Overlooked Media? The Inside Scoop on Outdoor Ads

Have you considered outdoor advertising in your marketing mix?

Too often, outdoor is passed over or is, at best, an afterthought to other more popular forms of advertising media. But that shouldn’t be, because outdoor offers a dramatic and effective presentation that can help irrigation professionals project a strong image.

Outdoor billboards are seen all day, every day. They can’t be turned off like TV or radio, or thrown away like print materials. Outdoor will be there continuously, each and every time a commuter passes by that site in their vehicle.

Make a Meal of Leftovers

Billboard companies typically want customers to sign contracts that commit you to a particular board location for a set length of time, often 6 months or a year. But a more advantageous approach is to seek out their odds and ends around town and sign up to take the “leftovers” that they haven’t sold.

You can often get these currently unsold boards with a 30-day contract. But, many times there is no one waiting in line to take over the board and put up their ad after your contract expires. When that happens, the billboard company will usually leave your ad up because it is cheaper to do that than to paint over the board until a new customer is found. So, you can often get well more than a month’s worth of exposure out of your 30 days paid.

Keep the Message Short

Unless a board is in an area where traffic crawls at a snail’s pace and motorists have time to study everything around them as they sit and wait, your audience is going to have only a few seconds to see your sign and read its message.

That said, make sure that what you want to say is simple and easy to view. Your logo and/or name is most important – you want them to know whose ad it is, right? If you want them to know your location, make sure that is easy to understand. “Smith Landscape, Serving the Westside of the Valley” says it all. Short and to the point.

Lettering needs to be clear and easy to read – capitalize first letters and lower case the rest. Provide adequate spacing between letters and words, since print has a tendency to run together from a distance. Colors of type and background should contrast for best readability.

Get the Most out of Your Messages

If you have the opportunity to use multiple boards, consider where they will be placed to determine how best to maximize their message potential. If the boards are on opposite ends of town or opposite sides of the highway, use the same message.

However, if you can get two boards on the same stretch of road, you can let them work together…perhaps using the first as a “teaser” for the second. Let the message you have on the first board leave them wondering about something that is “paid off” with the message on the follow-up board.

If you do enter into a long-term contract, consider changing your message several times throughout the year. Companies typically charge for the cost of having your boards changed, but perhaps you can negotiate some free or reduced rate re-working of your boards in exchange for extending the contract.

If you have the ability to change your messages in a cost-effective manner, you’ll be able to update your board seasonally. As an example, you can advertise your start-up services as spring approaches and your winterization services in the fall.

More than Billboards

In addition to billboards, outdoor advertising is also available on a smaller scale. Telephone booths, bus shelters, sidewalk ads, shopping mall kiosks and bus side panels are just some of the many places where ads have proliferated.

These types of media have helped advertisers target areas once unreachable by standard outdoor boards. In markets where billboards have been either outlawed or severely limited, these smaller options have blossomed to fill that void.

Costs are going to vary based upon the part of the country you are in, the number of billboards or sites (both total and available) in your area, and the desirability of the location you are seeking. But the good news is that, as a Hunter Preferred Contractor, you can pay for the cost of outdoor ads with Program Points, as these fall in the category of advertising for your business. Thus, you can use your “Business Development Funds” to cover your expenses.