Billboards are a popular and effective advertising strategy, with the US spending $5.5 billion annually on them. They use catchy slogans and imagery to grab drivers’ attention, but have also attracted criticism for promoting consumerism and being a distraction to drivers. Technological advances have led to new types of billboards, including digital and holographic ones. Some states have passed laws restricting their use.
Billboards are a highly effective advertising strategy. In the United States alone, advertisers spend $5.5 billion (USD) annually on this method of communication, adding between 5,000 and 15,000 new billboards in the process.
When placed along freeways, interstates, and busy downtown streets, billboards use witty slogans and eye-catching imagery to grab the attention of drivers. Since a billboard only takes seconds to make an impact, designing advertisements for this type of media is a tricky task. It can often take months for a business to create an advertisement.
Billboards are used all over the world, but this form of advertising became popular in the United States in the 1920s. From 1925 to 1963, Burma-Shave was a major billboard advertiser. This company has garnered a lot of attention by releasing catchy jingles that span across four or five different billboards. The promise of a punchline on the final scoreboard was a source of entertainment for drivers, and the company frequently ran contests that encouraged customers to submit their own Burma jingles.
Today, the Outdoor Advertising Association of America reports that McDonald’s, Anheuser-Busch and Miller are the top billboard advertisers in the United States. While billboards were once commonly used to advertise tobacco products, this practice was banned in 1997. However, billboard advertising is still used by political candidates, government agencies, and community nonprofit groups.
While billboard advertising is a relatively simple concept, there have been a number of technological advances in the process over the years. For example, some designers will create advertisements that feature a portion of the image that hangs over the edge of the billboard. Some newer billboards use a technology called a three-action motion to create a billboard with three separate parts, resulting in three billboards in one. There are also digital billboards which are computerized to rotate a series of advertisements. Some companies are even experimenting with the use of interactive and holographic billboards.
While billboards are hugely popular with advertisers, this method of advertising has attracted its fair share of criticism. For example, many environmental groups dislike billboards because they believe that advertising promotes a consumer-focused culture while intruding on the natural landscape. Some organizations have complained that an excess of unattractive billboards can hurt tourism efforts in larger metropolitan areas. There have also been studies to suggest that billboards create driver distractions which can lead to dangerous traffic accidents. In response to these complaints, Hawaii, Alaska, Vermont and Maine passed laws restricting the use of billboard advertising.
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