Signs of the Times
Spending on TV, radio and
newspaper advertising fell last year, but the outdoor ad
category rose 4.9 percent, according to TNS Media Intelligence
in New York. "I think for
an old medium, it's really vital," said Pat Wockley, director of
consumer engagement at
Strip District ad agency Mullen.
While the Internet has
siphoned the newspaper audience and cable has divided TV
viewers, so far no new technology has threatened outdoor signs
-- a form of advertising
around at least since posters for the circus went up in New York
in the early 1800s.
An important point for advertisers considering a billboard is
that, unlike the radio, "You
can't turn it off," said Brenda Yeager Carter, a media buyer at
Downtown agency Fitting
Group. Pittsburgh Post Gazette (PA), by Teresa
Lindeman, April 17, 2008.
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* * *
Meanwhile, recent advances
have driven more business to billboards. Vinyl sheets last
longer than the old paper billboards and can be moved from sign
to sign to put the
message in front of different audiences. In some markets, global
positioning technology
has improved the understanding of who is driving by the boards.
In addition, new digital
boards capable of changing messages every few seconds allow
owners to sell the same space to multiple advertisers. Revenue
can be five to 15 times
that of a static board, said David W. Miller, an analyst with
SMH Capital in Los Angeles.
"What advertisers love about digital billboards is they can
tailor different messages to
certain demographics at all times of the day," said Mr. Miller.
Starbucks can tell motorists
in the morning a latte would make life better. By afternoon,
McDonald's could send a
message to working parents headed for soccer practice and music
lessons.
The ability to change the
messages from a central location allows other applications as
well, from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette putting up news headlines
to the recent efforts to
post primary results in states around the country.
The first digital
billboards went up several years ago, said Jeff Golimowski, of
the
Outdoor Advertising Association of America. The trade group
estimates there are now
around 800 and growing, although that's still a small portion of
the nation's 400,000 total
billboards.
The digital boards aren't
likely to ever completely take over. In addition to the expense,
there are limitations by virtue of their need for electricity.
Mr. Miller estimates Lamar
might be able to convert up to one-third of its more than
150,000 billboards nationally.
Also, some ad messages are best delivered by the old-style
boards that hold a bright,
bold image up all day long, said Ms. Carter. "It's a big
presence."
Mullen client Highmark now
has boards around town offering simple lines such as "More
Doctors" or "More Choices" along with the tag, "Have a greater
hand in your health." A
trek down McKnight Road this week found UPMC and the Pirates
delivering digital
messages while Indiana University of Pennsylvania, attorney Tom
Crenney and
Columbia Sportswear were using static boards.
Nationally, growth in
outdoor advertising spending is coming from retailers with local
stores, telecommunication companies as well as beer and soft
drink businesses, said
Jon Swallen, senior vice president of research for TNS Media
Intelligence.
Other big billboard users
tend to be travel and tourism operators as well as media
brands such as TV and radio stations, although those tend to ebb
and flow depending on
the economy.
TNS Media is projecting
spending in the outdoor category will rise 5.5 percent this
year.
The category also can include bus wraps and even gas station
video screens but it is
heavily weighted toward billboards.
OAAA Newsclips, Friday, April
18, 2008.
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Despite more than one
consecutive year of increased spending in the outdoor category,
it's still just a piece of the overall advertising pie. Outdoor
advertising's $4 billion trailed
the $11.3 billion spent on the Internet.
Still if Ms. Carter is any
judge, demand for billboard space has grown in the region. "The
availability is not what it used to be," she said, noting a few
times that billboards were no
longer available by the time she got client approval to contract
for certain locations.
OAAA Newsclips,
Friday, April 18, 2008.
Outdoor Advertising Use Surges
Amid declining
usage and advertising spending for many traditional media,
outdoor
appears to be entering a new "Golden Age" spurred by greater
mobility of American
consumers, and new out-of-home media technologies and
installations. The most
immediate evidence of outdoor's ascendancy came Wednesday when
the Outdoor
Advertising Association of America (OAAA) released its latest
quarterly figures, showing
that ad spending on the outdoor media it tracks rose 7.9% during
the second quarter of
2007, far ahead of the pace of most traditional media this year.
VSS attributed
the growth to "favorable consumer trends," improved technology
and the
rollout of a highly regarded new outdoor audience measurement
system developed by
the out-of-home industry. Among the favorable consumer trends is
increased time spent
with out-of-home media.
Despite the
first roll back in the overall amount of time consumers are
spending with
media (MediaDailyNews Aug. 7), consumers are spending
more time with out-of-home
media. According to VSS, the average American's exposure to
outdoor media rose by
three hours last year to 133 hours in 2006, and is projected to
climb to 154 hours by
2011.
"Brand
marketers sought more effective media to connect with elusive
consumers
spending more time outside their homes," notes the VSS report.
"While the traditional
out-of-home media subsegment produced solid growth in 2006, the
primary growth
driver was the alternative media business including video
advertising networks, digital
billboards, and alternative ambient advertising." Outdoor Ad
Market Surges Amid
Positive Trends: New Tech, Increased Consumer Usage,
MediaPost, by Joe
Mandese, August 9, 2007
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“The space is increasingly precious. Outdoor advertising, a $4
billion industry in
1997, will hit nearly $7 billion this year. It is growing
faster than any other advertising
category besides the Internet. Advertisers like billboards
because consumers
are spending more time on the roads, and billboards are hard to
avoid-there’s no way to turn
the page or fast-forward through them”.
“Billboards and Loopholes”, The Wall Street
Journal, Section B, p.1, July 25, 2007.
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Global Trends, New Technology and Creative
Driving Outdoor Growth
CANNES, France — Even as the
Web and handheld devices shake up where marketers
spend ad dollars, one of the fastest-growing media is
tried-and-true outdoor.
While
overall U.S. ad spending in 2006 rose 4% over 2005 to $149.6
billion, according to
ad tracker TNS Media Intelligence, outdoor spending rose nearly
9% to $3.8 billion.
The rise was second only to Web spending, up 17% to $9.7
billion.
Driving
outdoor growth has been technology and a burst of creative ideas
that are making an old medium new.
Outdoor
has “been around for 150 years. It’s not something you think of
as new,” says James Miller,
Pepsi marketing director. “Now, there are so many new
technologies around it, it’s forcing companies to look at it.”
‘Outdoor
is still one of the most highly effective tools that we have,’
says Kelly Hoyman, marketing
director for McDonald’s northwest region in Seattle. ‘It… gives
us a lot of creativity.
“Outdoor Advertising Gets Freshened Up”, USA Today, Money
Section, p.1, June 20, 2007.
http://www.usatoday.com/money/advertising/2007-06-19-cannes-outdoor-usat_N.htm?csp=34
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“Traffic
Jams and urban growth are good news for the billboard
advertising market”.
“Operators
claim that growing global trends such as urbanization, air
travel, and traffic congestion,
provide more opportunities to be exposed to outdoor
advertising. That contrasts with the
changing presumption of television and press which is eroding,
albeit slowly, the ability of
those media to reach mass audiences”.
“Worldwide, outdoor advertising is the only other medium other
than the internet to be growing consistently
in both emerging and mature economies”. “Champion of the
Great Outdoors”,
Financial Times, May 29, 2007.
* * * * *
Outdoor advertising, one of the oldest forms of advertising, is
reinventing itself. The
$23 billion industry is introducing digital technology to change
ads faster, new ways
of measuring viewers, and billboards that beam information to
cellphones. As a
result, outdoor advertising companies -- which provide
billboards, posters and video
screens in public places -- are now seeing bigger gains than
many competitors.
Because outdoor advertising is much less expensive than TV
spots, it still accounts
for a smaller part of overall ad spending. But it has become the
second-fastest
growing form of advertising, behind the Internet, according to
market-research and
media-buying firms.
"Outdoor has got its act together," says Charlie Hiscocks, head
of global brands
marketing for London-based SABMiller PLC, the beer giant. The
company says it
has increased spending on billboard ads 50% in the past five
years. "Rather than a
scruffy old piece of plasterboard that you throw some paste onto
on the edge of a
motorway, you now
have high-quality sites."
Technology Boosts Outdoor Ads
The Wall Street Journal,
Aaron O. Patrick, August 28, 2006
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It's possible that, given
the mobile lifestyle of today's consumers, billboards
can reach more people more reliably than TV commercials. A survey
released by the Association of National Advertisers and
Forrester Research
last month found that 78% of advertisers think traditional
TV commercials have
become less effective. Since TV audiences are so fragmented,
insiders argue,
outdoor ads are a surer way to reach more people more
frequently than other forms
of advertising. On average, says Senese, out-of-home signs
are seen by 90%
of adults in a given geographic area over a four-week
period.
"Getting On Board",
p. 3, Time Magazine, April 3, 2006.
