Brands that invest in OOH benefit from short-term sales and long-term business results, says Rapport

Brands that use OOH for both sales activations and brand building are seeing stronger long-term business results, according to findings from Rapport revealed at yesterday’s DPAA Town Hall event.

According to its Standing on the Shoulders of Giants report, brands that dedicated 15% or more of their budget to OOH saw a 17% uplift in sales value, a 25% uplift in profit gain, and a 100% uplift in market share compared to brands that didn’t invest in OOH at all.

The research was commissioned by the IPA and Peter Field, assessed 40+ years of advertising effectiveness and 2,000 IPA databank case studies, and marks the second iteration of the study, first launched in 2018.

Ross Wilson, head of insights EMEA at Rapport, presented the research and outlined how over the past seven years, fragmentation across the media landscape has continued at pace.

“It’s driven a sort of short-termism and it’s fuelled increasing investment across digital channels,” Wilson reflected.

Referencing Les Binet’s research carried out with Will Davis, chief data officer at Medialab Group, Wilson argued that this short-termism has resulted in an over-focus on return-on-investment (ROI), which, as revealed by Binet and Davis, budget is nearly eight times more important than ROI when it comes to driving marketing effectiveness.

However, despite acknowledging OOH’s effectiveness, Wilson highlighted industry frustrations, such as the difficulty of measuring the channel and quantifying its effectiveness, relative to other channels.

Wilson said: “In that vacuum, we see budgets reduced or replaced by digital channels.”

During the event, it was also highlighted that, despite OOH accounting for 24% of media time, ad spend is 3%, marking a 21% underinvestment in the medium.

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The power of OOH

OOH’s role in driving business metrics and complementing other channels within a rapidly evolving media landscape was certainly not bypassed.

The research compared 41 brands that dedicate 15%+ of budget to OOH, or “OOH power-users”, with 41 non-users of OOH to assess the impacts on long-term and short-term business results.

OOH was identified as essential for boosting brand awareness, driving esteem, and the health and fame of a brand, with 46% of brands using it for both sales activation and brand building.

Along with its impact on long-term business results, OOH power-users saw a 25% uplift in sales activation, boosting short-term sales compared to non-users.

The research highlighted that short-term sales can be maximised with sales activation messages, with brands that utilise this seeing a 75% uplift and a 43% uplift in brand messaging.

A complementary mix

Along with identifying OOH’s individual effectiveness, the research addressed the role it plays as part of the wider media ecosystem.

Wilson said: “We recognise that OOH doesn’t exist in a silo.”

Highlighting the amplifier effect OOH can have on other channels, such as social, display, TV, video-on-demand (VOD), and search, Wilson underscored the impact this can have on sales.

“If we think about each of those channels that are very highly targeted, they’re often one-to-one and brands are increasingly having to spend over large budgets to reach them across those channels — OOH perfectly complements them by putting them in a public space, reaching large audiences and creating a communal talking point.”

The OOH power-users saw a 3% boost in display, a 17% boost in social effectiveness, a 21% boost in TV and VOD, a 27% boost in online video advertising (OLV), and a notable 129% boost in search.

For these brands, they saw a 28% boost in social sales, a 28% boost in OLV sales, and an 8% boost in TV and VOD sales.

Profit also boosted by 14% for social, 42% for OLV, and 67% for TV and VOD, highlighting the clear business effects OOH has when used in conjunction with other media, especially social and video formats.