Posts filed under 'How to: Digital Signage Tips'
The traditional “impression”, or “opportunity to see” an ad is no longer enough to prove the efficiency of advertising at retail, says Dick Blatt, President & CEO of POPAI, a point-of-purchase advertising trade organisation. Mr. Blatt told a POPAI digital signage conference in Montreal on Thursday that big advertislng dollars have started to pour into shopper marketing. He cautioned, however, that the problem the industry was facing now was how to keep these budgets in the absense of reliable metrics.
POPAI, among other trade bodies, has been working on establishing metrics to equip advertisers with insights into the real effect of their in-store initiatives.
A recent POPAIÂ MARI Proof of Concept research was the first attempt to measure the level of engagement shoppers have with the marketing-at-retail (MAR) displays.
The research revealed that only 20 percent of the MAR material was passed by shoppers on their journey. Only 4 percent of the material was both passed and seen, meaning that marketing waste in the measured stores was a shocking 96 percent.
POPAI used the findings to establish a new metric: impact ratio, that will be expressed in percentage points and will reflect shopper engagement as opposed to just an “opportunity to see”. The details of the research can be found HERE.
According to Dr. Hugh Phillips, a professor of McGill University who spoke at the same conference, many marketers and retailers are aware of the acute oversupply of advertising messages in stores. There are 4,624 display items in an average-sized supermarket in the UK and 4825 displays in average US stores, with up to 12,000 items in a megastore (POPAI studies). Some chains started cleaning up the store environments by reducing the amount of advertising materials.
Dr. Phillips, an expert on the cognitive psychology of shopping,  said shoppers have developed mechanisms of coping with the clutter by engaging a ‘deselection’ process, shielding themselves from the overload and reacting only to signs of potential relevant information. He found that shoppers may start reading the message only after they have singled it out on a subconscious level, by using indicators like color, shape and size.
The practical conclusion for digital signage networks? Digital signage enters an already busy environment in retail, and, to be successful, entrepreneurs should take the in-store clutter into account. Although digital signs has the unique potential of helping to clear the static display mess and stand out with its full-color and full-motion messages, they will still have to compete with over 35 other types of advertising, and will be perceived according to the same laws of shopper psychology.
In the long run, as Dick Blatt put it, those who understand that digital signage should be treated as ‘just another medium’, and measured as such, will prevail in making it a key part of a marketing mix.
October 26th, 2007
Digital signage as a medium appeals to advertisers because of its potential to deliver both pin-point targeting and unprecedented levels of accountability. What may be this industry’s dirty little secret, however, is the fact that a large number of networks that are currently enjoying success do not have the proper reporting in place to provide this accountability to the marketers they service.
As my colleague Nurlan has been saying for years, digital signage has a strong advantage over broadcast media because of the fact that it can account for every ad played on every screen. Imagine if you could track with certainty every single time a commercial is displayed on every TV screen in the DMA when this TV set is on and tuned to the proper channel. Such tracking would be worth a lot of ad money, but it is not feasible for broadcast TV (except by way of expensive metering of sample audiences).
Well, the good news is that, in digital signage, near-real time tracking of each ad play on each screen (not just a player) can be a standard and automated procedure.
In order to take advantage of this, networks need to put in place the four components of a properly accountable digital signage reporting system:
1. Provide Proof of Display, not just proof of play. Proof of play is the term used in digital signage to describe the summary playback reports and the raw play logs. Proof of play is the equivalent of tearsheets in newspapers and of online impressions and click-through reports in pay-per-click marketing. While it seems obvious that proof of play should report on which ads were actually displayed on each screen and when, most of these reports only register which content was played by the playback device at best, not on the screens connected to it. If one or more of the screens are off or disconnected from the player, the proof of play would not detect that in many cases. This leads to the wrong count of ad plays, distorted count of impressions and the wrong conclusions in the post-campaign analysis. So by saying ‘provide Proof of Display versus proof of play’ we want to stress the importance of reporting of what really matters: playback at the screen level.
2. Audited Play Logs: most digital signage playback devices produce raw play logs that track what ad played, the date and time when it played and the duration of time it has played. In order to validate the accuracy of the entire reporting system, these play logs will need to be audited by a third party. Again, these audits register what’s being played on the actual screen, and then the results are compared to the play logs.
3. The Campaign Plan Report: the purpose of the campaign plan is to be able to provide a promise to the media buyer before they sign the ad contract. Using the characteristics of the network, one can generate a forward-looking plan that estimates how many times the ad will play in each targeted location. Having a Campaign Plan report with planned ad plays numbers will make it easier for you to justify your initial billing estimates.
4. The Campaign Performance Report: the campaign performance report aggregates the raw play logs for that campaign and presents the total results of the campaign against the “promise” made in the campaign plan report. The comparison between the planned plays and the achieved plays is how performance is calculated. The first 3 components are what make this report the basis for invoicing the media buy, make-goods or invoice reconciliation.
Based on my experience, the vast majority of digital signage networks out there do not have even two out of the four of the above components of a fully accountable digital signage reporting system.
Some networks charge a flat fee for a week-long, a month-long, three month-long, etc., campaign, based on approximate “impressions”, without providing any proof of play (or providing just an affidavit). Since the ways the impressions are calculated vary from network to network, such campaign cost estimates (and CPM values) are highly questionable.
Some provide a proof of play report, or play logs. As I mentioned earlier, most of the play logs, however, only report the fact that the player was on when the ad was supposed to play, not what played on the screens.
How is the industry getting away with it? I think the answer lies in the inherent appeal of digital signage as a medium. We see that even without any standards and metrics, retail digital signage and digital outdoor billboard networks are attracting more ad dollars every year. I believe that, similar to the world of Internet advertising before it, digital signage will soon undergo a rapid shift where the wheat will be separated from the proverbial chaff.
The question for network operators then becomes: will your network be ready in time for this shift?
October 19th, 2007
We are getting really solid expert feedback triggered by the discussion and by the following questions from Darin Gilstrap posted last week:
“Since there are several media math formulas currently being used to calculate digital signage media buys, I truly wonder which formulas are really apples-to-apples. Can you charge a national advertiser a flat ad-spot rate/per month/per location across 500, 1000, 2000+ locations? As a network grows do advertisers hesitate to pay more based on network growth? What about niche audiences for example women-only, Hispanics, African American networks, do they garner higher rates based on tighter targeting.”
Rob Gorrie of ADCENTRICITY sells digital signage advertising to major media buyers. Here are his insights from the frontline trenches:
RG: Love this question – right in line with the type of mature answer buyers need. Here’s the long answers:
Media formulae – there’s no one size fits all…and that’s part of the secret…our medium is NOT a commodity, nor is it a “rate card”. A bunch of Omnicom clients (execs) I deal with relate this space to TV/Broadcast and feel it’s a trailer buy to a TV spend, which is measured against a quasi GRP. On the other hand, some of the guys I deal with in the WPP camp throw it in to outdoor, as a subset, which is measured on……..something 
(perceived passerby traffic)…
Others think it’s a subcomponent of online digital advertising, especially with the rise of online video.
One of my advisors probably had the best comment when he said: “your medium is everything BUT TV. It has the dynamic nature of the Internet, the recency/FMOT of point of purchase, the localism of newspaper, the frequency of outdoor, the POTENTIAL relevance of magazines, the qualitative measurement capability of none of them with none of the problems of TV”….FYI, he was one of the instrumental characters in launching a large number of specialty channels on TV. This, of course, brings us to our industry identity crisis problem..if we’re something of every medium, but none of them at the same time, what are we? (this is another discussion and part of why media buyers have such a hard time understanding what we are/can provide – and we don’t explain it well).
End of the day, everything in our space can be boiled back down to 2 baseline common denominators:
1.)Â CPM Audience (cost per thousand “impressions” on gross audience)
which is a 30+ year old metric. Regardless of how old or irrelevant
this number is, it’s STILL the baseline for COST comparison across media
- TV = $17-$27/CPM on survivor (40 million gross on monthly =
$500K+/spot). Magazine = $15 CPM on readership of 10 mil’ish. Digital
Signage = $5/CPM at C-Store….makes it easy to compare COST but not ROI
or performance or impact.
2.)Â CPM Ads Served (Cost per thousand ads served) – New School
Internet ratings. Works as an ROI comparative but means little on media
evaluation/effectiveness. Great for quantitative analysis on media
impact or “pseudo-efficiency” on spend. Using the above mentality; TV =
$500,000,000/thousand (1 ad = $500K), Magazine = $50,000,000/’000 (1 ad
= $50K). Digital Signage $50/’000 (1 ad = 0.05) – we’ve run campaigns
that serve 5 million ads in 4 weeks for very little…it gets a little silly.
EVERY other metric can be boiled down to one of these two. What we should be striving for is a pseudo comparative metric close to GRP, which every other traditional, measured medium tries to emulate. This will take a couple of years and, quite frankly, can’t be accomplished by 1 network on its own or one category of network (e.g. just pharmacies) – it’s completely dependent on the needs of the campaign.
Once you know this, you can reverse-engineer everything else. We don’t really care what people need to evaluate on so we provide them everything….down to cost per ad served per gross audience reached. It’s a little overboard, but it means a buyer can evaluate a $ figure immediately based on what they need to evaluate it on to prove a good
buy to their client.
So what does that mean to your network, taking learning from above? As I’ve said before, Media buyers care about 3 things; Efficiency, Effectiveness and Reach. I won’t go into all of them but the big one is TARGETED reach.
So to the questions:
“Can you charge a national advertiser a flat ad-spot rate/per month/per
location?”
Yes.
It boils down to CPM Viewers, whether you like it or not. Let’s take $200/venue/month/spot. And let’s pretend we’re talking about a Convenience store chain that sees 2000 ppl per day/venue on average. (60,000 gross audience per month/venue). If you’re charging the above $200/venue, you’ve effectively saying to the advertiser that your media is worth $3.33/’000. Now let’s say that you’ve got 500 Convenience stores on that average (30,000,000 gross audience). You’re still charging $3.33 at $200 a month per spot at 500 locations.
Realistically, 30,000,000 is worth a hell of a lot more than 60,000, especially if you want to start competing with the measured mediums, but Digital Signage isn’t mature enough as a holistic base to command that yet, nor do buyers trust it as a viable mass alternative or placeholder.
What’s more valuable?…a single, 1 day, $30,000 full page ad in the financial section of a newspaper that has a full paper “readership” of 1.2 million or a $60,000 Digital signage spend that serves 800,000 ads in 2 weeks in urban financial targets on various networks with a gross audience of 4,000,000 (targeted/net audience of 740,000)?
Give it 2 years and price inflation will occur naturally based on demand and finite inventory. Now, to top this off, you have to remember that the real value is in the actual TARGETED reach that an advertiser can get through the access achieved with your network. You should always really be selling on audience access as opposed to venues because that’s all a buyer really cares about…the more targeted your network is to their needs, the more likely they are to buy on it.
Where the REAL power comes in is with frequency. How many times can we make that audience on average see that ad without media fatigue? Does your audience come to your venue once a day or once a month? It’s a bit of a science and it gets really complex when you decide to merge 10 different categories together in one campaign (C-Stores, pharmacies, grocery, bar, etc).
Q: “As a network grows do advertisers hesitate to pay more based on network growth?”
No. actually, agencies and brands WANT more growth. 500 locations means nothing to them in the grand scheme of things. They can moan as much as they want (and trust me they will) but if you follow the above and your demo is what they want, you end up holding the cards. As above, if 30% of those 30 million gross audience are EXACTLY who they need to reach, you’re in the driver’s seat. Don’t fall for the “I reach X on TV” argument either…realistically, if you know the stats, less than 46% of people even stay in the room (or change channel or start chatting or look at their laptop) during a TV commercial and of those 46%, the recall is 21% versus a 35%+ recall on Digital Signage.Â
In addition, TV’s “ad acceptance rating” is very low whereas I have studies that show acceptance on Digital Signage up to 60%. And of that TV audience, that’s GROSS…not really even targeted based on the GRPs they’re buying. End of the day, each brand only has so much dough, however….you need to make sure your content is relevant and up to date, otherwise the impact of your ads is zero because there’s nothing for the audience to look at or be entertained by.Â
Lastly, the media agencies aren’t buying because of scale. If they’re making 15% on this and you’re trying to sell them a 50K program, they make $7500 for a ton more effort than buying a newspaper spot (which is a phone call away). The media agencies want the networks to grow too to buy on 10,000 locations because it means the buy gets into the millions and they start making some real money based on their efforts. As hard as they push you down on price, the harder they push the less they make for their efforts
(we sell on gross not net).
Q:”What about niche audiences for example women-only, Hispanics, African-American networks, do they garner higher rates based on tighter targeting”
RG: This is my favorite question. Yes and No is the best answer I can give, however. North American brands and media companies are disasters when it comes to targeting minorities or economic subsets. There’s been some great articles on ad age about this recently. They (we) aren’t very good at understanding how to effectively speak a different language other than “BRAND”. And a brand means something different to each targeted group. We’re learning, slowly, as the population changes and there are certain brands and agencies that have learned to capitalize on this trend.Â
Reality is, however, that you have to be smart about your sales efforts on this question. Despite the fact that they’ll deny it left, right and center, “Coke’s” media company will not see value in paying more for your “targeted” network of 500 locations versus someone else’s based on profiling of that nature. They’re VERY smart statisticians and very good at what they do, but it’s too small to be on their radar to have impact if they decide to target a particular group.
On the other hand, there are other brands who are second tier who LOVE the ability to get to this level, based on their product, service or campaign that no one pays attention to but are so perfect for Digital Signage (e.g. a inner city doctor’s network).Â
They also will realize more out of advertising with you than “Coke” will so…. Longer term, you can charge them more and, if you get enough of them, you get to turn down the “Coke’s” of the world on cheaper pricing, as attractive as they are, because your network is more effective for others and you don’t have to cater to their needs….the “A” list clients aren’t always what they’re cracked up to be. The old saying that “beauty is in the eye of the beholder” still holds true. If you have a niche that is attractive to a particular advertiser, they’ll chase you if you can prove value and effective returns.
October 15th, 2007
In continuation of the earlier discussion on how to sell your ad space, we received an answer to the following question posted by Darin Gilstrap:
“BroadSign Bloggers: Since there are several media math formulas currently being used to calculate digital signage media buys, I truly wonder which formulas are really apples-to-apples. Can you charge a national advertiser a flat ad-spot rate/per month/per location across 500, 1000, 2000+ locations? As a network grows do advertisers hesitate to pay more based on network growth? What about niche audiences for example women-only, Hispanics, African American networks, do they garner higher rates based on tighter targeting.â€
Here is the expert answer from Jeff Dickey, Founder/VP Business Development, SeeSaw Networks:
“While standards have yet to be agreed upon, one emerging currency for digital signage buys is CPM, where the impressions are determined using the combination of a validated traffic number multiplied by an awareness number. This formula truly brings an apples-to-apples comparison to digital out-of-home media buys that span multiple digital out of home networks.
National advertisers are reluctant to buy on flat rates simply because not all locations are equal, even within the same network (different demos, different traffic, etc.). Some networks have gotten away with requiring nationwide/network-wide buys, but those days are numbered as the advertisers push toward more specific buys with greater and greater levels of targeting.
If the research is available to support the demographics of female, Hispanic, or age groups — even better if the demographic data can be day-parted — a premium can definitely be applied to the better opportunities the advertiser has to reach their target audience.â€
Jeff Dickey, Founder/VP Business Development, SeeSaw Networks
Click here to read the whole discussion.
October 13th, 2007
I have updated my old ‘digital signage versus other media’ comparison doc. Apparently, quite a few people told me they found it useful in the process of selling the concept of digital signage advertising to new media buyers and advertisers.
Here is the updated version: Why Digital Signage?
Please feel free to send me your comments/edits/suggestions.Â
Cheers,
it’s a long weekend here in Canada!
October 5th, 2007
Retailers are gradually getting used to the idea that, through in-store media, they now own the largest mass media outlets, the advertising real estate that is growing even faster than Internet (see previous posts). Digital signage networks, in turn, are the fastest-growing segment of retail media.
One of the pains of such fast growth is that, unfortunately, very few digital signage networks have people with media sales background on their staff. Quite often the people in charge of selling network airtime try to re-invent the wheel, running into problems that could be avoided should they have media sales experience.
I asked Ian Dobson, VP of one of the largest national retail networks in Canada, Neo Advertising Canada, to share his views on how to sell airtime in digital signage.
Q – How do you get agencies interested in your ad space? What are the criteria by which they decide if they want to buy it or not?
ID – Ad agencies buy environments and audiences. They want positive results. They want to visit a location and see their ad running and in exceptional quality. They want to hear from their clients that they received positive feedback from customers; uplift in sales, visibility etc. They want to know if their competition is advertising on your network. They want to know where you reach their audience and if you engage them with your content. If the campaign strategy includes an environment where a network is located, they will look and consider it.Q – What exactly do media buyers want to see in your media kit? Do they care about details like loop length, day parts, etc.?
ID - Media planners certainly want to know about loop length, day parting and other critical features of the network. Loop length determines how many times their ad will be seen in a day/week and month. Day-parting allows them to really target their campaign to reach the audience of choice. Most planners are not using this feature enough yet but will as they begin to use digital signage more in the future. Media kits must contain relevant and accurate information on the network and the environment; weekly and annual audience numbers, screen location, network features, unique advertising programs, rates and network specs and contact information. Printed media kits are out – electronic kits are in. The media kit must be supported by an exceptional and easy to use website.Q – What do you think the ad sales efforts should be focused on: national advertisers or local?
ID - Our main focus is on national advertisers. That’s where you’ll make the majority of your revenue. Build your agency/account list and monitor daily the strategy and deployment of upcoming campaigns. Stay in constant contact with agency planners/buyers ensuring they are aware of special promotions and new network features. Local advertisers must be respected. Digital advertising is affordable and most advertisers are interested in only 1-5 locations so they can be encouraged to buy more and longer time on the network. I believe the best way to attract interested and qualified local advertisersis by running a “interested in advertising?” spot on the network. If they’re interested, they’ll call or visit the website. This will eliminate “tire kickers” and save you time and money.Q – Aggregation of digital signage ad space: is it happening in Canada?
ID - Offering advertiser’s ad space on different networks sounds good for the advertiser. It does though raise a lot of issues. Digital advertising is too young and not mature enough in Canada to begin this process. The quality of networks is questionable. There are a lot of small, under-financed networks that don’t have the credibility yet to participate in the national ad level. Every network has different rates, audiences, environments and advertisers negotiate making it a tedious process to arrive at a final plan. Advertisers in Canada know what environments they are interested in and what networks are there to support their campaigns. It’s a very small number and at this point it’s simpler for them to deal directly with each network.
September 28th, 2007
Many potential retail clients are asking us to give them an A-to-Z on how to build their network. Being a software provider, we can certainly help them with advice, but implementing a network is a multi-disciplinary expertise, while our focus is more on the network management side. This article by Extended Retail Solutions gives a good overview of where to start if you are a retailer considering a digital signage network.
September 13th, 2007
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