Outdoor Advertising: The “Brand” Communication Medium of the 21st Century

Outdoor Advertising Association of America, Inc., November 1999

AUTHOR:
James M. Maskulka

INTRODUCTION:

Marketers’ recognition of the increasing importance of brands as perhaps the firm’s most important strategic asset requires a fundamental rethinking of conventional business and marketing strategies. Not only must this re-thinking apply to brand management, but equally as well to brand communication strategies. Successfully managing brands today requires a creative portfolio of relevant media strategies that extends well beyond the “safe bets” of previous generations of advertisers. Today, generating awareness and enhancing an existing image are merely the price of entry to compete in a given market. Today’s consumers are yesterday’s Generation Xers — complete with short attention spans and the ubiquitous “been-there-done-that” attitude. Spontaneity reigns supreme in leisure activities, music, entertainment and receipt of information. Memory is relative. Something computers have; so, “Why do I need it they ask?” It is against this backdrop of a profound cultural and technology-driven shift in communicating that the media of 21st century are evaluated and that the future of outdoor advertising is presented.

The basic premise of this paper is that layout and design limitations imposed by the intrinsic nature of the outdoor medium frequently requires the creative talent of both the advertising agency and the client advertiser to rediscover the essence of a client’s brand. Case histories will be discussed in this paper in the context of: 1) the role of brands, 2) understanding the linkage between establishing brand attitude and advertising, 3) “managing” shifts in brand attitude dictated by consumer trends, competitor actions and/or information processing strategies of consumers. While this paper is primarily about the outdoor medium the discussion takes place in the context of all media. New angles on media usage and perspectives on how consumers are likely to use media in the future are additional topics discussed.

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