Article
The 25 gotchas of digital signage, part 1
Common mistakes and what you can learn from them. (Part 1 of 5)
August 3, 2008 by Mike White — pres, mms
The 25 gotchas is a five-part series on Digital Signage Today. Click to read numbers 6-10, 11-15, 16-20, 21-25 and check back each day this week for more installments.
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Mike White, president, Multi-Media Solutions |
Throughout the years, Multi-Media Solutions has seen its fair share of easy digital signage deployments — and troublesome ones, too. But through it all we persevered and learned from all the experiences, which ultimately proved to be more important than any profit from any specific job.
Below is a list of our most memorable (and painful) mistakes, numbers one through five of the 25 gotchas of digital signage.
1) Last minute content Beware of the impact of urgently adding untested and untried content into your digital signage system. Be sure to define, in writing, that the launch of your network will be with tested content, and that you have it in your hands for at least a week before you go live. Your customer will likely not adhere to this, but you need to protect yourself and have a contingency plan.
2) Installation conditions and timingMake no assumptions on the conditions of where your team will have to work. Many fine pieces of hardware have been destroyed by construction workers and the dust of last-minute work. Most of the time, the A/V company is an afterthought and when they build their time lines for completion, they generally don't consider your need to get into the work zone and safely finish the job. Also consider overtime requirements, security access and liabilities.
3) Firewalls and fixed IPs
Digital signage is all about getting information from one location to another, so don't forget about firewalls a customer might have in place and don't expect getting a fixed IP to be simple or timely.
4) Acts of GodNothing is worse than lightning hitting a location where you have installed a digital signage network, unless if your team happens to be working at the time the storm hits. Both have been true for my team and I strongly suggest that you have built into your contract that you cannot be responsible for equipment that is damaged because of Acts of God.
5) Operator competency This one should be obvious. It is best of have a discussion up front on who will be trained to operate the network.
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