Let’s be honest, many of us in the OOH industry could do a better job getting our clients quality photos in a timelier manner. Billboards or as we called them years ago, “30 sheets, 8 sheets, and even bus ads” were screen printed on heavy paper secured by billposters paste, only to flag after a rain or windstorm. Paints …were just that… hand-painted. Tri Visions were “the thing” back then. But then so was MTV
A lot has changed Since I got into the OOH Industry in the early ’80s…for the positive
The industry has exploded since then, in size, technology and scope of what Out of Home is. But for someone like me who has a background in photography, I’ve always found it disappointing that a visual industry like ours does such a substandard job of providing clients with great photos of their campaign. Don’t get me wrong…. there’s some great photography found on LinkedIn and some OOH website’s, but overall if we took a poll from media buyers and clients I believe our industry would barely get a passing grade on our photos, promptness and sell sheets.
Many a time I have heard the phrase, “Where’s my F*ing photos” from exasperated clients.
Providing great photos, videos and drone shots should not be considered a P&L expense, but as an investment for more business and growth!
Webcams, saying that’s all you’re going to get, or it’s the “industry standard”. That is us being lazy? Does waiting for two weeks to get photos of a campaign sound reasonable when everything else in our industry has sped up? So much for helping your client with a social media boost.
If we want more of the share of the national media pie, we need to step it up and change some attitudes. Providing great photos, videos and drone shots should not be considered a P&L expense, but as an investment for more business and growth!
Old excuses, “We don’t have a photographer”, “the board is 50 miles away,” “we only do install shots,” “we only will give you one photo for every 10 boards,” or the worst, “We just do webcams.” is not helping elevate our industry. It is clear, clients and buying services are demanding more while being much less willing to accept poor excuses.
It’s time to answer the call, let’s leave the 80’s attitude and mullet hairdo behind. We need to elevate our industry, gain market share and create more business. To do that, requires that we show off what we do, not make excuses about why we can’t.
I rest my case.
Steve Lind is the Chief Evangelist and Co-Founder of FotoFetch an enterprise resource solution to OOH photography combining a technology and evolving commercial photography solutions. FotoFetch serves industries as an on-demand photography source with thousands of photographers nationwide.
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