Outdoor Digital Signage using dayparting.
Hotels, individual retailers, malls and many other places are often part of the digital signage networks and have found a common feature: demographic data and or changing customer wishes throughout the day. The savvy marketers can take advantage of the ease with which outdoor digital signage messaging can be changed and programmed to adapt these messages to different demographic groups that roam their locations throughout the day.
The concept is known as “day parting” something that TV programmers have been doing for decades. This valuable tool has only recently become available to outdoor digital signage and advertising professionals.
Perhaps an example best illustrates the concept behind dayparting. Imagine the busy lobby of the hotel catering to business travelers. Near the elevator digital signage keeps guests informed of hotel amenities and services. A smart buisness or company can take this opportunity to advertise the tempting breakfast menu using dayparting.
As the day progresses when businessmen leave for appointments, the signs display what office supplies are available from the hotel’s business center. Then the lunch time messaging is intermingled with the outdoor digital signage pages that promote hotel amenities.
As the evening approaches, the advertising message changes again to promote the hall or bar of the hotel. Dayparting can be used in a similar fashion in a retail store to appeal to different groups of buyers to read carefully the corridors at different times of day.
Outdoor digital Signage opens this approach to vendors. Before outdoor digital signage, the exchange of messages through the day was awkward at best and impractical at worst. Printed posters and signs – prone to rip and tears would have to physically be swapped out several times a day to accomplish the same kind of result.
Outdoor digital signage – profiting from dayparting.
The splitting of the day in to marketable sections is very lucrative and is being used in many outdoor digital signage applications too, such as in malls, retail stores and a new emerging sector for outdoor digital signage applications: transportation. Consider how the mall traffic changes throughout the day.
Even before the retail stores are open, many malls serve as track and community center for retirees to get their morning walk in before you start your day. As stores open your weekdays, buyers are more likely to be adults, many of whom do not work or are after getting an early start. As the day moves on to the afternoon, teenagers begin to appear when school closes. In the evenings, visitors to the mall are more likely to be people returning home from work or visiting after dinner.
How could they possibly expect sellers to tap into marketing opportunities for population-specific statistics, printed signs in this case? “Conversely, how could they possibly ignore the chance to cash in on dayparting their messaging to match the shifting demographics of mall visitors throughout the day?
Many outdoor digital signage hardware solutions come with software that makes provision for matching messages to the changing demographic audiences a breeze. Doing so gives marketers and advertisers out-of-home opportunity to tap into dayparting to increase sales opportunities and to better meet the information needs of their audiences.
Too often, people tend to look to the future weighed down by the past. While previous experience can be a good teacher, should not blind one to the opportunities arising from new approaches. Dayparting is one of many powerful opportunities presented by outdoor digital signage, and are there to be grasped to take advantage of there potential.