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F7-10·F7 — Communications Strategy

Digital Communications in Context

The productive tension

Digitalandtraditional media as complementary, not competing

The synthesis

Digital media has genuine strengths: targeting precision, real-time optimisation, attribution, and direct response. It also has genuine weaknesses: attention quality, brand-building capacity, fraud, and viewability. The false dichotomy is "digital OR traditional." The evidence-based answer: use digital for what it does well (activation, targeting, measurement) AND traditional for what it does well (reach, attention, brand building). The medium is not the strategy. The strategy determines the medium.

Learning objectives

  • Identify digital media's genuine strengths and genuine weaknesses with evidence
  • Explain the attribution problem and its three main approaches
  • Evaluate the evidence on social media advertising for brand building vs. activation
  • Articulate the programmatic supply chain problem and its cost implications
  • Apply the evidence-based lens to media channel selection
  • Construct a media mix that uses digital and traditional channels for their respective strengths

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