George Rossides, founder of OOhyes, an Out-of-Home advertising consultancy, shares the firm’s personalised and growth-focused approach to client campaigns.
These days, customers have more opportunities to be sold to. So, how can businesses in the advertising game truly stand out from the competition?
This question is best answered by George Rossides, an advertising veteran and founder and CEO of OOhyes, a firm that offers bespoke Out-of-Home advertising solutions.
A specialist consultancy for both clients and agencies, OOhyes isn’t just for clients looking for advertising space, but for “end-to-end expertise in the Out-of-Home domain.”
For those who are unfamiliar with the term, Out-of-Home advertising is visual advertising targeted at consumers outside of their homes, such as on billboards and public transport.
Launched in 2016, OOhyes stands out for its comprehensive service, which does the legwork on campaign support and delivery so its clients don’t have to. “We carved out space as a firm focused on high-service planning for small to medium-sized independent businesses.”
A perfectly personalised client service
Its “full-service model” encompasses everything from the planning stage right through to campaign review: “We plan, advise, negotiate media spend, manage artwork, oversee print and delivery, and carry out post-campaign analysis and ensure that campaigns are not only delivered as planned but that they over-deliver wherever possible.”
Rossides and his team have a catalogue of successes to shout about, including when they won an Amazon recruitment campaign in their fifth month of trading, which became a four-year contract. There have also been successful campaigns for JD’s Ellesse clothing, where “exceptional sales” led to more work with the JD Sports brand. “From there, we scaled support for their stores across the UK, internationally, and in the Americas.”
“The fact that clients keep coming back is the greatest sign that it works,” Rossides says of his firm’s service offering. “We’re not sales-driven — we’re solution-driven.”
With its presence on billboards, buses and trains, and more besides, Out-of-Home advertising may sound traditional, but it is anything but, Rossides assures. “We’re now working with fully immersive formats, including 3D-generated copy and next-generation screen activations.”
From what Rossides says, his firm is part of an industry on the move: “Out-of-Home advertising now offers more than just reach; it offers dynamic, creative storytelling. For example, we are incorporating more AI into the work we do.”
While OOhyes remains a smaller outfit, “without the financial support or infrastructure” of its competitors in the industry, Rossides thinks this has made the team “more resourceful” and dedicated to offering “tailored, results-driven campaigns” which are “never off-the-shelf.”
This is a consultancy built on Rossides’ intense industry experience – twenty-seven years of it, in fact. But it all began with a seasoned career with specialist media organisation TDI.
Client growth and industry experience
Rossides started by advising Out-of-Home buying specialists but moved into direct client work later on, mainly helping independent businesses and startups grow during the dot-com boom.
His client list from this time is hugely impressive and includes the likes of flights and hotels service, Lastminute.com and digital rail platform Trainline.com.
“I later led international work for global brands investing in the UK, before heading up a team dedicated to serving independent agencies that weren’t receiving the level of service they deserved. We grew that business from £10 million to £20 million.”
After such an impressive career trajectory, it was time for Rossides to take these learnings and start his own enterprise, namely OOhyes. Nearly ten years on from its foundation, the firm shows little sign of slowing down. “We’ve expanded the team and launched more audience campaign packages than ever before.”
Key leadership lessons
Rossides has learned plenty about leadership, including that growth isn’t linear: “There are challenges and setbacks along the way, but if you learn from them and grow year on year, that’s real success.”
For Rossides and his team, success is not defined by the size of their client list, but by how they help them grow. “Success is measured by campaign effectiveness and the business outcomes achieved by our clients through the media schedules we recommend.”
He shares how an OOhyes client went from being “a minor player in the UK” to a “market leader” after just two of their campaigns. “That’s our definition of success,” he confirms.
So, that’s the story of OOhyes, a small but highly personalised Out-of-Home advertising consultancy that’s fully focused on helping its clients with their growth ambitions.
