Make the Move From Print to Digital Signage - Your Team Will Thank You

More and more retail environments are moving away from print ads, notices, and other posters in-store. There’s good reason for this change, as it is proven that enterprise digital signage will capture 4x the more shoppers’ attention than a printed poster.

Normally, when retailers start to think about the move from print to digital signage, the conversation gets caught up on costs. Some may think ‘How many printed posters will it take to pay for the cost of a brand new 4K LED SmartTV?’ But this isn’t the most realistic way to have the cost conversation. If you consider that a digital signage display can actually present the same as more than 50 different posters in a single day, the cost conversation is moot.

Another added digital signage benefit, is the reduced stress and pressure that using technology over print materials will bring to the team.

When a retailer wants to dress their planogram with posters and images to influence sales, they have to prepare the layout, have the artwork done and sent to the printer at least four months in advance of the season or product launch. This is 120 days of downtime when the plans cannot change, nor can the focus of the project adjust because the process has begun, and thousands of printed materials are in the pipeline. Any edits after they materials have begun production can delay the timeline and require extra costs. In the world of print you will be forced to make a painful and costly choice.

So, what happens when an industry event, a business decision or an opportunity arises that requires a change in the artwork? That’s where the digital signage benefits come in.

With digital not only can you avoid the four-month lead time, but you can also adapt real time to changes in the business. You increase flexibility and shorten time to market to nearly zero.

Often, we talk about the time required to get an idea from the boardroom to the showroom. With digital signage you can take an idea from the boardroom and within a few short hours have artwork digitally created and distributed to screens all over the organization – or only in specific areas if the content is specific to just some stores or store areas.

Finally, with digital promo boards you can assure compliance as well. It varies by brand, but generally in retail you see about 65% compliance for POS materials. The missing 35% is due to neglect in some cases, regional aversion to a design or even a misunderstanding of the timing and directions for use. With a digital signage solution you avoid these because the work is done centrally, and you can customize content to specific regions when necessary.

Why not reduce the stress and pressure on your store operations team? Utilize enterprise digital signage in your stores and improve the flexibility and ability of your team to meet the business needs for signage and branding in your stores.

Where do you start?

The key is understanding that any change of this scale requires an investment and the necessary resources must be used carefully. One approach could be to choose an area of the store that has the most traffic and begin there. This can serve as a test case. Next, choose ten stores and implement digital signage in the same department or area of each store. It can also be helpful to test different styles of content and vary the positioning within the department. Once you have this testing done, you will have some data to use to make informed decisions before you dip too far into your enterprise resources.

The introduction of SmartTV for digital signage use has reduced the upfront costs and more importantly simplified the deployment and testing of locations. Additionally, working with an experienced service provider like Hughes will also help you streamline the design and test effort and expedite the process with our Managed Services.