Is Billboard Advertising a Good Idea for a Service Company?

Bill­board Ads I’ve been asked on a num­ber of occa­sions what I think about bill­board adver­tis­ing. Many con­trac­tors want to know if it is a good use of their adver­tis­ing bud­get. The answer depends on the sit­u­a­tion. I love the idea of adver­tis­ing on a 40′ bill­board on a major free­way, but in gen­er­al, it is not prac­ti­cal for most small ser­vice busi­ness­es. In today’s mar­ket, bill­board adver­tis­ing has become slight­ly more com­pet­i­tive and some­what afford­able. I know of one painter who did secure a 40 foot bill­board for less than $800 a month on a major Los Ange­les inter­state. I typ­i­cal­ly see prices for $3,500 to 5,000+ a month. If the con­trac­tor real­ly wants to brand his/​her busi­ness and has the extra cash, bill­boards could be a good way to get the word out. How­ev­er, I would not spend more than $1,000 a month! Net­work­ing Is Better Anoth­er painter I know was strong­ly con­sid­er­ing a $5k a month bill­board share pro­gram. He was promised sup­pos­ed­ly 40 dif­fer­ent bill­boards. This too sounds entic­ing! Yet, I con­sult­ed him to save the $5,000 on bill­boards and spend it on hir­ing a sales or mar­ket­ing per­son. I asked him how much a pro­fes­sion­al sales­per­son could bring in the door if he was paid a min­i­mum of $5,000 a month. A good net­work­ing per­son could def­i­nite­ly bring in more qual­i­fied sales leads for a ser­vice busi­ness. So that would be my advice: stick with net­work­ing and refer­rals. By the way, I am not sug­gest­ing every­one pulls out $5,000 a month to hire a net­work­er. Many times you and your cur­rent staff can do this sort of thing. This par­tic­u­lar client wants to get in the growth mode and does not have much extra time on his plate to net­work him­self. In his case, hir­ing some­one to net­work is a good option. Have you had suc­cess with bill­boards? Why or why not was it suc­cess­ful for your business?