Anyone used to online advertising finds physical advertising uncomfortable, because there is no click. Here is how to measure it anyway, and where each method falls down.
1. Flying days versus non-flying days
The cleanest method available. Fly it some weekends and not others, and compare walk-ins, calls or till counts.
The flaw is that weekends differ for a hundred other reasons: weather, holidays, whatever your competitor did. You need several months of alternating data before the noise settles, and most people give up before then.
It is still the best method, because it is a real comparison rather than an opinion.
2. A code that only exists on the balloon
Print a short offer on the blimp that appears nowhere else. Count redemptions.
The flaw is that it dramatically undercounts. At 120 feet nobody memorises a code, and most people who notice you because of the balloon will never mention it. What you get is a floor, not a measurement.
Use it as proof that the number is above zero, not as the number.
3. Ask every walk-in
Crude, unfashionable, and better than people expect. Train staff to ask how somebody heard of you and to write it down.
The flaw is memory. People misattribute constantly, and a customer who drove past for six weeks and finally came in will say they always knew you were there.
Still worth doing. Patterns emerge across a few hundred answers even if individual answers are unreliable.
4. Just look at it honestly
Drive your own approach road on a flying day and a non-flying day. From what distance can you tell your business exists?
That is not a metric and it will not satisfy a spreadsheet. It is also the question the whole purchase turns on, and you can answer it in ten minutes.
We would rather you did that than buy on a promise.
The honest summary
Physical advertising cannot be measured to the standard of online advertising. Anyone who tells you otherwise is selling something.
What it can be is cheap enough, and durable enough, that the measurement problem matters less. A $1,526 blimp used for years is a different kind of decision from a monthly budget that needs justifying every month.
Ask for a quote. Call 1-800-791-1445 or email [email protected] and tell us the size and whether you want it printed.
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