Here’s Your Sign…

Use your vehicle as a moving billboard…Or Don’t

The idea of using signage on your organization’s vehicles isn’t new, but some new tools may make it worth taking a second look! You’ve likely seen how buses can be turned into moving billboards through the placement of several ads on the body of the bus, or by turning the outside of the bus into one huge billboard. Magnetic and static decal technology  today allows you to turn your vehicle into a moving billboard, too, and in a very professional-looking, eye-catching way. This can be a great way to get all kinds of exposure for your organization while leveraging an existing asset. Think about how much it would cost to put up billboards in all the places your vehicles travel, and this really becomes a promotional tool with exponential returns on its investment!

Once you decide to turn your vehicles into moving billboards, however, there are some things to consider. Chief among them is that EVERYTHING IS BRANDING! Everything that vehicle does, everywhere it goes, and so-on, are potential touch-points for your entire brand. This is something you and anyone who drives your moving billboard need to consider. ANYONE who drives a vehicle that has your message on it is literally driving your brand! So make sure they play nice on the highways and that they don’t park in handicapped zones and that your vehicles don’t end up parked anywhere else they shouldn’t be. I will leave specific examples to your imagination. Just imagine the worst, and counsel drivers accordingly!

It’s also a good idea to keep those vehicles CLEAN, regardless of what business you’re in. That’s obviously important to the business featured in the picture above. Barry Kelly, president and founder of Elite Mobile Wash, not only knows the value of using his vehicle as a rolling advertisement, he wisely recognizes that his vehicle is the window through which his services, and his BRAND, are viewed. So if you see an Elite truck, you’ll see a clean Elite truck! He has plenty of commercial clients who see the value in having a sparkling fleet and they use Elite to make sure what they drive is a positive component of their brand image. If you’d like to learn more about Elite Mobile Wash, you’ll see the web address right there on the truck.

On the other hand, sometimes NOT using your vehicle as a moving billboard is worth considering, and for the same reason: Everything is Branding!

A colleague of mine owns a growing business that does exceptional work. However, in his opinion, his current fleet of three company pickup trucks isn’t quite up to the high standards he has for his entire brand, so he has very wisely decided to forgo any signage or marketing messages on his vehicles until he has new trucks to put them on. In his case, this is a correct, big-picture decision! He realizes the importance of making sure his entire brand is built incrementally and managed correctly.