Digital Billboards for Dummies
How Digital Billboards Work
Digital billboards work by emitting light through LEDs. On most digital billboards, each individual dot of color is created by using a single red, green and blue LED. By varying the brightness in each color, any color in the spectrum can be created. For example, to produce the color purple, red and blue LEDs will be lit with somewhat equal brightness while the green will be dim or not lit at all. The color white is produced by giving full brightness to the red, green and blue LEDs. Black is achieved by not lighting the LEDs at all. The closer the groups of RGB LEDs are together on the billboard, the better the image quality.
How Advertisements are Sent to Digital Billboards
- An ad, image or piece of artwork is created by a designer, agency or software program. The artwork has to match the size of the billboard, more specifically, each group of LEDs represents one pixel on the computer screen.
- The artwork is uploaded to a digital billboard scheduling program (usually provided by the digital billboard manufacturer) or third party programmatic platforms like Adomni, who help sell your unsold ad space to advertisers anywhere in the world. The ad can be scheduled to run on certain days/times and are organized in a playlist.
- The scheduling program then sends the ad playlist to the digital billboard through the internet and wireless cell service. The billboard receives the ad through a modem and controller/software mounted on the billboard. The ad is then displayed during the date/time it was scheduled for.
A Brief History of Digital Billboards
The first “official” digital billboard was installed in 2005. Leading the way for a massive change in the out of home advertising industry. A single billboard could now host multiple advertisers, and at a higher rate due to the capability of running multiple ads at once and being able to change them remotely at the drop of a hat. The digital billboard business has been booming ever since.
Advertising on Digital Billboards
In the beginning, ad space on digital billboards was sold by the billboard owner/company themselves. But, with the growth of programmatic platforms like Adomni, it has become much easier to sell the ad space by simply listing the billboard on the ad marketplace to be seen and sold to advertisers all over the world.
Programmatic technology and digital billboard advertising have made it simpler for advertisers and display owners to find each other in an otherwise complex and spread out system.
