Mobile digital signage – the new technology

Mobile digital signage is a progressive media, which is catching on quickly, as advertisers are always looking for new and innovative ways to utilize any available space on which to promote a service or product.

Mobile digital signage options.

There are many options for displaying mobile digital signage, such as a person walking through a shopping mall wearing a digital signage vest – powered by a battery, which requires re-charging every few hours, but when combined with a much needed break, is a convenient way of covering a wide area which can potentially attract thousands of people to view the product or service.

A stage up from this, whilst continuing to be mobile digital signage, is to use a bicycle.  This form of transport can cover greater distances, continually promoting and advertising a single article of merchandise, or alternatively any number of products/merchandise or services on software which can be looped to incorporate all the sponsored advertisers in a consecutive order. Again the mobile digital signage battery requires recharging.

Mounting mobile digital signage.

Another way to mount the mobile digital signage is to install a digital poster, digital menu board or similar display screen onto a moving vehicle, such as a lorry, truck or bus.  This really is a novel form of mobile digital signage as it is an unknown quantity, due to its infancy within the industry.  However its potential to reach customers is huge – vehicles are mobile every day and night and if the advertising campaign is structured correctly, then millions of prospective customers will be targeted, which is the aim of every advertising agency.  Certain laws and conditions of use must be considered, as it can be distracting and therefore dangerous to other road users and pedestrians, but these issues can be overcome and increase productivity of the mobile digital signage.

Taking into consideration the journey of particular vehicles, some may be more appropriate than others, for example mobile digital signage is more suitable on a bus which travels through towns and cities, whilst lorries and truck transportation is networked across country, via the highways and advertising to passengers in passing cars and other heavy duty means of transports. There is no need to stop for re-charging these batteries, as it is continually being recharged via the engine.

As with all of these means of mobile digital signage, updating the content is reasonably easy, either by way of a wireless network – using 3G or similar provider, or alternatively inserting a memory stick into the media player located within the unit.

This subject of mobile digital signage is a fast growing and innovative form of modern advertising and will be increasing significantly over the next few years.

LCD Enclosure Global Limited manufacture a range of outdoor LCD enclosures that are used in mobile digital signage.

Professional grade displays – Tips for success

Professional grade displays are used both indoor and outdoors for digital signage applications, and it has been found that professional grade displays are the best solution than domestic grade displays.

With the new new bill being introduced in the USA for displaying information for the food such as calorific value etc, Quick Serve Restaurants and franchisee owners have been purchasing regular domestic grade displays instead of the professional grade displays due to the price alone and are finding they have made the wrong decision.

Now imagine the environment within a quick serve restaurant (QSR), you have to take into consideration the heat, dust, grease.

Why use professional grade displays?

Professional grade displays are manufactured to run 24 hours per day, compared to domestic displays that are manufactured to work only 4-7 hours per day. They are also designed to manage thermals and this prevents heat build up within the professional grade screen, these professional grade displays have a far superior operational time or usage time compared to a domestic display.

Professional grade displays against dust and grease

These units are manufactured to protect the internal circuits from any airborne particles, such as dust entering the display, also grease can build up in domestic displays but not in professional grade screens due tot he unique venting and cooling these units have. The front viewing window is a protective glass unit and has anti vandal protection as an industry standard, there is no protection on a home TV.

Professional grade displays & warranty

These professional grade displays come with a general 5 year warranty or 50,000 hours (equals 7.5 years!), compared to the 1 year warranty a home TV has, when a company uses a domestic unit in a commercial setting the warranty can be reduced to 3 months or void completely.

Controlling professional grade displays

Most professional grade displays can lock the screen so staff and customers cannot mess with the controls, this cannot be done with a home TV, so anyone could bring a remote control in and start changing the settings – imagine what this would do for your advertising!

Mounting profession grade displays

Professional grade displays can be mounted in either landscape or portrait, so they can be used as a digital menu board or digital poster, unlike a home TV that can only work in landscape.

These are some of the pitfalls of using a home display instead of professional grade displays.

LCD Enclosures Global Limited provide various solutions including their LCD enclosure range that are sometimes used to protect professional grade displays.

Rioters named using outdoor digital signage vans

Outdoor digital signage is being used by a number of police authorities in the UK, to combat the rioters and looters of last week.

Using state of the are digivans, the police are broadcasting images that have caught on CCTV cameras throughout the areas troubled with riots, including Birmingham, London, Manchester and Nottingham.

By placing these outdoor digital signage vans in shopping centers, they are giving the public the opportunity to name the culprits of the devastation, especially when a reward is offered for the conviction of a crime.

Outdoor digital signage vans.

Image courtesy of GLYN KIRK/AFP/Getty Images

Many people have had issues with the policing of the riots, however when a group of several hundred yobs are running through a city, the most effective action is to use technology and with outdoor digital signage being at the forefront this is why it has been used. As you may know most of the UK cities have CCTV and this has been used extensively to name the looters using the outdoor digital signage vans.

Once the police know the names of the looters, they arrest them in the early hours of the morning when they are in less aggressive manner, being waken up with their front door being knocked off its hinges by the police.

These outdoor digital signage vans have certainly opened up eyes that never realized they existed, we all know the digivans for outdoor digital signage at events and sporting venues. Is this a matter of outdoor digital signage working for both the good and the bad?

I think now more organizations will see the benefits of these digivans and how simple outdoor digital signage is achieved.

LCD Enclosure Global Ltd manufacture a range of LCD enclosures, in their range they also offer a riot resistant LCD enclosure for outdoor digital signage hardware.

Mobile digital signage ranges from people wearing video vest to LED walls that are on the side of trucks or trailers, discover there uses and where they best fit.

Mobile Vests – These consist of a 17” digital poster that is battery powered and is wearable using a heavy gauge vest, this is used for basis content delivery at exhibitions and shopping malls.

This is probably the most cost effective but there are limitations for uploading new, fresh content, you have to get everyone together or you have to hunt each wearer out individually, taking extra time.

LED video walls are created using panels of LED’s, these panels are approximately (39 3/8” (1 metre} wide by 39 3/8” (1 metre} high and these are then mounted into a frame, this frame can be attached to uprights either on the side of a truck or trailer to mount the video wall and make it mobile, the best option is to mount it at the rear of the truck and high up, so if anyone runs in the back of the truck it will not be damaged.

These are ideal for Churches to display their services and events at Church; by taking the trailer to the local neighbourhood they are targeting the right people – the congregation.

A bank used a similar tactic and crawled through peak hour traffic, by driving slowly more people saw the campaign and reacted, the results were that the bank had a 12% increase in their campaign for this specific bank account than they had had on other campaigns just by using the mobile digital signage solution.

The unique thing with a video wall is that because it is modular, it can be as big as you like ensuring it will fit in with your budget. The 1 metre panels make this a very affordable solution to outdoor sunlight read able screens.

LCD Enclosure Global manufacturer a range of outdoor LCD TV enclosure that are used throughout the outdoor digital signage market for weather proof protection.

LCD Enclosure Global – anything else is a compromise.

Some organisations in the digital signage industry think that some forms of digital signage are not used for the right application discover why they are wrong.

Digital signage is very prevalent anywhere and is set to be added to the mobile sector, from on the back of trucks to taxi top digital advertising. Now one US government body is looking to deploy over 50,000 taxi top digital signage solutions in the USA.

People think it will not work however the idea is that the images are static on the screens whilst the taxi is mobile, then when it stops a video starts to play, otherwise whilst the vehicle is in motion the ads would have very little effect as you would only be able to see them for a few seconds – not ideal for outdoor digital signage.

But the inside of taxi cabs is a totally different story with many taxi cab companies installing LCD advertising systems in their headrests, these include the screen and an in built media player, that stores the content on memory cards and can be updated with a USB flash drive using the connector on the media player.

For example there are units that are interactive and come with segmented touch screens, so all the passenger has to do is select the segment they are interested, so this is a marketing opportunity for local hotels, restaurants, theatres and bars to promote their company and services.

Other units can be updated using 3G or a wireless network, this sort of solution can be updated when the taxis are all over cities rather than in one central location. With visual screens from seven inches up to 17” and can be mounted between the front two seats, from the ceiling or in the headrests.

The companies that say taxi cab advertising will not work will for sure wish they had been involved with this technology.

LCD Enclosure Global offer solutions for outdoor digital signage applications including outdoor interactive kiosks as well as weatherproof LCD enclosures.

LCD Enclosure Global – anything else is a compromise.

Digital signage is now moving outdoors pretty quickly, it seems as though indoor digital signage has been deployed in shopping malls to dentists and now ad agencies are looking to target people outdoors.

So we will look at the different types of outdoor digital signage solutions, as they are all relevant to their own sector of delivering dynamic content to consumers.

Personal Mobile Digital Signage.

This is the most basic solution and it involves someone wearing a battery powered LCD screen with a media player built in.

Advantages are:

• It is ideal for exhibitions and conferences
• Quick to deploy
• Easy to update content
• Relatively cheap to buy

Digital Signage Vans.

These are vehicles mainly vans that have LCD screens built into the side of the vehicle, these are used to promote local events, for example they can promote a local businesses expansion and will drive round the area at rush hour so everyone will have time to see the promotion and take it in. Sometimes they park up in high traffic areas, such as at main road junctions so stationary motors can take note of the ads.

Advantages are:

• Perfect for local promotion
• Pay for the time you hire the vehicle

Disadvantages:

• Can cost more than standard outdoor digital signage with no outright ownership

Entrepreneurs are always looking to separate themselves from their competition this is why they are normally at the sharp end of their business.

An affordable solution?

However there are ways to create a mobile solution for a more affordable price, but it is a mix of technologies. For example a coach or bus company who offers tourist trips could use a similar technology to a video wall to create an outdoor LCD screen 3 metres (10’) long x half a metre (2’) high, the solution would be there’s and they could also create a revenue stream from advertising third party businesses in the area they are in.

LCD Enclosure Global have many years experience manufacturing solutions that are off the shelf as well as custom solutions, this is why their outdoor digital signage enclosures are used throughout the world by the top tier of digital signage integrators. Their LCD Enclosure offers both vandal and weatherproof protection to NEMA 4X and IP65.

LCD Enclosure Global – anything else is a compromise.

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