Good Design vs. Effective Design

Back in the Spring we had designed a billboard for our client PT Solutions. I made sure that we adhered to “the rules” for the project and did not let it turn into a brochure. Large type, simple message, letter spaced text were all used. The thing was, once it was installed, viewers said it was hard to read.

So we went back to the drawing board and re-worked it. I was a little skeptical at first to see what I could do to improve it but after about 15 minutes it was clear there was a lot we could do. Removing their full logo, switching to a much heavier font and also using a condensed version were all changes we made to make the message pop.

 

The new design reduced their brand presence and is a little clunkier but the changes will make it much more effective. If someone is driving up I-75, in pain from some injury, they could care less about the PT Solutions logo but they might be interested in physical therapy.

The real way we could tell that the new design would be more legible was to look at the design at a very small size. It’s easy with a 30″ monitor to focus on the details but from the road there is not a lot of room for subtlety. Take a look at how to two read at a reduced size:

As you can see, the original design is very hard to read at the thumbnail size.  Hopefully the new changes, which go up next week, will result in more call and new patients for PT Solutions. As much as I love design, the results of what we do are what it is all about and if the phone is not ringing the design may be good but not effective.