Digital out of home (DOOH) advertising is evolving at a fast pace, making it hard for businesses and marketers to keep up. Therefore, at this point, it is crucial to focus on the essential principles of success. In this article, we will take a Q and A approach to address the most important concerns for outdoor digital signage advertising.
- Important aspects of signage and marketing include diversity, inclusion and accessibility. How is the industry as a whole addressing these aspects and how can diversity and inclusion increase in the digital signage advertising space?
Be mindful of who you hire with your digital signage investment. Select a trusted vendor who has the necessary talent and equipment to help deploy and manage your network as well as assist with content creation. Find space for inclusion within the content itself and be mindful of what assets are selected to deploy to the field.
- Now that the pandemic is behind us, consumers are returning to physical gatherings. How can retailers use digital signage to convert browsers to buyers?
There are 3 categories to do so: attraction and entertainment, relevant offers, and lastly – education and interactivity.
The first category is where a lot of effort has to be put into content design to make it very attractive, also adding to the overall feeling and design of the space. The main intention is to grab customers and encourage them to spend time with a brand.
Digital signage must also ensure that only relevant purchasing information is placed in front of a customer. Retailers can highlight sales, seasonal promotions, reaffirm product availability, and the possibility of availing delivery services for certain products.
Educate consumers about the launch of a new product and the difference between two similar products, with an ultimate aim to increase sales. Interactive LED displays contributes towards positive brand sentiments and is helpful when consumers are skeptical about asking for help or have become too comfortable with online shopping that digital interaction is the first choice even in a physical shopping environment.
- Why should retailers focus on experiential marketing?
Experiential marketing is a program that elicits feeling and emotions to heighten the senses. It focuses on the experience given to audiences and is mostly used at events, pop-ups and other creative marketing efforts.
It is expected that brands will spend more on experiential marketing as this strategy has proven great results. Retailers are catching up with experiential projects such as store-within-a-store concept, brand collaborations and pop-ups, thereby delivering a unique experience for potential customers. These kinds of experiences are an easy solution for user-generated digital content, attracting a lot of social media attention.
- Why is interactivity so popular in digital advertising and how can businesses make their digital signage interactive?
Interactivity offers more depth to digital signage content. When customers drill for more information, the retailer is able to provide educational value, provide instant feedback on products and allow customers to place orders for products that are not currently available in-store. Interactive digital displays also allow retailers to create surprise and delight moments for viewers.
Most digital signage is directional – played at endpoints, hoping to be consumed by viewers. By installing hardware such as touchscreens and sensors to these existing displays, interactivity can be added. In fact, retailers can also provide a BYOD experience (Bring Your Own Digital device) by allowing viewers to scan a QR code that opens an interactive brand experience instantly. This two-way nature of interactive content creates a bigger impact on audiences, guaranteeing longer engagement and rich value.
- What are some easy ways to optimize ROI in a digital signage budget?
Consult subject matter experts, sit with them and plan. Put together multiple scenarios and find strategies to help maximize your ROI. Networking and IT experts will advice you on connectivity and security while those in the AV space will help you with choosing appropriate LED displays, and content experts will ensure you don’t make your investment go to waste with irrelevant content. In other words, by ensuring you don’t have to re-work any part of your digital signage deployment itself is a great start towards maximizing ROI.
Another great way to optimize ROI is to have a clear strategy for your ultimate goal with your digital signage investment. For example, the objective could be that ‘every customer is looking at your electronic display with enough frequency to lead to a purchase or remember the advertisement when they want to make a purchase’. Find the threads that can be connected to put together a good amount of content; already created content can be re-purposed and seasonal content from the previous year can be refreshed. Optimize ROI by being intentional in every way possible.
- From AI and IoT to QR codes and the metaverse, what are some significant trends to pay attention to in the upcoming year?
With plenty of options for software, hardware and networking components of a digital signage campaign, there still seems a lack of strategy leading to a gap in delivering effective content. Notice the content of most retail locations – most often there is content being pushed out than the available wait time, which is a bad idea if you want to drive action.
Considering the heap of innovation in software, more features can be incorporated such as AI – helps with analytics and content generation to keep playlists moving. The re-adoption of QR codes will mean more BYOD type of interactivity in digital signage. Retailers can expand beyond the 16:9 ratio and create mosaic-style installations. A storefront can transform its look and feel by dedicating an entire wall to a digital signage deployment such as LED video walls. Retailers must do everything it takes to drive traffic back to their stores, particularly when the global economy is facing challenging times.
Final Thoughts
To succeed in digital signage investment, retailers must continue listening to your customers and incorporating their feedback to stay relevant. Stay open to new ideas and navigate your way by letting your customers voice guide you. Don’t fall into the trap of shiny new things because more often than not, staying relevant involves a series of small changes to existing methods, not to adopt to entirely new things.
