Your hoarding, your press ad and your leaflet each carry a way to reply.
Print and outdoor advertising puts you in front of people who were never going to search for you. Gully Sales plans the sites and publications, produces the artwork, checks that it went up, and counts what came back.
- Sites and publications chosen from your catchment, not from a vendor's unsold list.
- A tracked number, code or QR on every format, so responses can be told apart.
- Dated photographs proving each board went up, stayed up and faced the road.
Gully Sales Private Limited works with small and medium businesses across India. Start with a free audit of your last offline campaign.
In one paragraph
What is Print and Outdoor Advertising Services in India?
Print and outdoor advertising places your message in the physical world your buyers move through: newspapers, trade press, hoardings, transit, shop fronts and leaflet routes. Gully Sales sets the objective and catchment, selects the sites and publications, produces the artwork, manages printing and installation, verifies display, and attaches a response path so the spend can be counted.
The problem
You remember what the hoarding cost. Nobody recorded what it brought.
Offline advertising in most Indian businesses is still bought the way it was bought twenty years ago. A vendor calls in March with a site that is lying free. A newspaper offers a festival package. Somebody's cousin prints ten thousand leaflets. The artwork is approved on WhatsApp the night before, the board goes up somewhere on the ring road, and for three months nobody in the company can say whether a single caller had seen it. The invoice is precise. Everything after the invoice is a guess.
You will recognise it as
- Your only proof that a board was displayed is one photograph the vendor sent on the day it was mounted.
- Every enquiry lands on the same office number, so a call from the hoarding looks exactly like a call from Google.
- The artwork is a shrunken brochure: nine lines of text, three logos, and a number nobody can read from the road.
- Print bookings happen when a sales representative calls, not when your own buying season begins.
- Leaflets are ordered in round numbers and given to whoever the printer knows, without a route, a date or a count.
- Last year's offline spend cannot be split by site, publication or format, because it was one line in the ledger.
What it costs the business
- The same money is spent again next year on the same sites, because no evidence exists that would justify changing anything.
- Strong placements and weak placements are renewed together at the same rate, so the half that failed is never found.
- Your staff cannot tell a caller who saw the board from any other caller, so the follow-up is generic and slow.
- Offline is eventually blamed as a whole and cut in one stroke, taking with it the placements that were quietly working.
Why it persists. Offline media has no dashboard, so measuring it takes deliberate effort nobody has been asked to make. A tracked number must be arranged before the artwork goes to press. Somebody has to ask every caller where they saw you and record the answer in the same place every time. Somebody has to visit the site in week six. None of that is hard, but all of it has to be decided before printing, and by then the decision has usually been made by whoever offered the discount.
If it stays unresolved. Offline spending settles into a habit: renewed every year, defended by instinct, questioned by whoever controls the money. Eventually it is cut in one go, and the business loses the physical presence its buyers, dealers and staff had been reading as a sign that it was doing well.
What changes
Offline spend becomes a line you can defend with numbers.
In the first weeks
- Every format goes out with its own tracked number, code or QR, so responses can be separated by site.
- Artwork designed for the distance and the speed at which each format is actually seen.
In how the work runs
- A booking calendar tied to your buying season instead of to the vendor who called most recently.
- Dated verification photographs for every site, taken again mid-run and not only on installation day.
- Every enquiry is asked one standard source question, and the answer lands in the same field every time.
In sales and marketing
- Cost per enquiry from a hoarding, a press insert and a digital campaign can be read on the same sheet.
- Placements that produced nothing are dropped at renewal, and the money moves to the ones that answered.
- Vendor rates can be argued from evidence, because you know what each site actually returned.
In what management can see
- Your name appears where your buyers, dealers and staff already are, without waiting for a search or a feed.
- Recognition built in the street makes your calls, quotations and digital ads easier for a buyer to trust.
Over the longer term
- A record of what each site, publication and format returned, so next year's plan begins with evidence.
- A house style for boards, counters and shop fronts that makes a scattered network look like one brand.
Gully Sales controls the plan, the creative, the production, the placement, the verification and the reporting. Footfall, readership and how many people act on what they see depend on your offer, your market and your price. We do not promise a number of enquiries from a board.
Who it is for
Print and outdoor suits some businesses far more than others.
The businesses it suits
- Businesses whose customers sit in a defined area: a city, a corridor, a cluster of markets or one district.
- Manufacturers and distributors whose buyers read trade publications your competitors are already advertising in.
- Showrooms, clinics, hospitals, schools and restaurants that depend on people within a few kilometres knowing them.
- Builders and developers selling a project where the site itself, and the road to it, are part of the selling.
- Brands entering a new city or region where nobody is searching for a name they have not yet heard.
- Companies whose dealer counters and shop fronts are unbranded, or branded by a competitor who got there first.
What usually prompts the call
- A vendor has quoted for a hoarding and you have no way to judge whether the site or the rate is reasonable.
- Digital enquiry costs have risen far enough that an offline rupee now deserves a fair comparison.
- You are opening a showroom, branch or project and need to be visible in the catchment before the doors open.
- Last year's offline budget cannot be explained to a partner, a board or a bank in any detail.
- A festival season, harvest cycle or admission window is approaching and the artwork has not been thought about.
What Gully Sales does
The work, component by component.
Campaign objective and the decision the media must move
We begin by naming what has to change: footfall at a new showroom, enquiries from one district, dealer applications, recall before an exhibition. Then we fix the geography and the period the campaign is answerable for. That decision governs every later choice of site, size, publication and format.
- Why it matters:
- A board booked because the site was lying free answers no question. A board booked to be seen by the traffic that passes your showroom does.
- You receive:
- A one-page campaign brief stating the objective, the catchment, the period and the number the campaign is read against.
- Business value:
- Every later choice, including the ones a vendor suggests, can be argued for or against on the same ground.
Audience, catchment and site selection
We map where your buyers live, work, shop and travel, then choose the roads, junctions, markets and publications that cross that map. Each candidate site is assessed for direction of traffic, viewing distance and angle, obstruction, illumination and what stands beside it. Publications are judged on who reads them, not on the circulation figure in the deck.
- Why it matters:
- Two hoardings at the same rate can differ enormously in who sees them and whether the message is legible at all.
- You receive:
- A shortlisted site and publication plan with photographs, viewing notes, sizes, rates and a recommendation for each.
- Business value:
- You pay for placements chosen against your catchment rather than against a vendor's unsold inventory.
Offer and response device
Every format gets something to ask for and a way to answer: a tracked phone number, a WhatsApp link, a QR code opening a page built for the campaign, or a coupon code shown at the counter. Different sites and publications can carry different numbers or codes, so the response can be attributed afterwards.
- Why it matters:
- Without a distinct response device, an offline campaign can never be separated from everything else you are doing.
- You receive:
- A response map listing the offer, the device, the destination and the tracking for every format and site.
- Business value:
- A hoarding stops being an impression and becomes a source you can name on an enquiry record.
Format and channel plan
We decide the mix across newspaper and trade press, hoardings and unipoles, bus shelters, transit and auto branding, shop fronts, in-shop and counter media, standees, inserts, leaflet routes and wall media. We also decide how often a buyer in your catchment should meet the message before the campaign closes.
- Why it matters:
- Most offline budgets go into one format because that is what was offered, when a mix of three would cover the same buyer more often for the same money.
- You receive:
- A dated media schedule showing every format, site, publication, size, quantity, run period and cost.
- Business value:
- You see the whole offline campaign on one page before any part of it is committed.
Creative built for a two-second read
Artwork is written and designed for the way each format is really seen: a hoarding read at speed from a moving vehicle, a press advertisement read on a crowded page, a leaflet held for a moment before it is kept or dropped. One message, legible type, honest contrast, and a response device large enough to use.
- Why it matters:
- Most offline creative fails because it was designed on a screen at full size and never checked at the distance the buyer actually stands.
- You receive:
- Print-ready artwork in every booked size, with language versions, checked for legibility at true viewing distance.
- Business value:
- Your message survives the two seconds it gets, in the language your street speaks.
Booking, production and proof of display
We collect quotations, compare rates and locations, coordinate the booking, and manage printing, flex and vinyl production, mounting, insertion and distribution against a written schedule. Each site is photographed after installation with the date visible, and inspected again during the run for damage, obstruction and lighting.
- Why it matters:
- A booked site and a displayed site are not the same thing, and the difference is only ever found by somebody going to look.
- You receive:
- A production and display file: quotations, purchase orders, approved proofs, installation photographs and mid-run checks.
- Business value:
- You pay for display that happened, and you hold the evidence on the occasions when it did not.
Conversion path and follow-up
The campaign number is answered by a person working from a script. The QR code lands on a page built for that offer rather than on your home page. The coupon is recorded at the counter. Every response is logged with its source and then followed up by call-back, WhatsApp, quotation or visit within a stated time.
- Why it matters:
- Offline campaigns are usually judged on how many calls came, when most of the loss happens after the call is answered.
- You receive:
- A campaign landing page, a call-handling script, a source-tagged enquiry sheet or CRM field, and a follow-up sequence.
- Business value:
- The response your board earned reaches somebody who can sell, on the day it arrives.
Site-by-site response reading
Responses are read by site, publication, format and week against the baseline recorded before launch. Sites producing nothing are challenged or dropped at renewal, creative that is not being answered is changed, and budget moves to the placements that worked. The report is written in language your accountant can follow.
- Why it matters:
- Offline gets renewed annually out of habit, because nobody has ever produced the sheet showing which half of it worked.
- You receive:
- A monthly campaign report by site and format, with cost per response and a written recommendation for the next cycle.
- Business value:
- Next year's offline plan is built from what happened, not from whoever called first with a discount.
What you will have at the end.
- A campaign brief stating the objective, the catchment, the buying period and the baseline the campaign is read against.
- A site and publication shortlist with photographs, viewing notes, sizes, rates and a recommendation for each.
- A dated media schedule covering every format, site, quantity, run period and cost on one page.
- Print-ready artwork in every booked size, checked for legibility at true viewing distance.
- Language versions of the artwork for each market the campaign runs in.
- A response map assigning tracked numbers, WhatsApp links, QR codes and coupon codes site by site.
- A campaign landing page built for the offer, recording the source on every enquiry it receives.
- A call-handling script and one source question your staff ask the same way every time.
- Dated installation and mid-run verification photographs for every site booked.
- A production file: quotations compared, purchase orders, approved proofs and any credit claimed from a vendor.
- A monthly report by site, publication and format, with cost per response against the recorded baseline.
- An anonymised sample site plan and campaign report, shared during the audit so you see the format first.
How it runs
The engagement, step by step.
- 1
Audit what offline has already cost you
We list every offline rupee spent over the last year or two, by site, publication, leaflet run and signage, with what each cost and whatever evidence exists of what it returned. We look at how enquiries are recorded today and whether a source can be attached to one at all.
- You provide:
- Past invoices and vendor quotations, the artwork used, enquiry or call records, and the vendors you deal with.
- We produce:
- A written audit of past offline spend, the gaps in evidence, and what can be measured from here on.
- Done when:
- You can see what offline has cost and what, if anything, can honestly be said about the result.
- 2
Fix the objective, the catchment and the baseline
We agree what the campaign has to move and over what period, mark the catchment on a map, and record the baseline: enquiries and calls per week, walk-ins, quotations, orders and average order value. The baseline is written down and signed off before booking, because it cannot be reconstructed later.
- You provide:
- Enquiry and sales numbers for recent months, your buying season, and the areas that matter most to you.
- We produce:
- A campaign brief carrying the objective, the catchment, the period and the recorded baseline.
- Done when:
- Everyone agrees what the campaign is for and what it will be measured against.
- 3
Select the sites, publications and formats
We survey the catchment, visit or photograph candidate sites, collect rates from more than one vendor, and check publications on readership rather than reputation. The shortlist reaches you with the reasoning and the trade-offs, including the sites we advise against and why.
- You provide:
- A decision on the budget range and one person who can approve the schedule without a long internal loop.
- We produce:
- A shortlisted site and publication plan with photographs, rates and a recommended schedule.
- Done when:
- The schedule is approved and the budget is committed against named sites, not against categories.
- 4
Build the offer, the response path and the artwork
The offer is written, tracked numbers and codes are arranged, the campaign page is built, and artwork is designed for each format at its true viewing distance. Language versions are prepared. Nothing goes to print until every number, code and page on the artwork has been tested end to end.
- You provide:
- Approval of the offer and the artwork, brand assets, and any legal or category wording you are required to carry.
- We produce:
- Print-ready artwork, the response map, the campaign landing page and the call-handling script.
- Done when:
- The artwork is approved and every way of replying that it shows has been tested and works.
- 5
Produce, book and verify the display
Printing, mounting, insertion and distribution are scheduled and followed. Each site is photographed on installation with the date visible, and the schedule is checked against what actually appeared: the correct site, the correct size, on the correct dates, lit where lighting was paid for.
- You provide:
- Purchase approvals, and access for any site on your own premises or at a dealer counter.
- We produce:
- Installation photographs, a display compliance sheet, and any credit or replacement claimed from a vendor.
- Done when:
- You hold evidence that every booked placement is live and looks the way it was approved.
- 6
Capture and answer every response
Calls, WhatsApp messages, form submissions and counter coupons are logged with their source from the first day. Your team asks the same source question and follows the same call-back rule, so the record stays comparable across sites and across weeks.
- You provide:
- Staff time to answer and record, and a decision on who owns follow-up while the campaign runs.
- We produce:
- A source-tagged enquiry sheet or CRM field, the follow-up sequence, and a weekly response summary.
- Done when:
- Every response carries a source and an owner, and none of them is sitting unanswered.
- 7
Read the results and plan the next cycle
At the end of the run we compare responses, cost per response and conversion by site, publication and format against the recorded baseline, and separate what this campaign produced from what your other activity was already producing. Recommendations follow from that comparison.
- You provide:
- Order and conversion data for the period, so a response can be followed through to revenue.
- We produce:
- A campaign report by site and format, with cost per response and a recommendation for the next cycle.
- Done when:
- You can say which placements earned their renewal and which ones will not be booked again.
Ways to work with us
Take the plan, the artwork, or the whole offline calendar.
Offline campaign plan
The thinking without the running: audit, baseline, catchment map, site and publication shortlist, format plan, response map and artwork, handed to your team with a walkthrough so they can book and manage the vendors themselves.
Managed print and outdoor campaign
Gully Sales runs the campaign end to end, from planning and creative through vendor coordination, production, installation verification, response capture and reporting, while your team answers enquiries and approves the spend.
Measurement retrofit
For a campaign already booked or already running. We add tracked numbers, codes, a campaign page and a source question, verify the sites now in place, and build the report, so at least this cycle can be judged on evidence.
Annual offline calendar
For businesses that advertise offline every year. We set the calendar against your buying seasons, negotiate the year's bookings together rather than one call at a time, and review each cycle before the next is committed.
Why Gully Sales
What you are actually choosing when you choose us.
We treat offline as a channel, not as a favour to a vendor.
Sites and publications are chosen against your catchment and compared across more than one quotation. Nothing is booked simply because it was offered at a discount in the last week of a quarter.
Every format is given a way to be answered.
A tracked number, a code or a QR reaching a page built for the campaign. It costs almost nothing to arrange before printing, and it is impossible to add once the board is on the pole.
Somebody actually goes and looks at the board.
Installation photographs with the date visible, and a mid-run check for tearing, obstruction and lighting failure. Where a site was not displayed as booked, we claim replacement days or credit.
The artwork is checked at the distance it will be read.
One message, legible type, honest contrast and a response device large enough to use, verified at true viewing size before the file goes to press rather than admired at full zoom on a screen.
Offline and digital are compared on the same sheet.
Cost per response for a hoarding, an insert and a search campaign is reported in one table, so budget can move between them on evidence instead of on preference.
We work the way an Indian SMB really buys media.
Regional editions, dealer counters, auto and bus branding, wall media and leaflet routes are planned as seriously as a lit unipole, because for many businesses they return more per rupee.
Where it applies
The same service, in different businesses.
Manufacturing and industrial supply
- The situation:
- Buyers are purchase managers and engineers inside two industrial clusters, and the company is invisible between exhibitions.
- How it applies:
- Trade press advertising in the publications those buyers read, hoardings on the approach roads to both clusters, and a tracked number reaching the inside sales desk.
- Likely benefit:
- Enquiries arrive between exhibitions, and each one can be traced to the cluster and the format that produced it.
Hospital and clinic
- The situation:
- A new department has opened and patients living within a few kilometres do not know the service exists.
- How it applies:
- Neighbourhood hoardings and bus shelters inside the catchment, a language-appropriate press insert, and reception standees carrying a QR to an appointment page.
- Likely benefit:
- Appointment requests can be counted by area, and registration asks one standard source question every time.
Real estate and construction
- The situation:
- A project is selling slowly and the site board is the only marketing anywhere near the property.
- How it applies:
- Directional boards along the approach routes, a press insert in the corridor's edition, and a project page behind a QR code on every board.
- Likely benefit:
- Site visits can be attributed to the road they came from, so weak directions are replaced instead of renewed.
Retail and showroom
- The situation:
- The showroom depends on walk-ins, and footfall falls away between festival seasons.
- How it applies:
- Shop-front branding, in-shop and counter media, leaflet distribution on planned routes, and a counter coupon code that identifies the route.
- Likely benefit:
- You learn which route brought buyers, so the next distribution goes where the coupons actually came from.
Education and training
- The situation:
- Admissions run on a fixed calendar and parents in the district decide inside a short window.
- How it applies:
- Press advertising timed to results week, hoardings near the schools and coaching clusters that feed the institute, and a tracked admission enquiry number.
- Likely benefit:
- Enquiry volume is read week by week against the admission calendar instead of judged after the season has closed.
Dealer and distribution network
- The situation:
- Counters across the state carry competitors' branding, and the company's own name is barely visible in the market.
- How it applies:
- Standardised shop-front boards, counter and in-shop media produced centrally, and a dealer-wise code so enquiries raised at each counter can be identified.
- Likely benefit:
- The network reads as one brand, and counters that create demand can be told apart from those that only hold stock.
Questions buyers ask
Before you enquire, the answers you will want.
How do you measure a hoarding when nobody clicks on it?
By giving each format its own way of replying. A tracked phone number, a WhatsApp link, a QR code that opens a page built only for that campaign, or a coupon code shown at the counter. Every enquiry is also asked one standard source question, recorded in the same field each time. You will not get click-level precision from a board, but you will get response counts by site and a cost per enquiry you can defend.
Is newspaper and print advertising still worth it for an Indian SMB?
It depends entirely on who your buyer is and what they read. Regional dailies, district editions and trade publications still reach people who are hard to find online: purchase managers, farmers, parents choosing a school, older customers. Print earns its place when the audience is concentrated and the publication is chosen on real readership rather than a circulation claim. If your buyers are scattered across the country, the same money usually works harder elsewhere.
What information and internal involvement are required from us?
Your buying season, the areas that matter, recent enquiry and sales numbers for the baseline, past offline invoices and artwork, and your brand assets. During the campaign you need one person who can approve the schedule and the artwork quickly, and staff who will answer the campaign number, ask the source question and record the answer. That last part decides whether any of the measurement is worth anything.
How long does a print and outdoor engagement take?
The planning stage covering audit, baseline, site selection, artwork and response setup runs over several weeks, and its pace depends mostly on how quickly artwork is approved and how far ahead your sites and publications must be booked. The campaign itself runs for the period the media is booked for. We do not quote a fixed timeline before the audit, because vendor availability and print schedules govern the dates, not us.
Do you handle the printing, mounting and site permissions?
We manage the process and coordinate the vendors. Printing, flex and vinyl production, mounting, insertion and distribution are executed by specialist vendors whose quotations we compare and whose work we inspect. Display permission for a rented site is held by the media owner. Where a permission is your own responsibility, such as signage on your premises or at a dealer counter, we tell you before booking rather than afterwards.
How do you decide which hoarding sites to book?
Against your catchment first, never against a vendor's availability list. We look at where your buyers travel, then assess each candidate site for direction of traffic, viewing distance and angle, obstruction by trees, poles or other boards, illumination, and what stands beside it. Rates are compared across more than one vendor. Sites we advise against are shown to you with the reason rather than quietly left out.
What is excluded from the scope of this service?
Media rentals, printing, mounting, insertion charges, distribution costs and permission fees are paid to vendors and remain your cost; our professional fee is quoted separately. We do not buy television or radio, run exhibition stalls or on-ground activation teams, or send addressed mail campaigns. Digital advertising, if you want it running alongside, is scoped and quoted as separate work.
Can a small business afford outdoor advertising at all?
Often yes, once outdoor is understood as more than a lit hoarding on a highway. Auto and bus branding, wall media, bus shelters, market entry boards, shop-front and counter branding and planned leaflet routes cost a fraction of a premium site and can cover a neighbourhood properly. The question we answer first is whether your budget can cover your catchment often enough to be noticed, or whether it buys one board nobody passes twice.
3 more questions
How is success measured, and against what baseline?
Against numbers recorded before anything was booked: enquiries and calls per week, walk-ins, quotations, orders, and the share of enquiries whose source is unknown. Through the run we report response by site and format, cost per lead, conversion to order, and revenue traced to offline sources. If a campaign produced fewer enquiries than the baseline weeks, the report says so plainly and we look at why.
Should we spend this money on digital advertising instead?
Sometimes, and the audit will say so if that is the honest answer. Digital finds people already looking for what you sell. Print and outdoor reaches people who are not looking, in a place they cannot scroll past. Which one deserves the money depends on whether demand for your category already exists in search, how concentrated your buyers are, and whether your website converts the traffic it already receives.
What happens if a board never goes up, or gets damaged mid-campaign?
It gets found, because somebody checks. Every site is photographed on installation with the date visible and inspected again during the run for tearing, obstruction and lighting failure. Where a site was not displayed as booked, we document it and claim replacement days or credit from the media owner. Without that check, non-display is the most common and least visible way offline money disappears.
Talk to us
Start with a free audit of your hoardings, press and leaflets.
Bring last year's offline invoices, the artwork you used and whatever enquiry records you keep. The free audit tells you what that spend can and cannot be measured against, and what a campaign with a proper response path would involve.
- No obligation and no sales script
- A reply from someone who does the work
- Your details are never sold or shared