[reaperducer]

If you only blame the billboard for the failure, then you don't really understand billboard advertising.

Placement, design, message, color, product, and a dozen other factors go into whether a billboard message works or not. It's why big companies hire advertising agencies to do these things for them. The agencies know the nuances of making it work, just like hiring an expert to do your AdSense buy.

I used to own a web site that advertised on billboards in the early 2000's. It worked pretty well. It helped that it was very geographic-specific, and the billboards were along major roads in those geographies.

[yegor]

All these factors are not going to make 3+ orders of magnitude difference required to make this even remotely worthwhile. Here is the previously mentioned billboard for reference: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D0XQvm7X4AIHhnQ?format=jpg

As for your anecdotal evidence, from early 2000, this is not relevant anymore. People are looking at their smartphones while walking outside/sitting in traffic. The only reason billboard advertising still exists is because 99.9% of advertisers cannot quantify the effectiveness of their efforts.

[reaperducer]

Here is the previously mentioned billboard for reference:

Now that I've seen the billboard in question, I'd say I was spot on. Especially the parts about design and placement.