Out-of-home or OOH Marketing, typically involve display advertising messages, in high traffic and highly visible public spaces such as; highways, billboards, train stations, airports, bus benches interior, and exterior of public transportations, taxis and business vehicles. This also includes storefront signage and posters. In large cities the exterior of landmark buildings are also commonly occupied by large format OOH ads. Out-of-home ads must be visible, in mega cities like New York, London, Hong Kong and Tokyo, where outdoor advertising is so pervasive and cluttered. Consumers quickly become very desensitized, by the bombardment of visual ads. Ads search the out-of-home marketing is often an competition of being biggest, being the biggest and the brightest. Another way to break through the clutter, is through creativity. Businesses rely on the creative professionals in the advertising industry to develop smart and creative outdoor displays and attract public attention. People are usually on the goal and are engaged in other activities in public spaces. As such it is critical for outdoor advertising to be brief and easy to understand. It is important for the viewers to process and understand the key marketing messages with a very quick glance. There are many advantages of the outdoor advertising. Out-of-home marketing extends the reach of on-screen marketing channels, beyond the confinement of houses and it bring consumers closer to the point of purchase. As most people are not glued to their television screens all day long, Out-of-home advertising fills the significant amount of off-screen space and time in our lives. OOH is also an effective way to increase brand awareness, as consumers we often have the feeling of seeing some successful brands everywhere we go, just think about Coca-Cola and McDonald's. These brands are very good at occupying the public spaces with their brand presence. But at the same time however, outdoor advertising can create visual clutter as I mentioned earlier in the public space and this is very annoying. In September 2006 the city of Sao Paulo, the fourth larger city in the world banned all forms of outdoor advertisements, including on billboards, transit and infront of stores and eliminate the visual pollutions. As I mentioned earlier people become a very desensitized, by outdoor ads very quickly, and which can also lead to low engagement and impact. Traditionally, outdoor marketing is disconnected from the media based marketing channels as well, and this is another disadvantage and limitation of this form of advertising and marketing. The development of digital technologies however, has significantly impacted the world of outdoor marketing. Working in concert with location based technologies and mobile social media platforms, outdoor advertising can be directly linked to online engagement. Here's one of my favorite Out-of-home campaigns of all time. Let's take a look. Innovative digital display technologies such as, 3D surface projection, holograms and interactive displays can also bring novelty to the boring old outdoor displays. Here's another example of how holographic projections can be used to create a visually and narratively interesting outdoor ad campaign. Finally, the digital revolution also brings new types of consumer engagement and interactive experience through various technologies and the Internet of things. Instead of using keyboards and mouse, consumers today can directly interact with large format digital displays, through touch, sound, gesture, eye gaze or even facial expressions. Virtual and augmented reality technologies also blurred the lines and boundaries of physical and the digital World. These new innovations bring exciting new possibilities for out-of-home marketing. Let's take a look at the recent news report about how retail stores are implementing futuristic technologies to improve their in-store marketing touch points.
