One of the highest honors in the Out of Home Advertising (OOH) industry is to have your design considered for a Grand Prix Award in Cannes.
Some question the reason for the awards, while others say they add value to the industry and accurately reflect and reward it.
Supporters of the awards say they are showing the multiple ways the OOH industry is changing to keep up with the times and stay relevant.
Changes like digital screens, audience data, and integrated consumer experiences are happening and putting billboards and other out of home options in the spotlight.
Even with all of the changes, the best asset is the most basic. Billboards can’t have the channel changed, be turned off, and the bold digital screens are quite noticeable on the landscape.
Studies are showing increasing attention from consumers when it comes to OOH, and some say Cannes is a “literal road map of evolution of OOH’s growing value to brands.” Business results are driven by a combination of creativity, technology, media selection, and consumer insights.
An example of one of these winning campaigns was done by Google a few years ago. It was for Google Voice Search, pictured above. Phonetic pronunciations of words were put in the right place for the right time frame to invite consumers to download the Voice Search app and ask a question for Google to answer. The campaign fueled 50% more downloads in London during its run time.
British Airways and Apple ran similar successful campaigns. British Airways encouraged viewers to look up, by placing their ad outside the airport and showing real time flight details and destination of a plane currently taking off.
Apple ran a campaign called “Apple Shot” with real photos taken by iPhone users to show the amazing images that can be captured with their device. They accomplished that as well as highlighting the intense relationships between users and their phones…how we capture our memories in our hands.
In 2017, a Twitter campaign won the Grand Prix.
The campaign confirmed that Twitter is “what’s happening” and features “powerful visual hashtags featuring icons and events from music, politics, social and cultural conversations. Twitter intrinsically understands there is no line between physical and digital worlds to consumers and we’re mobile and empowered and can move from awareness to action in an OOH minute.”
As we’ve discussed in previous articles, power house brands like Nike, McDonald’s, Honda, Coke and others have most of their ad spend on OOH. These brands have also won Marketer of the Year awards at Cannes over the last 10 years, making their campaigns a “highlight reel of powerful OOH creativity” that has driven results for the brands.
This article was adapted from a piece written by Sean McCaffrey.