OAAA releases guide for maximizing impact of brand messages

The Creative Best Practices Guide offers a checklist of each creative element to consider while developing a campaign

The Out of Home Advertising Association of America (OAAA) has released its "Creative Best Practices Guide", providing a model for maximising the impact of brand messages. OOH encompasses many formats, canvases, and experiences and there is no singular solution that fits all campaigns. The Creative Best Practices Guide offers a checklist of each creative element to consider while developing a campaign. OOH has the unique ability to tap into emotion and inspire, and the insights in this document are a product of collective wisdom that can drive the industry forward by ultimately changing the way people connect with brands, states an OAAA release. 

Seventy-five percent of an ad's effectiveness is determined by its creative, according to the Advertising Research Federation, and the guide zeroes in on key steps in the creative process. Featured are tips on where to start and how to shape a campaign, designing basics and timeline planning, as well as strategic advice on the power of transparency and feedback. Some critical observations include: 

• The importance of putting concept first and placement second 
• How to optimise creative for OOH formats 
• Design element tips for font, typeface, images, and CTA's 
• How to encompass all media as unified pieces of a campaign, from experiential to SEO 
• Key considerations such as locality, ensuring advertisers speak to the specific market where an ad will be placed, whether it be the entire country or metropolitan centres like NY and LA 
• Encouraging marketers and brands to share briefs with vendors and their creative teams 
• Touching base with experts who have decades of experience 
• Exploring, rather than shying away from big ideas 
• Looking for inspiration from award winning ads of the past, trusted media partners and even competitors.

"I'm proud to bring forward OAAA's latest Creative Best Practices Guide, which sets the foundation for creative expertise while bringing to light new, innovative uses of channels like mobile, programmatic, video and more," said Leslie Wingo, President and CEO of SandersWingo. "I encourage creatives, big idea thinkers, technologists, media planners, programmers, designers and storytellers to dig into the guide before starting their next campaign and be open to never ending change and new possibilities."

"Every OOH ad is essentially a call-to-action, and these ads need to inspire consumers to search, so understanding context and which canvasses work for specific messages are crucial elements to drive engagement from audiences," said Anna Bager, President and CEO, OAAA. "OOH is a highly creative communications platform. OAAA's best practices offer detailed design advice on colour, typeface and copy, down to the optimal font size for executions across a spectrum of physical and digital locations, from malls and billboards to all types of digital formats."

To view the OAAA Creative Best Practices, visit: https://thoughtleadership.oaaa.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/OAAA-Creative-Best-Practices-.pdf