Tag Archive | "WireSpring"
During the past few weeks, I've run into not one, not two, but three companies who are considering writing their own digital signage software. From scratch. We noted this phenomenon several years ago, when investigating the make-vs-buy question for kiosks and digital signage networks. Frankly, I'm baffled that people are still thinking about writing their own platform here in 2010, given all the mature and affordable software packages that are available today. Without turning this article into a sales pitch, I'd like to talk about some of the arguments that I've heard from the do-it-yourselfers and hopefully set straight some of the widely-held misconceptions about what really goes into creating a digital signage software platform -- or any piece of software, for that matter.
Better, faster, cheaper. Pick... none?
I don't want to write an article about why you should buy my company's software -- or anyone else's, for that matter. Nor would I ever discount the quality or capability of open source and community-authored software. I use many such programs every day of the week, and they usually rival or top their commercial counterparts. But of the three companies I encountered who were contemplating the make-versus-buy, none are software companies, and two aren't even tech companies of any kind. One has a significant amount of digital signage experience. Another has a more modest track record in the industry. And one is still cutting its teeth on a prototype network. In all three cases, WireSpring's kit is being considered alongside a number of our competitors -- mostly good ones, with a few lackeys thrown in. (Even with over 330 companies in our competitor database, we come across one or two new guys each month.) In each case, cost is being cited as the chief factor in prompting the make-buy decision. In general, the cost-related arguments fall into two categories:
Image credit: Andrew Michaels
Fallacy #1: We can write it ourselves for less than the cost of [X software licenses / Y months of SaaS service / Z firstborn children]
Software companies are businesses, so yes, we do make a point of trying to sell our products to others for money. And while some firms seem adept at gouging customers with sky-high prices, most of us either start out honest, or else we're kept honest by our competitors. Still, there's apparently a notion out there that software development involves no capital expense and has no ongoing support costs. The reality (from my point of view, at least) is that good software developers are expensive. I hate to objectify them like that, because they can be pretty awesome people, too. But awesomeness doesn't show up on my P&L statements. Salaries do. For the cost of even an extremely modest, hypothetical development team -- perhaps 2-3 developers and a QA engineer -- you can buy a lot of software. And that doesn't even figure in tech support or take into account how long it would take said developers and QA folks to build a product that was actually usable.
Another big misconception -- and I can totally appreciate why anybody who hasn't worked at a software company would think this -- is that once you've written and released your perfect software version 1.0, you can fire your development staff, kick up your heels, and be done with it. I really, really wish that was the case. (Well, except for the firing part -- see the aforementioned note about awesomeness.) But a software program is never really "finished," and even great software demands a considerable amount of expensive, ongoing maintenance. What drives this need for maintenance? Here are a few of the gremlins that are bound to pop up:
Discontinued hardware: The playback hardware you install at your sites (whether it's a PC or an embedded device) will eventually be discontinued and replaced with a new model, forcing you to update the operating system, integrate new drivers and re-test hundreds of scenarios before you can deploy on the new hardware.
Security patches: Mandatory security patches for the underlying operating system (whether it's Windows, Mac OS or Linux) or the other programs you use on there will interfere with your existing playback tools, forcing you to re-write those tools to be compatible. Internet Explorer has been notorious for this, with even a small change in the IE security model requiring major changes to digital signage playback tools that rely on IE for showing any type of web-based content.
New content formats: Your customers will eventually want to display new content formats that didn't exist when you first wrote your playback software, requiring you to integrate new codecs or upgrade the existing ones.
Browser updates: The web browsers that your employees or customers use to access your management portal (whether it's hosted in-house or out on the cloud) will be updated to new versions, forcing you to update your HTML, Javascript, and other code to be compatible with the new browser releases.
Bug fixes: No matter how much you test before releasing a software product, some number of bugs will crop up once it's in the field -- and it can sometimes take years before a given bug shows up. Like it or not, you'll probably be issuing bug fixes for the life of your product.
These scenarios may be specific to the digital signage industry, but the same general issues apply to all software development projects. In fact, companies like Microsoft, Apple, Adobe and Symantec are all constantly updating their legacy products, keeping a veritable army of developers and quality assurance staff employed in the process. But they have millions of clients over which they can spread their costs. When you write your own software, your first, biggest and only client is you. You get to pay 100% of the cost of every new feature and every bug fix. And instead of having a predictable, known cost for what you'll pay every year for keeping things up-to-date, writing your own software means that you bear the entire risk that those endeavors will be more expensive and time consuming than you expected.
Fallacy #2: We have elaborate, complex and unique requirements that need to be designed from scratch
If you really, really wanted a teal and fuchsia zebra-striped car, would you buy a car and get a custom paint job, or would you get an engineering degree and redesign the internal combustion engine? I have a slightly more diplomatic way of phrasing this when talking to potential customers. But what it boils down to is that when taking a from-scratch DIY software approach, you will be spending time and money solving problems that others have solved already. And I can tell you from experience that even seemingly simple tasks -- like reliably moving a file from server A to player B, or getting said file to play smoothly from beginning to end unattended -- turn out to be pretty complicated when they have to work in the real world, and not just in your development lab.
At the same time, I understand that all businesses have unique requirements, and some might have enough complexity to warrant writing software to automate (or at least improve) those processes. But in my book, that just calls for a good API and some engineering cleverness. I can't think of many real-world cases that would warrant a rewrite of what is basically the digital signage industry's equivalent of the wheel.
Perhaps you've done the math and considered salary expenses, time-to-market delays and opportunity costs, and you still think DIY software is a good idea. In that case, you're either planning an extremely huge network with remarkably unique needs, or you're underestimating some part of the DIY proposition. That sounds like a harsh conclusion drawn by a biased party, and maybe it is. But given how many do-it-yourselfers have become our clients and the clients of our competitors over the years, I've noticed a clear trend that goes like this: (1) Meet new prospect doing make-buy analysis. (2) Prospect chooses "make." (3) Wait 2-3 years. (4) Get new call from old prospect looking to retrofit old network. (5) Repeat. This cycle is costly for everyone and ultimately limits the growth of our industry, as otherwise promising network owners spend their time re-inventing the wheel, instead of expanding their networks and creating compelling content that achieves real business goals. Hopefully this article will help some of those people ask the right questions and understand the true costs of writing their own digital signage software, and enable them to make the best technology decision for their business. And if not... Well... I'll see you at step (4) then! Click here to leave a comment What's WireSpring's Blog All About? WireSpring provides hardware, software and services for digital signage and kiosk projects. But our blog is a labor of love. Our posts cover everything from case studies to creative briefs, and are authored by some of the industry's most well-respected leaders.
I'd like to offer up an observation based on nearly a decade of experience in this industry: business as usual hasn't changed much for the small network operator since the turn of the 21st century. For one reason or another, things haven't gotten any easier for companies who manage 100 screens or less. And despite numerous advances in the marketplace, the longevity of a smaller digital signage company doesn't seem to have improved much, either. This baffles me, since in the 5+ years that I've been writing this blog and researching the industry, digital signage costs have continued to decline, the quality of the products and services that make up a digital signage network has improved, and people have generally become more accepting (and less incredulous) of the benefits of out-of-home digital media. I haven't completed an exhaustive analysis of the data, but at this point I want to throw out a couple of guesses as to why this might be the case. With your feedback, my goal is to turn this discussion into a more comprehensive study that can benefit network operators of all sizes.
Why focus on the "little" guys?
Image credit: Stefan
Before I jump into this, I want to point something out: the digital signage business is probably quite difficult for everybody, large and small. I doubt the execs at industry heavyweights like CBS Outernet and PRN just breeze through their operations without a care in the world. However, there happen to be a lot more small companies in our space than large ones, and I certainly deal with many more small companies on a day-to-day basis. Thus, I have a much larger pool of data to work with there. If anybody from one of the really big networks would like to chime in with a comment or two about their own businesses, all the better. Also, there's nothing magical about the 100 screen or 100 venue cap on my analysis. That just happens to be my mental point for dividing networks into "small" and "large" categories, and is otherwise completely arbitrary. So, don't think that installing just one more screen or venue will catapult you out of the danger zone and into safety.
Those who don't know history...
...are destined to repeat it, as the British philosopher and statesman Edmund Burke noted a few hundred years ago. Sadly, plenty of people in the digital signage industry seem hell-bent on trying to prove him wrong. Very few succeed in this endeavor. One of the biggest sources of angst in our marketplace -- to large and small digital signage companies alike -- continues to be the challenge of justifying the value of the screens (or screen time) to entities that might like to put some content on them. The entity might be an advertiser, a government organization, or a non-profit. But whoever they are, networks owners have to convince them that the audience viewing their screens is valuable. Furthermore, they have to prove that the screens can reach that audience in a meaningful way. As many experienced folks in the industry have said: if you haven't sold ads before, then starting out with advertising-supported digital signage is a very difficult path to take -- and one littered with the corpses of dead networks.
Clearly, the gung-ho attitudes of new network startups hasn't changed. And while that continues to lend plenty of optimism to the industry, it also means that more companies are charging into the space head-first, often without the understanding of why so many of their peers have failed. Thankfully, I've talked to numerous institutional investors and angel groups recently who've noted they see many fewer "build it and they will come" propositions from network startups, even while the rate of new network formation (from my perspective) seems to be increasing. So my gut feeling is that more companies are testing the waters with smaller, self-funded pilots, and perhaps relying more on organic growth from real, actual revenues.
Wait, I thought this was a cost-driven industry?
Ask any digital signage vendor and they'll say it certainly feels that way sometimes. And as I noted above, costs have steadily declined since we started tracking them in 2004. But that trend only seems to be helping with the rate of new network formation, not the relative success or longevity of those networks. To me, this suggests that the reason for failure has to do with operating costs (or revenue shortfalls) that aren't related to the technology or initial installation expense (which is really all that we track). It might be content, it might be management, or it might be sales. But whatever it is, it's enough to sink network after network. Of course, the upshot for savvy firms is that once a digital signage company goes under, their screens remain in the field, so over time we've seen smaller networks grow inorganically by purchasing the assets of their defunct ex-competitors.
Obviously, lower costs will continue to reduce entry barriers for prospective network owners. However, just because more companies get started doesn't necessarily mean that more will be successful in the long-term. In fact, I kind of expect the percentage of successful network operators to decrease as more new firms jump in, realize how hard this stuff really is, and then quickly make an exit (or die trying). But on the other hand, more new companies means more innovation, more new and different business models, and hopefully more paths to success. From WireSpring's perspective, we continue to see the strongest growth from new customers starting relatively small networks. But the next biggest growth area is from small- to medium-sized networks expanding their existing operations (which by some accounts is an indicator of their health). For all that, though, there are plenty of networks that have fallen by the wayside.
What's the biggest reason that digital signage networks fail? Is there anything on the horizon that will make things easier for new network operators? Leave a comment and let us know! Click here to leave a comment What's WireSpring's Blog All About? WireSpring provides hardware, software and services for digital signage and kiosk projects. But our blog is a labor of love. Our posts cover everything from case studies to creative briefs, and are authored by some of the industry's most well-respected leaders.
I've been going through the results from our last industry poll on what a digital signage network should cost, and I'm planning to publish the results of that study in the near future. In reading the responses, I noticed some interesting differences between the answers given by people who have worked on larger projects, versus those who have predominantly worked on smaller ones. I was obviously expecting to see some differences in terms of what people expected to pay for components, or which services were deemed essential (or not), but even the words used by these people in the course of their open-ended responses differed substantially. This got me thinking about the vocabulary and parlance that I use every day, and how I change it (or don't) depending on who I'm talking to.
Words that need to go away
A few weeks ago, Dave Haynes wrote a great post on his Buzz, Not Buzzwords blog about some common buzzwords and phrases that really ought to be shelved, at least during polite conversation. ("Best of breed", I'm looking at you.) It's one thing for press releases and marketing documents to use ridiculous phrases -- I think we've all come to expect that by now, and with practice we've learned to more or less ignore them. However, I'm still stunned when people tell me about their n-tiered, next-generation solutions in casual conversation (which also tells you about the kind of "casual" conversation I usually find myself taking part in). In addition to minding Dave's excellent list, I will be doing my best to avoid using the words leverage, dynamic and anything that has to do with synergy. I sincerely hope you'll try to avoid them too :)
A sign, by any other name...
Image credit: Andy on Flickr
Long before I started running surveys and taking polls, it was evident that our industry had something of an identity crisis. One man's digital sign was another's electronic display. Captive audience networks were all the rage, until people started realizing that their audiences weren't really captive (aside from those few prison-focused applications). These days, digital out-of-home, or DOOH, seems to have become the de-facto industry acronym, despite the silly sound. But try using that on anybody unfamiliar with the industry -- including those folks who have done their fair share of smaller digital signage projects -- and you'll be greeted with blank stares, funny looks, or worse. Consequently, I stick almost exclusively to "digital signage" when talking about indoor screens and networks, and "electronic billboards" when talking about the big, side-of-the-road displays. From what I've seen of the open-ended responses of this last survey, it looks like most of you agree with that approach. I do find myself occasionally using the phrase "digital out of home," but only in the context of advertising, since "out of home" has been used commonly in ad circles for quite some time.
Referring to big networks versus small
In addition to the myriad words and phrases that could be said instead of "digital signage," I started to notice that those respondents who typically worked on smaller digital signage projects tended to use different words than those who worked on larger ones. Specifically, the folks from smaller projects more frequently used tech-sounding words like "displays," "screens" and "monitors," while those accustomed to larger projects almost never used such words. This might point to the different mentalities of the companies running each type of project. An AV integrator may have made a successful business out of installing digital screens for messaging in many of the local businesses, churches and schools in his area. But if the projects were heterogeneous and largely self-contained, he probably continued to think of them as technical installations of screens and media players. The function of the screens was ancillary. On the other hand, nobody is going to install a 2,000 screen network unless they have a very clear idea of what those screens will be used for -- and usually that means having some kind of digital signage content strategy. Consequently, large network deployers frequently used terms like "media" and "network" in their descriptions, which were uncommon in the responses from smaller integrators.
So while I'll start talking about more substantive results from the survey in the coming weeks, these preliminary, anecdotal findings have taught me that nothing -- including industry parlance -- is a truly settled matter in this business. Part of that is because as we grow, new people and companies from very different markets are getting involved, bringing with them their own perspectives and vocabularies. Plus, some people really just like to throw around marketing schlock, and apparently there's nothing we can do to stop them. I'm hopeful that somebody will eventually figure out how to prevent these people from synergizing their backward overflow dynamics. Until then, I'm leaving my BS filter on.
The difference in terminology for large and small networks is new and interesting to me. What terms do you use for the kinds/sizes of networks you're most familiar with? Leave a comment below and let us know! Click here to leave a comment What's WireSpring's Blog All About? WireSpring provides hardware, software and services for digital signage and kiosk projects. But our blog is a labor of love. Our posts cover everything from case studies to creative briefs, and are authored by some of the industry's most well-respected leaders.
Believe it or not, there is institutional and angel money available for digital signage companies and networks right now. Unfortunately, the general consensus is that nobody is dying to invest -- in our market or anywhere else -- at the moment. Given this difficult economic climate, investors have become much more cautious about evaluating not just individual opportunities, but the space as a whole. In the course of preparing for our Digital Signage Investor Conference in New York next month, I had the opportunity to catch up with several equity fund managers and investment advisors who are all tracking the digital out-of-home market right now. Here are some of the more interesting themes and thoughts that have emerged.
Picking winning networks
"In general, across sectors, there is more scrutiny at the proposed ROI model and testing of the cost and revenue assumptions," said Jeff Milkie, a director at Challenger Capital, an investment bank with offices in Dallas and Chicago. The firm was most recently engaged as an advisor to Indoor Direct's series B funding which totaled $22.5 million. While excitement about the digital signage and digital out of home space remains high, it's a matter of "picking the winners and losers" right now.
Image credit: Andrei Niemimaki
But what makes for a winning network? A big driver for investors right now is having manageable capital expenditures, given that building out a network is critical. Then it's back to the basics of rolling out the right venue and DMA so the network would be attractive to advertisers. The investment community -- be it venture capital or private equity -- requires that companies seeking funds be able to "hit it up front" and cover all the hot buttons to them, said Milkie.
A guide to success
Even winning companies can have a hard time raising money. Often, the difficulty lies with the amount of time and effort required to first find the right investors, and then close a deal with them. Hiring an investment advisor is an increasingly common way of accelerating the process. Lon Otremba, CEO of Access 360 Media, successfully completed a series B fundraising in 2008. While the network did not retain an advisor, he does see the benefits in doing so. "Fundraising always takes longer than you plan. It just does. One of the dynamics in any venture backed industry is you're going to have to see a lot of people. It's a very time consuming process. We chose not to retain an advisor to help us through the process mostly because we were introduced to funds through Bessemer (their round A investor). If you have an advisor that can help shoulder the load and help through the process, through time consumption, that's a great thing."
While an investment advisor does typically charge a retainer as well as collect a percentage of the funds raised, the upside to working with one is similar to working with a real estate agent. The firm is largely compensated based on their success. There is therefore a high incentive to ensure a successful placement. "Having the right advisor will help the company tell the story and connect with the right investors," Challenger's Milkie noted. A good firm can get the introductions made, will know specifically what the investors are looking for and be able to tailor the investment thesis to address the points investors are looking for.
Bill's thoughts
Fundraising is a hot topic for many companies in our industry, and I've previously written about how to raise venture capital for a digital signage business and raising money during an economic crisis. While not every firm will want to hire an investment advisor to assist in the process, having a "winning" business model is something that all companies -- whether they're looking for outside funding or not -- should strive for. That's actually one more thing that a digital signage investment advisor can be a gauge of. Taking a step back, it's no surprise that pitching an individual or angel investor group before chasing after larger, more established equity investor groups can help you refine your elevator pitch and determine which points are most important to articulate. Similarly, the act of pitching an investment advisor can give you a quick snapshot of how far away from a successful raise you may be. After all, these firms are largely compensated based on successfully raising money for you. If they shy away from working with your company, they might be telling you that your organization lacks the attributes that their investors are looking for. Of course, there may be plenty of other reasons why one particular group or another might not be a good fit: a digital signage investment might fall outside their target industries, or perhaps they prefer to work within a particular geographic area. But testing your pitch against a few groups can potentially provide some valuable insight. I'm aware of at least three different companies that decided to substantially change their business models (almost certainly for the better) after having little success talking to such advisors.
So if you're going to be in the New York area during the first week of October and are interested in raising money for your digital signage firm, you might want to stop by the Strategy Institute's Digital Signage Investor Conference, which takes place on October 6-7. In addition to lots of other entrepreneurs and business owners, you'll find a number of angels, institutional VCs and investment advisors that are already tuned in to our industry, and might be able to lend a helping hand.
Have the capital markets opened up since last year? Are investors tired of hearing about the recession? Leave a comment and let us know! Click here to leave a comment What's WireSpring's Blog All About? WireSpring provides hardware, software and services for digital signage and kiosk projects. But our blog is a labor of love. Our posts cover everything from case studies to creative briefs, and are authored by some of the industry's most well-respected leaders.
For my recent post about digital signage "lingo", I performed a very brief and rather unscientific analysis of the data from our survey on how much digital signage should cost. Today, I want to start a more in-depth review of those results. There is a LOT of data to go through, and I suspect we'll be poking at these results for at least another few posts, eventually leading to the 2009 edition of our annual digital signage cost estimate. So let's start with a straightforward look at what people think the different components of a digital signage network should cost. As a warning, this post has a lot of graphs and charts, so if you're viewing this in your email or RSS reader and can't see the pretty pictures, you might want to visit http://www.wirespring.com/blog to see them in all their glory.
First, the caveats
Did I say a straightforward look at the data? Surely there's no such thing! For example, while we did get a total of 223 responses to our survey (our best showing yet), some people didn't answer all the questions. Also, we're segmenting the responses by network size (splitting "small" networks from "large" ones at the 100-screen mark to stay true to arguments in previous articles). Some people will disagree with that inflection point. And finally, the data is obviously highly skewed toward existing readers of this blog and there is no control set to compare against.
With that said, I'd like to present the following graphs, which tabulate the results from people who answered our "what should this part cost?" questions. We'll focus on the hardware and installation components today, and take a look at the software and support components next week. To begin with, we divided the resulting data into four piles (or buckets, if you insist on using ridiculous business jargon): one for people who have never done a digital signage project before, one for people who have only done small projects (1-99 screens), one for people who have only done large projects (100 screens or more), and one for people who have done all sorts of projects, large and small. Even accounting for the caveats listed above, I think you'll agree that the findings are pretty illuminating.
What do people expect to pay for a 40" LCD screen?
LCD monitors are the components of a digital signage network that people have the most experience with, since they're used in many applications besides digital signage. From corporate conference rooms to trade show displays to break room TVs, the widespread adoption of LCD displays suggests that people ought to provide the most similar responses for this item, regardless of their individual experiences. However, those reporting no digital signage project experience clearly indicate that they would expect to pay less for a commercial screen than those who have digital signage project experience (whether small projects only, large projects only, or mixed). This may suggest that those unfamiliar with digital signage are accustomed to purchasing consumer grade screens, and aren't aware of the price premium for commercial screens. Or perhaps they simply haven't priced a commercial digital signage LCD screen recently.
Approximately the same percentage of people expect to pay $1,200 or more per screen regardless of project size (35% of small project only respondents versus 36-38% for large and mixed project respondents). However, fully 1/3 of small project managers feel that $1,000 - $1,200 is the sweet spot right now, whereas those with any larger project experience seem to think they can get a better deal on average. The latter finding makes sense, since that group would be more likely to commit to volume purchases.
What do people expect to pay for media player hardware?
I was really surprised to see how much consistency there was on the media player pricing responses. I was also quite surprised to see how little people expect to pay for these devices. Whereas our 2008 pricing estimates put the average price of a media player at around $1,100, our respondents on average said they expect to pay only about $890. If that data holds up, it would represent a pretty dramatic drop of 19% from last year. Of course, a few different things could be happening here. First of all, the "no project experience" group is skewing the data a bit. Their estimates were the lowest on average (though not by much). Additionally, some people might have been using the survey results to voice what they'd like to pay, and not necessarily what they would actually expect to pay if they were buying these components today. Or, the price of media players could simply have dropped a lot over the past year. That's certainly not out of the question given today's economy and the willingness of many companies to make deals.
What do people expect to pay for a tilting wall mount?
Like LCD screens, tilting wall mounts are fairly common outside of the digital signage world. However, there is a huge discrepancy in pricing these items between those people who have some digital signage experience and those who don't. Given that those who haven't worked on digital signage projects significantly discounted the price of mounts, the most likely culprit is that this group has either not purchased many (or any) mounts before. Or if they have bought them, they were likely to just head over to Walmart to get the inexpensive consumer ones designed for mounting HDTVs. Those who have done work with digital signage in the past uniformly indicated that the "sweet spot" for mounts right now is the $100 - $200 price range.
What do people expect to pay for screen and media player installation?
The last item we'll discuss today is screen and media player installation. If you believe the data we collected, most people seem to think it doesn't cost a whole lot to install a screen. I wasn't completely surprised to see that those respondents with no digital signage experience would price the expected cost of installation so low -- the average was around $610, with the vast majority indicating "less than $500". If these folks have experience installing big screens, it might be of the do-it-yourself variety, or even a total guess. What was really surprising, though, is how much people with experience said they expected to pay. Our 2008 pricing estimate put the expected cost of a 40" screen and media player installation at around $1100, which was a composite figure that included two laborers (since a 40" screen is heavy enough to require a two-man lift), and a combination of union and non-union cost profiles. However, either we were really off the mark, or prices have fallen significantly, or else this data is totally inaccurate... because the average figure cited by experienced respondents was only $840, which would be nearly a 24% discount over last year's estimates. Granted, the labor market is quite flexible right now, and again thanks to the economy I could certainly see more people making deals just to keep their payrolls current. But it was still quite a surprise to see such uniformity in the data, and such a low resulting average price for digital signage installation costs.
That's all for now, I'm afraid. Those very mediocre-looking graphs took far too long to make, and while I was hoping to continue this article with discussions of the remaining items (software and tech support), that will have to wait until next week. In the meantime, I'll leave you with a question:
What do you think of the results above? Do they fit with your expectations? Leave a comment and let me know. Click here to leave a comment What's WireSpring's Blog All About? WireSpring provides hardware, software and services for digital signage and kiosk projects. But our blog is a labor of love. Our posts cover everything from case studies to creative briefs, and are authored by some of the industry's most well-respected leaders.
As promised last week, today we're going to continue the analysis of our recent survey on figuring out what a digital signage network should cost. My last article focused on the hardware components that go into a typical project: LCD screens, media players, wall mounts and installation services. (Admittedly, installation isn't hardware, but it does fit nicely with the other items.) Now we're going to look at the various software components that power a digital signage network. Once again, if you're viewing this in your email or RSS reader and can't see the pretty pictures, you should visit http://www.wirespring.com/blog to view the charts in all their glory.
Picking up where we left off
When we left him, our intrepid hero was struggling to figure out how much to pay for all of the bits and pieces that go into a typical digital signage network. Satisfied with the answers he got for the digital signage LCDs, media players and installation, he turned his attention towards the hydra that is software and support.
The key challenge with getting good data on digital signage software and support pricing is that these things are often interrelated, so paying more for one might reduce the cost of the other, for example. Likewise, lots of people have navigated their way through this business using only one software scheme (e.g. self-hosted versus SaaS), and consequently have little experience with other approaches. Because we asked all respondents to give their opinions on both pricing models, this has probably skewed the data a bit. Let's take a look at the responses.
What do people expect to pay for media player software?
Unless you're buying some kind of low-power set top box or something equivalently embedded, you're probably going to have the option of buying your media player hardware separately from your software. If not, you could probably at least guesstimate the cost of the two components, since most non-embedded media players tend to be off-the-shelf PCs these days. Consequently, there weren't many surprises from the responses to this question: the free/open source/pirated software people make up a small but stable portion regardless of project size, and everyone else is paying for software packages that span the range from a few hundred to over $1,500 per license. This makes sense to me, since there are a lot of very high-end, feature-rich packages out there that can be used for both small and large projects.
What do people expect to pay for remote management software-as-a-service (SaaS)?
On the subject of software-as-a-service, I'm still not sure how to interpret the data. For example, do any of the people who have no digital signage project experience (and thus no experience with digital signage SaaS), actually have experience using any other types of software as a service? If not, it seems like their guesses would have to be coming out of thin air. Roughly equal numbers of large- and small-project people have never used a SaaS solution, though only 15% of those with mixed experience have never tried SaaS. This suggests to me that many of those noting they have mixed experience are probably pragmatists who use different software for their different products, or perhaps they've inherited some older networks using products different from those that they use today. Those running larger networks definitely expect a larger discount on their SaaS bill than their small- and mixed-project counterparts. On average, those doing small projects exclusively pay about $671/node/year (about $56/node/month), and those doing large projects exclusively pay about $470/year (about $39/month). Those who have done both kinds of projects are right in the middle, saying they pay about $598/node/year on average ($50/node/month). Given the very wide range of prices, I believe that some of these SaaS plans include products and services that aren't included with others. Unfortunately, I didn't ask for that level of detail in the survey, so perhaps some folks can leave a comment and let us know what they get with their SaaS subscriptions.
What do people expect to pay for self-hosted remote management software?
Since virtually everyone has experience (or at least some familiarity) with buying boxed software, I don't think the data from the "no project experience" respondents is as suspect as it was for the SaaS question above. Nearly a third of those working exclusively on small projects seem to have gone with either SaaS or (more likely) unmanaged options, whereas that number falls to only about a fifth for those who have worked on large or mixed projects. On a pricing note, one thing that does jump out right away is the huge difference between those who have never done a digital signage project (and have likely not purchased any software for it), and those who have. The "no experience" folks overwhelmingly felt that management software should cost less than $5,000, which is a pretty low number based on my knowledge of today's marketplace. This could be because they simply haven't priced out the market, or it could be because those respondents who have actually read my blog but haven't yet done a digital signage project are studying smaller networks that might eschew formal management software altogether. Otherwise, the numbers for only-small, only-large and mixed experience responses were very close, suggesting that the results here might be a fairly accurate representation of the market. Many server software packages are purchased upfront, before the network reaches a significant installed base, so project size may play a relatively small role in the pricing.
What do people expect to pay for technical support?
Last but certainly not least, we asked people what they expect to pay (or typically pay) for technical support. Phrasing the potential responses to this question was tricky, since many people get support for "free" as part of some other service. Others pay a fixed-fee per managed node. Still others simply pay for the support they use, usually on an hourly or per-incident basis. Because we were basically asking people to condense their experiences into one of a few fixed choices, I'm not as confident in this data as I am with data for the other assets and services studied so far. Still, we can draw some general conclusions. For example, excluding those people who get support as part of their SaaS purchase, project managers are roughly as likely to pre-pay for support annually on a per-node basis as they are to simply pay per-incident, regardless of network size. The number of networks who don't buy any support package at all also seems somewhat steady in the low teens, probably indicating that this portion of projects is handled completely in-house. I'd expect to see this number decline over time -- in lock-step with pricing if past experience is any judge. Finally (and again excluding those who get support with their SaaS service) there is a clear trend toward the lower-end of the pricing scale, both on the per-incident and per-player fee schedules. No big surprises there.
In my simplified view of the world, the eight components we've studied in the past two weeks -- LCD screens, media player hardware, media player software, screen mounts, self-hosted management software, software as a service, installation and technical support -- are the core elements of virtually every screen network out there. Are there other things that need to be taken into account? Certainly. Bandwidth, video distribution equipment and content creation all spring to mind immediately. However, I've opted not to include those in this survey in hopes of really focusing on the most basic (and static) bits and pieces. With our basic analysis of these costs done, next week we'll turn our attention to the additional services that go along with digital signage: content production, project planning, and about a dozen other elements that we included in our survey. Plus, we'll talk about some of the things that people asked us to include in future studies. Now that you've seen our data on software pricing, I'll ask the same question as last week:
What do you think of the results above? Do they fit with your expectations? Leave a comment and let me know. Click here to leave a comment What's WireSpring's Blog All About? WireSpring provides hardware, software and services for digital signage and kiosk projects. But our blog is a labor of love. Our posts cover everything from case studies to creative briefs, and are authored by some of the industry's most well-respected leaders.
Over the past few weeks, we've been studying the results of our digital signage costs survey. As you may recall, we're segmenting the 220+ responses into four groups: those with no experience working on digital signage projects, those with experience working only on small projects, those with experience working only on large projects, and those who have worked on both small and large projects. Thus far, we have examined the data for digital signage LCDs, media player hardware and installation and digital signage software, management services and tech support. But there's much more to a running a network than these nuts-and-bolts pieces. Indeed, a wide array of additional services might be needed, ranging from content creation to project management. Today we're going to share more data from our survey respondents concerning the services they deemed essential to making their projects successful. If you're viewing this in your email or RSS reader, you'll probably want to go to http://www.wirespring.com/blog to see the chart with all the survey responses.
A service by any other name...
Image credit: Purple Slog
While there are plenty of web directories that claim to be a one-stop shop for business services, I've never seen a compendium of definitions for these services and their related providers in one place. Further, because some of them are quite complex, they may be called different things depending on who you ask. To wit, one person's "logistics management" might be another's "roll-out management" and still another's "inventory and shipping management". When putting together the survey, I tried to choose what I felt was the most generic name for each of the services that I've run across while working on a large variety of digital signage networks. Still, the results below may be slightly skewed based on what exactly each person felt the listed services comprised. For that matter, they'll be skewed by what you think they comprise too. Here's what each of the services means to me:
Logistics Management: Hardware and software inventory control (possibly but not necessarily including purchasing), shipping and receiving management and RMA/warranty management.
Strategy Consulting: Figuring out what the network is responsible for, setting goals and objectives, establishing measurement criteria for determining whether said goals and objectives have been reached, and possibly translating valid business lingo into management gobblygook to get the deal sold.
Project Planning: Developing an itemized to-do list of things that must be done before, during and after each screen is installed, parceling these tasks out to the relevant teams/groups, and making sure each team achieves their goals (and dealing with the fallout when they don't).
Content Strategy Consulting: Upon figuring out the strategic purpose of the network, figuring out how to make content that will work towards those ultimate goals. May include aspects of content creation, but is often confined to a strategic and then editorial capacity.
Content Production: Making all the pretty content that fills up the screens, and (frequently) cleaning up the not-so-pretty content that other people give you to put on your screens.
Content Management: Assigning the content to the different screens on the network (and different areas on the screen) as appropriate, and then making sure that the content played correctly, at the right dates and times, and in the proper order and proportion.
Network/Operations Management: Once the network is up and running, making sure that the screens continue to function properly, watching for systemic errors, and dealing with the random errors and issues that crop up over time.
Initial Project Management: Some people choose to break out their project management into phases, and have a team dedicated only to the deployment phase. These people are responsible for coordinating site surveys, on-site construction (if needed), installation, shipping/receiving of the various parts that must arrive at each site, and generally making sure that each screen gets installed and turned on according to schedule.
Ongoing Project Management: For networks that continue to grow over time, these services are very similar to those listed under "initial project management." For those that tend to deploy all-at-once and then stop, the services might look more like those under "network/operations management."
Installation Services: The art of hanging screens, running power/network cables, drilling, hammering and otherwise making lots of noise all in the name of getting screens installed and lit.
As you can see, even my pre-selected list has some overlap between items. And without the benefit of formal definitions, some respondents may have interpreted these services quite differently than I did. Still, the breakdown of how many people handle each service in-house, outsource it, or don't bother with it is quite interesting. We'll look at the overall results today, and then we'll break them down by project experience in next week's article.
Looking at the overall results
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Service
We do it in-house
We outsource it
We don't bother with it
Logistics Management
66%
30%
4%
Strategy Consulting
86%
10%
4%
Project Planning
93%
5%
2%
Content Strategy Consulting
74%
23%
3%
Content Production
50%
44%
6%
Content Management
74%
23%
3%
Network/Operations Management
66%
29%
5%
Initial Project Management
89%
9%
2%
Ongoing Project Management
86%
10%
4%
Installation Services
28%
69%
3%
What do these results mean?
I'm pretty confused by some of the results, and I bet you are too. For example, how can somebody "not bother with" installation services? Is your network in a bunch of boxes in a warehouse somewhere? Likewise, 6% of people opted out of content production. How on earth does that work? I understand that you can do a lot with Twitter and RSS feeds, but seriously, are there really networks out there that don't have any custom content at all? Even throwing the word "Jim" into your "Happy Birthday!" template and hitting "Save" would count in my book. Perhaps that 6% didn't think so.
On the other hand, I was very pleased to see that only 3% of respondents gave no consideration to content strategy consulting, though a large number still do this in-house (and my bet is that a fair number of those aren't doing a great job). Even just a few years ago, that number would have been much higher. For the most part, people today seem to understand that digital signage isn't just nuts-and-bolts. It's also arts-and-crafts. Along a similar vein, strategy consulting is done by all but 4% of the respondents polled, though again the vast majority (86%) are handling this in-house. While I believe that most of the networks coming out in the last few years are dramatically better than their predecessors, I still feel that a few days (or sometimes even hours) with a bona fide digital signage expert would help virtually everyone undertaking a new project or revamping an old one.
Not surprisingly, installation was the service most likely to be outsourced. That makes sense, since most people don't have big crews of carpenters, electricians and A/V installers on hand everywhere they want to place a screen. Project planning, which is certainly a very critical element during every stage of a network's life, was the service most likely to be handled in-house. This is probably how it should be -- provided you have some experience doing project planning in-house, that is.
These results speak volumes about the transition of digital signage from a back-room operation largely handled by AV folks to a kinder, gentler sort of project that is now being approached by people with sales, marketing, corporate communications and other backgrounds. While the variety of people and skill sets can make a digital signage solution a bit challenging to sell (since you have to know your buyer and what his pain points are), it also means more opportunities as the marketplace continues to swell. As I noted earlier, the data I've covered today is just the top-line results from the entire set of 223 respondents. Next week, I'll segment the numbers into our small, large, mixed, and no experience groups to highlight some specific trends. In the meanwhile, I'd certainly appreciate your feedback:
Are there any services missing from my list? If you're a service provider, do you agree with my definitions for the items listed above? Please leave a comment and let me know. Click here to leave a comment What's WireSpring's Blog All About? WireSpring provides hardware, software and services for digital signage and kiosk projects. But our blog is a labor of love. Our posts cover everything from case studies to creative briefs, and are authored by some of the industry's most well-respected leaders.
Last week we looked at a list of digital signage services to find out which tasks companies tend to outsource, versus handle internally. Today, I'll break down that survey data based on network size, looking at how those with small network experience, large network experience, mixed experience and no experience responded to the questions. This data could be valuable for service providers who are trying to decide which companies to market to. Likewise, it could be useful to network owners and operators as a way of comparing their decisions to similar (but potentially competing) companies. We've got a lot of graphs and charts in today's article, so once again if they're not showing up correctly for you (e.g. in your email inbox or your RSS reader), surf on over to http://www.wirespring.com/blog to get a better look.
So, how do big and small digital signage networks handle their service needs?
If you missed last week's article on digital signage services, you might want to give it a quick read-through, since it presents some top-line findings that we'll be exploring in more depth today. Let me point out one quick thing before diving into the results: there are some slight numerical differences in the results between this week and last, due to rounding errors in Excel and a peculiarity with how the spreadsheet treats blank values in certain formulas. For the most part, these errors are small (less than 3% or so), and in any event they don't change the high-level findings or analysis presented in last week's article. With that out of the way, let's take a look at the charts for each type of digital signage service:
Digging into the numbers
As you can see, there really isn't much variance in the responses from each of the experience groups, which I found quite surprising. After all, a 10,000 screen, 500-venue advertising network is quite different from, say, a 2-screen employee breakroom application. I was really expecting to see more distinction between those with only-large and only-small network experience, but those variances simply didn't show up. Understandably, the group who admitted to having no experience working with digital signage did tend to have different answers than the folks who have done projects before. Whether this indicates a lack of understanding of the marketplace or just a different set of expectations based on some domain-specific knowledge is hard to say. Most of the time, though, even the no-experience people were within a few percentage points of those with some experience under their belts.
However, there were a few areas where the groups displayed more diversity in their responses:
Nearly 80% of those working with large digital signage networks handle their content management in-house, versus 74% of small networks and 70% of those who have done both.
Those respondents who had only worked on large network projects were slightly more likely to outsource their project planning (11%), versus just 3.5% of those who had only worked on small network projects.
Likewise, those handling large and mixed projects were more likely to outsource logistics management (35%), versus only 21% of those working exclusively on small network projects.
While those with both large and small network experience generally tended to answer more similarly to those with large network experience only, one exception is in the network/operations area. Those with mixed experience were markedly more likely to take care of that service in-house (76%), versus just 63% of those exclusively working on large projects, and 64% of those exclusively working on small projects.
Not surprisingly, small network managers were significantly more likely to handle installation services themselves (though it was still only 30% of them). Only 20% of large network managers handled such tasks in-house. Those with mixed experience were split between these two at about 24%.
Things to cover in future surveys
While I got a lot of positive feedback about this survey and its content in general, there were a few common themes in the suggestions that I received. For example, many people asked for a greater focus on content-related costs, including typical production costs, rework costs, and the like. Another popular area of focus was on hardware, with numerous folks asking for a study of pricing for components like directional audio systems, cellular modems and plans, and measurement peripherals. Still another group wanted a look at more business-y items like equipment financing and leasing, costs associated with customer attrition, and related site fees. And then there was one guy who said "Monkeys. Lots of monkeys. And pie."
I'm not quite sure how I can help that last respondent (except perhaps to recommend that he check the dosage of his medication), but for the rest of you folks with requests, I'll certainly begin planning some future surveys to cover these important matters. There's clearly still a lot of confusion and complexity in our market, thanks to both the variety of skills that must be brought to the table, and the wide range of corporate disciplines that have attempted to take on digital signage projects. My goal for future surveys is to continue bringing the relevant data into the open, which should help increase confidence among potential customers and increase the size of the pie for everyone.
Well, I'm finished studying this data for a while, but it certainly has been an educational set of articles (for me, at least). As many of you have been asking, yes, an update to our annual digital signage cost estimate is coming up soon -- either later in October or early in November. To compile the annual budget numbers, I definitely plan to use the data from this pricing survey in conjunction with my usual method of gathering industry-wide pricing (which largely consists of emailing and calling a lot of people). But thanks again to everyone who filled out the survey and left comments during the past few articles. I've learned quite a bit from the experience, and hopefully you have, too.
Did you enjoy the way we published the survey results? Would you like to see them presented in the form of a downloadable report, a slide presentation, a video, or a podcast? Leave a comment and let us know. Click here to leave a comment What's WireSpring's Blog All About? WireSpring provides hardware, software and services for digital signage and kiosk projects. But our blog is a labor of love. Our posts cover everything from case studies to creative briefs, and are authored by some of the industry's most well-respected leaders.
Five years ago, we started a tradition that -- much to our surprise -- led to industry notoriety as well as more fans and flames than you can count. Yes, that's right, I'm talking about the annual digital signage pricing guide. As the number of articles on this blog started to become unwieldy, we decided to create a single page with all the digital signage cost estimates and price guidelines that we've published over time. This year, we're introducing a brand new feature: the pricing study will incorporate some of the data collected from our "How Much Should Digital Signage Cost?" survey, which we analyzed in a series of recent blog articles. As you'll see from the results below, digital signage has never been more affordable or more available than it is today. So what are you waiting for? Keep reading to find out just what it'll take to get you into your very own 100-screen network today!
A quick review and introduction
For those new to the market (and those who've read these articles before but have forgotten), the numbers below are meant to model a "typical" 100-screen network. What does that mean? I think this paragraph from last year's writeup still says it well:
While our previous cost estimates and ecosystem components have closely matched those from other industry analysts (so we don't think we're too far off the mark), the myth of a "typical" network is more strained this year than ever before. More vendors and network owners are choosing to implement screens with new formats and more varied locations, injecting more diversity into the projects. Plus, the idea that there's a standard staffing requirement for any digital signage network is pretty ridiculous. While we and others have proposed a list of key positions that need to be filled when creating a digital signage team, some networks are still very heavy on content production, while others might be composed almost entirely of sales folks. Still, as we looked across a wide array of networks -- representing not just our products but also our competitors' solutions -- we were able to get a reasonable feel for what most companies needed as far as the human resources side of things.
What's the cost of a typical 100-screen digital signage network?
Despite the many variables that go along with this type of broad estimate, we found that the data we compiled internally -- combined with the survey results that many of you contributed a few months ago -- paint a very logical picture. More importantly, the pricing continues to follow the well-defined trend that we've observed for several years now. The resulting cost estimates appear in the table below. (If you're viewing this in your email or RSS reader and can't see the tables and charts, we encourage you to visit http://www.wirespring.com/blog to get the full experience.)
Cost of a digital sign for 3 years
40" LCD screen
$800
Player hardware
$775
Display mount
$110
Player software
$405
Management software & tech support
$1,300
Installation
$740
Initial project management
$225
Total
$4,355
How have things changed since our last pricing study?
Right off the bat, you can see the dramatic decline in pricing, which we attribute to the confluence of a few things. First, and most obviously, the broad macroeconomic trends that we've all been experiencing the last 12 months or so have made ours an even more dog-eat-dog world than usual. With slower than normal deal flow and a more cautious customer base, many providers have felt compelled to slash prices in order to keep the deals moving. Stemming from this, several of the better-known vendors in our industry have experienced some pain (e.g. running out of working capital, having major investors withhold cash payments, trying to get bought/sold, etc.), and have consequently tried some... um... creative pricing strategies in an attempt to keep their heads above water. And finally, the tireless march of progress (aided by low or negative inflation rates) has simply made some of this stuff cheaper, as it almost always does. Interestingly, looking at the breakdown of costs by component, you can really see the effect of the commoditization of the hardware:
Hardware items are taking up less and less of the pie, while the service-oriented components like management software and tech support take up larger portions. While I don't think we've seen the end of this trend yet, it's clear that those service areas are where the true value to the customer lies, so it's no wonder that they're getting bigger at the expense of the mere "nuts and bolts." The upshot to you, gentle reader, is that there has never been a better time to get into the digital signage business as a network owner or operator -- provided you have the working capital, at least.
As you can see in the tables below, the cost of implementing a 100-screen network has dropped nearly 23% in the past year and nearly 50% since 2004, which is the biggest annual decline that we've recorded since we started keeping track. (Note: to ensure an accurate comparison, we removed the 24/7 tech support line from the 2004 numbers, since this was not included in subsequent years.)
What happens when you consider personnel costs?
As noted, the table above is a composite estimate for running a 100-screen network over the course of 3 years. Building on work that we did last year to figure out the approximate cost (including personnel) for running such a network, we've re-verified that the "average" 100-screen network takes somewhere between 7 and 15 people to run. We stuck with the assumption that the average salary for these personnel is $50K (which is fair, since average salaries haven't dropped that much in the past 12 months). But we reduced the average staff size by one person (to reflect the dismal state of employment today), bringing the average headcount to 9 people. This adds up to another $450,000 in salaries and associated costs every year, for a total of $1.35M over our 3-year planning horizon. That's equivalent to $37,500/month in expenses, or $375/screen/month. When added to the $121/month in capital expenses, the "average" screen in a "typical" 100-screen network costs about $496/month after salaries are factored in. In other words, a 100-screen network would need to pull in just under $50,000/month to break even.
What about connectivity and content?
First, connectivity. To the people who tell me year in and year out that I need to include bandwidth and connectivity costs in my estimates, I once again went out to the masses and asked. Aside from a couple of interesting exceptions, most networks are still sharing the bandwidth that's already in place at their host venues, essentially getting Internet connectivity for free. So while connectivity could easily add another $30-$150/month in expenses to your network if you need to spring for it, in my experience this will be the exception, not the norm. And with airports, malls, superstores and coffee shops giving away free bandwidth to anybody with a wireless adapter, I really don't expect that to change. I know a lot of people are waiting for WiMax to really start making headroads in the market, but today we're still stuck with 3G at best, and 2.5G or worse in areas with poor coverage. So cellular connectivity doesn't really save anything versus wiring into an existing LAN or using WiFi today.
Next, content. In 2007, we took a look at some of the content creation costs that go along with digital signage networks and found them to be all over the map. Since then, content gurus like Pat Hellberg and Gary Halpin have chimed in with explanations of why certain things cost what they do. But during that period, nobody has really ventured forward with a formula for guesstimating the a la carte content production costs. The good news is that the prices in our 2007 budgeting article have likely fallen, thanks largely to the lousy economy, low inflation, greater competition, improved workflow processes, and offshoring. The even better news is that since last year's budgeting article, I discovered that every single network I spoke to has at least one in-house content person who handles some (or nearly all) of the network's content needs. Consequently, at least part of the content creation budget is already built-in to my estimates above.
Closing thoughts (and some more light reading)
So there you have it, the 2009 digital signage pricing estimate. After speaking with a bunch of networks directly and incorporating the data that we culled from the 220+ responses to our pricing survey, I'm more confident of the numbers above than ever before. Want more info on the survey results that informed our final pricing numbers? Check out our recent articles where we looked at each category in detail:
Digital Signage LCD and Installation Prices Are Falling
Digital Signage Software, Management Services Costs Vary
Digital Signage Services Mainly Handled In-House
How Network Size Impacts Digital Signage Service Choices
Of course, even with all my number-crunching, I don't claim this data is perfect. That's why I hope you'll chime in with your own thoughts and experiences. So...
Are you surprised by the big drop in costs this year? Do our numbers match up with your own experiences on the open market? Leave your thoughts in a comment below! Click here to leave a comment What's WireSpring's Blog All About? WireSpring provides hardware, software and services for digital signage and kiosk projects. But our blog is a labor of love. Our posts cover everything from case studies to creative briefs, and are authored by some of the industry's most well-respected leaders.
Legendary bank robber Slick Willie Sutton is probably better known for a clever quote than his lengthy criminal record. When asked why he robbed banks, Willie answered "Because that's where the money is." With a slight twist, we might apply Willie's wisdom to the digital out-of-home (DOOH) world and pose the question: Do advertising agencies think DOOH is where the audience (money) is? And the logical follow-up: how important is it to the long-term growth of the industry that the agencies jump on board?
Nearly five years ago, as a wide-eyed attendee at my first DS show, I heard this same question asked over and over. The response was always the same: "Unless the agencies get involved," one DS veteran told me, "this business is going nowhere." At that show, you could have fired the proverbial shotgun, repeatedly, on the trade show floor without hitting an agency person (though hardware and software sales teams would have suffered heavy casualties). Now, five years later, the scene has changed but the song remains the same. The question is as topical, and top-of-mind, as ever.
How important is agency involvement?
Image credit: Stephanie Carter
"It is critical," says Virginia Cargill, President of CBS Outernet, one of the largest DOOH networks. During my interviews with industry leaders I decided to play devil's advocate: "What if the agencies don't increase their involvement beyond the current level?" I'd ask. But none of the industry experts I spoke with took the bait. Rob Gorrie, President of Adcentricity (one of the top DOOH buying/planning/strategy groups) voiced the typical response: "The agencies are getting more involved and I think that will continue. But media is a wacky world." Wacky, complicated and lacking clear direction.
If you were to judge the market's health solely by the daily industry headlines, you might expect to see an agency stampede toward digital signage and DOOH. In just the past few weeks, Ad Age has declared a "Boon for Billboards" as DOOH is one of the few media "experiencing real growth." And ADWEEK weighed in on the fast growth of retail media, claiming that "retail has become a big media buy." It is worthy to note that there's significant research behind both articles.
So as Bill Murray might say, "We got that goin' for us, which is nice."
But that's the view from 30,000 feet. Dive down into the trenches today, and you'll hear a different story. Agency buyers and planners are clamoring for reach, frequency and measurement. DOOH executives counter by asking for more focus and energy from their agency counterparts. The frustration on both sides is palpable. "At the agencies, the out-of-home people understand the space but don't have the money," says Cargill. "The network people have the money but don't understand the space." The importance of measurement can't be overstated. DOOH business managers admit that they're struggling to provide it in a form palatable to the agencies. "What I hear a lot," Gorrie says, "is 'prove to me that the audience you say you are giving to me you are actually giving to me'."
Sensing little urgency to invest in DOOH, many agencies continue the legacy of buying TV, especially since large chunks of network time are drastically discounted due to economic conditions. But those old habits don't sit well with Ashley Swartz, a former VP at media firm PHD, and now the CEO of Ag8, a boutique "trans media" shop in London. Swartz knows whereof she speaks. And she doesn't mince words: "The agencies are lazy," claims Swartz. "One of the biggest challenges [DOOH] will face is that people will never get fired for buying a 30-second spot." Thus the onus is on the DOOH industry, Swartz believes, to make the process more user-friendly through standardization of the buy and (here it comes again) improved measurement.
What about Marketing at-Retail?
Retail digital signage, unlike purely ad-driven networks, feature a mixture of marketing, branding and product content married together. So that sector of the industry faces a combination of the agency-related ills and some problems all of its own. Fortunately, there are some experts guiding the way in that sector, like one Laura Davis-Taylor. If they ever build a digital signage hall-of-fame, Laura will surely be one of the first inductees. Coming from an agency background, Laura has been working the retail digital signage beat tirelessly for years. Ask her about the relationship between retail DS and the agencies and she'll tell you it's still very much a work in progress. One big stumbling block, Laura believes, is the lack of knowledge about the space. "The agencies know broadcast but they don't know retail," she says. "You don't learn retail unless you live it, and they've shown little desire to do that."
Another player in the retail digital signage game is Paul Flanigan. Flanigan produces the Best Buy in-store network, which touches virtually every aspect of the chain's operations, including collaborating (or cajoling) with multiple agencies on creative and content. Flanigan sings the praises of Crispin Porter + Bogusky, an agency that he says has become a great partner. Crispin made the effort to learn what works and what flops on retail screens, and has produced content specifically for Best Buy's in-store network rather than re-purposing existing broadcast content. That is a revelation unto itself, and, according to Flanigan, still the exception to the rule. "I have seen, first-hand, major agencies balk at wanting to engage in this space," Flanigan says. "They don't get it and they don't care." On more than one occasion, Flanigan says Best Buy's suppliers, the major electronics manufacturers, have gone around their agencies and requested that his in-house team produce content promoting everything from computers to cameras on Best Buy's in-store TV network.
Well Paul, I met Peter, your German brother-in-arms. While working as Germany CIO for Daimler, the car and truck behemoth, Peter Muller-Bruhl created a digital signage network in Mercedes-Benz dealerships throughout the country. He then moved on to a venture capital firm investing in the digital signage space. Now, he is at fischerAppelt tv media, a division of a large German ad agency. His primary responsibility: digital signage business development. "Is there anyone else working at a German ad agency devoted solely to digital signage?" I asked him. "I am one of two in all of Germany," Muller-Bruhl replied. "And it's not much different throughout Europe." An admitted DOOH evangelist, Muller-Bruhl doesn't worry that the agencies will fail to engage our medium. He predicts they will increase their involvement out of necessity. "Their clients will force them to jump on the bandwagon," Muller-Bruhl believes. "The agencies will claim to understand DS but will go for a quick fix using their existing resources. It will blow up and the clients will think DS doesn't work. The agencies will eventually develop specific expertise. But in the meantime, I'm afraid we'll see bad DS execution from the agencies."
But enough with the agency bashing and teeth gnashing!
Cutting through the emotion with a straightforward analysis is Jeremy Lockhorn, the director of emerging media and video innovation at Avenue A/Razorfish. Lockhorn would love to see our medium take off, but says that digital signage and DOOH is currently battling a double whammy: a terrible economy combined with too much supply and not enough demand. "The unfortunate reality for the industry," according to Lockhorn, "is the growth rate of inventory is grossly out pacing the growth rate of ad spend."
What's the conclusion? Our business has certainly come a long way. But we still have a long way to go. As Cargill says, "consumers are as out-of-home as ever," but capturing their attention, and monetizing that experience, remains a challenge for the industry. And the agencies? Well, they have their hands full trying to figure out mobile, social networking, online video, and the changing landscape of broadcast. Add DOOH to the mix and it's little wonder the agency folks gloss over whenever we start trying to engage them. We're working in a new channel. And with new channels, it takes time for everything to fall into place. Nonetheless, there is progress. There is energy. There is talent focused on this space as never before. "There is a recognition," according to Gorrie, "that this could be where the money is."
If Slick Willie Sutton was alive today, and planning his next job, he might take a long look at DOOH. No reason for him to look at a bank... there's no money there anymore. Click here to leave a comment What's WireSpring's Blog All About? WireSpring provides hardware, software and services for digital signage and kiosk projects. But our blog is a labor of love. Our posts cover everything from case studies to creative briefs, and are authored by some of the industry's most well-respected leaders.
As one of just a handful of people who can claim to have worked in the digital signage industry since 1991, I suppose I could be called 'old school.' In fact, the term 'digital signage' didn't even exist when I helped build and program the Blockbuster TV network in their 900 locations at the time. But as the store count grew (at a rate of 1.5 openings per day back then), it became face-slappingly obvious how powerful a medium this new thing was. Fast-forward 18 years, though, and while there has been plenty of progress in our industry, there are still far too many companies attempting to launch networks blindly -- when they should instead be drawing on the huge body of experience that we now have at our disposal. One of my biggest gripes comes while I'm wearing my creative agency hat, since I continue to see network owners skip some vital steps of the content creation process. This leads to bad results and in turn, a negative view of our industry.
Whither the Content Strategy?
I have witnessed so many networks, particularly the in-store variety, skip any discussion of a content strategy. It's one of those things that gets mentioned often at seminars, but is rarely explained in detail. Consequently, few networks really understand the process of building an effective content strategy. Granted it can be a somewhat complicated process, but the experience pays a huge dividend. It basically starts with getting a clear understanding of the network's objectives, their integrated marketing communications plans, and the physical limits of the network itself (audio or video driven, passive or interactive, where it is merchandised, dwell time, etc).
Image credit: HikingArtist.com
The early phase of a content strategy session feels a lot like reverse-brainstorming. This is the time to toss out questions rather than ideas, and as in a creative brainstorming session where there are no "bad ideas," at this stage of the content strategy no question is out of bounds. It's the time to figure out where there might still be lingering doubts or uncertainties about the content program, and begin shaping the content to match the client's marketing plans.
Skimping on Development Means Spending More Later
A second area in the content process that is often overlooked is the creative development stage. I have recently been part of two RFPs/Creative Briefs (reluctantly) where the parties believed the next step after delivering the RFP or Creative Brief was the execution, i.e. a finished video or animation, ready for in-store viewing. However, skipping the creative development stage (including the presentation of concepts, storyboarding, developing treatments, writing outlines, creating animatics, and so on) is akin to making a movie without a script. Heck, even reality shows have scripts these days, so it always amazes me when clients want to skip this all-important series of steps. There is a saying in the film business that a bad movie can be produced from a good script, but a good movie can never be made from a bad one. Now imagine the movie made with no script and you have an idea of where we are going by sidestepping the creative development phase.
I understand that all clients want their projects to come in ahead of schedule and under budget, but I doubt any of them would agree to those terms if it meant that the final product was poorly thought-out and executed. What would be the point of that? Yet many still seem surprised when creative agencies bill for their hours during the development stage -- even though this step can take as much time and effort as final production. Moreover, spending enough time at this stage will likely save the client money in the long run by bringing down production and execution costs, yielding content that performs better, and preventing the need to reinvent the wheel when everyone is wondering why the network is not performing as promised.
There are a lot of tangential benefits of these creative pitches too. In my experience, it has led to better creative that's functional, but more in keeping with the client's own desires than something we might put together without the development process. It involves the client on a deeper level, as sometimes they are not quite sure what they really want in their network at the brief or RFP stage. Consider someone who buys a plot of land and wants to put a house on it. It certainly is easier to visualize the house after it's built, but by that time it's too late to make major changes. That's why houses aren't built without architectural drawings and blueprints. Likewise, it's much easier to satisfy the client if they've had a chance to make their suggestions and voice their concerns before the production phase. Not every idea needs to be storyboarded and presented, especially as the network grows and matures. But in the early stages of a digital signage network's deployment, or when the client decides that the overall content strategy must change, it is indeed vital.
Don't Forget to Roll with the Punches
Our content strategy at Blockbuster did change over the years, so it's important for agencies to constantly review their strategies with their clients. For instance, when Blockbuster's business model moved to a revenue-sharing deal with the studios (vs. outright purchase of the movies), our content strategy changed too, since our higher-margin products turned out to be the paid-for and dust-collecting catalog titles. This in turn led to different creative. That all changed again when Blockbuster started selling advertising and developing more marketing partnerships. By 1996, so many internal departments were involved in the input process that the network was seen as a critically important, enterprise-wide program, used by marketing, buying, training, corporate communications, and even HR.
So in this time of 'hope and change', I hope that we can move forward as an industry, and that more of us will stress the importance of a sound (yet flexible) content strategy and creative process. As I noted at the beginning, I came into the in-store TV world backwards, with no true strategy and no creative plan. But that changed quickly after I took a few trips to Blockbuster stores around the country, and was finally able to visualize how our in-store program would interact with the environment. Starting with that seed of understanding, we then developed a content strategy based on Blockbuster's business model and marketing initiatives. Each concept that we deemed appropriate got a full treatment and outlines with the goal of maximizing its presence in the store. By the time we started conducting research on the program's effects, we were pleased to find that it was responsible for increasing rentals and sales by 8% (which was the main objective identified in our Content Strategy). Within a few years, we were able to fine-tune our content strategy and creative process to yield a program that would boost that number to more than 15% on average.
Want to learn more about Gary's techniques for creating in-store media programs that really work? Be sure to catch his talk on the "Basics in Content Strategy, Process and Design for Out-of-Home Networks" at the Digital Signage Expo in Las Vegas. His presentation is scheduled for February 26 at 3 pm. Click here to leave a comment What's WireSpring's Blog All About? WireSpring provides hardware, software and services for digital signage and kiosk projects. But our blog is a labor of love. Our posts cover everything from case studies to creative briefs, and are authored by some of the industry's most well-respected leaders.
When it comes to today's grocery stores, what's old is new again, and small is the new big. You see, many of today's supermarket chains began as small Mom and Pop groceries -- or, as in the early version of Loblaw's, "Groceterias." But the 20th century saw the number of Mom and Pop stores dwindle down as the supermarket became a mainstay of American life. Today, it's possible to get some kind of food almost anywhere you go, but the actual venues for groceries are more complex. Convenience stores inconveniently fill up strip malls and street corners, while Walmart and Target invest more space and more store brands for groceries. Even so, some lower income neighborhoods, urban downtown centers, and rural town centers exist in so-called "food deserts" that are miles away from sources of fresh produce, meat, poultry and fish. For something as parochial as grocery shopping, figuring out the right course for the future, whether big or small, is surprisingly complicated.
The trend towards small-format
For a variety of reasons, the major grocery conglomerates (Tesco, Whole Foods, Walmart, and Giant Eagle, to name a few) have been experimenting with small format stores recently. These venues are usually 15,000 square feet or less, feature high product density, and are located in urban or high-traffic areas. Price Chopper is the most recent to announce that it will open specialized smaller stores, particularly in locales where community demand is high but doesn't warrant the costs of more shelf space and bigger inventory. From Albany to India to South Africa, the small format store seems to be taking off.
Image credit: Jess Lander
The market has room -- and need -- for both large and small outlets. Most of the news has focused on the size of the store and what these versions mean for the overall direction of retail food sales. But if you look closely, what's important here is the ability of smaller stores to attract and maintain a core customer base. Most of the people I interview on their grocery habits rely on a variety of types of food stores, from convenience marts and local shops to the big warehouse discounters. Interestingly, no matter how big or small the store, people talked about an important factor besides the over-analyzed concerns for low costs, merchandise availability, and convenience. That factor is the personalized service for which only the Mom and Pop stores were known.
Attracting -- and keeping -- core shoppers
Core customers -- the constituency that likes your product and regularly returns for more -- are critical to big and small chains alike. Not only do they consistently outspend their non-core peers, but they also serve as part of the marketing machine by spreading news via word-of-mouth. So it's no surprise to see them being so heavily wooed these days. Many retailers are giving out coupons and depending on the strength of loyalty cards and reward programs. Others are putting their hopes on social media, word-of-mouth and online sites that tout their product over others. While each of these strategies has its pluses and minuses, the real retail magic lies in providing what some segment of the local populace needs no matter what the economic climate. And the emphasis here is on local.
Food seems like a pretty basic and obvious necessity -- everyone needs it. The problem is that in our previous incarnation as a Land of Abundance, we produced enough food to feed our own population three times over on a daily basis. The work for marketing was not in convincing people to buy food, but to buy a specific brand, a specific item, and to buy a lot of it on a regular basis. But in the words of Bob Dylan, things have changed. The introduction of the small format grocery is not a return to Mom and Pop's Deli, but a chance for the large chains to re-establish themselves in particular niches. The ones that will be successful are those who recreate the feeling of a personal relationship between store and shopper without losing the ability to draw on a larger, adaptable inventory. Add in a healthy dose of contemporary technology (seating areas with WiFi, an in-store video network, green building design) and you have the next incarnation of the corner grocery. Ironically, for a glimpse of a format-of-the-future, we need look no further than Walmart.
Walmart? Small? Are you joking?
Image credit: Les Chatfield
While Walmart generally seems to be successful by treating its customers as one indistinguishable mass driven solely by bargains, its latest small format test store reveals an ability to cater to geographically specific core customers. The retail giant's recently opened Garland, Texas location has a plethora of fresh and prepared foods appropriate for the local Latino community. There are aisles of specialty products, fresh tortillas and rolls made daily, fresh herbs in bunches, chiles of all kinds, and fresh tamarind, cassava, spices and other items widely used in the kitchens of Mexican-American families. But what's interesting here is that this is also one of the new environmentally green, energy efficient stores that Walmart has been promising. Potential PR coup aside, Walmart's push into sustainability is a calculated business move, as research suggests that segments of the Latino market are concerned with the environmental impact of giants like Walmart, and are buying organics.
While small format stores might seem like a good way for giant retailers to reconnect with shoppers, and for smaller retailers to expand on the cheap, we need to keep in mind that very little real-world research has been done on these stores in their latest incarnation. So while companies often approach the market with a focus on convenience -- the urban, time-constrained consumer who will also be attracted to in-store specials -- the core constituency is more likely to be locals who can turn the store into "their own" by finding recognizable products and brands that are suited to their cultural niche. Many small format stores promote too great a reliance on in-store brands, which may backfire unless it's demonstrated that core consumers in that area really want those products.
Fostering community and loyalty
As a model, consider the chain restaurant (the donut or bagel shop or even that ubiquitous coffee shop whose name we need not mention) that becomes a local draw simply by participating in community life. They might sponsor softball teams, provide product to local charity drives, and adapt menu offerings to regional tastes. While Starbucks tried to position itself as "The Great Good Place," there's no reason why the center of community life can't be a different kind of commercial site. As discussed in the Retail Media News analysis of Giant Eagle's Get Go, adding seating and WiFi, value-added meals-to-go, good coffee, and single-serving items also enhances the viability of these sites. Consumers don't really want to "hang out" in the regular supermarket, but its sheer size means that the average trip lasts about half an hour. In small format stores, people need a reason not to rush out, whether it's a food tasting or a digital display with tailored content, such as cooking demos or local sports highlights.
Finally, small format stores should focus on what they do best: catering to the needs and desires of their already-loyal following. For example, JoAnn stores, which have expanded their offerings to home decor, crafts and framing, have had success with small format stores that cater more explicitly to their core constituency: people who sew. The point is not whether small format is new or old, successful or silly, but rather that it exists and it does speak to core customers who desire a convenient but not overwhelming experience. The key is tapping in to a nostalgia for the small and the convenience of the local without losing the excitement of the new or the selection of the grand. It's no small order, but in today's tough retail landscape, the consumer demand for this precarious balance can no longer be ignored.
As a consumer, do you prefer small local stores or larger national ones? Does your perception of the store's local or environmental focus influence your shopping decisions? Click here to leave a comment What's WireSpring's Blog All About? WireSpring provides hardware, software and services for digital signage and kiosk projects. But our blog is a labor of love. Our posts cover everything from case studies to creative briefs, and are authored by some of the industry's most well-respected leaders.
When trying to explain the benefits of installing an ad-funded digital signage network, I'm often asked the same question again and again: "Isn't it just an expensive way of replacing my printed ads?" The extreme focus on price might have something to do with the fact that I live in Mexico, where we've seen the exchange rate with the US dollar rise 30% in just a few months (and most things you need for a network are priced in dollars). But I think it has more to do with the fact that people still compare the cost of installing the network with the cost of printing ads once. While the benefits of digital signs might be obvious to many of us, there are still plenty of people who don't understand the additional value that digital signage can offer over traditional signage.
Do digital signs really earn more money than traditional ones?
I'll use a project I'm working on right now with 85 stores as an example. Our initial estimate is that it will cost them around $200K for the necessary hardware and software for an 85 store installation, which comes out to $2,352 per store (not including installation and ongoing production costs). If we assume the installation will run nicely for five years -- a fair, even conservative, estimate -- that comes out to merely $39.20 per store per month. Even assuming that the customer makes this initial investment through a financial (leasing) company and incurs some fees there, it seems like a pretty reasonable figure. By comparison, considering the costs of designing and printing ads, shipping them to each location and being sure they are displayed, you'll see that the monthly cost of the traditional method isn't too far away from the cost of buying the equipment for the digital signage network.
Image credit: Gaetan Lee
Production and distribution costs are only a part of the whole equation, though. Another thing you have to estimate is the value of the ads being shown, typically by calculating the impressions -- or opportunities to see -- that you can make at the same space at each store. If you install a digital screen, you'll have the ability to run several ads in the same piece of real estate (but with fewer impressions for each). With a traditional printed ad tacked to the wall, you can't use that same spot for another ad at the same time. While the opportunity to see each piece of content may be lower, the ability to put multiple items in the same high-value location is very compelling for advertisers, so the real value of each spot remains pretty high. I'm not the kind of guy that will tell you to replace all of your printed stuff with digital, but using digital for high-value locations is a great way to squeeze more value out of your high-traffic or high-impact areas, which is more important during our current economic crisis than ever.
What's the secret to getting the most value from digital signs?
If you've made it this far into today's article, you're surely wondering "How can this guy prove I'll make more on the net with digital ads instead of print?" Well, I can't tell you that for sure, but speaking from experience (in a past life I managed the entire Walmart TV network in Mexico), what I can tell you is that the right content mix will absolutely make more sales. And I'm not talking about flashy, expensive, high production value content either. You can use simple tools on your own PC to create the right kind of ads as long as you know the right messages to transmit to your customers.
For starters, in the digital world the "one size fits all" concept is simply wrong. When you have a digital network, you simply don't do a country-wide promotion like you might in a catalog (where all of the "best" items typically have the best placement because you know for sure they will sell well). What we found to be productive was to run specific local promotions with our first-tier items, mixed in with promotions for some of our lesser-selling items (which tended to have a lot of excess inventory). Even better was when we would change our promotions on specific days, weeks or months based on past data about the kinds of shoppers who would be in our stores at the time. For example, the people buying a high-end beauty product around the holidays may have been doing so for a gift, whereas those that bought the same product mid-year were more likely buying it for themselves.
Another benefit of digital signage is the speed it brings to your internal workflow and distribution. When you only have traditional signage to promote your products, the workflow of that system is really slow. In your best scenario, your September catalog has to be at the printers by July to allow enough time to print and deliver it. This means your promotions for September have to be designed and defined somewhere around May. Where is the "opportunity" there? With a digital network you can build your promotions for September even one week or one day before the month starts. Imagine you have a beautiful raincoat in your September catalog, but this year turns out to be particularly warm and dry. Your printed catalog's advertisement is worthless. With digital ads, on the other hand, you can continue to promote summer clothing until the first drop of rain appears (whenever that happens). Just like the guys in New York City that pop up out of nowhere with umbrellas when it starts to rain, digital signage has the ability to be on time with the right message when needed -- and advertisers are willing to pay some premium for that advantage.
Image credit: Kevin Coles
Make sure you try new things
In the end, digital signage is all about the opportunity to let your customers see what they need to see at a specific place and at a precise moment. Like the digital menu boards that show you breakfast in the morning, lunch in the afternoon and dinner at night, digital signs add value by letting you use your most valuable space as efficiently as possible, with less "waste." But there's another advantage that frequently gets overlooked. Because digital signs are often put in the best possible store locations, store owners and networks owners can be reluctant to let certain ads run. When you see traditional signage in a store, 90% of the space is used to advertise products that store owners already know will sell well (even if they don't advertise them). Because it's inexpensive to update content on a well-designed digital signage network, you have the ability to go beyond these "safe" advertisements and try to push items that have great potential, but don't yet deserve the prime poster space. While we continue to find value in selling ad space to A-list advertisers, there's even more to be found in atypical uses. Digital sign networks have turned out to be amazingly useful for moving the products that were sitting in the warehouse, great for temporary promotions, and truly excellent for promoting new arrivals -- all of which were either too expensive or too difficult to accomplish with static posters.
How have you explained the value of digital signage to your customers? Has the process gotten easier over time, or are people becoming more skeptical due to the hype that accompanies many projects? Click here to leave a comment What's WireSpring's Blog All About? WireSpring provides hardware, software and services for digital signage and kiosk projects. But our blog is a labor of love. Our posts cover everything from case studies to creative briefs, and are authored by some of the industry's most well-respected leaders.
Have you ever wondered why so many digital signs are placed, hung or duct-taped to such seemingly terrible places? At airports, hotels and retail stores I often find myself wondering "what on earth were they thinking when they put that there?" Upon completing some research on the subject, I realize why this probably happens: what looks good to one person doesn't necessarily look good to all -- and I don't just mean aesthetically. The fact is, where a screen is placed and the angle at which it addresses its viewing audience can be almost as important as the content playing on screen, and the optimal angle and placement is different for virtually everyone. This makes things tough for store planners and venue owners preparing for a digital signage deployment. So while we've given plenty of attention to making great content, today I want to focus on the relatively unknown and still under-appreciated art of screen placement.
The Angle of the Dangle
There are two parts to figuring out the expected viewing angle. Well, three, really. First is the angle at which the screens actually hang. Second is the expected angle of incidence of the viewer (in other words, the angle a viewer's head might be expected to be at while approaching your screens). And third, in some cases, is the "correction angle" that you use to compensate for any obstacles that might come up between your viewers and your screens. Consequently, I can't give you general wisdom like "hang the screens at a 17 degree angle from the floor". Without knowing the size and shape of the store, its layout, the average height of a viewer, etc., there's no way to make that recommendation. However, we have determined a few key facts that influence how one might go about placing screens in a venue.
For example, a person with normal 20/20 vision has pretty decent visual acuity for about six or seven meters (roughly 20-23 feet). They can read text a few inches tall from that distance without too much trouble (you'll see why this is important later on). A few years ago, Walmart Mexico did some research and found that it takes a typical shopper somewhere between 5 and 7 seconds to cover that distance. This means that if you put a screen smack-dab in front of somebody at precisely their own eye level, you'd have at most 5-7 seconds to get your message across, assuming they were paying attention to your screen the whole time (which, of course, they won't be). By fiddling with screen placement -- both the height of the screen from the floor and the angle at which it points relative to the floor -- you will directly impact how much time a typical viewer has for taking in your message.
(Thanks to blog contributor Axel Vera for unknowingly supplying me with a bunch of graphics and icons to slice and dice into these charts.)
Wait, the amount of time changes?
That's right. It's a little counter-intuitive until you think about it: if I put a sign right in front of you about 20 feet away, and it's at exactly your eye level, then assuming you have normal vision, you will be able to see that sign for every moment that you approach it. If I pitch the sign a few degrees up or down, that's going to make it a little harder to see while you're far away -- up close it should be fine, but let's say you can now only see it clearly from 18 feet away instead of 20. I've just decreased the amount of time I have to message you by 10%. Since I can't possibly know your exact height or adjust my sign's position relative to each new viewer that comes into range, all I can do is pick a representative height and angle and hope that it works well enough that a big percentage of my viewers will be able to see it.
What's more, just because a screen is in front of a viewer doesn't mean that it falls within his field of attention, which is considerably narrower than his field of vision. The field of attention only constitutes about 20-25 degrees of your field of vision. This means that you'll actually have a lot less than 5-7 seconds to connect with a viewer (and get him to turn his head towards the screen). If your screen is a mere 5 feet away, it'll have to be within about 2 feet of eye level to be in the field of attention. At 10-11 feet away, it needs to be within 4 feet of eye level. At the "full" 20-22 feet away (the maximum we can count on a person of normal vision being able to see clearly, assuming normal-sized text, etc.), it would need to be within about 8.5 feet of eye-level. If we assume the average shopper at a retail store is 5 feet 6 inches or so, then a screen should never be more than 14 feet off the ground (8.5 + 5.5 = 14). Having a screen placed so high up does mean that more people will probably "see" it (though not necessarily be able to take in its message). But it also means that the average viewer will have to be a bit closer before they can read it clearly (since the distance from the eye to screen is the red hypotenuse line, not the black linear distance line), and that it will be in the average viewer's field of attention for a shorter period of time than if it was placed closer to eye-level. In a shelf-mount or endcap scenario, again if your typical viewer is 5'6" then your screens should be placed from 3'6" to 7'6" for maximum attention time, again with the best bet being at just around eye-level.
How do we increase viewing time?
Well, the obvious answer is to make such amazingly beautiful and compelling content that it simply can't be ignored and draws viewers in like moths to a flame. Or you could use some gratuitous nud ity, but that's likely to get you fired and sued in a hurry. Really, the best practical answer is to make sure your messages are easily understandable from a distance so that you give approaching viewers more time to see the message and act upon it. We've given you all sorts of tips on how to make great digital signage content in the past, but I'll add just a little more data to that conversation today. While visual images do most of the communicating on digital signage systems, text still does most of the selling, so that seems like an obvious place to try some optimizations. If we go back to the premise that an average viewer should be able to read your screen from about 6-7 meters (20-23 feet) away, that means the text on screen needs to be about 2 inches tall. That translates to about 50-60 pixels on a typical 40" 1360x768 screen. If that same size of screen is running at 1080p resolution (1920x1080), the text would need to be about 115-130 pixels tall. Speaking of which...
I get asked so many questions about whether to use high-def (1080p) screens or not. This chart is my new answer. The bottom line is that either your screens have to be whompin' big, or your viewers need to be really close to realize any benefit from moving from 720p to 1080p. So for most applications today, there's probably no reason to go with the added cost, complexity and bandwidth/server/player needs of 1080p content. If you're in an environment where people will be really close to your large screens, then sure, it might be worth it. But if you're using 19" screens on an endcap or 40" displays atop high shelves, there's really no point.
Ok, so now you can whip out your planograms and a protractor and start figuring out where put your screens, right? Well, almost. You might want to wait a little while, because next time I'm going to talk about some in-store research that sheds a bit of light on where in a store you should place your messages for optimal impact. Whether you're planning a new deployment or a retrofit of some existing screens, we'll be looking at why viewing angles are only one part of the equation.
I once saw a 42" plasma mounted directly behind a two-foot-thick concrete pillar. What's the worst-placed screen that you've ever seen? Click here to leave a comment What's WireSpring's Blog All About? WireSpring provides hardware, software and services for digital signage and kiosk projects. But our blog is a labor of love. Our posts cover everything from case studies to creative briefs, and are authored by some of the industry's most well-respected leaders.
The second part of my content presentation from the Digital Signage Expo dealt with screen placement -- the how's, where's and why's of putting screens into venues to make sure that they get looked at. After all, the very best content in the world is utterly useless if it's played somewhere that no one can see it. As it turns out, this is a very complex subject, rife with provisos, exceptions and gotchas. Plus, an approach that works in one venue might not work in another, even if they appear very similar. The reason? Even if you do everything you possibly can to properly integrate your screens into a venue, the differences in personalities, demographics and mentalities of the viewers from one place to the next can make a huge difference. Still, our research has turned up a few key recommendations to keep in mind when deciding where to place your digital signage screens.
The Decompression Zone
You've all read Why We Buy: The Science of Shopping by now, right? No? But it was on our summer reading list. Surely you breezed through all of those weighty tomes during your downtime, right? Well, if you had, you'd probably remember that in that book, author and retail anthropologist Paco Underhill identified something peculiar about the entryway to a retail space: namely, we don't notice anything about it when we walk in. You see, shoppers change walking gait and mental state when moving into a store, especially from outside. Once in the store, they tend to ignore the first 10 to 15 feet of space. And unless they have a specific destination in mind (e.g. the checkout counter in the floor plan for a convenience store as shown below), they tend to move ahead and to the right, beginning a counter-clockwise path through the store.
Consequently, the decompression zone is a veritable no-man's land when it comes to messaging. Many folks still tack up posters and install POP displays at or near the store entrance. But at best, these work like visual "speed bumps" that attempt to get the shopper to slow down and start processing the displays. With a poster or cardboard POP display, that might not be too bad. But using a digital sign for that purpose? That's an expensive proposition. Consequently, we usually recommend that customers avoid installing digital signs at the store entrance. Are there ways to do it that are attractive and effective? Sure, probably. But are there better places to spend the money? Most definitely. Don't believe me? I'll give you an example.
Location, Location, Location, Baby
A few years ago, we did a project for a chain of large furniture showrooms in Florida. The chain wanted both kiosks and digital signs installed. The kiosks would print coupons and allow prospective customers to apply for a line of credit. The digital signs would advertise the services available on the kiosks (since in-store credit is a big money maker for furniture stores), as well as show some ads for current specials. The digital signs were mounted directly on top of the kiosks on large stands that stood about six feet off the ground. This made both screen and kiosk very easy to spot, even across the large showroom floors.
In a dozen locations using a similar store layout, we placed three kiosk/screen combos in strategic areas to measure where they would be most used. On the first floor, we placed them at the entrance (about 10-12 feet inside the doors), and in the center of the main showroom floor near a large stairway. On the second level, we placed a third kiosk/screen in the high-volume bedroom furniture area, which tended to be in the middle of the floor. After about six months, we looked at the data, and were astonished to find that the kiosks in the middle of the showroom floors handled 300% to 500% more transactions than those near the entrance. It became clear that moving that entry kiosk somewhere -- anywhere -- else would probably make more financial sense (and sure enough, it did).
In our case, we also found that transaction volume (which I'm using here as a proxy for engaged viewership) was also directly proportional to the amount of floor traffic in the area. We thus learned, over time, to simply keep the devices in the most heavily-trafficked parts of the store, excluding the entry landings. In this example, we had the good fortune to have access to the transaction data from the kiosks, which represents bona fide interactions between the device and a shopper. For more traditional non-interactive screens, coming up with an understanding of who's watching will be more challenging, and will likely require some kind of visual measurement (either using people or technology -- or probably both). By the way, if you want to learn more about analyzing foot traffic within a venue, check out this vintage article on using store traffic patterns to optimize digital sign placement.
So far, I've given you a lesson on what not to do, but you're probably wondering what you should be doing in terms of planning out your digital signage screen arrangements. Well, that will have to wait for next week's installment, when we take a look at viewing angles, the angle of approach, and making sure that your screens get seen when shoppers are most receptive to messaging. (We're about to launch our new FireCast Digital Signage EasyStart product for small networks next week, so it might be teensy bit delayed, but I'll try my best.)
Have you had any success with marketing to shoppers in the "decompression zone"? We're sure it can be done, and we'd love to hear some first-hand accounts. Take a moment and share by leaving a comment below. Click here to leave a comment What's WireSpring's Blog All About? WireSpring provides hardware, software and services for digital signage and kiosk projects. But our blog is a labor of love. Our posts cover everything from case studies to creative briefs, and are authored by some of the industry's most well-respected leaders.
David Verklin, former CEO of Aegis Media and now CEO of Canoe Ventures, had some interesting things to say about the future of television during a keynote address at an industry event in New York a few weeks ago. On subjects like addressability, creative versioning and media targeting, Verklin made it a point to reference the out-of-home industry, which counts those abilities as key advantages over today's broadcast media.
So, what did he say?
Here's what Verklin told the audience during his keynote at the conference:
Another bright spot in the business is the outdoor business. You know, a picture on a stick in the age of TiVo is actually a pretty darn good idea. In many cases, the out of home business... Every one is under pressure. Don't get me wrong. I'm not here to paint a rosy picture of the American media business, but outdoor is doing surprisingly well."
Image credit: Rob DiCaterino
He even mentioned OVAB:
"Also, pay attention to something called the OVAB. The [Out-of-home] Video Advertising Bureau, a new trade association that has been started in the last two years to track the delivery of out of home video advertising. Think about it. Everywhere you go in America you see a flat screen. You see a flat screen in the airport. You see flat screens in elevators all the time. We have seen an industry emerge in America, the OVAB... it is actually a growth spot in the American economy.
Why is Verklin paying so much attention to OOH?
"I think it actually does relate to Canoe because it's about video. Isn't it? It's not about television. It's not about television. Video is coming in all kinds of forms. We're seeing video obviously being delivered on the web. We're seeing video in television."
Verklin’s comments are in line with what Donna Speciale, President of Investment and Activation at MediaVest USA, said during an interview in September:
"It will eventually end up being a video choice. We need to stop thinking it is TV, OOH or digital."
Part of the ramification for a "video" buy vs. TV vs. OOH vs. digital is that of budget allocation. If and when that materializes, the pot for networks to dip into will likely get bigger. Much bigger. And that should pave the way for stronger growth and sustained health.
Bill's comments:
Reallocation of funds is happening today, so Christie's observations are very much on target. Don't believe me? Just ask the guys at SeeSaw Networks or Adcentricity where their clients are taking money from to dump into digital out-of-home ads. Funding for DOOH media like flat-screen LCD advertising in airports and roadside LED billboards has to come from somewhere. And as we've noted before, the budgets for TV, radio and other broadcast media are so gigantically huge that even allocating a tiny fraction of those media buys to below-the-line channels can have a big impact (both percentage wise and dollar wise) for smaller markets like ours.
Can the market for digital out-of-home media grow without taking revenue away from more traditional advertising options? Leave a comment and let us know. Click here to leave a comment What's WireSpring's Blog All About? WireSpring provides hardware, software and services for digital signage and kiosk projects. But our blog is a labor of love. Our posts cover everything from case studies to creative briefs, and are authored by some of the industry's most well-respected leaders.
Laura Davis-Taylor was nice enough to let me give a presentation on content optimization strategies at the Digital Signage Expo this year. While it turned into a 60-minute whirlwind of slides and sample clips that left more than one person's eyes glazed over, I actually received quite a few compliments and requests for the PowerPoint deck itself. I don't really like giving out PowerPoints, since a lot of my slides don't make much sense without a narrator. Instead, I came up with what I think is a better approach: I'll be sharing the contents of the presentation in a series of blog articles. Today, I want to start with some tips that our designers and partners have used to make on-screen motion that looks great -- without sacrificing clarity and readability.
A brief review of motion in digital signage spots
For anyone new to this blog, I translated last year's DSE content presentation into blog articles, creating a list of best practices for digital signage content creation. With regard to motion, I pointed out seven things to keep in mind when using motion (moving text or imagery) on your digital signs:
Just because you can make it move doesn't mean that you should.
Don't let motion interfere with readability or comprehension.
You get only 1.5 - 3 seconds of full attention for glance media.
Leave enough time to read the text.
Treat moving text like it's not there at all (from a readability perspective).
Motion on the periphery is more subtle than motion in the middle of the field of view.
The most important features of your spot should be static.
Some new tips and tricks for using motion effectively
Image credit: Andrew Larsen
As you can see, most of the tips focused on improving readability. Why is that? Well, you could have the most recognizable and iconic brand imagery in the world (and I'm talking mouse ears or golden arches), but unless your message is actually readable on-screen, your content isn't going to be performing up to its full potential. From a practical standpoint, I'd like to add three more items to the motion checklist:
If you're the DESIGNER of the content, make sure you can read any on-screen copy 5 times in the time allotted. Quite simply, as the person most familiar with the copy, you're going to have a predisposition to vastly underestimate the amount of time it takes to read it. That's because you've not only had lots of practice reading it during the content development process (so it's already floating around in your memory), but also because you'll be familiar with the other distractions on screen (things like layout, animations, etc.)
If you're a REVIEWER of the content, make sure you can read any on-screen copy 3 times in the time allotted. A good designer will hand off a semi-finished piece of content to at least one other person to review before signing off on it. This person might be familiar with the account or campaign being worked on, but should be looking at the piece with "fresh eyes," in order to offer up some constructive criticism. The reviewer should be able to read any copy that you have on-screen at least three times before it disappears. We've found this to be a good rule of thumb for approximating the amount of time it will take an average engaged viewer to actually read what's on screen in the screen's actual out-of-home venue.
Ensure that the text can be read from a non-ideal angle of incidence. One common pitfall of designers and reviewers alike is that they typically view the content dead-on (e.g. perpendicular to the screen), and from only a few feet away. In reality, your content will probably never be seen like that out in the real world, so why would you review it like that? Take five big steps back, turn your head to the side a bit, and then see how easy or hard it is to get the gist of what's going on. I've seen more than my fair share of content that becomes unreadable if you're not staring at the screen from point-blank range, as I'm sure many of you have as well.
Should you include a ticker? Let's check the research
Oh tickers, how misunderstood you are. It's no wonder I get so many questions about using scrolling tickers. They look cool. They add motion and interest to static content on screen. And even though CNN toned down their tickers, they're still in full force at CNBC and other networks. Tickers seem to be quite popular, so they must be effective, right? Well, the truth is that unless you've got content that everyone is already used to looking at on a ticker (such as stock quotes), then a ticker is more or less the worst way to display it on screen. I've done a bit of research on the subject, but thankfully the boffins at Georgia Tech, Virginia Tech, Cornell, IBM and others have done many more in-depth experiments to determine the efficacy of using tickers to disseminate critical messages. This is a surprisingly popular area of research, probably because ticker displays are often used as notification systems that provide emergency/interrupt information to people performing primary tasks. The key takeaways from their studies are as follows:
Moving text takes longer to recognize/comprehend: 2-10x the time -- or more. The faster the scroll, the lower the comprehension rate. And I include the "or more" since you can scroll a ticker really fast and drive comprehension down to 0% if you want to.
Scrolling text has a 10-22% lower recall rate versus "fade in/fade out" delivery. Assuming that the text is on screen for the same amount of time in both cases, using a simple text "fader" to bring messages in and out with some visual appeal might be a better way to go, since the text is much more readable and memorable that way.
In-place displays such as a fade or blast are better than motion-based displays like a ticker for rapid identification of items. More than just being less readable, text messages that scroll are actually harder to understand than those that fade or blink in and out, probably because our brains are simultaneously trying to keep track of the moving text while deciphering the letters, forming the words, and working out the meaning of the message.
However, a scrolling ticker might make sense in certain situations. For example, dwell zone screens where a viewer will be waiting for more than 3.5-4 minutes (and will thus experience time dilation) are a suitable candidate, since it might actually be better to occupy the viewer's mind with a more challenging mental problem. Similarly, locations where there are no other distractions nearby would be acceptable. However, once you start talking about complex environments with lots of motion, other kinds of displays, and the like, a ticker is going to be an inefficient way of getting your message across. Don't believe me? Then just ask Earl K. Miller, a professor of neuroscience at MIT. As he explained to the New York Times, viewers may think that they can process it all, but they're fooling themselves. "A lot of times, when you think you're multi-tasking, you're just switching your attention between one or two or three things," he said.
Want to see some examples of great (and not so great) content?
There's one day left to vote for your favorite digital signage content over at the 2009 POPAI Digital Signage Viewer's Choice Awards. Even if you don't want to vote (for some reason), there's over a half hour of digital signage content online for you to review. Some of it is truly great. Some of it could probably use a pass or two through some of our best practices. But if you're a designer or creative director -- or even if you work in ad sales -- I suggest you take a look through the reel of content to see how other people have approached the problem of getting their message out on the moving screen.
Looking for more places to learn about content?
One other note: the folks at Strategy Institute are giving readers of this blog the opportunity to attend their 4th Annual Content Strategies Summit at a nice discount. The lineup looks pretty good, with Al Witteman from Tracy Locke, Christopher Gray from Saatchi X and Doug Bolin from Razorfish speaking, just to name a few. If you're interested in going, the discount code for our readers is WST10, which will entitle you to a 10% discount on top of the $500 early bird discount (which ends on March 30th). Perhaps I'll see you there!
Moving text and tickers are a hot-button issue in our industry, and something we continue to research. Do the points above match your experience, or even just your "gut feeling"? Leave a comment to let us know! Click here to leave a comment What's WireSpring's Blog All About? WireSpring provides hardware, software and services for digital signage and kiosk projects. But our blog is a labor of love. Our posts cover everything from case studies to creative briefs, and are authored by some of the industry's most well-respected leaders.
While visiting the recent ISE convention in Amsterdam, I was attracted to the booth of the Korean company Tovis. In their booth, they were showing something decidedly different from the other screen vendors on the floor (who were apparently engaging in the usual fight for the largest screen ever seen). Tovis took a different approach to catching eyes by showing off a full range of "stretched" displays, presenting form factors different from the common 16:9 we're all so used to. While the screens certainly drew my attention, I first dismissed them as a novelty -- something unusual, but not necessarily useful. As I thought more about it, though, I realized that catching my attention is the ultimate use of most digital signs. So perhaps these stretched screens will have an important role to play in our field.
Not all screens are created equal
Among the unusual screens I saw were "1/2" and "1/3" height monitors, ranging from 6" to 42", which provide a new way to present extended landscape content. These were especially well-suited for digital signage applications in public transportation, entertainment and retail. The screens have been "announced" for a while (I remember LG presenting a couple of stretched monitors last May). However, those models were apparently prototypes intended to test market reaction. I've read about a few deployments with stretched screens, but they are still very uncommon.
Image credit: Roberto Vogliolo
I must confess that I have a particular interest in the subject. This arose when I was looking for some ideas regarding the evolution of our queue management product line, in which we are using LED panels to show the number being served at each line, integrated with standard 16:9 LCDs for information related to the services and other video content. A brilliant and dynamic "stretched" monitor in place of an "old fashioned" LED display could potentially give a boost to the system by providing a means to integrate service information with video communication. At the same time, it could preserve the traditional form factor of the LED display and easily fit within existing venues. I don't think this will be the killer app for such screens, though. It seems that with their unique form factors, stretched displays could help improve digital signage effectiveness inside railway and underground stations, airports, malls and cinemas, or wherever users need to find a place, a point of interest or a direction.
Judging a screen by its cover
Another interesting approach to making screens more noticeable and eye-catching is to integrate them with the branding and color scheme of the venue itself. This usually involves dealing with interior designers and companies specializing in the production of custom-made frames or enclosures. A couple of exhibitors were showing off-the-shelf solutions for "dressing" any standard 40" monitor with plastic or steel "skins" available in different colors and styles. These screen skins are designed to be integrated with a full range of wall and ceiling mounting systems. All of the screen bezels are fully certified and the estimated delivery time for standard colors is very quick. I saw the same concept applied to indoor and outdoor totem shells, designed to fit standard monitors from the major producers. These seemed a bit less "stable" in design and production, but I believe they can deliver the product as claimed.
Image credit: Roberto Vogliolo
Just a few years ago, a customer of ours asked for special custom frames for their monitors. At that point in the industry's development, we had to contract with a specialty craftsman to custom-build them for us. It would have been much easier (and probably much less expensive) to use an out-of-the-box solution. From just a few hours on the ISE show floor, it was obvious that the digital signage market is now big enough and mature enough for vendors to take these unconventional ideas and specialty products, and produce them in quantities big enough that they're affordable. Industrial solutions will start to appear not only for the basic components (e.g. monitor or player) but for these more exotic products as well, giving customers and integrators more options for the make versus buy decision.
Bill's thoughts
In an industry whose primary function is to make sure messages get seen, novelty devices have had a decidedly mixed success ratio. On the one hand, flat screens themselves were once unique enough to get noticed on their own, and we've certainly seen a huge adoption of them in all sorts of out-of-home spaces. Likewise, rear-projection and polarized films like 3M's Vikuiti are turning up all over the place, despite reasonably high upfront prices. On the other hand, though, there have been more failed 3D devices than I can count at this point, and some cool gadgets like those 360 degree LCD screens look great, but are too expensive to ever make it into mass-adoption territory.
Nonetheless, the drive to be seen will continue to foster new developments in display technologies. Like the stretched screens, they'll start out in the realm of business services products. But like Microsoft's Surface (or any of the other multitouch and gestural systems that came out right before and after), they might find their way into the home before too long. When that comes to pass, the novelty value decreases dramatically, which could force networks to look for the Next Cool Thing to attract eyeballs.
Flat screens are standard fare now, and 3D has been "around the corner" forever. What new displays or technologies will be the new "gotta have" novelties in the next 2-3 years? Leave a comment to let us know what you think! Click here to leave a comment What's WireSpring's Blog All About? WireSpring provides hardware, software and services for digital signage and kiosk projects. But our blog is a labor of love. Our posts cover everything from case studies to creative briefs, and are authored by some of the industry's most well-respected leaders.
When we tallied up the results from our 2009 reader poll, I promised to invite more ongoing conversation by pointing out some of the interesting comment threads that are popping up in articles long after the original publication date. There's a large amount of untapped insight and perspective in some of these posts, so in what I hope will become a recurring feature (based on your feedback), I've picked three articles with comments worth exploring and expanding upon. The first has to do with where the statistics for advertising performance come from, the next is a rebuttal of my little "uncanny valley" article on in-store privacy, and the last concerns everyone's favorite whipping-boy, scrolling text tickers.
Advertising performance: What do the numbers really say?
In our article back in October about hedging traditional media buys with ad placements on digital signs, I asked whether a spot on a digital signage network will "do" more than a spot running on TV, and if so, whether that additional work would justify more experimentation by brands and their media buyers. Mary Anne Fleisher (from aim digital visions, if the link is anything to go by) noted that:
[The] economy today has set our revenue back a bit. But it has really set back revenue for radio, tv and newspaper. For the first time in history radio revenue is going backward. Layoffs are huge and their big ego's are shrinking. We are doing a great job taking a share and as you pointed out even a 10% share can be big even with local advertising. Its a hard way to go the revenue generating digital signage, but testing the results is very exciting. The best thing going for us is 80% retention.
Image credit: ArtemFinland
However, Gaurang Shah from DSN Global felt that the discussion may have generated more questions than it answered. Specifically, he noted:
I have yet to find few really good case studies that we can show our advertisers the merits of our medium/industry. You mentioned that from your own experience you think the return is 7-8% with sometimes even 300-400% - could you provide some details on these cases?
As I noted in my response, a big part of our problem is that ad performance is very inconsistent, partly because the networks themselves are inconsistent, and partly because much of the content being produced today is still pretty bad. (TV advertisers have had 50 years to perfect their skills. We haven't... yet.)
The 400% example I cited in the article comes from an old client of ours, Bass Pro Shops. Bass Pro is a chain of sporting goods stores with a very loyal customer base. In the example I mentioned, they were advertising a type of fishing line, which was on the shelf with approximately 30 other similarly-packaged items. When advertised on the in-store network, sales of the product jumped 400% versus other brands of fishing line, none of which were advertised on the network. The ad ran in 22 stores, and was not featured in another 25, yielding a statistically significant result.
Was it typical? No, of course not. Most ads in that chain had nowhere near that kind of impact. But it does show what's possible.
In-store privacy: Are consumers really at risk, or am I just whining?
I got a pretty strong reaction to our recent "Uncanny Valley" article, which talked about the dangers of trading the privacy of digital signage viewer data in exchange for added convenience. While most of the folks who either commented or emailed expressed a view similar to my own (that a tight policy with strictly-enforced opt-in and opt-out provisions could yield a working system for trading privacy for personalized service), one commenter, only known as Anonymous, clearly felt I was off the mark:
Bill, I disagree with your chart and your theory behind consumer squeamishness.
First, your chart only places face/iris identification below the X axis, without explaining why the other applications you list don't belong there as well.
In fact, the application in which the kiosk is activated by RFID in a consumer's loyalty card is actually a much greater invasion of privacy than iris/facial recognition.
The loyalty card not only identifies individual consumers, but links this identification with their shopping histories.
This application belongs below the X axis of your chart even if it has yet to gain as much media attention as facial recognition.
The other loyalty card application is less privacy invasive because it suggests tea and crumpet information is analyzed in aggregate, not at the individual level; so this may not belong in the valley.
Second, I think consumers' distaste for facial recognition in digital signage has very little to do with the existential paradox of human-like robots; that theory trivializes some very concrete privacy issues.
On one level, it's more simple than that: people instinctively don't like being watched or scrutinized without their consent and especially without their notice.
Digital signage with identification technologies represent a new front in mass surveillance; in this case the surveillance is used for marketing and not security, which makes the privacy encroachment more offensive because it is surveillance for profit and not for safety (and consumers are already bombarded with ads to begin with).
It's naive to think that digital signage will not evolve to routinely identify individuals, because it will be profitable to do so once the technology is less costly.
Similarly, it's against the trend of history to believe that the data digital signage firms collect on individual consumers will never be shared with other parties or used for purposes other than marketing; law enforcement is one good example: remember that any records kept by a digital signage firm are available via subpoena or court order.
Digital signage companies, trade associations, their partners and their affiliates must commit to consumer anonymity when using facial recognition cameras, and notify consumers of when such cameras are in use; RFID and mobile applications should operate strictly on an opt-in basis.
It is past time for the industry to establish concrete consumer privacy standards, both technical and policy-based.
I don't even know where to start with this one. Obviously everyone's entitled to their opinion. That includes our anonymous commenter. But it also includes me. The chart I made reflects something close to my own opinion on the privacy-personalization exchange, so of course it's going to be different for others. My main point, though, is that I think everyone ought to be able to decide this for him or herself. What we have right now is a wild west-type scenario where people are gathering data, often without consumer consent or even knowledge, and are then using that data in ways that might not be in the consumer's best interests. I agree wholeheartedly with the anonymous commenter's last point -- we do need to establish a set of standards and stick to them. I know it's something that's being worked on by at least one major industry group, so I'm hopeful we'll hear something about it soon.
Scrolling tickers: How should you display two tickers at once?
That's the question asked by Jessica, on our article about using motion and silhouettes to improve your digital signage content. My simple answer to "how to use two tickers?" Don't do it. Seriously, unless you have a very unique situation, two tickers is almost certainly a terrible idea. In fact, unless you really know what you're doing, even one ticker often doesn't make sense. It all has to do with how we absorb information from the screen, and while this will be the subject of an upcoming blog article (and I went over it during my presentation at the DSE last month), suffice it to say that using a ticker is one of the least efficient ways to transmit information to your viewing audience. Heck, even CNN figured that out and abandoned their ticker late last year.
So that wraps up our first collection of reader questions and comments. As you can see, there are some pretty interesting conversations taking place throughout these five years' worth of articles. And sometimes (OK, often) the commenters prove more insightful and perceptive than me. So the next time you come across something I've said and you want to call me out on it, please be my guest. My loss will certainly be the community's gain -- but if you want to agree with me, that's OK too :)
Did you enjoy the format of this article? Leave a comment and let us know. Click here to leave a comment What's WireSpring's Blog All About? WireSpring provides hardware, software and services for digital signage and kiosk projects. But our blog is a labor of love. Our posts cover everything from case studies to creative briefs, and are authored by some of the industry's most well-respected leaders.
Back from a week in Las Vegas and the 2009 Digital Signage Expo, I'm struggling to find a way to summarize what I saw, heard and experienced that won't just be a rehash of what so many others have done across the web already. Sure, there were lots of great conferences and presentations. And there were lots of booths showcasing new and interesting products. But I didn't get to see most of those, and I didn't get a chance to meet up with a lot of the people that I had on my list. Thus, any "comprehensive" overview from me would be woefully incomplete. Instead, I'd like to go through some of the things that struck a chord with me -- especially the developments that give some perspective on where our industry might be headed.
The sessions: Content Day, Mobile and Gestural Signage, and more
I had the opportunity to speak at sessions for both the "Content Day" track and the "Mobile and Gestural Signage" track on Tuesday, before the expo hall opened. The good news is that the Content Day room was mobbed -- it was standing room only the whole day through -- which means that there are at least 120, maybe 130 people out there who understand how important this stuff really is. That day's festivities began with a creative brief smack-down, with four different creative houses competing for a hypothetical contract with Samsung. There were several other good presentations, including a very interesting and illustrative panel session with a bunch of content lawyers at the end of the day. What I learned from the lawyers: if you're doing anything that effectively allows you to make money off of somebody else's content, you need permission. What I learned from the audience members: many companies are too cheap/small/busy to get permission, so they're going to shoot first and ask permission later.
Image credit: Sid/Stephen
My favorite quote of the day came from Show + Tell's Phil Lenger, who gave a fantastic presentation on developing a creative strategy (echoed on their pretty killer new website too). His fundamental insight: your digital signage network simply can't be compelling all the time, so don't try to make it. Strive to be really, truly compelling sometimes, so that your audience will come to appreciate your quality content, but not get tired out. It's one of those counter-intuitive thoughts that makes so much sense after you've worked on a network -- or ten or a hundred. He also has some pretty charts and graphs that you might want to download from here (PDF format).
I didn't get to catch much of the Mobile and Gestural Signage event. However, the one event that I did participate in (along with Jay Patel from Bluefire Digital and Stephen Randall from LocaModa) demonstrated that the audience there, if somewhat smaller, was no less enthusiastic and knowledgeable. Between talking to people at that event and noting the number of mobile- and touch-enabled screens on the floor, it's clear that interactive digital signs are the next hot thing. Which means I can dust off that old article about kiosk-signage convergence from 2004 and pretend it's all new :)
The show floor: Solid turnout, a few new toys, and signs of maturity
As I mentioned, I didn't really get a chance to spend a lot of time on the show floor aside from walking to or from meetings. There was a lot of square footage, and a LOT of exhibitors. Conversely, floor traffic looked a bit down from last year (though it might have been an illusion because there was so much empty space). But the folks I talked to were pretty happy with the traffic levels, and generally thought that turnout was good. It certainly could have been much worse given this economy. Every cab driver I came across made an effort to tell me that business was down 30% from last year. I think they were mostly fishing for bigger tips, but I'm sure the story was rooted in truth somewhere.
Aside from lots of new ways to interact with screens, it also seemed like everyone and their brother were also flogging 3D screens of some sort or another. I've been watching those things evolve for years, and this is the first time I've come across one and thought "you know, that might actually work." The manufacturers seem to be figuring out how to improve brightness and viewing angle. I understand they're getting cheaper, too. Along the same lines, the small form-factor, low-power media player seemed to come into its own at this year's expo. There were easily a dozen companies on the floor flogging tiny, fanless boxes for digital signage. Too bad most of them still cost upwards of $1,000. But the trend towards embedded devices and reduced power consumption seemed to be pretty strong.
In all, I was actually kind of satisfied to find myself bored after just a few minutes of perusing booths at the DSE. We're a maturing industry now, and while there are still hundreds of vendors out there essentially trying to solve the same problem over and over, at least now the solutions are starting to look more like one another. Were there new, cool technologies that might be able to make a meaningful contribution to the industry? Absolutely. But the fact that most companies on the floor were offering "better mousetraps" instead of "new paradigms in mousetrap technology" is an indicator that maybe the flood of hype will begin to subside and we can get on to some real business.
Other thoughts and observations
I was really surprised by the number of people who just walked up to me and said something like "Hey, you're Bill Gerba! I read your stuff all the time!". I'm continually both surprised and flattered by the amount of attention that this blog gets, and I very much appreciate the feedback -- both good and bad -- that you provide.
DailyDOOH's Adrian Cotterill doesn't care much for fish. He will, however, down deep-fried soft shell crabs with wanton abandon.
The folks at BroadSign had the good sense to keep Dave Haynes locked up in a small plexiglass box a'la David Blaine for most of the show. Surely they were worried that his célébrité was such that out in the open, he would be overwhelmed by hordes of die-hard fans pleading for his autograph.
Neither @KioskGuy nor @DigitalSignGuy look like their Twitter icons. @raffivartian and @manolo_almagro do (the latter only recently), as do I (though I'm a bit less blue in real life). By the way, you can follow me on Twitter if you like.
Speaking of Twitter, one company on the show floor actually issued a two-sentence press release indicating that they were joining the "Twitter revolution." Seriously. Lame.
Lyle Bunn simply must be two or three different people. No matter where I went in the convention center, every time I turned around he was there, deep in conversation with someone or other. I walk pretty fast, so there's just no other explanation aside from there being at least two Lyle's. Scary -- I know -- but it must be true.
Consumed too quickly or with too much enthusiasm, DS-IQ's specialty "Optimizer" cocktail will leave you in a decidedly less-than-optimal state, I'm told.
Despite what many predicted, Scala's Jeff Porter + CoolSign's Lou Giacalone != spontaneous combustion. We had them both in a room for quite some time and there was hardly even a spark. Bummer. Oh well, maybe next time.
So there you have it. Another year gone, and another Digital Signage Expo over. (Well, technically they have another DSE show coming up in September, but I'm referring to the flagship event.) For me, the show was a good opportunity to see what the industry has to offer and meet up with people I normally only get to talk to on the phone or over the 'net. If you made it out there, I'd love to hear your perspective on how the show worked for you, and whether you think it will help you to meet some business objective in the future.
What was your favorite conference session, or your favorite booth on the show floor? Leave a comment to let us (and them) know! Click here to leave a comment What's WireSpring's Blog All About? WireSpring provides hardware, software and services for digital signage and kiosk projects. But our blog is a labor of love. Our posts cover everything from case studies to creative briefs, and are authored by some of the industry's most well-respected leaders.
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
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