Out of Home expert Tatiana Wilkins explains the booming business you see everywhere.

Photo courtesy of Tatiana Wilkins

When we watch Netflix, HBO or any other streaming service or TV or when we scroll through our favorite websites and are inundated with pop-up ads, we are acutely and painfully aware of every ad. Yet, somehow when we are riding on public transit, driving on the highway (or freeway depending on where you are), inside an arena for the big game or to see our favorite band, we often are blissfully unaware of being targeted. But when you stop to notice those ads and think about them you realize they are truly ubiquitous.

Turns out there is a massive business behind those ads or every billboard you see in Times Square or London by Spotify or Amazon Music announcing that week’s biggest new releases. As anyone in music is aware, those giant promotional billboards have become an important key to artist relations in the highly competitive world of streaming.

So, as a music junkie and expert I was curious to know more about this important practice. It turns out it is called Out of Home advertising. To explain it in depth I found a true expert in the field, New York-based Tatiana Wilkins, who started in Out of Home straight out of college. As Wilkins explained in an in-depth and fascinating talk, it is a field that is constantly evolving and growing. 2

Steve Baltin: What attracted you to this field?

Tatiana Wilkins: I was doing business marketing at California State Long Beach. When graduation was approaching, I was applying to all these LinkedIn marketing jobs that I could find. And I got an interview the day of my graduation, actually for an Out of Home company. And weirdly, in the business/marketing course that we had, they did not teach out of home. It was a focus on TV, social and print. So, I didn't really know what it was. I think most people who come into the industry of out of home don't fully understand it until you're in it because it is that niche medium. But I got the job a month or so after my interview. I've gone to a few different out-of-home companies and made such a cool network of people. I think what's kept me in the industry is the people. It does feel like you're just working with some of your best friends and they're really smart and I've learned so much from so many people. It is cool to also see your media in the wild, on Sunset in L.A. and the big bulletins of New York, in Times Square. So that's how I got into it and stayed in it. It's a very people first industry.

Baltin: As you say, not many people are familiar with it if you're not in the industry. So, what is out of home?

Wilkins: It's a type of advertising medium. So, when an advertiser, let's say Pringles or something, wants to advertise their new flavor of chip, they're going to put it on social media. They're going to do TV ads. They're going to maybe do some magazine ads. Out of Home is another one of those channels to use. So that's essentially putting up media placements. outside of your home so bulletins on the highway, bus bench advertising, the transit shelter ads that you see, the digital that you see you in New York or Las Vegas on the Strip. Those are Out of Home ads, so you're surrounded by Out of Home at all times for the most part unless you're somewhere really rural, which does still have Out of Home. It is all around you and once I started working in it, I started to notice how much of it there is. and it's a growing market, especially with digital ai coming into fruition a lot stronger. So, it should be interesting to see how that forms over the next couple of years.

Baltin: That is interesting though because it's one of those things that like you say you see it everywhere, but you don't think about it.

Wilkins: Exactly, it's all subconscious. Say you're looking for a new car and you're like, “Oh I like a Toyota, but I like a Volvo.” as soon as you make that thought process in your head you start noticing ads everywhere for it. I feel like that always happens to everyone, so it is a very effective medium awareness wise whether people are just passing and glance at it. Your mind is still taking that information in and it's still processing it and it's using those aha moments where it's like, “Oh, wait this is actually perfect for me. I'm the target audience.” So, it's a cool job and it's been cool to see the industry change over the years. Sunset Blvd, for example, has changed so much over the past couple of years, especially since I've been there. There's a lot more digital and it's a lot more artsy, so things like that. The market landscapes are changing. Advertising is advertising, but it does change the cityscapes.

Baltin: People are so focused on social media, as well as TV and streaming, and yet still you spend the vast majority of your time outside. Are there companies that prioritize Out of Home because they recognize that?

Wilkins: Yeah, it's very advertiser dependent so say you have an entertainment client like Warner Brothers or Sony or something like that, you're going to see those big flashy Sunset Blvd or New York entertainment plays for example. Or you can get an Amazon or a tech company where they want to target tech workers on their way to and from work. So, you can get really granular like that, looking at targeting certain companies, company size, and find that path of advertisement from when they leave their home. So, you have commuter transit -- the subway ads, bus ads, highway ads where people are driving. Then you can get them in their elevators on elevator screens as they go to and from work and there are also things like adding on geo targeting. So, it's targeting mobile ads after they've seen an Out of Home ad so it all pairs together and it does work very well with other channels for that holistic approach. But it's a lot more nuanced because it is physical. You’re not just dealing with clicks on the internet, you have to deal with outside sources; there's weather, graffiti, all things that could affect the placement, but it keeps you on your toes.

Baltin: How has Out of Home advertising evolved?

Wilkins: I think a lot of the formats and opinions have changed over the years, like bus benches in L.A. I’ve seen really cool and unique ones, like the bus bench ad for Better Call Saul where he's advertising his services, so it looks like a real ad but it's for the show. You can do it very well and really creatively. But then again, it does come down to when you're media planning and you're creating the strategy of what you want to do, the formats you want to look at and what are our goals? “Do we want that splashy, flashy moment? Do we want coverage? Do we want to target by age, like the audience?” So that's very dependent on all that planning.