Bitcoin Forum

We are updating our billboard on the side of a VERY busy expressway in Silicon Valley California.  (Lawrence Expressway just south of Central Expressway)
The billboard will be seen by tens of thousands of people per day.

We are considering the following layout:

http://i51.tinypic.com/zuhy15.jpg

I would like to hear the bitcoin community's thoughts on ways to improve the effectiveness of this ad.

Please give me any thoughts, ideas, design changes you may have.

Thank you!

Roger Ver
Memory Dealers.com, Inc.
3350 Scott Blvd.
Building #32
Santa Clara, CA 95054
USA
 
Phone:+1 408 486 5650
Fax: +1 408 486 5653
Email: roger@memorydealers.com
Aim: rogerkver
MSN: roger@memorydealers.com

For all yor networking needs visit:
http://www.memorydealers.com


********************* Sept 2017 Update *********************
We are now offering a $1,000 bounty for the world's first Bitcoin Cash Billboard.
Details here: https://forum.bitcoin.com/topic149.html#p100058 (https://forum.bitcoin.com/topic149.html#p100058)

This is a wonderful thing for you to do.  However, I recommend that you use 75% of the sign area to advertise your business and 25% to tout Bitcoin (put the "We accept Bitcoin" part at the bottom).  This will still be plenty of promotion for Bitcoin.  Definitely keep the Bitcoin logo.

Fantastic!

(the sign is a bit halloweeny!  :D)

I would use a graphic similar to this:

http://www.howtovanish.com/images/Bitcoin.jpg

BITBOY has made wonderfull vector graphic files available that could be blown up (with Adobe Illustrator) to large size with no loss in quality.

This gives bitcoin a little more consistent branding and looks really good.

I like how bitcoin is large.  People who see the sign will definitely notice the sign and your business.  Basically you are taking the viral and social nature of bitcoin and this will rub off on your company.  Since you are the first to do this it will have a really good effect, imo.

Black and yellow is a really good color combination since it makes the bitcoin stand out.  Maybe change the orange to yellow and it might also match better with the coin.

Since you live in Silicon Valley I would write, "We accept BitCoin" and near the bottom in small letters "P2P Cryptocurrency" or "Decentralized Cryptocurrency"

Thanks for doing this!!!

Don't forget to take pics of the billboard and to post it here!

I disagree.  I think people will be more curious about bitcoin than anything, so they'll check it out online.  Then, when they're traveling by the sign a second time (the vast majority of traffic that sees said sign will probably be past it several times, at a minimum), they'll make note of the company that is selling items with bitcoins.

If 75% of the advertisement was the typical boring "shop here, blah blah blah" ad, I don't think nearly as many people would take note of it.

Just my completely unprofessional and possibly biased opinion.  :)

I'd also change the color scheme to black/yellow or black/gold.  Black/orange is just kind of... unattractive, IMO.

Too much neutral space around "we accept bitcoin."

And I agree that the colors could be better.

And also you could knock the "www" off the url, plus remove some of those tech names, or break them up into two lines.  That's a busy block of text.  To hard to read at 85 mph.

The carrot-orange-reddish color of text looks weird. It's not the color of the coin, neither any of the predominant colors of your website/logo.
I would advise you to stick to the exact colors of your logo (gray, light orange). Here is a version made by me:

http://imageshack.us/m/151/3222/weacceptbitcoinbanner.jpg

Very good!

I am in favor of this design.

very nice

That billboard with HUGE coin is more impressive. Will drive attention, IMHO.

Please, post here a photo of the billboard, when installed.

Please give me any thoughts, ideas, design changes you may have.

Just a Quick Rough Idea surely you should use this space to advertise your business first and foremost

http://www.sherbetlemon.co.uk/images/memorydealers.jpg

My suggestion (didn't add the coin cause I never learned to use my image editor):

https://i.imgur.com/ylpID.jpg

Your site's currency conversion code is very friendly to canadians.

I need someone to help me get all the exchange rates to update in real time.
Anyone out there who can help out with this?

The store is currently a Yahoo Store (Proprietary RTML)
The first week of June our new Magento based store will launch.

I want to see that Billboard!  Tell me when its up!

B

rather than (Google it) - put (bitcoin.org)

For real, I might buy a car and take a trip to see this.

Make sure to take a pic of it and show it to the rest of us!

I like it sherb. Didn't quote it cause we're getting a lot big images here.

You know a few strategically placed "campaign" signs advertising bitcoin.org or WeUseCoins wouldn't be a horrible idea in general. In this situation MemoryDealers would most likely benefit from it as a second form or advertising even if it isn't dosen't have the company name on it. 

I'm going to try to have this up by the end of this week.
Here are a few more designs I am considering.  Pastel colors don't work well for billboards,  so we need high contrast colors for everything.
Please continue to give me your thoughts.
I will be sure to post photos of the actual billboard once it is up.

Design A:
http://i54.tinypic.com/2hcnndd.jpg

Design B:
http://i54.tinypic.com/iqfubs.jpg

Design C:
http://i52.tinypic.com/30svkb8.jpg

Design D:
http://i53.tinypic.com/2zns6er.jpg

Design E:
http://i54.tinypic.com/125q1ky.jpg

I like A and D but isn't gray on blue a little low contrast?

I prefer bittersweet's design.

I'd vote for A.

I like D and E

Nice!

http://img708.imageshack.us/img708/290/memorydealers1.jpg


Was looking for an excuse to procrastinate my other work this morning! Here's a first draft, I tried to stick to your branding look and feel. Roger, feel free to PM me or email at erikvoorhees@gmail.com.  Obviously don't use this JPEG for the billboard... I'll make you a vector print ready version. BTW- I always hear your ad on Free Talk Live! =)

Dude, that font kerning on "Memory Dealers" is IMHO really terrible.

Plus, I feel that black-background billboard will take more attention and has nice contrast to golden BTC.

Ooooh, I love the reflection of the bitcoin though.

It looks good on the web, but I'd have to agree, I am not sure that it would stand out enough in the "real world".  Black background with a yellow/orange text would look best.

Agreed, I've fixed it now.

I've been trying to buy from MemoryDealers.com using Bitcoins, but I can't. The site shows me the price in USD, and when I check out it asks for credit card or PayPal :(

I think its great!

On a side note, I'm new here and I'm sure its been talked about, but isn't that bitcoin logo the same or very close to the That Baht??

A sighting:

http://instagr.am/p/FNIFl/ (http://instagr.am/p/FNIFl/)

Looks great   ;D

I'm working hard and fast to have an automated bitcoin shopping cart ASAP.
If there is anything you would like for now,  feel free to email me at roger@memorydealers.com and I can take care of everything for you.
http://images.instagram.com/media/2011/06/04/c39658593b1746e681df25f14fe9b872_7.jpg

That damn bush!

Pretty

Awesome.  :)

So has this thing come to fruition yet or what?! I have told some of my buddies in SV to look out for it!

That's what she said  :D

Ermm... see the picture?   ???

can we get a shot that includes the freeway so we have some sort of perspective?

great job

I think it's very cool that this enterprise accept bitcoins. But I have a question regarding the conversion rate.

Look at this product that sell for $499 USD
http://www.memorydealers.com/sfp-10g-sr-cisco-original-10gbase-sr-850nm-sfpp-lc-multi-mode-mmf-300m.html
The store accept the sell it for 92.71 BTC. Why on earth would someone be willing to pay this price in bitcoins when you can get 3 times more USD if you sell them on MtGox ?

This question can be asked for mostly all stores that accept bitcoins today. Usually the conversion rate is wrong. I understand there is some kind of risk because bitcoin can lower in value. Can someone explain why the price on MtGox is not the reference for the conversion rate ?

likely because the price is moving faster than they are updating their exchange rate.

Well, post the USD price and refer to mtgox+3% to cover the risk.

yeah you should really get the exchange rate updating automatically, MemoryDealer

if you need help getting that working; pm or email me and ill do it for store credit

I'm pretty sure most stores use a moving average.  That said, 92.71 BTC for $500 is a price from long, long ago.

Currently it is updated manually.

I am actually willing to give a 5% discount for all bitcoin orders.

Private message sent.  (I hope I can get everything set to update automatically)

Everyone loves the billboard!  It is getting a lot of press and was on falkvinge.net.

http://falkvinge.net/2011/06/06/bitcoins-four-hurdles-part-two-transactions/

I posted it on my blog. :-)

Here are a few more photos of the Billboard on Lawrence Expressway in Silicon Valley.
http://i52.tinypic.com/2hi6tex.jpg
http://i52.tinypic.com/21ee2qo.jpg


I promise I'm doing whatever I can to help make bitcoin succeed.  (Billboards,  National radio ads, etc)
This billboard costs $1200 a month,  so if you would like to help contribute to it, please send whatever you think the billboard is worth to you:

1visyiW5YM5WvCyjwaELAf6zfdmMz8yDV

or order some stuff from www.memorydealers.com (http://www.memorydealers.com)

Awesome

Donated a full Bitcoin... and now rocking with a new desktop wallpaper! ;D

Thank you so much for this Billboard!

I got the bitcoin, thanks!
I think I will make it my desktop wallpaper too!  What a great idea!

And that was so easy to send...

God I love Bitcoin!

We needed this.

A new billboard has appeared in this location:
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-vj9nhY4dzEY/U8_tFz9sZfI/AAAAAAAAFiA/RJ8VGjslGaY/s640/2014-07-23.jpg (https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/XfZgV4wrV0FzD-DID-XOTtMTjNZETYmyPJy0liipFm0?feat=directlink)

The road in the picture is Lawrence Expressway, also known as Country Route G2. It is 8(!) lanes wide, yet still gets jammed with bumper-to-bumper traffic during commute hours. The billboard is visible while traveling north, with morning commuters traveling from the bedroom communities of Cupertino and Saratoga to Silicon Valley companies.

The land on which the billboard sits is 10 acres of farmland in the middle of Silicon Valley, owned and operated by a farmer who is nearly 90 years old. You can read about it here (http://wikimapia.org/579556/The-Corn-Palace), which was written before one of the brothers died. A more recent write-up is here (http://www.funtourguru.com/2013/07/the-corn-palace-not-south-dakota-one-in.html).

i like the picture in the advertisement

Please add it to www.bumpbitcoin.com and any other ideas you have.

very nice

What does that weird sign even mean? God with a halo holding a spiked Bitcoin with black satanic looking hooded monks and the earth below? Roger Ver must be losing it.

I believe those dark monks (not satans LOL) are representing bankers.

http://gettoknowbitcoin.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/honey-badger.jpg

[vouches to keep ol glory alive through honeybadgerofmoney.com]

The sign above was replaced by the sign the op shows.

I think the new sign is going to miss its target audience. I'm into Bitcoin and I don't get it. What will the driver of car going down the expressway quickly think when they glance at that sign? Jesus and his devil monks are gonna throw a Bitcoin Shuriken at your ass. lol

It is hard to see in the photo, but each of the dark monks has a necklace with a different fiat currency symbol on it:
$, £, €, etc.

I think it is about time for a new billboard,  so if anyone has any good ideas for the next one,  please post it here.

Does it have to be product linked? Maybe something super simple, like the basic orange BTC logo with bullet points like:
Cheaper
Faster
Safer

Then a QR code or something linking to an ATM map?

Something that is easy to remember, gets the main important user points across (I know there are many aspects to BTC that people should know but I think most people really dont care at all about the background or philosophy of BTC; they just want to know the practicalities) and a follow through pointing ppl to somewhere they can buy in?

This billboard gave me chills..:) Its now just a matter of time. Paypal is with us now.

Franky's sign is pretty good. At least it's a road sign. It's fun to have a cool sign that all the Bitcoiners that drive by will enjoy but it should say something to the average driver like:

Bitcoin is the future of money. Learn about it at (your favorite link here).

Businesses that now accept Bitcoin.

Memory Dealers - PayPal - Dish Network - Overstock.com - bla bla bla for the rest of the sign to the bottom.

Every time they drive by they will see another big business name they're acquainted with that takes Bitcoin. Eventually they will want to know what this thing is that all the big names are using.

That's really good. Can you move that bitcoin.org up enough to list some big business names that accept Bitcoin?

looks cool, nice!

I vote for E

I wish to see these signages on gasoline stations. :)

Yeah, I dont care about the signs, I want them to accept btc.

Lol..I thing Dave meant the same thing.!!

we need more advertising for bitcoin like this  graphics are well done

nice +1

I would make the Bitcoin image twice the size. And change the color scheme to yellow and black. Studies have shown that that is the most catchy color scheme.

This is genius, because it is thinking out of the box and people driving by need to see something different to let it attract their attention. It will be great for your business! And for bitcoin!

It seems he used ideas from your suggestion:
https://i.imgur.com/VTnKMwh.jpg

That is an excellent road sign. You can easily see the intent and read it when driving by it quickly. I need to go to Saratoga this weekend, I'm going to make a side trip to look at it in person. You want to meet me there Roger? LOL jk

the idea is great, but looking at the current design of the Billboard it doesn't look attractive/intriguing, i think matching
bitcoin with the design would be better, i mean bitcoin is digital and making it look digital may attract a passerby. this
is the only thing i can think in the point of view of as a another person, and it would be best if bitcoin is noticeable at
first glance.

I'm glad you guys like them.
I've been paying for various Bitcoin billboards there since mid 2011.
It's amazing how quickly the time has passed.

P.S.  If anyone has a picture of the previous Bitcoinstore.com billboard that was there,  please share it here.
Unfortunately I don't have any pictures of that one, but I would like to.

wow, these two are awesome!
may i steal your idea to one here in brazil? ::)

Please feel free!
Anyone is welcome to use any of these images however they would like.

That design is already good it gives emphasis to bitcoin as your mode of payment. That may attract attention to bitcoin users as well as it gives curiosity to non-bitcoin users. FUrther it may help promote bitcoin to passerby as your billboard is big and large enough to be seen by commuters and passerby. Though this is a simple billboard but it will help the bitcoin industry little by little.

You are replying to a post I made in May 2011.
The Billboard has already gone through several iterations since then.

I think we need something to specify what a bitcoin is or maybe another small space for a web url? You say there are lots of people passing that way. So a person may ask himself what the hell is bitcoin?  ;D

********************* Sept 2017 Update *********************
We are now offering a $1,000 bounty for the world's first Bitcoin Cash (https://www.bitcoincash.org/) Billboard.
Details here: https://forum.bitcoin.com/topic149.html#p100058 (https://forum.bitcoin.com/topic149.html#p100058)


Well,  the "Dollar is Exit Only" billboard has been online for the last 2 years or so. 
It is starting to look a bit sun damaged and faded,  so I think it is time for the next one.

https://i.imgur.com/cyK3lAn.jpg (https://www.instagram.com/p/BZiphoWAWUh/?taken-by=rogerkver)



Who has a good design idea?

One idea that comes to my mind is:

FREE CASH!
(Bitcoin Cash)
Bitcoin.com

It also might be fun to point out that Bitcoin.org is rotten to the Core, and engages in censorship in "support" of censorship free money.  All in all, I suppose we should just focus on how awesome Bitcoin Cash is.


I'll pay $1,000 in Bitcoin Cash to whoever comes up with the design we actually use.
Please post your submissions at https://forum.bitcoin.com/topic149.html#p100058 (https://forum.bitcoin.com/topic149.html#p100058).

The "Dollar is Exit Only" billboard is one of the best I've seen and if anything just needs a little refresh on the design side. No need to confuse a casual observer with conflicting messages of what Bitcoin should be. That debate shouldn't happen on a billboard imho.

I have been away for a while, helping a sick family member, and this is a great old memory.  // It's good to be back