How to Buy Billboards Efficiently

I can help you to understand how you should measure and assess billboards, and plan a good billboard campaign.

Billboards are valued by the number and demographics of traffic that pass by them each day, known as a DEC (daily estimated commute.) The total number of people is important, but so is the quality of the people that are in that number. If you are selling high end jewelery then 100 high income people have more value to your campaign than 1,000 blue collar workers. If you are a grocery store and selling something that everyone wants then you can take a look at straightforward numbers and just go for as many people as you can. This is where the quality part comes in.

The billboard companies have all of this information - they have the traffic count and they have the demographics of that audience. If you need a certain type of audience then pick the neighborhoods that you'll find that audience traveling through. If you want mass, then highway locations will be likely to be your best bet.

To be effective with billboard advertising you need to aim for a certain level of frequency. What frequency you need will depend on what the purchase cycle for your product or service is - for example, a cell phone is a quick purchase and a billboard with a strong offer could get you results within a few days, but a real estate company billboard needs to be up for months before you'll really be getting that information through to people who need your services.

The great thing about billboards is that if you're on someone's route to work they'll see your board every single day for it's lifespan. The bad thing about them is that if you're on a route that's used occasionally they will only see your board once or twice, which is not usually enough to motivate people.

There are different types of billboards too and different costs associated with producing them:

Really big ones, called bulletins - these take vinyl ads, which are more expensive to produce, but they are very durable, can stay up for a long time, and can be moved from location to location. The drawback of any expensive production is if you change any part of the offer then your investment in the vinyl is wasted.

The slightly smaller ones, called posters or 30-sheets. These take paper and are much cheaper to produce. However, the paper is not as durable and has a lifespan of about 3 months at the most. It also can't be reused or moved to another location.

Digital billboards - these are really cheap to produce because you don't print anything, and often come with a back-end system that allows you to change creative any time you feel like it, but these boards are usually the most expensive to buy. They also rotate your ad with multiple other advertisers, which means that there is a chance that a passer-by won't see your ad and it also means that you could have an undesirable neighbor.

You also have much smaller boards, which are even cheaper to produce but the smaller size means less noticability and may also impact a viewer's opinion of your business (that you're cheap, basically!)

Don't forget bus shelters too - they don't just reach bus travelers as bus stops are usually on widely traveled routes and everyone driving past them gets to see them. These can also get really creative.

My advice to anyone planning on doing this is to talk to as many providers as you can - get all of the options, from the big companies to the independents - they're full of information and knowledge and if you talk to a few you'll be able to 'triangulate' the information and find the common things that seem to be more truth and less selling.

You could also talk to an advertising agency - we have this knowledge already, we have tried and tested a lot of different campaigns so that you don't have to learn the hard way, we can produce the creative in a way that will look right (nothing as disappointing as seeing your ugly billboard proudly displayed!), and we can save you time and money by doing it the right and most efficient way.