Digital Billboards

Outdoor Advertising’s Glowing Future

A new technology is giving advertisers the unparalleled ability to change their ad messages quickly and efficiently. The same technology is making communities safer by helping catch fugitives and find lost children. It’s providing valuable information to keep the public informed about issues important to them. And it’s all wrapped in a familiar, comforting package: the billboard.

Digital technology’s marriage to billboards is one providing countless benefits to diverse groups of consumers. There are hundreds of digital billboards in the United States, and that number is expected to grow by several hundred over the next few years.

Digital billboards are updated electronically through a variety of methods. Some are networked together, most are operated remotely, and all of them can be updated quickly, sometimes with just the click of a mouse. This ability gives digital billboards flexibility and nimbleness.

This nimbleness gives local businesses a unique and powerful way to reach a large number of geographically targeted consumers very quickly. In Toledo, OH, the Toledo Blade newspaper has used digital billboards to display daily headlines and even to deliver breaking news. In other cities, television stations use the technology to advertise the stories airing on the 6 pm news in the afternoon and the 11 pm news in the evening.

The message is getting out. A recent study by Arbitron, the media research company, found nine out of ten people notice the advertising copy on digital billboards some or most of the time. Nearly two out of three find digital billboards to be a cool way to advertise and recall for specific brands hit 50% for some advertisers.

Yet the advantages of digital billboards go far beyond selling products and services. The Arbitron study found more than 80% of people believe digital billboards provide important community information, and for good reason. In many cases, digital billboards are used as powerful aids to public safety. Throughout the country, local police departments are entering into partnerships with outdoor advertising companies to post the pictures of people wanted for arrest.

Digital billboards represent a significant advance in the technology used by the outdoor advertising industry to provide substantial benefits to advertisers and communities.