Digital signage is all around us, used by businesses worldwide to entertain, persuade and inform both existing and potential customers.
You might encounter several examples throughout your day: reading a digital menu board in a café or restaurant, viewing an information screen in a waiting room, finding your way in a retail store using a floor plan or using an interactive map in a shopping centre. So what does the term digital signage include?
Digital signage is the name given to a digital screen or projector of any size – ranging from tablets to giant stadium screens – that displays custom made content from a business in order to inform or persuade the customer. They can be used to provide:
- Product Information
- News and Announcements
- Menu and ordering information
- Wayfinding (to provide custom directions)
- Branding
- Advertising
The primary goal of digital signage is to engage the customer with your business or product. Providing an entertaining and interactive experience makes customers more likely to respond to your message.
Traditional signage is static, printed and usually planned well in advance such as a board or banner convey one piece of information at a particular time. Now all business can afford to use digital signage as part of their in-store offer. Screens and projectors have now become significantly cheaper and easier to use and cloud based storage means it is easy to store, update and report on the information instantly from any location.
What are the advantages of using digital signage?
- Engaging Experiences: Digital signage provides a more engaging experience for the customer. Unlike traditional printed signage, the customer can interact with the information. Screens can play audio or multimedia and can be touch sensitive, allowing the customer to interact.
- Greater Impact: Dynamic digital marketing has more impact than traditional printed signage and delivers messages more quickly and effectively.
- Increased Spend: Studies have shown that if you engage with something you absorb more information and are more likely to make a purchase.
- Flexibility: Screens can be arranged in any size or format, in any location, to create an attention-grabbing focal point.
- Reduce perceived waiting times: Engaging customers with targeted content actually reduces perceived waiting times. If you are watching a video of a product then you aren’t focused on your wait.
- Real time updates: Printed signs can’t be updated if the message changes. Now you can change store branding, messages, prices and offers and roll out new product information at any time using networked digital signage and an intuitive CMS. Instead of updating every screen individually you upload everything throughout a whole store or multiple locations at once.
- Sustainability: There’s also a positive environmental impact to not printing physical signage and creating waste when they are updated.
What sectors can benefit from Digital Signage?
- Retail – Service desk, checkout line, visual product information, store fronts and window display screens
- Libraries – Help points, event calendars, promotions
- Airports/Train/Bus stations – wayfinding points, menu boards, product information
- Restaurants – Menu boards, offers, information
- Healthcare – Wayfinding points, check in areas, exam rooms
- Hospitality – Wayfinding, Lobby areas, special offers, activities
What do I need to get started with digital signage?
There are three main elements to implementing your digital signage strategy. These are the hardware, software and content.
Hardware – this includes the physical digital screens or projector to display the content, and any mounting elements required, plus the media player to run the software.
Software – this is the system that manages the content you create. Ideally this will be easy to use and cloud based like our integrated Core platform.
Content – this is the message or information you display on your screens. High resolution, design led digital signage displays messages, graphics, images and video which can all be uploaded across your entire estate at the click of a button.
Ready to get started with your digital signage strategy? Take a look at our out of the box products or contact our team to discuss our custom designs.
