Outdoor Advertising – Definition, Importance, Types and Examples

By Hitesh Bhasin 

Table of Contents

Outdoor Advertising Definition

Outdoor advertising is when a business runs an advertising campaign in specific geographic locations that reaches the prospects and potential consumers when they are outside their home. Outdoor advertising may use different tools such as Billboards, Restaurant ads, Transit ads or others. In this article, we will delve into the world of outdoor advertising and try to understand different types of out-of-home advertising campaigns businesses can opt for. So, without any further ado, let us get started right away

For any company out there, getting the word out about the products and the services that they have is essential. This is how they can increase the sales of the product. The more people know about the product or the service of the company, the more they are interested in buying it.

So, the profits of the company are just related to the fact that people know about the product or not. Well, how do you think companies can achieve that goal?

It is definitely with the help of advertising, of course. From newspaper ads to digital ads, advertising has been a massive part of our lives for a very long time now.

Outdoor advertising is one such technique that is quite efficient as a mass-market medium, and you can use it for branding, broad messages, support campaigns, and so forth. It is a form of advertising where people can know about specific products or services when they are outside the home.

While you are outside, you might see billboard advertising about a specific product offered by a company. So, this is precisely what we call outdoor advertising. It is letting people know about the products or services through some ads when they are outside their homes.

8 Types of Outdoor Advertising

Here we are going to mention some of the essential types of outdoor advertising options –

1) Billboards

You might have come across a billboard now and then, right?

Billboards are some giant posters that are displayed in some of the most popular locations in the area. Now, these giant posts are the ones that have some advertisement about the product or the services.

The crowds of people that see the poster can know more and more about a product. It can be said without a doubt that these billboards tend to work in the best way for sure.

2) Mobile

There are some graphics and advertisement options that are often seen on trucks and buses, and they seem to be mobile. So any form of advertising media which is mobile can be used as Outdoor media.

This is another one of the most incredible forms of outdoor advertisements that brings the best results to the company. You need to try it once to have some great results.

3) Digital

There are some other types of billboards which we are pretty sure that you are going to love for sure. You might have seen a proper digital billboard which has some different advertisement every single time.

This is another one of the fantastic advertisements which tend to provide some great results to the company that is doing the ads for sure. So, there is no doubt that this one is worth a shot.

4) Lamp Post

This is another type of fantastic outdoor advertisement which is very common amongst some of the main areas. Particular lamp post banners are really noticeable at night by the streetlight. This is a typical banner style that makes sure that people are paying attention to the poster.

So, this is another fantastic form of outdoor advertisement that people need to try out in the best way.

5) Transit

Now, this is another form of excellent advertisement which can target the tourists, commuters, and people in the city. These people are always using extreme types of transport. So, that is something which they can see a lot of times.

Having some advertisements there can help the company out a lot. So, this is another type of outdoor advertisement which can be helpful.

There you have it, people. These are some of the types of outdoor advertisements that you need to try out. We are sure that the results would be great.

6) Outdoor Advertising on Bridges

You can opt for this type of advertising for targeting commuters, and for this, you can make a bridge banner for busy pulling in more prospects.

You can use these banners on different types of brides in your target location. This sort of advertising can be quite useful if your primary target group is the frequent travelers who follow the critical bridges in your areas.

Being aware of your market segment and their presence will help you come up with the right bridge outdoor advertising strategies. Bridges can be the most impressive point of attraction for many prospects, so using this strategy can be quite useful for you.

7) Point of Sale Displays

You must have noticed different products available at the billing counters. They are also integral parts of outdoor advertising in which, some impulsive buyers opt for those products just by seeing them in front of their eyes while waiting for their turn to come at the billing counter.

Businesses that opt for this strategy request to the store owners to place their products around the billing counters. However, the critical thing that you need to pay heed to here is that only tangible products are displayed here.

Interesting, unique and useful products that can immediately draw in the attention of the buyers are considered the best pick for such sorts of advertising.

8) Retail

With this kind of outdoor advertising, you will be able to keep a customer proceeding to shop more. For this local outdoor advertising campaign, there is no preferred place over a shopping center to advertise the goods.

At the shopping malls or centers, customers are motivated to shop, and being an excellent advertiser; you have to exploit this mindset in your favor.

You can come up with different types of marketing materials and use them at various places in the mall. For different items that people regularly purchase, outdoor retail advertising is considered highly useful.

Posters, banners, storefronts, etc. are some of the most common forms of retail outdoor advertising options that you can try.

Now, after understanding different types of outdoor advertising, let us now have a look upon some of the most informative examples of outdoor advertising-

Examples of Outdoor Advertising used by Small Business as well as Companies

1) McDonald’s sundial billboard

This billboard is used by McDonald’s back in the year 2006, and it is still rated as one of the best examples of outdoor advertising.

In this creative billboard ad, McDonald opted for an M-shaped sundial that displayed a range of snacks of McDonald depending upon the specific times. So, it used to show coffee and croissant in the morning while burgers and patties in the afternoon, and so forth.

2) Audi A4 Wi-Fi hack

Audi quite adeptly uses outdoor advertising in one of its campaigns in the year 2016.

They offered a series of Wi-Fi hotspots in the 2016 New York Auto Show whose names were the advertisements of their new model Audi A4.

Different names of the Wifi hotspots were- “328 reasons to choose A4”, “A4: more torque than 328i”, “A4 has Wi-Fi”.

This strategy was quite effective in sharing the company message in the most impactful manner possible. First, they were offering free services to the car fans, plus they were psychologically influencing them to not only remember the Car model but also the core features that make it superior from other competitors.

All such inclusions of amazing creativity made this Audi Out of Home campaign one of the top-rated examples of outdoor advertising.

Wrap Up!

So, that was all about the outdoor advertising, and we hope you would have understood different types of out of home advertising techniques and their impacts in widening the reach of a brand and encouraging more sales.

Different outdoor advertising strategies have been quite prominent for small as well as big businesses for ages. It empowers a brand to use different varieties of creativity to target more and more prospects and enjoy better lead generations and conversions.

Have you ever tried the outdoor advertising techniques for optimizing the presence of your brand?