This is the launch of our Ask the Experts content series, a collection of agency and brand leaders’ short-and-sweet responses to a single question related to out-of-home advertising, experiential and digital marketing.
Our blog is a platform for our internal strategists and marketing experts to share their knowledge of the industry and perspectives on the evolving field of location-based marketing. It’s just as important to hear from the voices of industry leaders across media, agencies, creative, technology and data. So, we’ve asked these experts to give us their take on a single topic.
With that, we kick off the series with our first question…
Out-of-home advertising and media has changed dramatically in the last few years. What has been the most influential and exciting change in out-of-home that you’ve witnessed?
The introduction of mobile location data and audience analytics into Out-of-Home has driven a number of areas of fundamental change in our industry. We now have deep understandings of the audiences reached by OOH, along with the ability to measure the medium’s ability to influence a broad range of consumer behaviors. Yes, OOH continues to be a highly effective and efficient “top of the funnel” medium, building brands and telling creative brand stories at scale. But now we can talk about that impact and value in the context of how OOH fits into the broader, digitally-led, audience-focused media mix. OOH is no longer seen as a nice-to-have, siloed medium, but rather as a core element of a data-driven media plan.
In my opinion, I think the most influential change in out-of-home advertising has been the ability to connect the offline and online world. As we work in “full funnel”, architected media plans, the ability to capture audience attention with a bold, impactful message, but to then re-message that consumer with a relevant message to move them forward down the funnel is exciting. And this ability aids in our ability to further target and impact our audience.
Sometimes the obvious answer is also the best one – technology. The impact the technological revolution has had on outdoor advertising has, in my opinion, saved the medium from extinction. From digital billboards with on-demand features that update the weather or local team scores to bus shelters that serve up a custom ad based on the cookies in your phone as you walk by to interactive walls that turn into viral, impactful moments when done right – these are the building blocks that will provide a sustainable future for outdoor advertising to build on. The most successful companies in this space will find a way to capitalize on existing technology + assets, innovate to stay ahead of the competition and recognize that consumer privacy (in today’s climate) is paramount. I’m excited to see what comes next.
As a long-time user of outdoor media, I continue to value its impact and role in fully integrated campaigns and promotions. In particular, I’m excited about the use of video boards for their eye-catching resolution and creative applications. We continue to recommend out-of-home media to our clients for a variety of applications.
I would have to say the increased accessibility for advertisers to dynamically display different content based on real-time, data-driven conditions such as weather, time of day, lotto jackpot, pollen count, sports scores, etc. Whatever you can dream up! When content and messages reflect what’s happening in the moment, they are far more relevant for audiences — dramatically increasing the effectiveness of the ad creative, and ultimately your media spend.
Before the days of digital media strategies such as geofencing and mobile location targeting, Out-of-Home (OOH) played a critical role in advertising a brand or product to a targeted geographic area or demographic-specific audience. But one of the most exciting advances in advertising is the partnership between digital advertising and OOH where the brand/product can reach a consumer with uncanny accuracy. Combining these media channels, brands can geofence a traditional billboard, serve a specific ad to a targeted user on a gas station pump TV, or retarget a user whose mobile device passed by a brand wrapped mall kiosk. Ultimately, it’s the ability to serve the right ad to the right user at the right time that makes the OOH and digital strategy combo so effective and exciting for advertisers.
To me, one of the most exciting changes in OOH has been the increase in technology-led and integrated media forms; especially digital signage. This shift is allowing the interaction between advertisement and consumer – sign and person – to be more dynamic and multidimensional than ever. With innovations like motion tracking, gesture recognition, mixed reality, and touch and voice-activated hardware, messaging is becoming a sensory experience. As responsive creative becomes more commonplace, brands will be able to build more memorable, meaningful and rewarding relationships with consumers.
I believe that the most exciting shift in OOH in recent years is the surge in experience/interactive ideas coming to life. While experiences and pop ups are not new, the public’s openness to interact with OOH installations is a shift that has great potential. The only thing you need is a great idea.
As brands look to give consumers a more hands-on and rich experience, the use of experiential marketing has skyrocketed. As never before, agencies that specialize in outdoor are “taking it to the streets” and bringing custom consumer activations to life making brands more relatable and more connected to their end users.
What voodooh is quietly seeing is growing awareness of the intelligent capabilities of Digital OOH, linked with progressive appreciation of the importance of campaign relevance. “Relevance” refers to the brand and message, the outdoor creative associated with that message, and the elegantly creative link of audience, data, local conditions etc. to the particular outdoor panel being targeted with that brand message.
Clients are slowly starting to harness this power.
They are increasingly – within a single campaign – targeting specific audiences with bespoke creative messaging, based on a combination of client data-sets, days of week, times of day, current conditions and local audience metrics. As this evolves further, we believe the days of broadcasting a single linear creative for the entire outdoor campaign period are, finally, almost over.
Every aspect of advertising has completely changed in the last few years, but no channel has been more dramatically affected than out of home advertising. What used to be a 2-D, flat monologue has now become a three-dimensional, interactive experience.
From the advertiser’s point of view, this static, unchangeable ad has turned into a real-time tool that can be modified and re-purposed as circumstances or the marketplace changes.
We’ve just scratched the surface of what’s possible. As technology, innovation, AI and augmented reality mature, we’re going to experience even more change and mind-blowing opportunities for out of home users.
Out-Of-Home is an incredibly powerful channel whose full potential was not realized until the industry started to embrace location data the way that other media channels did. Until a few years ago, there simply wasn’t scalable and actionable data that was able to quantify the ROI of OOH campaigns, so my initial meetings with clients were spent discussing the potential of location intelligence, the different methods of data collection, and the nuances that affect the precision and accuracy of the data.
It has been an absolute blast working with our channel partners, specialist agencies, and industry groups to push the industry forward and find creative ways to incorporate location data into new and innovative methodologies. I look forward to seeing the channel continue to grow in terms of both revenue and recognition!
Once a quarter, we will post a new Ask the Experts volume featuring these and other industry leaders. Click here to follow the complete series as new posts become available.
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