Notes on Recency and Continuity in Media Scheduling

The third dimension of media knowledge: determining when to reach your target market. We analyze the purchase cycle of category buyers to time media.
Key takeaway from the prior video: apply the one plus media strategy, and now understand how to time it to reach category buyers.
Core principles introduced: Reasons and Continuity.
- Reasons: aim to reach people as close to purchase as possible.
- Continuity: spread the media budget over time to create routine exposure and reduce weeks of air gap.
Practical implications: balance reach, memory, and timing to optimize ad effectiveness.

Definition: reaching consumers as close to their category purchase as possible increases advertising impact.
Wood study (referenced): the closer exposure to an ad is to a purchase, the stronger the effect on sales.
Why it matters: advertising effects decay over time; memory traces diminish without recent exposure.
What this means for marketers:
- Understand your category buying cycle and any seasonality.
- Examples of seasonality:
- Chocolates peak around Halloween.
- Ice cream tends to spike in summer.
- You may scale media toward specific times of the year if patterns support it.
Practical challenge: predicting exactly when an individual will enter the market is difficult.
- Solution: maintain continuous media presence so you can “catch” buyers as they come into the category.
- Burst strategies (on-air then off-air) risk missing entrants who come into the category during off periods. Competitors’ ads may dominate during gaps.
Takeaway: continuous presence increases the odds of intercepting shoppers when they enter the market; timing of individual purchases is uncertain, so broad, ongoing reach helps.

Continuity supports memory and recency: steady exposure maintains familiarity and reduces risk of missing late entrants.
Practical guideline: aim for one plus reach rather than high frequency; do not assume more exposure per person is always better.
Conceptual metaphor: advertising is like a game of catch them when they fall — you must be on air so entrants to the category can be caught as they arrive.
Key implication: continuous presence helps keep brand memories fresh across the category’s user base.

Core finding: spreading exposures over time improves recall compared with clustering exposures in short bursts.
Example data on light TV viewers:
- 70% of light viewers in week 1 remain light viewers in week 2.
- After six weeks, only about 30% remain consistently light.
- Implication: it is not difficult to reach light viewers if advertising is spread over six weeks.
Important nuance: continuity does not mean advertising every single day; it means spacing exposures with breaks between them.
Meta-analysis evidence: from about 250 experiments, recall was systematically higher when exposures were spaced out.
- Memorability gains: spacing typically yields a 10–20% increase in memorability.
- Interpretation: long-interval spacing enhances learning and encoding in memory, whereas massed repetitions can lead to diminishing attention.
Short-term effects still exist with single exposures, but over time memory fades and competitor activity can dilute impact. Continuous presence helps counteract this.
Practical implication: advertise in a spaced pattern (e.g., weekly or biweekly) rather than a heavy burst, to maintain memory and reach.

Quote and idea from Efron: advertising needs continuity because not being there is like being out of stock.
Visual metaphor: advertising is like a product sitting on a shelf; if you’re not there, a consumer may look at a competitor.
Consequences: continuous presence keeps brand memories across the entire category user base fresh and recent.

Objective: be on air with a spread that maximizes one plus reach while minimizing frequency.
Practical scheduling guidance:
- Be on air consistently for as long as the budget allows (e.g., weekly or every other week) while avoiding long gaps.
- Aim for high cumulative reach (across the year) and as close to 100% category reach as possible by year end.
- Don’t only optimize for a single spot; consider long-term reach across channels and periods.
- Seasonality can be leveraged to align with peak sales times if applicable.
Important balance: reaching many different people (high unduplicated reach) versus repeatedly reaching the same people (high frequency).
- In practice, you want to maximize one plus reach while minimizing unnecessary frequency among already reached individuals.

Budget allocation concept: spread the annual budget across weeks so that each period adds new exposure to previously unreached people.
Strategy idea: for each week, allocate a small amount to maintain presence; even low-weight, continuous exposure builds memory over time.
Unduplicated reach focus: periodically review which people have not yet been reached and add them to the cumulative reach plan.
Cumulative reach objective: move someone from zero to one exposure, as this first exposure is the most effective step toward purchase due to Recency Effect.
Long-term goal: by the end of the year, maximize cumulative reach toward the 100% target for all categories.

The Recency Effect drives scheduling: keep a presence near the purchase point rather than relying on late-stage bursts.
Continuity and spacing improve memorability: spread exposures to enhance encoding and reduce fatigue.
Light media users are reachable with a well-spaced schedule: evidence shows that audiences perceived as light viewers can still be engaged over a multi-week window.
Avoid long gaps in advertising: continuous presence prevents competitors from capturing the shelf and keeps brand memory fresh.
One plus reach prioritizes breadth of reach over aggressive repetition: aim for broad category coverage with manageable frequency.
Seasonal and category-specific timing can boost effectiveness: align media with predictable buying patterns when applicable.
The goal is a practical balance: maximize cumulative, unduplicated reach while keeping frequency at a level that remains effective and efficient.

Recency Effect principle: ads closest to purchase have the strongest impact on sales.
Seasonal examples: chocolates around Halloween; ice cream in summer.
Continuous presence vs bursts: bursts miss entrants and allow competitor saturation during gaps.
Light TV viewers persistence over time: week 1 → week 2 retains 70%; after six weeks, ~30% remain consistently light.
Memorability gain from spacing: $$ ext{Recall}{ ext{spaced}} ext{ vs } ext{ Recall}{ ext{bunched}} ext{ with } riangle R ext{ in } [0.10, 0.20] \