Do you follow advertising trends? If you pay attention to ads and billboard advertising, you’ll see that once a company runs an incredibly successful ad, others start to imitate it. Then the trend catches on nation- or even world-wide, and suddenly a large majority of the ads you see look very, very similar. When you see this happening, you have to make a decision: do you follow this advertising trend and hope your ad gets out while the trend is still hot, or do you go with something different in the hopes that the trend will have burnt itself out and your ad will get noticed?

Deciding how to treat an advertising trend can be difficult. That’s why many business owners seek the advice of an advertising company. The experts at these companies have seen trends come and go, and will have an idea of how the current trend is doing, and what current billboard advertising costs will run for your campaign.

The problem with advertising trends is that when they start to die off, there are still several months’ worth of ads following that trend that will be shown. That’s because ads have to be finished several months or more in advance. The ads that are completed at the height of the trend’s popularity will then be printed or televised during the downward slope, so they won’t be as effective.

What this means is that you need to know in advance when a trend is about to start losing its popularity. Figuring that out is part analysis, part guesswork. Looking at past trends in your specific industry can help determine if there’s a pattern that you can use that as a guide. But you also need to have a feel for the current market. Maybe the most recent trend is going to last for a year, or maybe it’s going to be a flash in the pan and be gone in a few months. Once you get a feel for marketing trends, you’ll be one step ahead of the competition.