Airport advertising is clutter breaking: Times OOH and The Nielsen Company survey

According to International Air Transport Association (IATA), the air transport industry will handle 2.75 billion passengers in 2011. Huge investments in infrastructural development, coupled with a long dwell time at airports, offer marketers an opportunity to advertise their brands to a captive and relevant audience via OOH. However, OOH faces a unique problem -- being primarily a static advertising medium, it is often reduced to duplication of the print ad and its recall gets clouded by multimedia campaigns.

The objective of the research was to measure the isolated effect of an average advertising campaign at an airport, based on the recall of a fictitious brand. This was done by preparing an advertising creative around a fictitious passenger car brand, Hustle. The creative was put up at various media properties at the domestic and international terminals of Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGI) in Delhi. The creative carried the rear shot of a car along with the tag line, 'The fastest car on Indian roads'.

With a total of 14 ads placed across the domestic and international terminals, the data was gathered by conducting a face-to face-survey with more than 500 respondents, primarily in the age group of 26-35 years, belonging to SEC A1. Majority of the respondents were men.

Interestingly, around 95 per cent of the respondents remembered seeing at least one ad at the airport. More than two-thirds of those recalling the ad attributed seeing it only at the airport. Also, one-third of the respondents were able to grasp the core message of the campaign – the fastest car. These findings established airport advertising as a clutter-breaking medium.

Sunder Hemrajani, managing director, Times OOH feels that since airport advertising commands such high recall amongst commuters, it can well be used as a launch pad for brands. "Also, I believe engagement activities organised in the vicinity of the ads can take the experience to a higher level," he adds.

Times OOH plans to incorporate the insights of this research in future pitches it makes to clients.