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They’ve been around for so long and continue to be something we see frequently. So why are billboards so effective? Even though many consider billboards to be antiquated, they still comprise a significant amount of advertiser spending.

Billboards may be antiquated, but they are undeniably effective. Due to their effectiveness, a good billboard is an invaluable piece of advertising that can easily lead to greater brand awareness, greater sales, and greater profit.

People Spend A Lot Of Time On The Road

The total population of Puerto Rico is 3.2-million people. For every 1,000 people, in Puerto Rico, 614 people own and drive a car. There are a lot of drivers in Puerto Rico, and people in Puerto Rico spend a lot of time on the road. Since there are so many drivers in Puerto Rico, it’s very easy for billboards to be noticed and seen.

You Can Place A Billboard In Areas With Heavy Traffic

The San Juan area, in Puerto Rico, is exceptionally busy. The busiest highway in San Juan sees an average of 286,600 people driving across it every single day. That is a lot of people, many of whom are spending large amounts of time on the road, waiting for the traffic to lessen so they can get to wherever they need to be.

Since billboards are, more often than not, large advertising displays that are placed along roads, they can be set up in areas like San Juan. By being set up within those areas, you are able to convey what you offer to many, many people. So consider the number of eyes on billboards when you ask yourself, “Why are billboards so effective?”

A Good Billboard Is Very Memorable

A billboard, if it is well-designed, can be extremely memorable.

So memorable, in fact, that it not only spreads awareness of your brand and what you are offering but inspires the person who noticed the billboard to follow up and see what you offer.

A Good Billboard Conveys What You Offer In A Compelling Manner

A billboard, if it is well-designed, conveys exactly what you offer in a manner that is genuinely memorable and compelling.

Through the use of images and words – among others, if you’re using a digital billboard – you are able to create unique advertisements that capture people’s attention, showing them what you offer while also entertaining them with the advertisement’s design.

People Will See Your Billboard More Than Once

Just about everyone has a familiar series of routes that they take. Each one of these routes makes it easy for people to get to work, school, home; and anywhere else that they need to go. By placing a billboard on a popular route, it is very likely that those same people will see and engage with your billboard many, many times.

As science has shown, if someone sees a particular advertisement over and over, it will become internalized and associated with a particular service or idea. Billboards allow your brand and services to be noticed and internalized by the people driving by them, allowing more and more people to know what you do and to follow up on what it is that you offer.

People Enjoy Looking At Billboards

Just over a decade ago, a study known as the “Arbitron National In-Car Study” was conducted. One of the most interesting pieces of information this study uncovered was that around 71% of drivers actively look at and engage with the billboards that they see while driving. Billboards break up the monotony of driving – especially long drives – and give people something nice to see and think about.

You Can Use A Billboard To Advertise Anything

As a form of advertising, billboards are extremely versatile. Much of this versatility comes down to the medium itself, which can make use of unique colors, drawings, words, shapes, and figures; among a plethora of other elements.

Since billboards can make use of those elements, billboards can be used to advertise just about anything. This means that no matter what you offer, you can use a billboard to reach large numbers of people with ease. But, of course, for this billboard to be successful, it must be well-designed and it must make use of an effective billboard marketing strategy.

You Can Place A Billboard Just About Anywhere

Most people, when they think of billboards, think of large, colorful boards that are on the side of a road. That is, generally speaking, quite accurate. But, the billboard medium is so varied and diverse that you are able to not only advertise anything, but you can place a billboard just about anywhere.

Moving billboards and digital billboards are two examples of the versatility that billboards offer.

A moving billboard is a billboard that, more often than not, sits on a vehicle. As the vehicle drives by, people see the billboard and notice who you are and what you offer.
A digital billboard is a billboard that makes use of a digital screen to convey messages in a unique and dynamic way. Digital billboards come in all sorts of shapes and sizes, allowing them to be placed just about anywhere.

Billboards Can Be Very Dynamic

Why are billboards so effective? Because they’re ever-changing.

Digital billboards are only becoming more and more popular. It isn’t difficult to see why this is the case, since digital billboards allow for incredibly versatile and dynamic advertisements to be created with the kind of ease and efficiency that traditional billboards simply don’t allow for.

For many advertisers, one of the most unique benefits that digital billboards offer is their inherently dynamic nature. Digital billboards can be set up to display jall kinds of unique and dynamic advertisements that make use of videos, various sounds and musical compositions, animations; and a wide variety of other extremely unique elements. Each one of these elements allows for dynamic advertisements that are genuinely distinctive and incredibly memorable.

You Can Change A Billboard Quickly And Easily

A traditional billboard is, essentially, completely static. You can change a traditional billboard, but doing so is expensive and labor-intensive. Because of this, when you set up a billboard with a particular advertisement, it’s likely that advertisement will remain there for as long as you are using the billboard.

Traditional billboards aren’t the only billboards that you can use, though. More and more advertisers are using digital billboards, which can be changed very quickly. If a particular message isn’t working, you can change the message that’s being displayed with the click of a few buttons.

Because of this, digital billboards make it easy for you to respond to what isn’t working, and what is, with the same ease that internet advertising – to name one example – allows for.

Why are billboards so effective? Simply put, they’re large and attractive, they’re in high-traffic areas, and they’re effective.

You’re being watched…we all know that the day would come that robots would invade our world. However, it looks like science fiction was being overly dramatic in a lot of horror stories; they never mentioned how profitable the robots would be.

That’s right – we live in a world where billboards are thinking. They can read you, decide what you’re thinking, and give you the best possible ad. From there, all you can do is grab your credit card. Billboards have been around for a long time, but as technology continues to improve, billboards do, too. With the introduction of augmented reality (AR) and artificial intelligence (AI), we’re starting to see more and more smart billboards.

Did you know this was an option for your business?

What is a Smart Billboard?

Billboards were installed in London as a test of the technology to see if it was possible for a computer to successfully design the perfect ad – on its own. They had a digital display, and they had a camera inside to read the people looking at them. The first step was to decide what sort of mood the person was in. Then, depending on whether the viewer was happy, sad, or neutral, it would display a different version of the ad. Afterward, it analyzed the responses to measure how successful the ad was. Finally, it repeated the good ads and trashed the bad ones.

Nowadays, we all own some piece of technology that is labeled, “smart.” We enjoy smart technology in things like:

Smartphones
Smart TVs
Smartwatches
Vacuums
Cars
Smart glasses (yes, there are really smart glasses now)

And, to an extent, we’ve already been exposed to smart advertising – ads that change and optimize themselves over time. You will see these types of ads when you search for a term on Google, when you visit a website and then exit out, and when you’re on social media. Smart advertising changes depending on how they perform with different audiences that they interact with. What’s most recent, though, is how this technology has made its way to the billboard – smart billboards.

Advertising, as it’s always been, is designed to capture your attention and inspire some sort of action. That hasn’t changed. What has changed is how technology has evolved from traditional billboards – and even digital billboards, for that matter. It’s not as easy to ignore a smart billboard that learns about you over time and therefore adjusts its message.

The Technology Inside

You might imagine that they developed some sort of incredibly advanced technology to make this happen, but that actually wasn’t the case. This was put together by the M&C Saatchi Advertising Agency, and they were working with Clear Channel and Posterscope to make it happen. The billboards just had a Microsoft Kinect camera inside, so they were really just using technology that had already been developed for playing video games. Kinect is able to read people’s reactions, so it gets the job done.

How AI and AR Are Changing Billboards

Artificial Intelligence has made its way into billboards, which has obviously sparked conversation around the brands using this technology in their advertising. Here are just a few ways that Artificial Intelligence is changing the way brands do advertising (specifically on billboards):

Object recognition – through AI cameras and sensors, billboards can now detect facial features. This helps them decide whether they think people who are passing the smart billboard are happy or sad. It can determine a certain demographic, as well, telling the difference between ages and genders – and serving relevant ads in response.
Statistics/data – AI cameras and sensors can also give valuable data on billboard areas. Billboards are keeping track of the amount of traffic that the area receives each day, etc. This helps brands determine which areas are best for placing another smart billboard.
Recognition of climate and surroundings – not only are these smart billboards able to recognize objects, but also things like weather, noise levels, and even cigarette smoke. You’ve probably heard of the advertisement that ‘coughs’ every time it senses cigarette smoke in the air. Other smart billboards can sense if it’s hot outside and recommend a cold drink or smoothie.

Bahia: The Coffee of the Future

Unfortunately, this whole campaign probably created a lot of angry customers. For the experiment, the advertising agency decided against using a real brand, so they simply made one up. The product was an instant coffee called Bahia, and it’s not the type of thing that usually draws a lot of attention.

The Evolution of the Ad

The billboard was only advertising one brand, so it was fairly limited in what it showed. It didn’t promote sports cars to one person, laundry detergent to the next, and allergy medicine to a third. Instead, it was programmed to use a series of different fonts, colors, and styles to see how different people reacted to the plea to buy coffee.

Why Spying on Your Customers Works

While the first instinct of many is that this whole idea is kind of creepy, it can actually work to improve everyone’s life. If you remember that the main goal of advertising is to let people know about products or services they want, then this just helps eliminate all the noise on the street. Instead of wasting your time, these smart billboards were able to show people what they wanted to see. Also, since it measured reactions to seeing what people liked and didn’t like, and it can help make higher quality advertising in the future. It’s basically like having a focus group that’s composed of, well, everyone.

Why the Internet Isn’t As Important as We Think

The internet has become a great place for businesses because it makes it possible to measure things in a way that has never even been remotely possible. A lot of companies have been using it as an excuse to steer away from more traditional forms of advertising media, but this could put a stop to that pattern. Internet browsing history is a great way to build a profile of your customer, but nothing beats walking around town with them and asking them their opinions. If this technology can be in a few bus stops in London, it might not be long before it’s all over the globe.

This Campaign Doesn’t Invade Your Privacy

One nice feature about this little experiment is that it was designed in a way that wouldn’t let it cause any invasion of privacy. It didn’t follow the standard internet strategy of storing all your information. Even if it did, it wouldn’t make a huge difference because it never actually knew who it was looking at.

Time for You to Do the Same

Do you use similar techniques in your business? Even if you don’t want to go to such extreme measures as this campaign did, are you taking advantage of modern advertising strategies? The marriage of technology and traditional advertising is a key relationship in influencing consumers.

Tag: billboard advertising

Why Are Billboards Effective?