Outdoor and Billboard Advertising in Atlanta

Outdoor advertising, often called out-of-home, covers any paid message a person meets away from home. Billboards are the most familiar format, but they are one of many. Static boards hold a printed or painted message in one place. Digital boards display several advertisers in rotation and can change copy quickly. Around them sit transit shelters, bus and vehicle displays, benches, posters, wall murals and street-level screens in public places.

The common thread is that the audience is defined by where people are, not by what they chose to watch or read. That makes outdoor a medium for broad reach, repetition and reminders, and for pointing people toward a physical location. It is rarely the right place for a long explanation, and it is seldom asked to work alone. In a metro area such as Atlanta, where many people travel by road, the choices are many, which makes the selection process more important. For background on the medium's role, see why outdoor advertising still works. Related articles on outdoor and media buying are collected under media and outdoor advertising on the blog.

Outdoor and billboard advertising is part of what Kirk Donovan Enterprises offers businesses in the Atlanta area.

With outdoor advertising, the location is the media buy. A board on a road your customers never use is worth little no matter how large or well designed it is, and a modest display on the route they take every morning may be worth a great deal. The question worth asking is who is in the passing vehicles, which direction they are heading and what they are likely to be thinking about at that point, not only how many vehicles there are.

Direction matters. A board that faces drivers heading toward your business can serve as a final reminder or a directional cue, while one facing the other way catches people who have just left. Distance, speed and sight lines matter as well. Visit the site at the time of day your customers pass, look at what competes for attention nearby, and check how the board looks at night. Outdoor companies supply estimates of passing traffic, and those counts are worth reading as estimates of vehicles, not as numbers of people who read the message.

Static boards give a business constant presence in one place for the length of its posting. The message is always there, which suits a name or a direction that benefits from steady repetition. Production is planned ahead, because the artwork must be printed and installed before the posting begins.

Digital boards work differently. Several advertisers share a rotation, so a message appears for a few seconds in each cycle instead of being permanently visible. In exchange, copy can change by day, by time or by event, which suits a timely offer, a changing special or a message that only matters at certain hours. Artwork for a digital board has to be built for a short display time, and complicated animation usually defeats its purpose. Neither format wins in all situations. The decision turns on whether the message needs to be steady and always there or flexible and timely.

Outdoor planning is a balance between concentration and coverage. A few boards along the routes your customers use every day build familiarity through repetition, since the same drivers pass them again and again. A wider spread of locations reaches more different people, but each of them sees the message less often. A business with one location usually gains more from boards on the roads that lead to it than from scattered boards across a metro area. A business serving a wide territory has a different problem, and may need to choose its main corridors first and expand later.

Timing matters as well. A posting that begins just before a season, an opening or a sale gives the message time to be noticed before the moment arrives. Longer postings build recognition, while shorter ones suit an event with a fixed date. Whatever the length, allow time before the start for design, approval, printing and installation.

An outdoor message is read by people who are moving and looking at something else. It has seconds to be seen, understood and remembered, which leaves room for very little. Strong outdoor design usually follows a few plain rules.

• Use as few words as possible, and let one idea carry the board.
• Make the business name large, since a message that is not attributed helps no one.
• Choose high contrast between letters and background, and avoid thin or decorative lettering.
• Use one strong image, or none at all.
• Add a directional cue only when it helps, such as an exit reference or an arrow.
• Skip long web addresses and anything that must be copied down.

A useful test is to shrink the artwork to the size of a phone screen and look at it from arm's length. If the message is not clear at a glance, it will not survive a passing car. The discipline of outdoor copy is the discipline of cutting rhetoric, and the book AdSense2: The Digital Revolution, written by Kirk Donovan, deals with the same problem. It approaches advertising as a behavioral scientist would, and it teaches readers to see past advertising rhetoric and draw the customers a business needs. A billboard leaves no room for anything else. You can read about Kirk's books on the training page.

Outdoor space is sold by media companies that own or manage the structures, and availability varies by location and by time of year. Contracts are commonly sold in blocks of weeks or months, with posting dates fixed in advance and production deadlines to meet beforehand. Prices are negotiable, and what is worth negotiating goes beyond the rate: the specific location, the length of the posting and, for digital boards, how often the message appears in the rotation.

A careful buyer asks a few things before agreeing to a purchase. Ask which exact face of the structure is being sold, what the sight lines look like, what nearby displays compete for attention and whether the board is lit at night. Ask for proof of posting, which is usually a photograph of the finished installation, so you know the copy went up correctly and on time. Confirm any content rules and approval steps before the artwork is produced, because the requirements vary by location and by vendor. A vendor's job is to fill available space, so comparing several options, which is much of what media buying involves, protects against choosing a board because it is open rather than because it fits.

Outdoor rarely produces a clean count of responses, so measurement means collecting several kinds of evidence. Ask new customers whether they saw the board. Compare calls, walk-in traffic or website visits across the posting period with the weeks before. A phrase or short message that customers can mention gives a more direct signal.

Be honest about the limits. Seasons, promotions and other media all move the same numbers, and outdoor often works by building familiarity that pays off in combination with other channels. Treat the findings as evidence rather than proof, and review them alongside everything else running at the same time. The broader measurement picture is covered under marketing analytics.

Outdoor is strongest as part of a set. Radio can introduce a name and an idea, television can show the picture behind it, and an outdoor board can repeat the same phrase near the place where people decide. When the wording matches across media, each placement strengthens the others. Online listings and a clear website catch the people who look the business up after passing a board.

• Which roads, directions and times of day matter most for your customers?
• What single thing should a driver do after reading the board?
• Will the message still make sense in a glance, whatever the light?
• Who produces the artwork, and what are the deadlines for approval and installation?
• How will you tell whether the board played a part in the responses you receive?
• What happens to your posting if something goes wrong with the structure or the lighting?

• Too many words. If a driver cannot read it in a glance, it will not be read.
• Choosing by price alone. A low rate on a board facing the wrong traffic is no bargain.
• Low contrast and fussy type. Beautiful artwork that cannot be read from a distance fails.
• Several calls to action. One action per board is the limit.
• Forgetting night and weather. Visibility changes with lighting and conditions.
• Missing production lead time. Artwork that arrives late shortens the posting.
• Expecting instant response. Outdoor builds familiarity over repeated passes.
• No plan for the response. A board that sends people to an unprepared website or phone line wastes the exposure.