4 steps to ROI success on your out-of-home advertising

Whether you are running a long term or short term campaign, the unique nature of out-of-home advertising is compelling; the guaranteed exposure to adverts from as wide or niche a target audience as desired; the creativity used to utilise the local neighbourhood spaces and to design an advert with a call to action can bring a sense of credibility to a brand or product.

Unlike running a marketing campaign online, where the tools to effectively reach your audience are a mere Google search away, running an out-of-home advertising campaign is a whole different ball game when it comes to targeting and successfully monitoring the results.

You needn’t be thrashing around in the dark when it comes to your out-of-home marketing campaign. Following a carefully considered strategy and taking into account target audience, location, clarity of message, and a call-to-action, you can ensure a good ROI on your out-of-home advertising.

So how can you get a good ROI for your out-of-home advertising?

1. Identify your target audience

A compulsory place to begin your campaign. Identify your ideal target audience. Have a clear understanding of who you want to reach with your adverts. Are you hoping to reach men or women? Of what age? What income bracket do they fall into? And so on.

Search out any existing customer data and try to get an understanding of the customers or users already buying into the sector your product or brand falls into.Your advertising should demonstrate an understanding of the brand sector and the history and future of its users. The more you understand about your potential investors/ customers, the more successfully you’ll reach them.

2. Choose the best Locations

Don’t waste your money on adverts where there is little pedestrian or vehicular traffic. Apply your analysis of any existing customer data to start your search for locations with the largest number of people in your target demographic. You can use our online interactive map to search for advertising spaces in your preferred locations.

3. Ensure clarity of message

The adage, ‘less is more’ is worth paying attention to in this context. Out-of-home advertising should utilise white space and give a concise message that doesn’t overload those passing by or waiting nearby with too much text. Brevity and clarity are key. Don’t be afraid to keep it simple- you often only have a small window to capture attention, so use images and graphics to enhance the message you are trying to convey.

4. Measure your ROI using a Call to Action

The success of an out-of-home campaign can be difficult to track- how do you know if you are getting a good Return-on-Investment without obvious results?

Formulate a strategy to track your out-of-home ads digitally. Consider including a call-to-action at the centre of your campaign utilising one or more of the following ideas:

• Display a unique promotional code that offers an exclusive deal to customers, who have to enter the code before purchasing online
• Create a unique landing page, with a short, memorable URL (displayed on the advert)  to track the number of visitors/ sales/ bookings as a result of the OOH ad
• Utilise the ever popular hashtag to encourage activity on social media

Using the information gleaned from tracking your adverts digitally, you can calculate the effectiveness of your campaign. It doesn’t have to be a guessing game when it comes to knowing how to get a good ROI on your out-of-home advertising.