Category Archives: Digital Signage

CETW Session #1 – Understanding the Landscape of Customer Engagement Technology

This post is a recap of the first session I attended at CETW. This panel included Brian Ardinger, David Weinfeld & Janet Webster

“The first stop on your journey here over the next 3 days.” (Truly a 101 class.)

Where do you start? Going to provide you a framework. Try to avoid getting into technology first.

The 4 keys to this framework:

  1. Customer
  2. Business
  3. Environment
  4. Technology

 

Customer

Their journey – map it, know what else they’ve consumed to get to that point, want consistent, forward-moving messages/value

Gotta understand customer first. Put yourself in their shoes. The last thing they’re going to be thinking about is seeing more ads. Try to understand what their needs are and then try to create an experience that fits those needs.

The thing about digital signage, kiosks, mobile – make things easier for customers and provide an innate value in a physical environment.

What are your customer’s expectations of you as a business?  How, really, will this improve their experience?

What’s available vs. what they’re looking for = what you deliver and how

Business

Criteria – where’s content coming from, what else can I leverage, are there infrastructure assets, content assets, database assets? What do you want to do with this particular technology? What are your objectives? And how are you going measure? Need to understand the infrastructure required. How is this going to play into everything else I’ve got going on?

Google – fast & happy

Disconnected channels just don’t work for customers. So, is your business offering an integrated solution for your customers? (Wow. Some language/verbiage.)

There is no cookie cutter anecdote/advice we can give you for measuring success.

Question – can each of you address ROI?

Ardinger – it all depends on how you implement the solution. Webster – usually a company has their defined way of measuring ROI. Weinfeld – lots of data that you can capture, it’s all useful, but maybe not right away.

Environment

What are the experiences that you want to create and what is the environment they’re going to be in?

Traffic patterns. Lighting. Noise. Weather.

Sometimes that might lead to a decision to not deploy a solution. You’ve got to be able to adjust based on the environment. At all costs.

Market tests – important. Include them in your business plans. Do them as much as you can.

Technology

If you don’t address the first 3, you’re going to get the technology wrong.

It’s straight-forward getting the content to a display. There are so many different considerations that you must consider – indepth scheduling, having content react to data, management of sending content to multiple screens.

How are you going to maintain and support the technology? A lot of times the IT groups do not have the expertise for these solutions.

What about payment options? There are requirements out there. Have you taken them into consideration? Disability compliance, too.

Bringing it all together – hopefully, this provides you a framework as you venture out on the showroom floor.

Net – nice nuances on the differences, all the things to think about without being overwhelming

CETW Keynote #1 – Driving Customer Engagement through Digital Experiences

Note – this dude is a heavy hitter and brought to life a great way of thinking about this wide, open space that technology and our world has given to us. This is a post that captures many of his thoughts from his keynote.

Brought to us by, B. Joseph Pine, author of Experience Economy & other books – now Infinite Possibility

Progression of Economic Value – goods and services no longer enough, what consumers are looking for are experiences

Commodities > Goods > Services > Experiences

What we need now is innovation in experiences

New digital frontier that changes things today; need a tool to help us explore the digital frontier

The known universe – time, space, matter – in Future Perfect (Stan Davis), he says he wants to give new meaning to time, space and matter. This will require profound transformations in the way we think about these 3.

When you have matter, you have no-matter. Matter is material things, no-matter is about bits.

If there’s no-matter, then there’s no-space and no-time. No-space is virtual places. No-time is autonomous events. This now is a model about what is possible in today’s digital space. This is what he calls the Multiverse.

This is not a plea to abandon reality. But there is a migration going on. More and more, people are spending their time in virtual worlds through screens.

We can access virtuality through screens of any sorts. Virtuality is an experience that you have through any screen.

You can have virtuality without digital technology. Think about books. Just from words on paper, you can create a world in your mind where that is taking place.

Enchantment – close to Engagement

Reality and Virtuality

Augmented Reality – this is the quintessential reality/virtuality example. It augments what you’re experiencing in the real world by giving you information in a virtual environment, typically on your mobile phone. Using digital technology to enhance the real-world.

Showed a lot of examples of AR – Word Lens – real-time translation of your own language that you see, take a picture of. Pop notes – virtual post-it notes.

Think of AR as a virtual prosthetic.

Augmented Virtuality – interact with the virtual world from the real-world. Augmenting that virtual world. Some material substance that is controlling that environment.

Wii. Kinect.

Look into this company – Personal Space Technologies.

He also showed an example of Hallmarks cards that, to me, seem like Augmented Reality (not Virtuality??) He addressed this. So, what’s the difference? Primary experience is either in the real world (reality) or the digital world (virtuality). Interesting. I like it.

Alternate Reality – alternate view of what’s going on in the real-world. Use the world as your playground (ARG’s).

Alternate reality is no time.

World Without Oil – HBR article by the author. We can use Alternate Reality as the new Business Reality.

Physical Virtuality – design experience that becomes real. For example, take a digital picture of a physical space. Then, it turns into a 3D space. Now, use a tool to design how it should look. Then, you can make the furniture. Make it real based on the virtual experience that you have online. Your ideas can become real.

Shapeways. Autodesk. Techshop.

Warped Reality – taking you into the past. Reenactments like the Civil War Adventure Camp. But what about the future? Not reenactment, but preenactment.

Starizon (company) – you determine what experience you want to have happen in the future and then they create it.

Flow – look at this book. “Freedom from the tyranny of time.”

Mirrored Virtuality – real-world experience & time tied into virtual world & time. Anything you can track is an example of this. Look at MLB.com and you can see what’s going on in the game, real-time via your computer. Tweetdeck – no real world component, but it’s mirroring what’s going on real-time in the Twitteverse.

This is the Multiverse.

Some tips as you think about each one of these components in the Multiverse.

  1. Reality – shift marketing from advertising to marketing experiences.
  2. Augmented Reality – use smartphones to bring messages to customers when and where they most need it. Stop bothering them when they don’t need it.
  3. Alternate Reality – use the real-world as your playground for engagement.
  4. Warped Reality – get customers into the flow. Engagement them so much that all time goes away. Or help them envision their future.
  5. Virtual Reailty – shift your marketing dollars from advertisng to virtual marketing experiences.
  6. Augmented Virtuality – use customers own bodies to control what they experience from you.
  7. Physical Virtuality – mass customize your offerings – not just target your messages – to help your customers realize their dreams.
  8. Mirrored Virtuality – help your customers track what’s important to them in your offering category. And then give them a dashboard.

 

The best offerings are those that do not live within one of these categories.

On My Way to Engage at CETW

Customer Engagement Technology World (CETW) Logo

I’m headed to NYC today for Customer Engagement Technology World (CETW), which is being held at the Javits Center Wednesday & Thursday. In my opinion, it’s one of the best digital/interactive signage and emerging technology shows that no one knows about. The folks at CETW have done a great job of repositioning themselves and the conference to focus on engagement at the point of impact, across whatever channel/screen is available and utilized. They’ve moved it from being a show about the technology to being a show about what the technology can do.

I’m not speaking this year, but am looking forward to seeing colleagues in the industry who are speaking and exhibiting. I will be giving a few exhibit floor tours on Wednesday morning and then introducing a panel in the afternoon. Outside of that, I just really hope to soak in all of the great information and perspective being shared.

As I do at these things, you’ll get a lot of real-time “reporting” on the sessions I attend with a little bit of my own perspective sprinkled in. I’m really looking forward to it. I hope you enjoy it as much as me.

If you’re going to be at the show, drop me a line and let’s get together for a chat.

The Time and Technology Conundrum

11th Screen | The Interactive Out-of-Home Blog

Time is a funny thing. It keeps going. Regardless of how much value you place in it. Personally, I didn’t really learn the value of time until later in my life. Perhaps some people are instinctually tuned into how valuable their time is. Not me. I like to do many things, help many people, say yes, make time, make stuff. I think there comes a point in your life when you actually start to put a premium on time and therefore prioritize, consciously or unconsciously, all of the things you find yourself faced with.

Technology has a funny effect on time, the thing that keeps going. It seems to make it go by faster. Consumption via all these screens fast-forwards our lives in drastic proportions. Just by the shear rate of life, who has time for what content?

Ah, this pesky, key ingredient – content. What we consume and engage with on a daily basis. What we give our attention to, be it for connection or entertainment or education. TV shows, websites, blogs, videos, pictures, news feeds, texts – the sea of content is deep and easily time-suckable. How do we prioritize what content we give our time to? I think that decision is based on any of these three factors:

  1. We like the subject matter
  2. We like who makes it
  3. We have nothing else to do or have time to spare (this is hardly sticky but it is a reason to consume, to give your time to it.)

 

These factors are much easier to control on our personal screen. Not so much on a public one. That begs the question – what is the role of digital signage, these public screens?

And what can we expect them to really do?

Am I Right About “Innovation” in the Digital Signage Industry?

11th Screen | The Interactive Out-of-Home Blog

When I think of the future and how digital signage plays out and how mobile plays out, here’s what I think:

  1. Digital signage won’t go away. It will have its place, but to what extent – I guess that’s the question. Will it be more like billboards, where it’s primarily push? Or will it be, by and large, interactive?
  2. We won’t need digital signs to interact with the outside world because of mobile phones and tablets and their capabilities. Specifically, their capabilities to “turn anything on” and even more, provide personal experiences on a personal screen.

Mobile technologies will have a profound impact on the future of digital signage. It’s just that simple.

Part of the reason is that innovation is happening in mobile in a short amount of time. For the past few years, we’ve all been talking about whether or not this is going to be the year of mobile. Well, if we weren’t there last year, we’re certainly there this year. One of the ways you can see this is through the innovations brought to life in the mobile world. Tablets. Apps. Siri. Near Field Communication.

And while mobile’s innovations might be young, I think you can feel pretty comfortable that they’ll be around for a long, long time. As we can see in the short amount of time, creating these innovations is not confined to a select few Technorati or business minds – anyone can innovate and get that innovation out in the market place. To me, this is one key development and asset that the digital signage industry does not have yet. Innovation is confined to a few companies. It’s closed to a seemingly few, albethem brilliant in their own right, minds. It’s not the open-to-the-masses platform like mobile is. And perhaps that’s the reason its innovations and, as a result, its place in the market, have not developed to the point to where the industry has been expecting and hoping for, literally, years.

Unlike mobile, I feel like the digital signage industry will ask themselves again, in 2012, “is this the year of digital signage?” Maybe they can take a page from the mobile book and strive for open innovation, that which is brought on by the masses, not a select few.

Apple’s Influence on Digital/Interactive Out-of-Home

Pirate Apple

Apple has and will continue to singlehandedly shape the future of digital (and interactive) out-of-home.

  • They have redefined mobility.
  • They have created devices that take the intimidation out of touch and gesture. And made them accessible to the average consumer.
  • They have enabled thousands of independent developers to create content for native mobile devices.
  • They have created a personal expectation that we can have what we want when we want it.
  • They have made little bitty boxes that run powerful programs on most any display.
  • They have set the standard in interface design and functionality.
  • And now, they’re introducing the idea of always-accessible voice recognition and memory.

 

They have fundamentally changed the way that people interact with content and technology, the two core components of digital/interactive out-of-home.

So, if you’re a creative, a technologist, a developer, a strategist, a network operator – whatever you are – and you’re trying to figure out this or that for your digital/interactive screen, look no further than the phone in your pocket or the tablet in your bag or the computer on your desk.

 

Photo credit: UsingMac.com

Morning Musings About Screens and the Human Condition

On the train, there are 2 screens. There is this one:

DART digital sign

And there is this one:

Mobile Phone Screen

I never see anyone looking at, much less paying attention to, the red, scrolling, digital one. As I look across the train right now, out of 8 sitting comfortably in their seats, waiting for a) the car to fill up or b) us to leave, 6 of them are looking at and giving their attention to the phone one. They don’t even look up aimlessly to the sky to watch the sun peak through the clouds, like I’m half doing. Just head down, sucked to that little personal screen that some people still call a phone.

We are a captive audience here on the train and no one wants to look at the scrolling digital sign. Clearly, they place no value in it, whether it be from the low-fi technology that is too rudimentary for them or the content scrolling across the screen – happy birthday’s to this celebrity or that, facts about diabetes, or this day in history, all fascinating tidbits of content interesting only to who? – or the phone screen is simply too magnetizing to give attention to anything else.

One person plays solitaire. One person reads a book. One person scrolls through their music. I can’t see the others, but I’m certain that they’re all doing something different. This is one of powerful aspects to that little personal screen – anyone can essentially do anything they want to do on it. The experience is theirs. Not a preconceived and served up one. It’s the content they want as frequently as they want it. How can any other screen measure up?

————

In the lobby, there are 2 screens. There is this one:

Lobby Digital Screen

And there is this one:

Mobile Phone Screen

Out of 4 people waiting for the elevator, 2 (plus me) look at the large news screen, 2 look at the mobile personal one. The ones looking at the large news screen are just filling time. It’s moving pictures and noise. We’re all half tuned in. I can just tell. And why not? I mean, it’s the same content that each one of us are a) coming from, having tuned into the news before work b) going to, being that the “news” feed on the monitors in our own company’s lobby is literally on news of some sort.

It’s too easy to just pipe boring, meaningless, depressing content across other screens, outside of personal TVs and desktop computers. More screens more places, right? They’re everywhere. Problem is, “more content” is easily overlooked.

As I ride up the elevator, no one speaks beyond, “Good mornings,” and “You doing OK’s?” It’s eyes to the personal screen, that darn magnet.

————

People – including me – say all the time, “people are on the move, now more than ever, so it’s important to hit them where they are, which is less in their living rooms and at a desk and more when they’re out and about, in the real world.” This is one of the profound opportunities that anyone in the digital signage business has.

I wonder if those same people – again, including me – ever think about the responsibility that comes along with that opportunity. The responsibility to not create more noise and distraction. Kinda like solitaire or music.

We’re also in a time, now more than ever, where no one seems to experience boredom or lose themselves in thought. Quiet time, in the auditory and visual sense. Is there such a thing for people now?

These screens are impacting behavior and I have to wonder if it’s healthy. Is “all on all the time” or any variation really healthy for the human condition?

Where is the Good Digital Signage “Packaging?”

DART map

Look around you. Design is all around. In the past five minutes, I’ve noticed the poster at the train station, the map on the train, heck, even the train itself. I’m having one of those moments where I think a little bit too deeply about normal things. But, if you think about it, there is so much thought put into how things look. Those things that you and I might take for granted – someone labored away and made choices that resulted in what we see everyday. Now, granted it’s not all good, but that’s for another time. The point is, time, energy, thought, and skill went into packaging these things.

Recently, I was reading through Communication Arts. I love this publication. I see it as a showcase of the best-of-the-best creative work in our industry. This particular edition was the Design Annual, where all sorts of design – print, digital, experiential – from the past year were lauded. One of the categories that they highlight is packaging. Everything from beer to a bag of chips to an iron box.

Monteith's Beer

Safeway Potato Chip Bag

Bajaj Majesty Iron Box

All of these examples elicited an emotion from me. I was curious about all of them and told myself to look for them the next time I was in whatever store might sell them. And maybe, just maybe, if I was so inclined, I would buy them. All just by the way they looked, the way they were packaged. This is what design is supposed to do. Create an emotional response to drive action.

This got me thinking about digital signage and the way that I normally see signs out and about. This is pretty standard fare:

11th Screen | The Interactive Out-of-Home Blog

Sure does seem like these signs could benefit from some good packaging. I’ve often wondered if everyday people were blind to digital signs, particularly because of the noise that they generally broadcast. Signs are all around so unless there’s something extremely compelling and relevant on the screen, how many people actually watch them? Enough to consume the content that brands want them to consume?

What if these signs were packaged a little bit better? Would it make me stop and notice them? Would it elicit the same emotions the iron box does?

I hear so much talk in the digital signage industry about content, content, content. What’s on the screen. True, that is critical. But I’ve never heard anything about how the screen actually looks out in public. How it’s packaged. Seems like that’s a critical component, too.

But who wants to spend money on fabricating this or that so screens can go in them? Especially, an entire network of screens? Well, businesses have been created for just that thanks to the introduction of the iEverythings:

iPad Dockintosh

Book Book iPad Case

Maybe that’s too much to realistically expect out of network providers and/or venues. Seems like a pretty daunting task to me. But in a world where the most preferred screen is in our pockets, packaged to our own likings, why would we want to give attention to anything else, especially when it’s just plopped onto a metal stand or hung on a wall?

Design changes things. Design makes us stop. Design makes us consider. Design makes us feel something.

When’s the last time you were out & about and saw a digital sign and actually felt something?

 

Photo credits: (beer): mmminimal.com, (chips): theimpulsivebuy’sphotostream, (iron box): commarts.com, (dockintosh): techmoan.wordpress.com, (book case): twelvesouth.com

A Word About Content

Dave Matthews Band Out-of-Home

Is there more noise out there than quality content? Or is it just harder and harder to find the quality content, given all the creators and channels to consume it on? These are more rhetorical than not, especially since these questions have surfaced in different forms over the past few years. But each day, it becomes easier and easier for anyone to create good content and distribute it across many different channels. (What was once intended for Twitter can now be seen on a billboard in the middle of Times Square.) And with that, it becomes harder and harder to focus on and find the quality content. That is, the content that I want, need, and like.

As one of my colleagues recently said to me, we don’t need more platforms to consume and share content on, we need 1 tool to shut out all the noise. So, there you go, inventors – an identified and growing need.

When I think of content – either producing it or consuming it – it’s not about the type of content that is most important to me. Meaning, just because it’s video content (dynamic, moving, all that), does not mean that I will consume it. In fact, that’s really the least important factor. It takes much more than that to make me stop, consume and ultimately, interact with it. Here’s what’s important to me, in order:

What is it about? The subject matter is the key. If it’s about Dave Matthews Band, I’ll consume it. If it’s about baseball, I won’t. However, if it’s about the Texas Rangers, I will. It’s important to understand the generality and specificity of your audience/community when planning content.

Who is producing it? Where is it coming from? Take the examples above – if Dave Matthews Band is producing the content, I want to see it. It’s about them, by them. If my wife forwards me a piece of DMB content, I want to see it. It’s about them, by them, yes, but in this case, passed on to me by someone that I trust, especially about “quality” content pertaining to DMB. If someone close to me – be it friends or family – sends me something or posts something, I want to make sure that I consume it. If it’s someone who I think is credible on any particular subject, I’ll consume it. Otherwise, it’s harder and harder for me to even give it a chance.

What type of content is it? I think too much emphasis is put on type of content above all. Not that great looking content isn’t compelling enough to get me to consume it, but it’s certainly much harder if it’s not something I care about – and even more, am passionate about – or it’s not coming from someone I trust.

Maybe the type of content is enough to get my attention, especially when I’m out in the real world. But if it stands any chance of getting me to actually spend time with it, much less do something with it, it takes much more than that.

So, whether your making content for a website or a OOH digital sign, what drives your content creation? The answer could be the difference between noise and consumption. Maybe even action.

Image credit: dailydooh.com

Why I Love Domino’s Times Square Billboard (& What to Learn)

Domino's Times Square Billboard

What Domino’s is currently doing – by broadcasting (virtually) unfiltered comments on one of the biggest stages in the world (Times Square) – is something I applaud and would actually recommend to any client more times than not. Here’s why:

#1, it’s simple. There is absolutely no time/effort spent on content creation. Yes, they have to filter comments, but if there is human involvement, it’s not much.

#2, it’s coming from the right place. Simply, if a brand is coming at the experience and/or engagement – regardless of channel – from the right place, they’ll get credit. Regardless of any specific negative comments that might come their way. Domino’s has made a pledge – as a brand – to listen to their customers to get better. What can be a better place to come at it from? The community recognizes this and Domino’s will get credit, sales, and ultimately loyalty by being open. Remember, people want a say. Domino’s is going full tilt and giving it to them. Then, using it to make their product better.

#3, it’s big and out in the open. There’s no hiding from anything on any of those screens in Times Square. Not only is Domino’s being transparent by broadcasting these comments, they are putting those comments front and center for everyone to see. This is just another example of them showing how committed they are, as a brand, to improving. And in the process, kind of innovating.

In the digital signage industry, the concept of utilizing social media as content has seemed either a) intimidating and/or b) incompatible, to the point of not using it altogether. For whatever reason. LocaModa seems to be one of the only companies who has whole-heartedly embraced it, enough to build a thriving business around it.

I wrote a post the other day about fundamental human behaviors that are critical inputs to us as we create engagements using social media channels. I believe those behaviors apply to any marketing or communications across any channel. Including Out-of-Home (OOH) and digital signage.

Often times, I feel like the industry doesn’t know what to do and/or how to sell these screens that broadcast in public places. In the end, it probably always comes down to a question of content. While we see (and will continue to see) many examples of creative content being produced by brands and broadcast across various channels, it’s important to recognize that consumers, themselves, are creating buckets of content about the brands they love everyday.

So, from a strategic POV, why not tap into this? Brands will always open themselves up for negative comments on any social channel – be it online or off. More channels and more screens don’t alleviate that possibility. Those channels only give those voices more of a chance to be amplified. But this is not something to shy away from. Unless the brand is completely averse to change.

Almost always, the community wins. And not a single individual within the community, but the community as a whole. The brand is an enabler and a participant. That’s pretty much it.

Next time you’re sitting around trying to think of the golden piece of content, it might be right under your nose. In the social channels. Don’t be afraid.

Photo credit: Fast Company