Outdoor

In the wider context, a lure needs to attract an audience to ads. Few people seek out ads. Something has to lure an audience to where the persuasive messages will be seen or heard. Therefore, the function of the various "media" is to deliver an audience to the persuaders.

Billboards and posters are targeted at people on the roads going to and from work, or at crowds gathering for some event.

Billboards are designed for quick impressions as cars go by, usually one vivid image, or a simple repetition campaign for name recognition or brand awareness.

Other outdoor ads include posters on the sides of busses and trucks, on the tops and rear of taxis, flyers on car windows, painted bus stops, benches, waste cans, kiosks. Smaller posters in public places such as airport terminals, train stations, and subway walls. In the sky, ads appear above crowds at parades, football games, auto races, marathons, beaches, state fairs, festivals: using blimps, planes towing banners, skywriters, searchlights, and lasers.

In 2006, Time reported that "an old advertising medium is being reinvented, billboards are getting smarter and more interacrive, letting you in on the action." New technology (cell phones, text-messaging) has changed everything and the business is growing quickly, as one advertiser put it: "It's a medium where there is no remote control. You can't mute it or change the station. You can turn it off. It's there 24/7."

Several recent controversies relate to the content of billboard ads. For example, many places have a disproportionate number of state lottery ads in ghettos and barrios, the poor neighborhoods. "Americans shelled out $48 billion on lotteries in 2004.... That means that the average American spent more on lottery tickets than on reading materials or movie tickets." (USA Today 6/15/ 05) Opponents to gambling argue that these target a most vulnerable audience.

In sports auditoriums and stadiums, ads are usually placed where they will be seen in the background of any television coverage. But, stadium ads are not limited to that. For example, the 2005 World's Championship team, the Chicago White Sox, exposes its paying customers to more than 300 ads during a game, using electronic signs and audio announcements. Unbelievable! ( Find 2 unbelievable things in that sentence.)

Most American cities prohibit loudspeakers as "noise pollution"; but, many other countries have not, so traveling loudspeakers atop cars and trucks are commonly used there for local ads and political elections.

Visual pollution, however. is the most common complaint about billboards. Before the federal interstate highway system was created in the late 1960s, such visual pollution was much worse. The Highway Beautification Act (1965) has removed over 800,000 signs, but over 120,000 still remain. The federal government is required to pay compensation money to the owners, but, because of industry lobbying, Congress, however, never appropriates much funding for this. Thus, many, many billboards still remain, grow in size and replacement value.

Zoning regulations in many cities also have "grandfather" clauses. No new signs or billboards are permitted, but the existing signs have been "grandfathered in." Anytime you see a billboard in a high density area, you can assume that there's a complex legal problem (and big money) involved. Political pressure and bribery are commonly involved in the conflicts between advertisers and regulators acting on behalf of the common good.

For example, see "Big Sign Firm Accused of Corruption." about a case in Los Angeles:"Brian Gurnee, who once ran part of Regency's sales team and is suing the firm in a financial dispute, estimates that the Kennedy brothers, with their high concentration of valuable freeway and Sunset Strip signs, net tens of millions of dollars a year. A full-size billboard costs $40,000 to $100,000 to build but, in the right location, can pay for itself in a month. Regency asks advertisers for $3,000 to $80,000 a month, depending on the exclusivity of the neighborhood and how many motorists pass by."

Billboards go Digital: (New York Times Jan 11, 2007): "Billboard companies are adopting digital technology that rotates advertiser images every six or eight seconds — the better to catch the eye. The new billboards look like television screens, although the images do not move.... There are currently about 400 digital signs across the country. But within 10 years, about 4,000 billboards may be converted.... The digital signs have also revived a debate in towns and cities that dates to 1965, when the Highway Beautification Act was passed, limiting the number of new billboards that could be erected. Billboard critics have long said the roughly 450,000 billboards in the United States scar the landscape along highways and local roads. Billboard companies counter that they have a right to sell the space."

Billboards That Know You By Name (New York Times Jan 29, 2007) "Each day, it seems, marketers go further in their quest to deliver messages so engaging and personalized that one cannot help feeling special. The latest step will be seen today in four cities when Mini USA begins delivering custom messages to Mini Cooper owners on digital signs the company calls “talking” billboards. The boards, which usually carry typical advertising, are programmed to identify approaching Mini drivers through a coded signal from a radio chip embedded in their key fob. The messages are personal, based on questionnaires that owners filled out: “Mary, moving at the speed of justice,” if Mary is a lawyer, or “Mike, the special of the day is speed,” if Mike is a chef."

Billboards That Look Back (New York Times. May 31, 2008): "In advertising these days, the brass ring goes to those who can measure everything — how many people see a particular advertisement, when they see it, who they are. All of that is easy on the Internet, and getting easier in television and print.

Billboards are a different story. For the most part, they are still a relic of old-world media, and the best guesses about viewership numbers come from foot traffic counts or highway reports, neither of which guarantees that the people passing by were really looking at the billboard, or that they were the ones sought out.

Now, some entrepreneurs have introduced technology to solve that problem. They are equipping billboards with tiny cameras that gather details about passers-by — their gender, approximate age and how long they looked at the billboard. These details are transmitted to a central database."

See also: www.scenic.org - the website of Scenic America: 'Throughout the country, our most cherished scenic resources and hometown assets are being obscured by a blizzard of monstrous billboards, badly sited telecommunications towers, a tangle of overhead lines, and a hodgepodge of visual clutter. Open space is being lost. Our natural and cultural heritage is being buried under unconstrained development and poorly designed transportation systems. America's beauty and community character are being obliterated by a steel curtain of visual spam.But at Scenic America, we believe we have a choice about how we want to live. Change is inevitable. Ugliness is not."

For more: Catherine Gudis, Buyways (2004); or the excellent review of this book, here by Dan Neil (2004 Pulitizer Prize for Criticism) with an informative overview of the political issues involved.