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DSE13: A final digital signage 8

Here are eight key takeaways from this year's Digital Signage Expo in Las Vegas.

March 8, 2013 by Christopher Hall

Two days just isn't enough time to see everything at the Digital Signage Expo, between educational seminars, new product showcases and the once-every-show-or-so conversations that help develop a bigger-picture view of the digital signage industry.

But it's a good start, and the breadth of what was on display last week in Las Vegas is still percolating throughout the digital signage industry and beyond.

For now, though, here are eight last thoughts from the show:

1. No player needed?

Samsung's system-on-chip system has some people talking, and some people squirming. A digital signage display that doesn't need a media player, but instead plugs directly into a cloud-based CMS or has content apps already on it? Saying that's got the potential to be disruptive is an understatement.

Reactions have ranged from "game changer" to "nice for the niche" to "stupid," but it certainly has people talking.

One of the more interesting reactions heard at DSE was the idea of technology "cadences." If the "cadence" for media players, or the time it takes for the current model to be outmoded by a new one, is two years, and the cadence for a display is five years, but you've got one embedded in the other, then it shortens the cadence of both to the shortest of either, in this case two years. It'll be interesting to see how Samsung addresses that one.

Of course, it isn't intended — yet — to do away with the media player market entirely, but is aimed at simple, entry-level deployments, but if this is the first step, then what comes next?

Also of course, there are some who say it will work and some who say it won't work, but either way it's a bold move by Samsung.

2. New players are changing the market while it lasts.

At the same time, new technologies are shifting the media player market.

Everyone from BroadSign to BrightSign, from AOPEN to IAdea, (and a few more in between) is embracing Android, HTML5 or advances in solid-state technology to bring better, faster, stronger — and cheaper — media players to the digital signage market.

3. 4K Ultra is 4K ultra-cool.

LG Electronics USA, Planar Systems and Sharp Electronics made a big play out of their 4K Ultra HD displays, and while the price point still makes them prohibitively expensive for larger rollouts, the picture clarity and quality really is breathtaking.

4. Don't fight it

A seminar on embracing showrooming brought this refreshing take from Scott McGillivray of iQmetrix: Don't try to hide the fact that other retailers have the same product you do; they know that; they're not stupid.

Embrace omnichannel retailing to take advantage of two key facts: Most shoppers use their smartphones to comparison shop, and most shoppers still prefer to buy in-store.

5. Be true to your school.

A seminar on digital signage and the patient experience at the Mayo Clinic, made one particular point over and over — and it's a point that also applies equally well to retailers, hotels, anyone else who might deploy digital signage: Keep your core values in front of you at all times and let those guide your decisions on everything you do with digital signage.

"How do we make sure the patient truly is at the center of it?" asked the Clinic's Sharon Erdman, who specializes in patient experience design. "The needs of the patient come first. If you can use that lens in health care you'll get it right."

6. DOOH your research.

A seminar on digital out-of-home networks unearthed several nuggets, not the least of which was a gem that isn't new, but isn't any less valid to keep bringing up: Do the research. Shaneeka James, president of America's Minority Health Network Inc., stressed repeatedly the value of research, both researching your audience to know who they are and what they want to see and bringing in third-parties (e.g., Arbitron, Nielsen) to measure your network and prove to advertisers that it works.

7. Screw the research; if you build it they will come.

Amusingly, at the same seminar in which James was evangelizing for research, Helena Athans, the digital retailing manager for National Australia Bank, was proving the value of passionate advocacy in the absence of hard numbers and research.

In Athans' case, most of the research has come after the fact, after she evangelized within her organization and acted as the internal champion for an in-store digital signage network.

Since she couldn't prove the ROI beforehand, Athans said, she had to sell it on the cool factor — and she found alternative funding from one of the bank's telecom partners, so the initial deployment didn't cost the bank anything, which probably didn't hurt.

"Own it," she said, "and be really passionate about it."

8. Stop talking about yourself for a minute or 50.

Athans also said in her presentation — though she wasn't the only presenter to make this same point in one way or another last week — that the research she's been able to do since getting her network up and running shows that customer recall of what's playing on the screens is much higher when it's about them.

So if deployers want customers to watch the screens, and to remember what's on them, they need to make the content about the customer (which is not to say it can't be about both you and your customer, but it can't just be about you).

"You cannot talk about yourselves all the time," Athans said. "You have to make it about the customer."

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