Melody Roberts: Using Creative as a Sales Tool

Melody Roberts, Owner | Chief Creative Officer, Out of Home Creative

Melody Roberts is an award winning Creative Director who has been designing outdoor billboard advertising since 1999. In October 2015, Melody launched Out of Home Creative (outofhomecreative.com), an outdoor advertising design firm which designs traditional billboards and digital campaigns, transit shelters and any new non-traditional media as well as provides out of home design consulting and training.

Before developing Out of Home Creative, Melody served as the Southeast Regional Creative Director for Clear Channel Outdoor as well as the Creative Director for the Atlanta division. She has received national awards and international recognition including being named as a 2014 OBIE Finalist for her work with Casteel Heating, Cooling and Plumbing and placed first and second in the 2014 Outdoor Advertising Association of Georgia’s creative contest. Her creative designs have been featured in the Outdoor Media Association of Australia’s OPEN2 book and Out of Home Magazine.

Here are Melody’s thoughts about billboard design and her latest venture.  You can reach Melody at: info@outofhomecreative.com

 

Melody, you spent 15 years as a Creative Director for Clear Channel’s Atlanta division.  What’s the Atlanta outdoor market like?

 

The Atlanta market is the 9th largest DMA in the United States and one of the most competitive markets in the country. With so many outdoor advertising companies such as Lamar, Outfront Media and Fairway competing for the same ad buy, often times the sale came down to the creative.

 

There were several factors at play in this market: who could offer the client the best rate or location and who could execute the best creative. Since the other outdoor advertising agencies employed multiple designers in their art department, I was often challenged as a solo designer to perform at the highest level. For 13 out of 15 years, I delivered creative fulfillment for 12+ sales executives, averaging 70% of local market design needs while inventory grew 40+% during my tenure. It was a very fast paced and ever changing environment. Because of this, I had to be on top of the latest billboard advertising design trends in order to produce creative both locally and nationally often with a same-day turn around. Since 2007, the demand for digital billboards in the Atlanta market has more than doubled to almost 90 digital displays.

 

In addition to sold contracts, speculative creative was actively used as a sales tool to generate new business which often lead to a contract.

 

What’s the most memorable outdoor design you’ve done and why?

 

Melody Robert's award-winning Casteel ad.
Melody Robert’s award-winning Casteel ad.

2014’s Casteel Heating, Cooling and Plumbing not just because it won several accolades including a 2014 OBIE finalist nomination but because it was the client’s first outdoor advertising campaign. In all my years in the outdoor advertising industry, I have never worked with a client in the category of Consumer Services with a budget as large as their vision which included two 3D props.

 

It was also a win for the Atlanta market as we were up against competitors for the buy. To top it off, the client wanted two spectaculars and fourteen static rotary billboards in the air within 45 days of signing the contract, during the Holiday season. The production time alone for the two 1,500lb (toilet roll) props is usually six to eight weeks. We used Atomic Props for the prop fabrication and hats off to them and the Clear Channel operations team for getting this project done on time. The client gave me complete creative freedom once they told me what their vision was and the result was a classic embellished billboard with a simple and effective message.

 

 What are some common mistakes clients make when designing outdoor ads.

 

Screen Shot 2016-03-18 at 9.09.02 AMMany first time out of home clients usually think they can take a traditional print advertisement and adapt it to large format advertising. It is hard for clients to go from a half-page ad to 14 x 48 feet; it was my job to guide clients to help them understand how an out of home ad should be designed. Once I show them how their idea looks on a billboard and how it will not translate, nine times out of ten they’ve given me the creative freedom, from concept to completion, to come up with an idea which will meet the client’s needs and work well in outdoor media.There are a couple outdoor billboard design tips I always start with:

 

  • The “seven words or less” mantra really is true. A consumer needs to be able to read an outdoor advertisement at 70 mph, yet be impactful enough to stop a pedestrian walking by. Consulting in addition to design is a huge part of what I do. Helping clients understand how out of home advertising should be used is essential for their success and best ROI.
  • I often see clients using too many objectives: URL, phone number, directions, etc. I always preach to use one or two at the most. When a client tells me their website, phone number, directions and headline are all equally important, they need to be educated on why one of the four needs to be larger than the rest. If the billboard design attempts to have all these objectives at the same font size, it ends up cluttering the advertisement and the consumer isn’t able to focus on the advertiser’s most important message. If it comes down to that, I haven’t done my job.

 

How is digital outdoor ad design different from static outdoor ad design?

 

Digital billboards offer limitless creative, social media integration, day parting, total traffic networking, dynamic countdowns, real-time messaging, current weather and more. They also offer clients the flexibility to change their message the same day (or hour), more options on how to engage consumers and dynamic campaigns that rotate throughout the day. New technology is always coming on the scene e.g. driving by a digital board for Dominos can, if the consumer has it installed, push an instant promotion to your Dominos mobile application.

 

Static outdoor advertising is primarily bought with the intent to advertise one message. Although you can do a rotary campaign for either, static does not offer most of what digital products can. It does however stay in one place for a long period of time without flipping to another advertisement so it is a persistent message. Utilizing wallscapes and being able to take over the side of a building offers remarkable advertising opportunities that usually create a lot of media buzz. I’ve seen some of the best advertisements in out of home come from using this platform.

 

Static/traditional billboard advertising will always hold a place for me because you can go outside the live space of the billboard and get really creative with extensions and 3D props/embellishments which you cannot do with digital. After all, who doesn’t love a classic billboard advertisement that has a simple message and an enormous prop branding the company? When I think about, “what is out of home advertising”, that is what I initially think of… big, bold and what traditional print, TV, radio and online can never offer – the impact of seeing an advertisement at 14×48 feet or more.

 

 What sets Out of Home Creative apart from a Graphic Designer?

 

Effective and creative outdoor advertising or billboard design is a specialized skill. I’ve seen first-hand some of the most well-known and respected ad agencies in the world, struggle with designing large format out of home advertising. Some graphic designers will go their entire career without ever designing a billboard and when they do, they realize that the design skills they’ve applied to small-format or online platforms, don’t always translate over to outdoor billboard advertising. I’ve provided out of home direction and best practices to some of the biggest agencies and clients in the country and understand the importance of how creative is a deciding factor for an outdoor advertising buy. Clients will gain a unique access to my specialized outdoor design experience while knowing our creative will separate them from their competitors.

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