Outdoor Billboard Designs
People love to be entertained. That is why laughter has an enormous power when it comes to advertising. The use of humor in advertising campaigns does not only get the attention of consumers, it also make your product or service easier to recall or remember. If there is one advertisement that you seem to remember up to this day, I am sure it is one of those funny ads you saw on a billboard while driving on a highway.
Here are 35 cool billboard ads that make use of humor to get the attention of people. Some of them are not really billboards but other forms of outdoor ads. To know more and get to the source of each image, just click on the text link found below each of the preview image. Have fun browsing through these cool billboard ads!
#01-Nikon D700 Guerrilla Style Billboard
Nikon took its cue from our celebrity-obsessed paparazzi culture to launch the brand’s D700 model in Korea.
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#02-Swiss Skydive Elevator
Call it buzz, guerrilla, viral, word-of-mouth, whatever – marketing and advertising stunts and ideas that achieve free attention are working now perhaps better than ever before.
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#03-Get Them off Your Dog – People As Fleas
Perwanal Saatchi & Saatchi in Jakarta, Indonesia, has taken interactivity and creepy-crawliness to a new, flat level with the creation of this massive ‘floor sticker’ in an Jakarta shopping center .
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#04-Fitness First – Wait Watching
No more living in denial about the size of your waist line, thanks to this fantastic albeit terrifying guerrilla marketing initiative from the health club chain, Fitness First. Unsuspecting commuters in the Netherlands are faced with viewing their body weight in bright lights – quite literally – when they take a seat at this Rotterdam bus stop.
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#05-Strip Club Pole Position
Life like print ads are sweeping the world’s most prominent cities. In Paris, Stringfellows strip club have put the pole into pole-dancing by cleverly designing their print campaign to work with existing lamp posts throughout the city.
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#06-Duracell bus ad in New Delhi, India
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#07-Indonesian Railways: Giant Cleaver
Many accidents happened on train crossing gate in Indonesia. Instead of putting unusual notice board poster (that people never notice), they installed a giant cleaver shaped poster on the gate to remind people about the danger. The copy says, “Don’t be reckless, Stay safe.”
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#08-Royal Canin: Drooling dog
Two billboards were placed face to face, each on one side of a small street. One of the billboards shows the close portrait of a dog on a plain white background that looks directly to the billboard in front of him.
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#09-Sirius: 100 Percent Commercial Free
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#10-Virgin Atlantic: What brings you to London?
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#11-McDonald’s: Billboards 200m-197m
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#12-Panasonic nose trimmer: Baldy
Billboards built around actual electric wires and poles to amusingly yet convincingly dramatize the need for the panasonic nose hair trimmer’s safety cutting system.
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#13-Rejoice Tangle-Free Shampoo
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#14-Hansapark: Are we there yet?
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#15-Interactive Sharpie e-cast Billboard
Many of us have a fascination with graffiti art, and we sometimes even look over our shoulders to make sure no one’s watching when we scratch out our initials in a freshly laid slab of cement — or carve them into a wooden desk — or even scribble profanities across the stall door in a public restroom.
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#16-McDonald’s: four Bucks is Dumb
McDonald’s ad campaign takes a non-too-subtle jab at Starbucks. The ad says “large is the new grande” or “four bucks is dumb.”
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#17-Coops Paints
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#18-KOLESTON – Outdoor Ad
To promote the line of Procter & Gamble’s Wella Koleston HairCare Naturals hair colourant, H & C – Leo Burnett Beirut did thiscreative piece of outdoor where the woman’s hair, die cut out of the billboard, allows the colour variations of day and night shine through.
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#19-Pacific Airlines: The sky has never been cheaper
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#20-T-Mobile: Don’t Drop Your Girl
No one has fewer dropped calls in New York.
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#21-Cingular
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#22-Copenhagen Zoo: Snake Bus
Giant constrictor snake squeezing complete Copenhagen citybus.
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#23-Chili Club: Man on Fire
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#24-Don’t be stupid, protect yourself. Use condoms.
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#25-Denver Water: Use only what you need
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#26-Formula Toothcare Billboard
Formula Toothcare “builds strong teeth.”
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#27-Dense Muffins
In North Carolina, there is a successful supermarket chain, called Bloom. Amongst the large variety of regular groceries and specialty products it sells are several signature products. These include two-ounce gourmet cookies and “Bloomberry” jumbo muffins.
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#28-”The Back Seat’s No Safer. Belt Up”
Here is a unique way to remind people to buckle up in the back seat. Created by Clement BBDO in Austalia, this billboard displays a huge slingshot in 3d which appears to propel a passenger into the air. The message is clear, belt up or your body will be slinked.
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#29-Transparent Billboard from Nike
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#30-DHL Billboard Box
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#31-MINI Coopeer Comes in Boxes
A Christmas guerilla campaign with huge cardboard boxes around Amsterdam promoting MINI.
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#32-Transparent Billboards for Sony PSP
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#33-Sony Pictures 2012 The Movie: Flooding the subway
Campaign of the film’s release in 2012 in Brazil. Action in the subway Cantagalo, in Copacabana – Rio de Janeiro, where a patch of about 45m on each side simulates a flood the subway.
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#34-Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre: Break
Take a break from the sun.
[Cool Billboard Ads]
#35-Bic Billboard: Gardener Required
Bic developed this creative outdoor advertisement for their razors. The billboard is blank except for a small logo, but without it the advertisement might be missed and it acts as a good backdrop for the giant razor and cut grass. The only draw back is the constant trimming of the lawn.
[Cool Billboard Ads]
Media Planning for Smarties
You say you’re ready to advertise. How are you going to choose whether to place your ad in the local newspaper or a national magazine? Why not do a radio spot or place a banner ad on a related company’s website? Understanding the benefits and pitfalls of these different forms of media will help you get the most out of your advertising budget.
Do you believe that simply placing an ad in the newspaper or a commercial on the radio will drive customers to purchase your product or service? Or does your business have a well-developed marketing strategy with an advertising plan for the year? An effective advertising plan will clearly identify and select the media that will provide the greatest amount of targeted exposure for your business.
Your advertising plan should answer the following questions: What are your specific marketing objectives? Who are your target markets? What media types will you use? How many placements will you buy? What is your advertising budget? How will you track the effectiveness of your advertising efforts?
The marketing strategies you implement with your advertising plan will depend on the length of time your products/services have been on the market, how you’ve chosen to position your business, the message you wish to send, and the media you’ll use to send it. Advertising will keep your product or service in the public’s eye by creating greater awareness over time. Defining your target market in terms of demographic, geographic, psychosocial characteristics will be the single most important factor in selecting which media to use. Choosing between radio stations, newspapers, magazines, and television stations, will be evident if you have defined your market well.
Savvy planners set advertising goals in terms of reach, frequency, gross rating points (GRP), and continuity. A basic knowledge of these terms will help you talk to advertising representatives and understand their media planning kits:
Reach is the number of different people or households that are exposed to your message during a specified time period.
Frequency is the number of times that your target prospects are exposed to your message.
Gross Rating Points (GRP) are a measurement that equals the reach multiplied by the average frequency. The GRP is intended to give the total impact of the media effort. Continuity relates to the scheduling or timing of the media placements.
Your overall marketing budget will determine how much you will spend on your advertising. Getting preliminary placement costs will help you estimate how much will be required to have an impact on the consumer. Like many aspects of marketing, it is not an exact science and you will have to use your judgment when it comes to developing a budget. It’s always a good idea to reserve a small portion of your budget for unexpected opportunities, like a “special issue” just before an important event that you had not planned for. Scheduling the actual media placement will depend on the seasonal sales patterns of your product. Typically, advertising will run in a continuous, pulsed, or flighted schedule.
To build sales, your business has to market itself. And, since advertising is expensive, it’s important to make your efforts effective. However, advertising planning can be a bigger job than most people anticipate. A marketing professional can help you to define your goals, develop your advertising plan, and place your advertising to maximize the impact and effectiveness of your message.
Here is an overview of the pros and cons of different types of media:
Newspapers
Advertising in a daily newspaper can be very effective if your product or service is relevant to most people. On the other hand, it can be a waste of advertising dollars if you are trying to reach a very specific interest group. Newspapers allow you to take advantage of current events. This is a great advantage if you’re selling roses and Valentines Day is a week away, but isn’t likely to be helpful if you’re trying to reach a narrow niche (ex: marketing a new technology to IT managers at community hospitals). Advertisers will find an unlimited amount of print space available, but the cost is incrementally high. It doesn’t pay to incorporate detailed photographs or quality color images when the newspaper printing is generally poor to medium quality.
Magazines
Magazines allow for good quality image reproduction and layout flexibility. Advertising space is usually expensive. Magazines cover hundreds of niche interest areas, so finding the right publication to reach a specific audience is easy. Magazines tend to be around for a longer time, so ads have the potential for being seen multiple times. However it is difficult to predict when the reader will actually see an ad. Deadlines for advertisements are generally a month in advance of publication, so there isn’t much room for last minute changes.
Internet
Web advertising can take the form of a Web site or an ad banner on another’s website. With an ad banner targeting a specific audience is a matter of finding other relevant but non-competing websites that reach the same target audience. Websites that are set up intelligently count hits and can even identify repeat traffic. It pays to study the traffic and number of hits at the different sites and make your own comparison. Ads can be interactive and quickly edited. When properly indexed and registered on search engines, advertisers can maximize the number of potential hits. The negatives are that it is difficult to gauge the impact and costs effectiveness of Internet advertising.
Radio
Radio is a great medium for targeting a concentrated geographic area and is considered to be relatively cost-effective. The various formats such as talk radio, classical, and easy listening help zero in on the demographics that match those of the targeted consumer. Advertisers can select the frequency and time of day that most closely matches the target audience’s listening habits. With radio there is room for quick reaction to sudden developments like a snowstorm or a stock market crash. Since radio uses voice, the advertiser can reinforce his or her message with a voice that suits the message.
Other
Other forms of media that one might consider include direct mail, broadcast TV, cable TV, transit, and outdoor billboard advertising. If your decision seems more complex than you anticipated, consider soliciting the help of an advertising agency. An ad agency can not only help you select the most appropriate forms of media, but can develop and design ads maximize the impact of your message on your potential consumers.
Define your target audience, map out your advertising, and determine your marketing goals. Make sure you have a tracking system in place. With a carefully developed advertising plan, your business should realize a much better rate of return from all of your advertising efforts!
