation, and get comfortable with simple JavaScript snippets for tracking tags and with CSS basics to understand on-page SEO issues. Adobe Photoshop helps when you must mock up or edit creative.
Media planners set SEO KPIs (organic traffic, keyword rankings) and SEM KPIs (cost per click, conversion rate) and tie them to the same business goals, like sales or sign-ups. Use keyword research and competitor analysis to decide which queries to bid on and which to target with content.
On-page SEO and website health audits (fixing slow pages, meta tags, structured data) lower cost per conversion for SEM because better landing pages convert more. Tools like Elasticsearch can help analyze site search and content gaps you then use in paid campaigns.
AI can speed tasks: generate ad copy drafts, summarize analytics, or suggest keyword lists. Use it to automate repetitive work (for example, generating A/B test variants or tagging) while you keep final decisions and quality checks.
Don’t rely on AI alone for strategy, contract negotiation, or policy work. Always check AI outputs against Google Analytics, HubSpot records, and real user behavior. Mask or avoid putting customer PII into generic AI tools—follow your company’s security and online transaction policies.
Salary varies by region and experience. Entry-level digital media planners in the U.S. often start in the $40,000–$55,000 range; mid-level with platform and vendor negotiation experience often reach $60,000–$85,000. Large agencies or tech companies pay more.
What changes pay: proven ROI on campaigns (lower CPA, higher ROAS), skills in analytics tools (Google Analytics, Looker), vendor negotiation experience, and managing larger ad budgets or automation systems like Marketo or HubSpot. Certifications in Google Ads and Facebook help.
A media planner creates the strategy: which channels, target audiences, KPIs, and content themes (SEO, SEM, social). They plan budgets and measure performance. A media buyer executes purchases and negotiates placements with publishers or platforms.
A marketing product manager focuses on the product’s features, pricing, and requirements with engineering and UX teams. Media planners collaborate with product managers to define ad messaging, but they don’t usually build product roadmaps or manage ERP integrations.
Data judgment: turning analytics into action. You need to look at Google Analytics, Facebook metrics, and marketing automation reports and decide what to change—pause a low-performing ad, refine keywords from competitor analysis, or push a content update after an on-page SEO audit.
That requires knowing enough about tools (HubSpot, Marketo, Elasticsearch, simple JavaScript tracking) to trust the data and enough business sense to pick which test to run next and how to negotiate with vendors or ad agencies.