Critical Daily    Critical practice in graphic design

This project is about pointing to flagrant violations of circumventing the law with billboard companies. I was impressed by one magic phrase that directed my reflection in a slightly different way. That sentence was: "Although the outdoor advertising constantly changing and evolving, its core mission remains the same - effectively reach and influence customer behavior." Last years such an amount and density of billboards, city lights, megaboards and various other advertising devices the past twenty years had filled the streets of our cities (and not just cities). People pay them too much attention, how could I actually effectively reach and influence their behavior? 

After receiving the signals from the sensory organs to the brain the information is either stored in long term memory, or is rejected as unnecessary. All unsaved information from our short-term memory disappear during the 20 seconds the average man hardly enough to remember 5-7 characters in a series of numbers. In the test in which the 15 seconds we see 10 different subjects, after a period of time most people will remember no more than 5 and if we saved the information into long-term memory. To make the information stored in the brain for a long time, we have to arrange them in a particular context or memorisation process repeatedly.

When advertising is placed by the roadside, it is not possible to pay attention on all of them at once. The drivers, pedestrians and other road users do not primary focus on the driving situation but the ads, but they don't have enough time to pay attention even to ads because of short observation. So the result is that the ads disappear without a trace. Perhaps these facts relate well with the problem of our strong resistance to visual smog in our cities. They do not give us enough attention, so we can not see them in fact, so they can not interfere in principle.

I don't know if it's coincidence, but especially in countries such as Slovakia and the Czech Republic, ne don't have surveys about the effectiveness of outdoor ads in public space. Television, radio and print media are monitored regularly, but outdoor advertising for unknown reasons not. Everyone who has visited any of the countries of Western Europe have seen that the situation with outdoor advertising is completely different from ours. In general, they have less ads, but with much higher quality. We can only hope that sometime we will see a regular professional independent study that would confirm or refute my assertion that outdoor advertising in our country has very small, even zero efficiency, and for many firm and entrepreneurs means a waste of money for this type of advertising.

Sources: Test your Brain/Prověřte svůj mozek, National Geographic Channel, 2011 / Výhody a nevýhody outdoor reklamy, mediaguru.cz / Prieskum názorov verejnosti na reklamu na billboardoch, avr.sk / Prieskum: Pre ľudí je najdôveryhodnejšia „reklama“ odporúčanie známych, strategie.hnonline.sk

The project was created during the course Critic – Critical practice in Graphic Design at Department of Visual Communication at Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Bratislava. The course foucuses on practicing and developing individual or collaborative critical projects.