APERTURE MARKETING

Aperture: The best place and time to reach a person in the target market group.

An aperture is the ideal moment for exposing consumers to an advertising message. It is the moment for exposure effective advertisement when interest and attention are high. Media planner is responsible from locating the aperture opportunity

Definition: Aperture is the ideal moment for exposing consumers to an advertising message. When the consumer is in the purchasing mode, when the consumer is in the information mode (the search corridor).

In either case, advertising works best when interest and attention are high. Interest and attention are high.

Even the most brilliant message will fall on deaf ears if the target is not ready to listen and in a position to act. For example, a person vaguely aware of depression might pay little attention to a TV ad prompting one to your doctor" about an anti-depression drug.

There are simply too many steps the consumer must take--from deciding to actually do something about the problem, to making the doctor's appointment, to actually visiting the doctor and asking for the prescription. Thus, the doctor's office would seem to be a better location to deliver the message.

But even a well-crafted anti-depression product ad in the doctor's waiting room may not motivate the patient to broach the subject if those patients are engaged in activities such as filling out paperwork or reading tired magazines. Ironic as it may seem, in the waiting room their minds are not focused on their health condition.

But take that message to a location only 50 feet away--to the physician's exam room--and then you've found the right moment to prompt this very personal discussion, right in the location where doctor and patient interact.

Bringing three dimensions of targeting together--the right consumer at the right time in the right place--is the discipline we like to call aperture marketing.

Aperture is a term borrowed from photography to describe the opening of a lens. In marketing, the aperture is the opening of the consumer's mind to grasp your message and take action based on that message, in the perfect moment of time captured by a well-crafted program. This is the aperture moment.

Aperture moments can vary widely according to the product, category, brand and consumer. If you identify and leverage these moments, you can assure yourself an audience that engages in and acts on the message you provide. Moreover, you've honed your medium not only to the best consumer, but the best moment, so you can afford to bring optimal resources to bear at that precise moment.

Effective aperture marketing requires, before anything else, thorough consumer research that allows the marketer to glean insights into the dimensions of time and place that make up an aperture and consumer involvement with a decision.

Without such understanding, consumer targeting becomes decidedly one dimensional, resulting in flat approaches that may not break through to the consumer, and often don't deliver results for the marketer. 

Armed with an understanding of aperture marketing, savvy marketers can directly influence targeted customers at the precise time and place that involvement and intensity with the brand are at a peak.

Ref: Dr. H. Lakdawala's Media Planning and Buying Notes