# Has anyone ever used a billboard to advertise there shirts?



## tomstar (May 31, 2007)

Has anyone ever used a LOCAL billboard to display your t shirts/website before? I always see local buisness's portrayed on billboards and they seem fairly catchy. Anyone ever try it or heard of someone doing it? Effective?

Thanks
Tom


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## Rodney (Nov 3, 2004)

I've thought about doing that before, but I've never done it.

From what I understand, it's better for overall "branding" purposes and not really effective for "return on investment"/"conversions" type of marketing.

I think will definitely get your name out there, but I wouldn't expect a flood of immediate sales from it.

Hopefully someone else with more direct experience with billboard ads will see this post and have more input


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## Twinge (Apr 26, 2005)

That sounds about right to me, though I have no direct experience either. They might be worthwhile in an overall advertising plan combined with other mediums to help branding, but would probably not be effective by themselves.

As a side note, I've heard that (at least in my area) it's actually cheaper to hire someone to hold a sign by a busy street than to buy advertising space on a sign for the same busy street.


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## FSP (Aug 9, 2007)

We looked into using a billboard for a non-shirt related business in Houston. They are VERY expensive and unless you are willing to pay for placement they do not guarantee where your billboard will be. 

From my conversation with 2 different companies they don't care too much about the smaller advertisers. This may be due to high demand in the Houston area.


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## cjoler (Aug 22, 2007)

Want to revive this thread a little...

I'm a one-man shop with a part-timer in the near future so looking for some controlled growth. I have the opportunity to put up some small billboards on a minor highway with good traffic for only the cost of materials and some annual tee trade to the land owner, plus county permit fees. It's a double lane highway through farm country (only a few miles from my shop) so signs would be close to road and only need installed higher than mature corn lol. A contractor friend said he would supply phone poles and digging/installation if I make him a sign too. Thinking about putting my sign on one side and his on the other. My question is do you think 4x8 would be a good size or would it be too small and look hokey? I already have two full sheets of heavy corrugated plastic with white aluminum on each side that I could use. I only make signs for freebie church projects so I'm slow at it, but have the cutter and materials needed.

Seems like a good opportunity, but want to make sure I put up something that looks professional while keeping initial investment low. Thoughts?


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## hutch82 (Aug 24, 2010)

Billboards are more for branding as Rodney put it earlier, or for events coming to your area. It would take a very long time to see any ROI doing that. To get the ones that will be seen by lot's of folks, there is a premium attached to it. Much better ways to promote your t-shirts via the web, cross marketing with non-competitive businesses or events in your area.

We actually do media buys for some clients that include billboards in some cases, so I speak from experience.

Core Media Group - Home


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## ryan barker (Jul 21, 2011)

i had asked about billboards once before awhile back, too.

there are two new electronic billboards on the highway (just outside dayton, ohio, the crossroads of america, as they say), the kind that keeps an ad up for 30 seconds or so. i went to the website, but didn't find any numbers and didn't follow up with a call. 

for me, who doesn't have a brand and would be advertising screen printing services and trophies, i think my return would probably be okay. if it was for my brand, no, i don't see how it would help much at all. someday i probably will give it a shot, but the context in which i would use it is likely a lot different than most people's.


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## hutch82 (Aug 24, 2010)

Yes Ryan, for your screen printing & trophies you would probably see a return over time. It's a commodity service that you offer & is highly searched on the internet which of course means at some point a lot of people need those services. Selling screen printing is much easier than selling t-shirts to the masses. Although we are actually launching a t-shirt line ourselves, "blobtees", but have some creative ways to market the line. I'll post the site when we go live.

Core Media Group - Home


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## ryan barker (Jul 21, 2011)

let us know when it's up. i always look at people's sites. when we (my wife and i) agree on a site to have, i'll do some seo for the local market (or try to, at any rate), which should put us leagues ahead of 95% of the other screenprinters in the area. while i whole-heartedly believe in word-of-mouth advertising, the simple fact is that you have to get people to try your services out in the first place.


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## GN (Aug 1, 2011)

I've done bill boards and I believe, as with all sales, in order for it to be effective you just need the right ad. Mine was effective and seemed to bring in traffic... however, with that said, the most effective advertising I have ever done is movie screen previews. My marketing team will go onto IMDB to find out which big name movies are coming out for the whole year and then place the ads accordingly. If your market is children then placing an AD before Toy Story 4 obviously is better than placing an ad before SAW 12 (or whatever number it's up to now). Moreover, we did a ton of research (a few years old now) and the numbers were staggering... all in all it was the obvious choice for advertising at an affordable rate. 
Billboards back when I did it was $5k a month for a certain high traffic area and many times you had to lock in 3-6 months at a time. Advertising in the theater was under $1k and was on all screens played and cycled at least 4 times before each of the movies. But again, it depends on the ad.. I go to the movies alot and always read the ads and some are just dreadful and serve no purpose. We used "mention this ad and get.." to help track it and also advertised a certain phone number specific for that ad so if anyone called to that number we know which ad it came from. It more than paid for itself with all the new customers. I can't say the same about the billboard ... but having a billboard does give legitimacy and brand awareness to the general public. I would advise if you DO get a billboard then utilize that billboard in other ads.. for example if you do a commercial end the commercial with a shot of the billboard and say something like ... "General Tees... you know, the one with the Big Board!!"


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## ryan barker (Jul 21, 2011)

i'm guessing that billboard was a traditional format, no? where they print out huge graphics and some guy gets up there with paste and a broom to affix it? i think that style is going the way of the phone book, really used by large companies and generally with some flashy kind of graphics or mechanics, not so much for the smaller guy these daze. it's all electronic now and i'm guessing much more affordable. 

i'd thought about theatre advertising once or twice, too, but just questioned how effective it would be for me. i think that's one of those things where you would really need to nail down your market research to get the best results.


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