Student Worksheet

Billboard For An Ethical Business - Activity Instructions

In this activity you’re going to create a billboard to promote an ethical business or project. By analysing effective billboard design, you’ll learn to grab the attention of people who might not realise that ethical businesses can make money too!

Before completing this activity, you will need to complete ‘Ethical Entrepreneurship’.

Billboard Task

You are going to design a billboard for an ethical company, but before you do that, let’s have a look at some eye-catching billboards and consider what makes them so effective.

Pick two of the billboard designs below and explain whether the billboards:

Are attention grabbing
Have a clear message
Are evocative (create a strong reaction in the viewer).
.

Now you are going to create a catchy billboard (or, more likely, a poster) to promote and encourage greater community support for the ethical entrepreneur/business/project you analysed in ‘Ethical Entrepreneurship’. Make sure your billboard:

Is attention grabbing
Has a clear message
Is evocative (creates a strong reaction in the viewer).

Before you start on your design:

Go to the business or project website you are creating the billboard for and find out more about its mission, its challenges and its successes
Decide on what part of the project needs the most promotion or support
Decide who your target audience will be (there’s no point targeting an audience who are likely to already support this project OR an audience unlikely to ever support such a project)
Decide where the billboard should be placed (based on your target audience).

Note: Billboards are usually some distance from their audience, and viewers are usually on the move when they pass them, so the best designs will:

Use colour/images/clever themes that catch a person’s attention (you’ll probably also want to tie in the visual details with the existing brand)
Have minimum text but a clear message
Evoke emotions in the viewer that make them want to respond to the message.

You should create a scaled-down version of your billboard (A4 size) using a desktop publishing program or an app like PicCollage.

Taking It Further

Read the following statement:

Ethical businesses or entrepreneurs will never make as much money as other businesses or entrepreneurs.

Your task is to write a short persuasive piece (no more than 200 words) that either supports or opposes this statement. Your piece should include an introduction that states your position clearly, at least one piece of evidence to support your stance, and a conclusion that restates the topic and summarises your main points.

Remember to write in a persuasive manner. You want your audience to agree with you!

Create a Billboard for an Ethical Business

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Summary

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