Billboards resurge as the timeless titans of advertising in a digital age

I drove past a billboard recently that made me curious. On a bright yellow background, one word was printed in large pink letters: “Unskippable”. 

No brand name, no logo in sight — and it’s not just the billboards in my area that have been affected. The self-proclaimed “OG Influencer” has taken over billboards across the country with a wink and a punchline. “You stretch, I reach” beams down in gyms. “All eyes on me, literally” flashes across mall walkways. And roadside, the flex is bigger: “More followers than your feed. I just call them the population.”

These billboards are advertising… well, billboards. 

Exactly who is behind the campaign remains a mystery (trust me, I’ve searched high and low), as is who you are supposed to contact in the event that you would like to advertise on a billboard. The message, however, is very clear: online advertising may be what’s in vogue, but billboards invented this game, and as this campaign would have us believe, they’re still winning it. 

A short history of big statements

The billboard story started in the 1830s with a man named Jared Bell, who painted giant, picturesque posters in the United States. Bell’s speciality was big, bold signs for circus acts, especially the legendary Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey. The brief was simple: make it eye-catching, and make sure everyone in town knows the circus is coming.

By the 1860s, things had shifted. New laws made it legal for businesses to actually purchase outdoor space for advertising. That unlocked a whole new era. Suddenly, companies weren’t just plastering posters wherever they could — they were buying space and experimenting with placement. Of course, producing those giant canvases was still an art in itself, taking hours of labour to paint by hand.

Then came the late 1800s, and with it two turning points. First, large-format printing became commercially viable in the US and Europe, cutting out the need for artists to paint billboards  by hand. As machine printing started to bring the cost of making billboards down, demand shot up so strongly that industry associations began forming, laying the groundwork for outdoor advertising as a serious, organised business.

Second, standardisation arrived. In 1889, the now-famous 24-sheet billboard was introduced — a format so effective it became the global standard. For the first time, billboards were consistent, repeatable, and scalable. That moment turned them from one-off painted posters into the backbone of modern outdoor advertising.

The industry professionalised with associations like the Outdoor Advertising Association of America and the International Advertising Association, which standardised formats and practices. After World War 2, billboards even helped fuel economic recovery in Europe and Japan, plastering their way across cities.

But it wasn’t all upward trajectory. The inevitable backlash arrived in the 1960s. In the US, the Highway Beautification Act cut down on excessive signage, while France banned many billboards from rural and historic areas in 1979. But every time regulation trimmed billboards back, technology pushed them forward again, from vinyl printing in the late 20th century to the LED-powered digital screens dominating city skylines today.

If you’re wondering when South Africa got its first billboard, you’re not alone. Desktop research hasn’t produced any clear answers to that question; in fact, the earliest mention of a billboard in South Africa that I could find online is the first digital billboard in SA, which was unveiled in 2007 by Primedia Outdoor for the Coca-Cola Company at their offices in Woodmead, Johannesburg. How we got from hand-painted wooden boards to a digital billboard is unclear, but I think it’s safe to assume that we followed the trends set by the technology of the time. 

Still here, still evolving

Billboards may be universal, but the way they show up around the world couldn’t be more different. In India, they’re practically an art form, as giant hand-painted Bollywood posters that can take weeks of painstaking brushwork are still the norm. 

In Brazil, creativity took an unexpected turn when São Paulo banned billboards in 2007. Advertisers, unwilling to disappear, pivoted to guerrilla-style tactics like projecting images onto buildings and experimenting with alternative outdoor formats.

Head to the Middle East, and it’s all about scale. Dubai’s highways host some of the largest (and priciest) outdoor ads on the planet, more spectacle than signboard. Contrast that with Scandinavia, where the focus on sustainability has produced solar-powered billboards made from eco-friendly materials.

And then there are the experiments that make you raise an eyebrow.

Case in point: America’s first scented billboard. In 2010, a grocery chain in North Carolina unveiled a giant cube of beef skewered by a fork that extended all the way to the ground. Twice a day, the billboard puffed out the carefully orchestrated smell of black pepper and charcoal, convincing morning and evening commuters that they were driving past a steakhouse instead of a sign.

How long before we get a peri-peri-scented Nandos billboard?

The future of big signs

The humble billboard’s job description has always been quite simple: grab your attention in seconds, and leave an impression that sticks even after you’ve driven past at 120km/h. That’s why they keep it short and impactful: big fonts, simple images and the kind of messaging that cuts through traffic noise. It’s not subtle, but subtlety was never the point.

And it works. Recent studies show that billboards generate up to 55% brand recall, compared to just 21% for digital banner ads. In other words, people are more likely to remember the advert they saw above the highway than the one shoved between two Instagram reels.

It’s tempting to see online advertising as the billboard killer. But the truth is, the two now play complementary roles. Online ads can be precise and interactive, but they’re fleeting, and viewers often glance past them. Billboards are broad, constant, public — and as the OG Influencer reminded us, unskippable.

For many brands, the sweet spot is integration: a billboard that drives awareness, paired with online ads that capture clicks and conversions. Outdoor media establishes the memory, while digital media closes the deal.

As cities grow denser and attention spans shorter, the billboard’s relevance is unlikely to fade. If anything, they’re becoming more creative, more targeted and more adaptable. And in a world drowning in content, that might be their biggest competitive advantage.

So next time you’re stuck in traffic, glance up. The ad glaring down at you isn’t just filling space — it’s working. Quietly, consistently and sometimes even cleverly, billboards continue to prove that the oldest tricks in advertising can still hold their own against the newest. DM