User-generated content
It is clear user-generated content is burgeoning. According to Google vice-president (VP) Marissa Mayer, the amount has increased fifteenfold over the past few years.
While the term may be most closely associated with actively uploaded content on websites like Google’s own YouTube and various social media, however, user-generated content also includes much ‘passive’ data. Just as there are new social media, there are also new data sensors, types, volumes, technologies and economics.
Vancouver International Airport provides real-time flight information through digital signage at flight counters, in concourses and at customs and immigration points.
Retail chain Target, for example, has analyzed data gleaned from the purchasing habits of its customers. Based on certain changes in these habits and specific products, the company has been able to guess which female customers are expecting a baby and what point they have reached in their pregnancy.
This practice gained widespread attention after a man visited a Target store demanding to talk to the manager and asking why the store was sending leaflets and coupons to his teenage daughter that seemed to encourage her to get pregnant. As it turned out, Target knew the girl was pregnant before her parents did!
Floods of information
Data is powerful and there is only going to be much more of it available in the future, but it must be used in smart ways before it can improve business results. In digital signage messaging, especially, good content is certainly essential, but it is useless without the right focus and context.
The rapid pace and sheer volume of information people must process in any given day both dwarf any time in the past, so it is natural for viewers to adapt, cope and filter what they see. Good messaging can help facilitate their decisions, such as what shoes to buy or how to assemble parts in a factory. Studies suggest there is a limit to the number of good decisions an individual can make in a day, so the provision of timely information can have a significant effect on the decision-making process.
Fortunately, digital signage has been evolving as a medium for the past 20 years. It is already one of the best ways to deliver relevant information to the right people at the right places and at the right times. In some cases, even the simplest, least expensive digital signage system is more than adequate for a given communications strategy.
Today, however, many digital signage network owners want to achieve better returns and make their systems more easily manageable. They are looking to ‘intelligent systems’ that can improve the effectiveness of their existing investment in digital signage technology. A simpler system, by comparison, is less expensive to purchase, but can be more expensive to operate—and less effective at delivering targeted messages to the intended audience.
Enhancing intelligence
Intelligent systems create a unique experience at every point of contact, built around the needs of the viewer. As technology continues to advance, the infrastructure to make such systems viable is being put in place, but there must also be a stronger emphasis on content planning and execution.
For one thing, there are many communications systems available for reaching an audience. Often, a combination of these technologies will be needed if a message is truly going to be driven home.
In traditional marketing, for example, advertisers pay for space or time in mass media—such as television, radio, newspapers, magazines or billboards—to deliver one message to the largest possible audience. In today’s connected world, however, that audience has been introduced to more personalized media. If a retailer’s prospective customer owns a smartphone and carries it around at all times, it can become more difficult for the retailer to present a message. Indeed, the company must earn the right to do so.
