Billboard Critique

August 29, 2011

There’s lots of bad design out there. I’m picking on one particular example for 2 reasons.

1. I walk past a billboard with this advert on it at least twice a day
2. There’s a really good core concept in this advert, which feels like it’s been ruined by a committee of unfocused input

The billboard is targeted at holiday makers in the South West. The core of the advert is the ‘Tiger Prawn’ illustration. It’s a good concept, it’s fun, engaging and reads very quickly.

So what really grates with me is that a good concept has been diluted with a mess of tacked on messages. Most of which are unnecessary, if not detracting or contradictory.

Top left corner features the message ‘Torquay’s coastal Zoo’. I can live with this. I’d be happier if was incorporated with the Living Coasts branding in the bottom right corner - but I suspect there are other funding and organisational agenda’s going on here that make this a less optional feature.

Lets look at the problems. Bottom left corner: ‘Pay Once Return Free for a Week’. This isn’t really such a great offer that it deserves a place on a billboard. The purpose of the billboard is to introduce the zoo to holiday makers, most of whom are not aware of the zoo, with the intent of giving them the idea of making a trip to the zoo. It’s unlikely the offer of being able to come back a second time is actually going to swing this decision.

A holiday maker wanting to make best use of their days want’s reassurance that the family is going to have a great day out when they visit the zoo. At this stage the fact they might be able to come back again for free is irrelevant. It’s an offer that should be presented to the visitor when they’re at the zoo buying their tickets. This offer doesn’t clinch the deal for getting first time visitors to come to the zoo - it is just an incentive to encourage previous visitors to come back and hopefully spend some more money in the gift shop.

On the billboard, all this message does is detract from the main graphic.

In the top right corner is a message that, when you think about it, directly conflicts with the free return offer. ‘New Exhibits’.

I think the intention of this billboard is to attract visitors who haven’t been before. In which case New Exhibits is redundant, because to the first time visitor they’re all new. There might well be some return visitors, in which case promoting new exhibits might seem reasonable - but - it seems to be an acceptance from the zoo that if you’ve seen the old exhibits, there wouldn’t be much appeal in coming back. This being the case - what does that say about the Free Return for 1 Week offer?

It’s a weak message that will do little to finalise the decision to visit the zoo for a typical holidaymaker and again, mostly serves to detract from the main graphic.

The caption under the graphic ‘Tiger Prawn!!’ - I don’t think adds anything. But equally I don’t think does much to detract either, although I really hate having 2 exclamation marks. One is plenty.

‘Great little Creatures’ - I like this tag line. It sits well with the graphic (in concept) - it’s just placed badly on the page. In fairness, there’s no alternative space left on the advert to place this. But it’s yet another piece of text crammed in to send your eye bouncing all around the space.

Here’s my version of what the advert should look like.

This article is written by John Cowen, owner of Mekonta - a small web design studio in Exeter, Devon.