Seasonal and Campaign Marketing Planning
Campaign planning organises marketing activity around key commercial moments and brand objectives. Effective campaign planning aligns creative, content, paid media, email, and social into coordinated executions with clear objectives, budgets, and measurement. Annual planning locks in major campaigns; ongoing agility allows response to market events and opportunities.
Annual Planning Framework
- Commercial calendar: map key trading periods (Black Friday, Christmas, Valentine's Day, back-to-school, etc.) and brand-specific events
- Campaign hierarchy: hero campaigns (major brand investment, 2-3 per year) → seasonal activations (mid-size campaigns) → always-on activity (continuous performance marketing)
- Budget allocation: split budget across campaign tiers, channels, and measurement objectives. Reserve contingency for reactive spend.
Campaign Brief
Each campaign should have a clear brief: business objective, campaign objective, target audience, key message, required assets, channel plan, budget, timeline, and success metrics. A good brief aligns teams and prevents scope creep. Define both input metrics (spend, impressions) and output metrics (conversions, revenue, brand uplift).