Design Tips for Outdoor Advertising
Provided by the Outdoor Advertising Association
of America Creating Award Winning Outdoor
While there are no hard and fast "rules" when
designing for the outdoor medium, there are a few basic
guidelines that should be considered to ensure success.
There are always exceptions. However, breaking the
guidelines requires an appreciation for the rudimentary
principles of good outdoor design.
Outdoor advertising presents limitless options and
approaches for creative design. There are dozens of sizes
and shapes, endless locations and boundless opportunities
for designing effective outdoor advertising.
The Creative Challenge
Designing outdoor advertising is visual storytelling.
The expression of an idea can surprise viewers with words
or excite them with pictures. Through the use of humor or
drama, outdoor designs can influence consumer decisions
and sell products. However, designing for the outdoor
medium is a challenging communication task that requires
the expression of a concept with clarity and austere
focus. When outdoor advertising is well designed, it will
entertain and intrigue consumers with arresting impact.
Basic Rules for Design
The outdoor viewing audience is mostly mobile. People
travel swiftly in vehicles or walk at a brisk pace while
they perform the activities of daily life. Mobility limits
the potential viewing time of an outdoor message to only a
few seconds. Because of limited exposure time, outdoor
designs require a disciplined and succinct creative
approach. However, high frequency is a fundamental
strength of the medium and repeated exposures will ensure
that a message is absorbed and retained over time.
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Guidelines for Legibility
- Color
The spectrum of full color, vividly and faithfully
reproduced, is one of outdoor advertising’s distinct
advantages. Designs bursting with brilliant color can evoke
emotional responses that will inspire lasting impressions.
- Typestyle
Fonts selected for outdoor designs must be easy to
read from variable distances. Adequate spacing between
letters, words and lines will enhance visibility. The
relative size of letter characters is also an important
consideration.
Tactical Design
The world is a hectic and busy place. Outdoor
advertising reaches people whenever and wherever they
travel outside of their homes. Over time, outdoor
advertising can consistently reinforce a message with
crisp immediacy.
Location, Location, Location
Outdoor advertising conveys the right message, to the
right audience, at the right time, in the right place.
Understanding the dynamics of the marketplace is essential
for designing effective outdoor campaigns. In the case of
Apple computer, the side of a bus was the only logical
place to feature an image of civil rights icon, Rosa
Parks. Finding the relevant and hidden relationships
between the message and the environment makes the
advertising smart.
Although many outdoor panels have a horizontal format,
some displays are vertical. The physical orientation of an
outdoor unit will significantly affect the placement of
design elements such as product identity and the headline.
Orientation will also affect the overall balance of a
design. It is important to remember that geography,
demography and the orientation of a display are all
necessary considerations when designing for the outdoor
medium.
Recency
Outdoor advertising is a frequency medium that
provides multiple exposures to a message throughout the
full duration a campaign period. Recency is another
important factor. Defined in the book, When Ads Work" by
John Philip Jones, recency reminds people who are already
in the marketplace that a brand, store or service is a
good choice. Consistent and repeated exposure to an
outdoor message over an extended period of time will
maintain high levels of advertising awareness and recall.
To avoid memory decline, multiple design executions for a
campaign can be implemented simultaneously or introduced
at appropriate intervals during the campaign period.
AdView
AdView is an easy and economical method for
pre-testing outdoor creative designs. Using the Adview
guide, accurate outdoor viewing distances are simulated so
that the readability of an advertising message may be
evaluated and altered, if necessary, before final
production commences.
AdView is intended to help designers answer important
questions when designing for the outdoor medium:
- Are the fonts easy to read?
- Is the letter size large enough?
- Does the spacing between the letters, words and lines
aid legibility?
Do the colors properly convey a high contrast of value
and hue?
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