A How To Guide
Getting Good Creative Approved
We get asked constantly, “How do I get clients to stop adding their phone numbers to billboards?”
Wrong question. Rather than having counterpoints for requests like that, what if you never had requests like that in the first place?
That’s what we’re hoping to do with this presentation—avoid those requests and get killer creative on the street.
TIME TO CLEAN UP THE STREETS
Out of Home’s Greatest Sh*ts
These are the problems that plague every billboard operator.
The Wall of Sh*t
A list of every service they could possibly offer in all caps, extra bold, outlined in black.
Scattered Sh*t
A list of products, a list of attributes, an address, a phone number, two discounts offers – upchucked all over a design.
Typical Sh•t
Multiple images, multiple messages, but we still need to add a phone number. Just slap a bar on the bottom.
Meaningless Sh•t
Quality, excellence, tradition, luxury. These words are so overused they mean nothing anymore.
More Meaningless Sh•t
Surely this is better because it’s shorter, right?
No. It’s still effing boring.
Start Early
Your clients only know what they’ve seen. You can make a major dent in the number of phone number, photo, website, and bullet point conversations you have, by simply showing good creative before you ever start talking about good creative.
DON’T SHOW THEM SH*T LIKE THIS
This is what most local advertisers think billboards should look like. Show them what good billboards look like, not what other advertisers in their category look like.
This is what our potential clients see before we talk to them.
Showing good creative early raises the bar and clients’ expectations immediately.
Back It Up
Research backs up what we’ve been saying about the amount of junk that gets crammed into a design. Use these before you need to. If you’re using these stats after a client has already asked for the phone number, and website, and address, and list of services, you’re too late.
The likelihood that consumers will take away a single message from an ad drops by 35% for every additional message.
1 Message = 100% chance of 1 message recall
2 Messages = 65% chance of 1 message recall
3 Messages = 43% chance of 1 message recall
4 Messages = 35% chance of 1 message recall
Source: Journal of Advertising Research - Millward Brown
There’s a 0% chance you’ll remember that Farm Stand is your community’s home for healthy living, that they’re grocery, that they’re deli, that they’re pharmacy, that they have bulk bins, or that the feature Azurewell or Azure brands.
There’s a 100% chance you’ll remember ProDough is protein.
The number of visual elements within a creative design have a negative correlation with recall and recognition.
Source: Franzen, 1994; Hendon, 1972; Stern, Krugman, and Resnik, 1981
A headline, four drinks with four different names, a website, and a logo. 11 visual elements.
A guy, his name, a headline, a logo. Four elements.
Which one do you think you’ll remember an hour from now?
Studies of both print and outdoor advertising have shown the amount of text correlates negatively with attention, recognition, recall, and the appeal of the advertising for every additional message.
Source: Bhargava, Donthu, and Caro, 1994 Donthu, Cherian, and Bhargava, 1993; Gardner and Luchtenberg, 2000; Hendon, 1972; Rossiter, 1981
You looked at the one on the right first
Starting a Creative Conversation
You’ve shown them good creative. You’ve worked in some research. Now it’s time to talk. Stop asking what they want on their billboard. That’s just asking them to fill it up with stuff. Start with what they want to accomplish. Talk about outcomes. That leaves the creative path open for exploring something interesting.
WHAT DO YOU WANT ON YOUR BILLBOARD? TO ACCOMPLISH?
Put Up or Shut Up
If you’ve gotten this far with your client, they should be pumped to see what you come up with. That means the sales and creative teams need to talk the talk and walk the walk.
Sales
Speak intelligently about how advertising works.
Hold the expert position.
Keep learning.
Creative
Don’t just make things look pretty.
Create big ideas.
Speak intelligently about why this idea will resonate with the audience.
Keep learning.
And wouldn’t you know it? We offer Fractional Creative Director services for this exact thing.
We’ve developed a framework to build a creative culture within your company, level up your sales staff’s advertising knowledge, and boost your creative team’s big idea muscles.
What does it look like for a media operator to build a creative culture?
Like this. Grace Outdoor has been using us as Fractional Creative Director to arm the sales team with knowledge and work with their creative team on big ideas.
That’s resulted in a jaw-dropping portfolio of their own work and far better creative conversations with their client.
If you don’t have a creative team or portfolio-level work yet, we can help.
It Takes Time
There’s no easy. There’s no quick. This is a from-the-top-down cultural shift within your company. Employees might be slow to adapt. Clients might not get onboard immediately. But one will. Maybe two. And when their killer creative hits the streets, others will follow. Within a year or two, you’ll likely see a difference in client retention and increases in rates, as you justify the value you’re adding to your clients’ budgets.
Phone Number Hill
You’ve done everything we just talked about. Show good creative. Talk about goals. Deliver on good creative. And they still want their phone number? F*ck it. Do it. You’ve still got a great billboard concept. Phone numbers don’t kill ads. Boring sh*t kills ads.
See below? Phone number. No big deal.
Need help on your creative journey?
We have a whole framework for building a creative culture within your company, arming your salespeople with marketing knowledge, and training up your creative team to bring big honkin’ ideas.
Drop us a line.