Do This Don’t Do That Can’t You Read The Sign?
From a blog post by:
Friday April 11th 2008, 11:27 am by Steve Portigal
From: (http://www.portigal.com/blog/do-this-dont-do-that/)
Earlier this week I spent the day with the design team of a global technology company. I can’t say much more but I can share a couple of photographs from different bathrooms.
The standard soap dispenser has been repurposed for hand lotion. The soap comes from the other kind of standard dispenser, a foot away, next to the sink..Washing your hands is a fairly unconscious behavior; you assess the space visually and quickly move through the various tasks…so who stops to read the sign that says Hand Lotion? That sign serves more of a “here’s how you messed up, buddy” explanation than as a preventative measure. I had a hard time stopping myself from getting hand lotion when I wanted soap.
We did have a group discussion about observing signs in the environment to identify workarounds and opportunities for improvement and so I was pleased to have an example from their environment to share back. This ended up in the always enjoyable men’s bathroom vs. women’s bathroom comparison…in this office the women’s bathroom includes a dispenser for hand sanitizer (in addition to soap and lotion). Unfortunately I didn’t get in there to take a picture.
I was struck by the presumed need for this sign in a different bathroom, explaining what locked and unlocked look like. I had this quick “well that’s dumb” reaction, took the picture, used the facility, and then upon exiting realized that I had failed to lock the door! I’m not sure exactly how I managed to not lock it, since that is another automatic behavior.
In both cases, the signs themselves caught my attention, but I still exhibited the behavior they were trying to prevent (taking lotion instead of soap, leaving the door unlocked).
Does the above message from Steve strike a cord? We have signs all around us. Indoors, outdoors… Everywhere just as the song says.
Just putting a “sign” or words on a board, building, or vehicle will not always get the attention of your customer enough to move them out of their every day routines to do what the signs direct them to do. When creating your signage for your business (or anywhere else for that matter), your message needs to “pop” as they say in the sign business.
Here are our suggestions for getting the most exposure for your business. Get:
1. A lighted sign – So your customers will see it bright against the night sky when there is little competition from other signs, etc.
2. With a vivid color background – To make it stand out during the day.
3. Limit the text so you can make the font larger for people to read.
One of the reasons we chose the colors we did for our web site (www.SmartBizChoices.com) was so that you could see how the site “pops” when you pull it up. The “OPEN” sign on our account is an example of a sign that we sell, so we wanted to promote it. But the color and clarity also “pops” on some monitors in a way that is extremely realistic, vivid, and memorable, which one of the reasons we chose that to highlight our site.
Following the basic suggestions above for creating your signs or web site will make your company more memorable in the eyes of your customer. And isn’t that the goal of all your advertising… to make your customer think of you when looking for your product?
Check out our sign web site at www.NorthGeorgiaSignsandLighting.com.
Then contact Choices today at 678-389-9687 for signs and more for your business.