DESIGNING A GREAT BILLBOARD

Colors & Spacing

For easiest legibility at a distance, experience and research indicate that the width of a letter’s vertical strokes should be about one-fifth its height. Horizontal strokes may be slightly thinner. Use colors and pictures that contrast with the sky and other surroundings.  Your creative design should be specific to the board if possible or if not then designed for the poorest visibility board in the showing.  Do not put words or sentences stacked on top of each other. This reduces the ability to understand and view the message. Remember KEEP IT SIMPLE. Does your ad have a sufficient amount of space between the actual lines and words? If the letters or words run together it won't be read.Use a PMS or other color system. If you have an image, make sure it attracts the eye separate from the background and the copy. For example, color combinations that work are blue and yellow or red and black. Whereas, colors such as purple and yellow, or red and green vibrate together at too high a frequency and do not tend to be as effective.

Viewing Time

An important factor to consider when designing outdoor is does your message communicate effectively within 10 seconds? According to market research, that's how long your viewer will have an opportunity to see your ad. Consider this, cars traveling on the expressway are moving fast, if the ad is cluttered with too much info, the viewer will not get this info gradually as they keep moving. Instead they will ignore the ad as it too hard to read. Keeping it simple is the key to a billboard's effectiveness. It is a industry best practice to use no more than 7 words.

Font Sizes

Remember the viewer will be viewing the board from a distance. A well designed billboard will have large, bold fonts that can be read from distances of 1000 ft or more. Good creative typically has sturdy letters with even spacing and letters that are not crowded. You can see some examples below.

Distance @ 100 Feet

Distance @ 200 feet

Distance @ 300 feet

Distance @ 400 feet