We have all seen them at one time or another. The not-so-illusive yard sign has been a staple marketing tool for both professional and personal use for many years. Garage sales, graduation parties and “For Sale By Owner” signs populate homeowner yards all year round, helping bring attention to a passerby in hopes that a home is purchased or an item is sold.
For professional use, a yard sign is an effective marketing and brand awareness tool. With its durable material of corrugated plastic, a yard sign can last a long time outside and can withstand all weather conditions including rain and snow. When the right inks are used for printing, the color and design on a yard sign will not fade in the sun as well, making this type of signage a great option for many different types of businesses.
There are several standard sizes that are used for yard signs, but with large format printers and cutting tables, the size and shape of a yard signs has no limitations. This opens the door for creativity beyond the traditional applications for a yard sign.
Popular uses for yard signs
There are many traditional and unique ways to utilize yard signs for marketing. Here are a few popular ways to use them.
Real Estate: Yards signs are used in real estate for both personal use and by real estate agents. They can be placed in the yard of a home for sale to promote the property and be custom cut in an arrow or house shape to provide direction a couple of blocks away to the location of the home and open house events.
General Contractors: Whenever construction companies are building or remodeling a home, yard signs provide great brand awareness allowing for people to know what company is working at the construction site as they pass by. Using signs for this application provides opportunity to gain more business from the surrounding homes and can grow online traffic when a website or social media pages are promoted.
Home Services: Along with general contractors utilizing yard signs, many home services can also benefit from putting a yard sign by the road of a home they are servicing. Some of these types of businesses include; cleaning companies, lawn care services, landscaping businesses, siding and roofing companies. Similar to the contractor strategy, home services can enhance their brand awareness and online following by strategically using yard sign marketing at the job site.
Political Campaigning: A quick Google search will show that yard signs used for political campaigns can not only help promote a candidate, but can provide a marketing advantage that could potentially help persuade others in the area to vote a certain way for someone or something like a school referendum. Yard signs are also a great way for candidates to generate campaign funds by using yard signs as an option for people to help support the candidate.
Hiring: Yard signs are a way to show that your business is hiring and is also a simple and affordable option compared to large vinyl banners. With a metal stake, yards signs offer enough exposure at your business to generate interest and new applicants to your team.
Graduations: Similar to real estate, yard signs used for graduations offer an easy way to provide direction to where the party is being hosted. With a simple designed theme and the name of the person graduating, yard signs are a nice looking piece of signage that can add that special touch to the event. Life-size and custom cutouts of the newly graduated are a fun way to display card boxes and photo-ops for the attendees to interact with.
Community Awareness and Fundraisers: Yard signs work very effectively for bringing awareness to community and non-profit organizations, along with providing a marketing tool for fundraisers. Supporters of the event or organization can purchase a yard sign to put in their own yard or window and the money from the purchase goes to the cause. The purchased yard sign brings awareness to the group, potentially raising more money and boosting awareness. A win/win for everyone involved.
Best practices for yard sign design
When yard signs fail as a marketing tool, it’s usually because there is too much information on the sign or the design is too cluttered or busy to comprehend. Here are some ideas to keep in mind for your next yard sign design.
Simple design: When using a standard size or custom shape yard sign, keeping the sign design simple is important. With only so much space to utilize, you want to make sure the design is simple so any words or images are easy to view. “White space” is an important design term that means to keep empty space around the images and text so that the elements on the sign are easy to read. Words too close together or overlapping images can cause clutter and will not be effective for viewers to easily read.
Catchy, short verbiage: Whether you are hiring new employees or trying to grab attention to your target audience, keeping the messaging short is important. People viewing a yard sign are walking, running or driving past it, making their reading time short. Try to keep your yard sign message something that grabs the viewer’s attention but can also be read and understood in just a few seconds.
Contrasting colors: One of the most common mistakes with yard signs is when colors that are too close to each other in the color wheel are used together on a sign. Colors like red on blue or purple on black are examples of bad color combinations to use together. They tend to blend together and it can be hard to read from a distance or even up close. Using any color on a white background is for sure to be seen, but you could also use any dark color text on a light color sign or vice versa for easy reading.
Call to action: Like all marketing pieces, a call-to-action is one of the most important strategies to consider. First, you want to grab the viewer’s attention with the design and a simple message, and then you want to direct them to do something after they have read the sign. Saying something like, “Learn more” or “Call today” are good examples of how to get your viewers to act on your yard sign marketing. These messages followed by a website URL or phone number will make your viewers take the next step to contact you.
Custom shaped: Traditionally, yard signs are rectangular or square in shape. Utilizing a custom shape yard sign gives you more flexibility with your design and will potentially bring more attention to the sign as well. You could go as far as making the sign in the shape of an objective, like a house for real estate or a starburst for announcing a new hiring a position. Going beyond the square shape for yard signs can be more effective in grabbing eyes and bring more fun to the sign project.
Location: You can have a great sign design with the perfect message, but if your yard sign is not placed in the ideal location, you may be missing out on views. Most brands are good at positioning yard signs at the end of the yard near the road. This is perfect for people passing by to see, compared to right next to a home or building where people would have to make an extra effort to go up closer to the sign to read.
Also consider intersections for sign placement as a way to grab more traffic from different directions. Utilizing a double-sided yard sign can be effective when implemented in this strategy as well. Some cities and state highways have sign ordnances to keep curbs from being cluttered creating a driving distraction, so be sure to check with the local authorities on the proper location to display a yard sign so that it doesn’t end up getting removed.
Yard signs offer an effective and affordable way to market your brand, but there are some important strategies to consider when implementing. Utilizing the above tips can bring much success to your next yard sign design and strategy. If you want to get started with yard sign marketing or need some help in a design and strategic direction, IntegriPrint can help! Start the conversation today by contacting us to set up a meeting with our team.
