Over $3 billion is spent on outdoor advertising every year in the U.S. So why is so much of it ineffective? This post provides examples and thoughts.
I read this morning that Wind Mobile – a new wireless entry in Canada – had passed the 100,000 customer mark (U.S. translation: x 10 = 1 million). I’m not surprised. The marketing has been stellar: great branding, great use of social media but particularly a strong use of out-of-home advertising.
Take a look at this example.
Simple.
Clever.
Well-branded.
It makes its point clearly: the headline is paid off by the subhead ‘No contracts’. I get it.
Now let’s compare it to another billboard where the advertiser has been disguised to protect the guilty.
What the heck is the image?
Keep in mind this board is 10X the size of the first one and you still can’t figure out what it is – much less what it’s trying to say to you.
I’ll help you out. It’s a railtrack where the railings have been redesigned to look like a purse. It’s for a transit system. Even when I tell you what it is, it’s hard to understand their point. Transit is good for shopping?…okay…
The all-too-common problem here is that it’s been designed as if it were a magazine ad and you’re relaxed in a chair with your stationary nose inches from the paper. Which is precisely where the designer was when he designed it.
Not whipping by it in motion with only seconds to get the message.
One year we had a billboard that scored in the top 10% of all billboards that year for recall. You could literally see our billboard from over a mile away from my office on the 10th floor. Now that’s a simple & powerful design.
Here’s some tips & tricks:
- Next time you’re driving around see how many billboards fail the distance test and how many leaving you staring off into the distance going huh? Which ones work and which don’t? If you’re like me you’ll see it’s almost always a few simple clear words against a strong background.
- If you want to make sure the ad being proposed to you is good get out of your chair, get outside and compare it in situ as the lawyers say.
- If you’re lazy a simpler trick is to just zoom out on the image on your computer.
Try it now with the options on your browser and these two images. For Google Chrome it’s just Ctrl+-. It’s fun.
You’ll quickly see who had the good ad and who didn’t get bang for their ad buck.
Hope this helps.
