So you’re ready to launch your first outdoor campaign. Follow these steps and you are guaranteed to get zero return on your advertising investment.
- Buy the cheapest boards you can find. Worried that people can’t see your board because it’s a cross-read behind a huge oak tree? Don’t worry about those details. Get as many cheap billboards as you can. The more the merrier.
- Use lots of words. The seven word rule? C’mon, it’s 2019, you can’t say what you need to say in under 7 words. Bonus points if you can include multiple, unrelated sentences to really get people thinking. People love that as they’re zooming past at 70 miles per hour.
- Multiple CTAs. Give people some options. They may not want to visit your website, so give them a couple phone numbers, and email address, and all your social media profiles.
- Tiny print. You can’t go too big, or how will you ever fit in all those words (see #2 above).
- Say no to contrasting colors. Use similar colors for font and the background. Ideally very light colors for both the background and text, so they’re easy on people’s eyes. You don’t want your ad to stand out too much.
- Lots of pictures. Depending how well you followed #2 and #4 above, you will still have room for at least 3 photos. At the very least, include a headshot of your general manager. That guy’s got such a great smile.
- Do your own design. Don’t even think about hiring a professional designer to create the ad. Anyone with a compute and MS Paint can do it, and good designers are EXPENSIVE! Save yourself some money and headache and just do it yourself. Or if you have a computer savvy cousin or a 10-year old kid, let them help you with it. Oh, and if you’ve never heard of Comic Sans font, do yourself a favor and set that as your default. Best. Font. Ever!
- Never change out your creative. Hey, you spent good money to get it printed in the first place, just let it ride. Besides, the longer you keep it up there, people will learn to love it. It’s all about repetition, right?