Solving the Media Budget Puzzle: Piecing Together Traditional and Digital Placements

So, your media budget for 2026 is approved, and now comes the fun part – deciding how to spend it.

For many home-based care providers, figuring out how to split their media dollars between traditional and digital placements can feel like tackling a giant puzzle. You know you need to reach caregivers, referral partners, patients and your broader community. But knowing where to show up and why can quickly turn into a 1000-piece headache you swore you’d finish in a weekend, only to find it sitting on your coffee table for three weeks.

As any puzzle lover like me will tell you – when you don’t know where to start, it’s best to find the framing pieces and build the border.

Border Pieces: Define Your Goals and Audiences

Before you start choosing placements or reviewing rates, outline the goals your media placements should accomplish. These goals frame the entire picture.

If your goal is broad awareness …

Maybe you’ve recently rebranded, are new to the area, or are planning to open a new facility or location. You need to get your name out there and educate the broader community. Broad awareness and education are where traditional media shines. Billboards, radio, print, and cable or broadcast TV build community-level recognition. With traditional media, you’ll have some “audience bleed,” which means that not everyone who sees your ad is in your ideal audience. However, you gain substantial reach and name recognition among the general public.

If you’re worried about audience bleed, you can refine traditional media by using publications trusted by older adults, choosing senior-focused magazines, or selecting billboard locations near medical facilities and high-referral areas.

If your goal is growth and reaching decision makers …

Targeting key audiences to drive growth is best achieved through digital media placements. Digital ads allow you to target family caregivers, healthcare decision makers or even prospective employees for recruitment needs. Tactics like online ads, paid social, video pre-roll and streaming ads will enable hyper-targeting based on demographics, caregiver behaviors, job titles and ZIP codes. Digital media will provide performance metrics that let you see real-time audience behavior and engagement to inform adjustments across your campaigns.

Tip #1: Avoid the 50/50 Split Mistake

Many people mistakenly assume they should split their media budget evenly: 50% traditional and 50% digital. While it sounds balanced on paper, in practice, it can weaken your media goals.

Small nuances can dramatically impact what “balance” should look like for your organization, such as designated market area (DMA) costs affecting broadcast TV rates, traffic counts influencing billboard pricing, or the number and types of campaigns and their intended audiences. What makes the communities you serve unique is what will also make your media split customized to your organization.

Your budget should reflect your strategy and goals, not a perfect ratio. The strongest media plans blend the strengths of traditional and digital without overweighting any one channel. Traditional helps you show up broadly. Digital enables you to reach your highest-priority audiences. Suppose you don’t have the budget to run both types of media year-round. In most cases, a digital-forward plan with only a few small, strategic traditional placements (like a monthly local print ad or a small radio/TV flight around the holidays) can still be highly effective.

Tip #2: Don’t Forget About Community Presence

Face-to-face conversations are incredibly valuable in home-based care marketing. For example, senior expos can help educate potential patients and caregivers. Local events reinforce your role as a trusted, community-based provider. A “Top Doctor” community event can place your team alongside referral partners. Since these opportunities don’t always appear during annual planning, keep a small portion of your budget flexible. For small providers, this may be $2K to $5K. For mid-size providers, $5K to $10K may be more appropriate. Flexibility allows you to say “yes” when the right opportunity arises.

Dump Out the Remaining Puzzle Pieces: Do Your Market Homework

Once your goals are clear, start gathering information. Think of this as shaking out the remaining puzzle pieces and sorting by color – except you’re sorting by placements, channels and data-driven decisions.

Identify where your DMA falls and how it impacts rates, what types of campaigns you’re running, whether you have the creative bandwidth to support all placements, where your audiences actually consume media, where competitors are showing up, and which local vendor relationships you want to maintain. This is where data becomes essential.

Seek out audience insights to illuminate where your communities spend their time, what messages move them, and which channels they trust. You can use national data online to inform these decisions, ask your teams, or use professional media buyers.

If you’re worried about any of your market puzzle pieces falling to the floor and getting lost, Transcend’s TRi™ Reports include audience insights that provide clarity around consumption habits, motivators, values and messaging.

Building the Picture: Pull Rates and Build Your Flight Plan

Once you’ve built the border and sorted your puzzle pieces, you’re ready to assemble your plan. You can begin collecting TV/radio rates and reach, vendor proposals, outdoor traffic counts and availability, and digital impression estimates across the tactics you’re considering.

Then build out your flight plan. Map when tactics will run, their costs, the balance between traditional and digital, and identify any coverage gaps. As the picture starts to form, it becomes easier to narrow down and see what placements fit together.

Media planning doesn’t have to feel like a guessing game. If you have the right strategy and goals, the correct data, and a blend of digital and traditional media placements, your media plan can come together with clarity and intention. Need a puzzle partner? If you’re looking for a strategic guide to help you assemble the pieces, email us at [email protected] to learn how we can help.