A lot of people seem to think only the size of an ad, or billboard in the case of outdoor advertising, determines readership of the advertising. This is not necessarily true. What does determine readership is the layout and how the design works within the environment it is competing in. For instance, color ads work best placed within black and white ads. However, if the immediate ad environment is mostly color, black and white will stand out more boldly. Reversed black and white ads will stand out among a black on white environment. Full page ads, a lot of the time, do not deliver as much traffic as an ad leaving 1 column open for readers following news stories. In the case of outdoor advertising, mother nature and clutter has a large effect in laying out good chicago billboards.
The Daniel Starch Company many years ago measured advertising effectiveness for display ads which also kept copy writers in check. Mr. Starch came up with a system where an ad was measured as “seen”, “noted” and “associated”. Size, headlines, focal points, copy content and other techniques were taken into consideration. In many cases larger ads were not as effective as smaller ads. This was due to the mere layout of the advertising. Placement can also have a lot to do with readership. One cannot ascertain that certain techniques work in all scenarios. There is no one way to design a good layout that will work in all schemes. The real answer is, IT DEPENDS. Many variables can contribute in successfully communicating your message. Understanding that size does not necessarily determine readership can save an advertiser a lot of money. In fact, downsizing ads and creating better readership through good layouts will accrue advertising dollars. This in turn will enable advertisers to buy a larger and better media mix for what they previously spent on one media alone. More GRP’s and decreases in cost per thousand will be realized. Focusing on design causes more readership and allows budgets to be better spent. Good layouts more than any other thing cause greater readership, not size.