Oakland is one of the most important cities in the San Francisco metro area. It’s the home of many San Francisco workers and commuters, but it’s also a center of industry, tech research, and learning for millions more. If you can advertise successfully in Oakland, odds are you can advertise successfully anywhere in the US.
Of course, that’s easier said than done. If you want your Oakland billboards and other advertisements to be effective, you need to know where to advertise just as much as you need to know who to advertise to. Today, let’s answer that question and more in detail.
College Universities
As a major college town, Oakland has top universities and college campuses you can use as prime billboard advertising locations. These can also be great spots to advertise with trucks or vehicles, particularly if those vehicles tend to the students and professors of the area.
But where exactly should you advertise? The best universities and colleges to advertise around include:
- The University of California at Berkeley
- Samuel Merritt University
- Holy Names University
- Patten University
Remember, for your advertisements to be effective, they have to speak to the people who live and work in these areas. Don’t, for example, put out an advertisement tailored toward blue-collar workers around college campuses, or you won’t see much of a conversion or revenue increase.
Tourist Attractions
Due to its proximity to San Francisco, Oakland is also a major tourist attraction, both for the nearby city and for its own fun places to hang out and explore new things. These can be great spots to position a few key advertisements, particularly if you want to advertise to people from around California and the country overall.
Specifically, you should try to place wallscapes, windowscapes, and billboards around locations like:
- The Oakland Zoo, one of the most famous in the entire country
- The Oakland Museum of California
- Children’s Fairyland
- Joaquin Miller Park
Sports Centers
While not as much of a sports town as other major metro areas in the US, Oakland does have its fair share of sports fanatics. To satisfy that need, it also has plenty of great sports stadiums and arenas. These are excellent spots to place some out-of-home advertising inventory, either inside the stadiums or on the cross streets surrounding those locations.
Try to put advertisements in locations like:
- The Oakland Icecap center, a hockey stadium
- The California Memorial Stadium
- RingCentral Coliseum
- Burrell Field
Transit Hubs and Freeways
People commute in and out of Oakland frequently, oftentimes to work in San Francisco. With that in mind, it might be wise to position impactful billboards along freeways like:
- Interstate 880: John B William Freeway and Nimitz Freeway
- Interstate 580: MacArthur Freeway
- Grove Shafter Freeway
Don’t forget airports when choosing your advertising locations, either! Oakland International Airport, San Francisco International Airport, and Hayward Executive Airport are all perfect spots to position advertisements to reach international customers, to spread awareness of your brand of the country, and to target key demographics like businesspeople, frequent travelers, and vacationers who might benefit from what your brand has to offer.
How to Choose the Right Places to Advertise
While each of the above areas can yield excellent marketing returns, you need to know how to pick the right places to set up your billboards, truck ads, and subway ads for maximum effect.
It all stems from market research. Simply put, you won’t be able to advertise successfully to your target audience if you don’t understand its members. If you understand who you are advertising to, you’ll understand:
- Where they frequently travel
- The kind of ads that speak to them, enabling them to form long-term connections to your brand
- How to communicate the value of your brand
- And more
Say that your target demographic is discovered to be primarily comprised of college-age students and professors. In that case, it’s a no-brainer to put up most of your marketing materials around college campuses throughout Oakland.
On the flip side, if your target audience is mostly made up of blue-collar workers who don’t go to college, you’ll be better off advertising your sports centers, freeways, and similar places where those people tend to commute or relax.
Bottom line: don’t simply spread your advertisements to each of the above areas. Pick the areas that are most likely to give you maximum bang for your marketing buck, and your budget will go much further.
Wrap Up
As you can see, there are many different spots in which you can advertise effectively throughout Oakland. Best of all, many of these strategies can be applied to other major cities, like San Francisco across the bay. Advertise in as many distinct areas as possible based on your target demographics, and you’ll see major marketing returns on your investments. Good luck!
