Today I stumbled across the term “dayparting” when I was reading two articles relating to digital signage and thought I’d quickly explain what this means.

Dayparting in digital signage terms, means scheduling messages or content based on the time of the day to target different types of audiences. This is very similar to how TV advertisers reach their audiences. For example, on Saturday morning they schedule to play cartoon for the kids, sports on the afternoon and news or movies at night.

Now this is possible with digital signage when your software application allows you to schedule different types of content based on date and time of the day.

Category: Digital Signage Blog News

2011 has been great year for digital signage but in the media all we hear about is the big digital signage manufacturers/developers launching new products and  the large digital signage network owners growing their networks.

We hardly hear about the smaller companies launching their unique and innovative digital signage solutions and this year we want to recognise the quiet achievers. So if you’re a small business, let us know about your digital signage project so we can share this with the rest of the digital signage industry.

Category: Digital Signage Blog News

I’ve been stumbling across a couple of articles relating to SLIM digital signage players and to be honest I didn’t have a clue what SLIM was so I decided to dwelve a little further into this topic.

According to a-smil.org they describe SMIL as:

SMIL (pronounced “smile”) stands for “Synchronized Multimedia Integration Language” and defines scheduling (“Synchronized”), video, audio, images, text (“Multimedia”), multi-zone screen layout (“Integration”) in an XML-based text file format (“Language”). It is an open specification (royalty-free to use) created by the World-Wide Web Consortium, the same organization responsible for defining the HTML language, an open standard for the Internet. Products that utilize SMIL are available from leading companies such as Adobe, Apple, Microsoft, and Real Networks.

Digital signage deals with scheduling multimedia files for playback on digital displays connected on an IP network. The industry has roots tracing back for a few decades, but has recently expanded rapidly due to the proliferation of low-cost flat panel displays that are easy to install and maintain in public space. As the market expands out of the “emerging” status, mainstream customers demand compatibility and interoperability among products from different vendors. SMIL appears to be an ideal technology to answer the needs of the industry.

So basically, SLIM digital signage players are small form factor PCs that use this open standard. The purpose of using SLIM is compatability and the ability to reuse playlists and information across digital signage networks with different brands/model.

Category: Digital Signage Blog News

Net Display Systems  (NDS), is a well known digital signage software company based in the Netherlands. We have just read the following news:

Net Display Systems BV (NDS), manufacturer of digital signage software have closed a loan of approximately 1 million euro (1.33 million dollar) for financing its growth plans of 2012 and beyond. The loan will be provided by ABN Amro Bank. Jasper Verriet of ABN Amro Bank comments: “NDS showed a very strong and clean balance sheet and proved it was and still is beating the market.”

“We are very pleased with this agreement as it will enable us to accelerate our current market expansion plan.” – says Louis van Geldrop, founder and CEO of NDS. Use of proceeds will be to penetrate the Western-European market even further, while also opening branch offices in the United States and Middle East.

NDS also plans to hire additional executives, tighten strategic partnerships with some of its current channel partners. Peter de Jong, business partner manager for North America: “We explored the US market in 2011. Our next priority is to find sales executives for the United States branch office”. NDS considers local representation to be a requirement for accomplishing growth in new geographical markets.

NDS will broadcast a webinar on December 21st in which it will provide further details on the growth plan. If you’re interested to join this webinar please sign up here.

advertise me is one of NDS channel partners in Australia and have rolled out and installed PADS for several companies. They look forward to further tighten their strategic partnerships.

Category: Digital Signage Blog News

We recently helped one of our clients with implementing digital signage at their exhibition booth. As part of our digital signage exhibition package we included the following:

• Hardware rental of the LCD Screen, Stand and Digital Signage player
• Transportation of the goods to and from the exhibition hall
• Installation of the system and removal at the end of the event
• Template Design
• Management and Monitoring of the digital signage solution – we were able to monitor the system remotely and make the relevant changes if required

During this exhibition, we introduced an innovative way for the exhibitor to manually switch content with a push of a button. The idea was that on quiet periods, the exhibitor will push a button and the screen will display specials to draw more attention to their booth.

In addition, we also integrated Social Media (Facebook) with digital signage. The company’s Facebook page with the number of Fans was displayed.

We know how stressful attending and participating in exhibitions are, so let us take care of your digital signage needs whilst you take care of more the important taks.

Category: Digital Signage Blog News, Digital Signage Case Study

advertise me is your one stop shop for all your digital signage needs and solutions. Whether you need a digital menu board or an enterprise digital signage system, Advertise Me will be able to deliver a solution that will meets your budget and needs.
Advertise Me is a leading digital signage solutions provider and are able to supply digital signage displays from leading manufacturers, lcd/plasma/led screens, video walls, touch screens, digital signage players, digital signage software, digital signage servers, digital signage interactivity, digital signage hardware and accessories such as video extenders.
Advertise Me has completed digital signage installations at the major capital cities (Adelaide, Sydney, Brisbane, Perth, Melbourne) and can pretty much cover all the states in Australia.
So for your next digital signage solution, contact Advertise Me on 1300 880 005 or contact info@advertiseme.com.au or click here to request a quote.

Category: Digital Signage Blog News

We were recently contacted by a 3D screen manufacturer who wanted to introduce their products.
Now I personally believe that 3D screens are a great way to attract attention especially in bars and clubs, however is it worth spending the extra cash to replace your existing screens with 3D screens?

Category: Digital Signage Blog News

advertise me has showcased their digital signage solutions at the Digital Signage World 2011. The event was held over two days (9th & 10th June 2011) at Hall 1 at Darling Harbour Exhibition Center Sydney Australia. The Digital Signage World 2011 is the second digital signage event that has been held in Australia and is the only dedicated tradeshow and conference for the digital signage industry and included seminars from key speakers and exhibitors.

Advertise Me was one of the many exhibitors at the event which included large companies such as Sharp, Fujitsu and Netcomm. During this exhibition, Advertise Me stood out from their competitors by demonstrating the use of Social Networking tools such as Twitter and Foursquare to communicate real time information on the screen. The setup of their stand was also unique which incorporated the use of a video wall(2×2 47″ FULL High Definition LCD Panasonic screens) to demonstate different applications for digital signage. Here’s the setup:

The digital signage software that was used for delivering and distributing the content to the screens was PADS Professional developed  by a Netherlands based company called Net Display Systems. Net Display Systems has thousands of installations in multiple market sectors from transportation, corporate and government to hospitality and retail.

The PADS Professional software was installed on the Shuttle XS35 – one of the smallest and powerful PC we’ve seen on the market. The unit has an atom processor with an NVIDIA ION graphics chip set and is able to play Full HD videos without any issues. In actual fact,  we played a number of Full HD Videos at the same time and didn’t notice any lag. For convenience, the unit can be mounted on the back of a screen with a Shuttle VESA mounting kit.

The top left hand screen demonstrated the use of Twitter, Foursquare, News and Weather feeds, and the ability to show real time video (USB Camera) as an input source.

The top right hand screen demonstrated the use of Advertise Me’s custom built SMS solution. This digital signage solution enabled visitors to select a music video clip from a list by texting a code to a mobile number. According to the company, this application can be used with any digital signage software that can be connected to the Internet and it’s use can be applied in any industry. Advertise Me also used this solution to distribute the PADS demo key via SMS.

The bottom left hand screen played marketing videos and was also used to demonstrate the PADS software. This allowed Advertise Me to answer and show the user how easy the system is to use.

The bottom right hand screen played an image slideshow demonstrating the use of digital signage in different industries such as hospitality, education, retail and the corporate sector.

Facial recognition, hand and SMS interactivity were some of the innovative technologies being showcase at the exhibition and it is anticipated that businesses will soon adapt to these new technologies in Australia.

Advertise Me would like to thank their sponsors for their help and assistance:

• Net Display Systems
• Shuttle/Altech
• Panasonic
• Visual Sounds
• Squeak.com.au

Here’s a few more photos of the expo:

Category: Digital Signage Blog News

Let’s keep this simple, the only reason why you should install digital signage for your business is because everyone else is doing it. Yes, that’s my blog post for today. Short and simple.

Category: Digital Signage Blog News

Before we first started our company advertise me – we didn’t have a clue what the industry was called and the different terminologies that was used to describe this booming industry. Back then, the idea of having advertisements  or content such as menus, images, videos, weather feeds, and text displayed on digital screens was still at its infancy. Commercial plasma screens was becoming more popular and with the introduction of LCD screens, prices of plasmas was becoming more affordable. If you look at the below image of google trends for the term digital signage, you’ll notice that this term became more popular (from google’s search perspective) in 2007.  I tried trending the term digital out of home and dooh but google responsed with “do not have enough search volume to show graphs.”

digital signage google trends

One of the terminologies that we were unfamiliar with was  DOOH – to date we still don’t use this term that often since it has been replaced by Digital Signage. Now to me, the two terms DOOH and Digital Signage can be used interchaneably and I don’t care if there is a difference. One might say that DOOH (since it’s not at home) is a screen network in a public area and that digital signage can be located in a corporate building to display internal communications. To me, both are the same but Digital Signage sounds shorter and easier to say so we’ll stick with this.

If you have a different opinion let us know.

Category: Digital Signage Blog News

Written by Guest Blogger: Bryan Cochand

Communication is crucial to any type of business, but choosing the right way to communicate can be challenging. digital signage — a term for publicly displaying important information and announcements on a large plasma, LED, or LCD screen — is a cutting-edge method for businesses or organizations to get their message out to their consumers in an economical and flexible way. Catching up to all the advantages of this method can be an easy and very lucrative improvement. So if you are looking for new methods to increase the exposure of your company or organization, it may be worthwhile to check out the benefits of using digital signage.

continue reading »

Category: Digital Signage Blog News, Digital Signage Guest Posts

The Electrical Engineering Department at the University of Newcastle has implemented a digital signage solution  to help communicate information (course timetables, date/time and important notices) to students. The 50″ Screen is installed on a professional and sturdy stand that is located near the front entrance hall of the building. One of the main reasons why the screen is positioned in portrait mode is due to space – it was envisaged students would accidentally bump the screen if it is located in landscape. However, we supplied the University with a versatile stand that allows the client to easily rotate the screen in  either landscape or portrait.

Here’s a few photos of the installation:

About The University Of Newcastle

Sector leader in providing opportunities for students from diverse backgrounds.

Over 40,000 students including onshore, offshore and distance education.

Expanded into the Newcastle city centre on a campus accommodating business, law and creative arts students. Planning underway to establish education, humanities and social sciences disciplines in the city.

Home to the best engineering and health faculties in the country relative to size.

Even stronger health and medical research capabilities through the new state of the art Hunter Medical Research Institute building.

Increased reach across the region and overseas through expanded online program delivery.

Established infrastructure and support systems that provide one of the best student experiences in the country.

Category: Digital Signage Blog News, Digital Signage Case Study

Just for laughs, here is a picture of what you can do to cool down a FANLESS digital signage embedded player – you add an external FAN:

On a serious note, we did notice that temperature had an impact on CPU performance on a FANLESS embedded player so although there are some advantages of using a fanless system you may want to check whether CPU performance is more important for your requirements.

Category: Digital Signage Blog News, Digital Signage Blog Products

If your business provides an end to end digital signage solution, have you thought about which type of network switching infrastructure you should use for your digital signage solution? Basically, in the networking realm there are two main types of switches, one is managed and the other is unmanaged. What does this mean? Well, for an unmanaged switch you don’t need to administer or make any configuration changes – you power it up and connect your cables and that’s it, it will work. The only downside with this is that you don’t get the extra features like being able to remotely or locally manage the devices and use additional features e.g VLANs, Quality of Service, Security etc.  Many small to medium business would most likely use an unmanaged switch because it does not require additional resources and man hours to complete the setup. In this case, it means that connecting the digital signage players and servers to the network is simple and straight forward.

However, based on our experience working with large corporations they are most likely to have a Cisco or HP managed switches. To be honest working with this infrastructure can become very troublesome in some ways. Especially if the company uses VLAN tagging and manually disables each port. This means the installer needs to co-ordinate and rely on the IT network administrator to make the necessary changes on the networking switches. If it’s not done correctly or in a timely fashion, it could mean that the installer has no way of testing the digital signage players.

In my opinion, unless you need the additional features mentioned before I would personally just use an unmanaged switch – the overall solution becomes cheaper as well. As part of advertise me‘s services, we design and supply all the necessary infrastructure to build an enterprise digital signage solution that includes the networking component.

Category: Digital Signage Blog News

It’s interesting to see that the University of Melbourne has a Google Map of where their digital signage screens are located in their campus. In total (based on the information on the map) the University has 43 LCD screens and 1 Projector as part of their digital signage infrastructure. What’s more interesting is that they are using the NDS PADS system (based on a URL I discovered). The University uses this system to promote university events and initiatives to staff and students.

Here’s a map of their digital signage screens:

Category: Digital Signage Blog News

This week we were up to no good and opened up two digital signage players to have a look to see what is inside the unit. Here’s some pictures of what we discovered:

Digital Signage player 1	Digital Signage Player 2

As you can see from the picture, these players have the same components as a computer – basically it is a computer. It has a CPU, Motherboard, PSU (Power Supply Unit), Graphics chip, HHD, Memory, Storage Drive and heat sinks/FANs.

Most of the digital signage players that we have seen have an Intel Central Processor Unit chip. The CPU requirements will depend on type of content and software you intent to use the player for. For example, if you just intent to display images and text an Intel ATOM CPU will suffice but if you need to display High Definition videos with flash and images, then a Dual Core CPU will be required.

Digital Signage Player Intel CPU

In addition, the Graphics chip is also a crucial component when determining what digital signage player is required. In particular, there are different types of Graphics chips and cards that has many useful features e.g multiple video outputs (HDMI, VGA, DVI), extended or clone video (the ability to duplicate or extend the content to multiple screens)

If you intent to display lots of Videos as content, then the bigger the HHD the better. SATA is generally faster than IDE. These days, HD Videos can take up as much as Gigabytes of storage, and given that storage is quite affordable then why not have the large storage space.

Digital Signage Player HHD

RAM (Random Access Memory) is temporary storage that loads much faster than a HHD. Memory is also cheap, so the bigger the memory the better. Obviously, costs is always a deciding factor when purchasing any type of product but before you do decide to make that final purchasing decision, make sure you thoroughly review and test the unit.

Digital Signage Player Memory

Category: Digital Signage Blog News, Digital Signage Reviews

The title of this post may lead you to believe that I’ll be writing about a movie but I decided to share with our readers my thoughts on the digital signage screens/hardware in the current market. This is divided between the Beauty and the Beast.

Let me explain. The Beauty are those devices that look very expensive and pleasing to the eye but functionally, the system behind it is useless. It may catch your attention at first but then when you get to know the ins and outs of the device, you’ll just put it to the side and wished you never purchased it. Then you have the Beast, which I classify as devices that look weird, ugly and cheap but is sturdy and the overall system is exactly what you want. So which one are you currently using at the moment?

In the years that I’ve been in the digital signage industry, I’ve seen so many Beauties and Beasts. We constantly receive emails from overseas businesses showcasing their products and to be honest there’s never been one that just stood out. Maybe it could be time for us to start developing our own system.

Category: Digital Signage Blog News

I thought I’d bring this up again since I just saw a video of a digital signage presentation that I believe breached several legal aspects. I want our readers to understand this clearly before they take the next step further.

The first legal area is about copyright. Yes, it’s something we all know about but the Internet provides us with so much as information, images and videos that we sometimes forget how easily the content can be easily re-used. So for those creating content, don’t be tempted to just use content that you find on the Internet. There are many companies out there that is able to provide stock images, videos, templates etc. Most importantly, in the video I noticed that there was an option to add an RSS news feed from CNN news. Even thought the video was a demonstration of a digital signage system, I believe there was a breach in the RSS terms and conditions. The CNN website clearly mentions that the use of the RSS is for non-commercial purposes. We previously talked about breacking RSS copyright laws in the post titled: Are you breaching RSS copyright laws? By the way, in that post we mentioned that we were getting 100 RSS feeds per day(statistics from early 2009 and as of today, we receive over 1000 feeds per day).

The second legal area is about overlaying RSS text or advertisements or any other type of content over live TV feeds. We also talked about this in one of our previous posts titled Embedding live video content in digital signage. Is this a breach of copyright in Australia? For example, if you were showing a live feed of a soccer match and you overlayed an RSS feed at the bottom of the actual feed then you’re breaching some of the broadcasters terms and conditions. Besides all the legal jargon that you will find on the broadcasters websites, I believe the main reasons why commercial businesses are not allowed to do this is for the following reasons:

1. It costs big money to broadcast video content and they make the majority of their money by displaying advertisements during the ad breaks. By you displaying other content such as ads then the broadcasters are not making money from you and they obviously want to avoid this.

2. The broadcasters do not want to give the viewers the impression and confusion that the other content on the live TV feed is actually displayed from them. They don’t want the affiliation simply because they are unable to control what is displayed on the screen. Just image you’re displaying live TV of a news channel and all of a sudden you display an overlay RSS feed of the CNN news. Now, that will be confusing.

I simply want to make our readers, system integrators or digital signage users aware of some of these legal issues because I don’t want you to be in a legal battle – I’d rather you spend the time rolling out digital signage solutions than sitting in a court case. I also thought that our readers needed to be better educated on how to best use the features in a digital signage system and  not breach any laws.

Has these laws changed? If not, then think twice before you use some of the advanced features in a digital signage system and don’t blame the solution provider or manufacturer for giving you the functionality to do this!

Category: Digital Signage Blog News

Does anyone know or have seen a small digital signage player that is able to support HD (dual core) videos and can fit between the screen and the wall?

Category: Digital Signage Blog News, Digital Signage Blog Products

Here’s an example of why it is important to invest in a good screen and I’ll give two examples I saw at Darling Harbour in Sydney Australia. The first example is an LCD screen in Sydney Wildlife World that was relocated from the inside of the reception area to the front. I think the company realised that the location of the screen is important and that visitors walking past did not notice the screens when it was located at the back of the reception area. It is now located at the front closer to were most of the traffic is. Besides one set of the screens being too low (I think this is an OH&S issue – I could almost touch the bottom of the screen with my head) the quality of the screen was pretty bad – have a look at the below picture. I could hardly see the content on the screen even when standing right in front of the screen. I think it’s time for a replacement – please call us if you’re reading this and want it replaced.

The second example is from Sydney Aquarium, which is just around the corner from the Sydney Wildlife. They recently installed multiple digital signage screens at the front of their reception area. From far away, you can clearly see the content of the screen. The colours on the screen is bright compared to the previous example. It’s eye catching and that’s what most digital signage installers need to think about i.e how can I make my screens get noticed. In total they had 5 screens, 4 in landscape and 1 in portrait. My suggestion would be to use a digital menu board at their food counter.

Category: Digital Signage Blog News, Digital Signage Klips

I stumbled across an RFP that was released on the 15th March 2011 by bidUSA and here’s the link http://www.bidsusa.net/Default.CFM?Page=400&BSID=63937&PC=70DB213F . The closing date is the 29th March 2011 and it’s for the North Carolina region. Apparently from the title the RFP is for the supply of digital signage 46 LCD display screens. In order to obtain more information you will need to register and login. There is currently a special offer “Sign up today to get full access to bidsUSA through May 31, 2011. There is no cost, obligation or credit card required.” so for those of you who are interest, apply for an account and start bidding…. and good luck.

Category: Digital Signage Blog News

Just recently, the NSW Bus transport department launched an SMS service for it commuters to receive up-to-the-minute information about when the next Sydney Buses service will arrive at their stop. All you have to do is simply SMS your bus stop number to 0488 TXT BUS (0488 898 287) for up-to-the-minute timetable information about when the next Sydney Buses service will arrive at your stop. The stop number can be found on the bus sign. Now I catch public transport (both bus and trains) and when I was waiting at the bus stop I was thinking to myself why don’t they convert your ordinary bus signs with a digital signage screen and display the location of the bus on a map. That way commuters exactly know where the bus is and how long before it will arrive. At the same time, the screen can be used to provide advertising and other useful information such as scheduled outages. If you have a smartphone then an application can be developed to provide this service to the general public. One that can be faced with having such an implementation is that buses can be target by terrorist or stalkers.

The screen can also be interactive so that commuters waiting at the bus stop can interact with the screen. Here’s a good example:

Yahoo! Bus Stop Derby from Obscura Digital on Vimeo.

Category: Digital Signage Blog News

Last year we noticed a number of companies launching their audience measurements tools as part of their digital signage solution. The solution normally consists of a digital screen, server, digital signage player and a webcam. By using the webcam, the software tool detects and counts the number of people who are looking at the screen. For some solutions, it can even go beyond just tracking this number and determine what gender and age the person that looked at the screen was.
You may be asking yourself, “Do I really need this solution?”. If you’re a marketing or advertising company then yes, this information is critical. Using raw data and number to present to your advertisers will make a compelling reason why they should advertise on your screens.

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Category: Digital Signage Blog News

Digital menu boards are becoming the greatest marketing tool for Restaurants and food outlets. Why? Because food can be more engaging and enticing if there’s motion and if information can be updated based on time schedules.

One of the main advantages of using digital signage is the fact that if you own multiple stores at different locations, you can centrally manage all of these from the head office.

Traditionally, one of the most time consuming component of a menu board is changing the prices and images of the food items. With a digital menu board this task has become so much easier. For some digital signage solutions, all you need to do is update the prices in an image editing tool or edit a text file.

For those of you who are interested in a digital menu board visit advertise me – they are offering a packaged digital menu board solution which includes the following (click here to view their offerings and pricing):

• 40″ Commercial Grade LCD FHD display screen
• (Other screen sizes also available)
• Built-in Digital Signage player
• Creation and design of your menu board (preview some of our designs)
• 1 Year Commercial Warranty
• Operations/Training Manual
• Installation Guide
• Delivery

So take the step now and GO DIGITAL and contact Advertise Me to discuss your digital menu board solution.

Category: Digital Signage Blog News

At a recent digital signage implementation at Liverpool Hospital, we installed a digital screen at two areas of the hospital, one was at the student lobby and the other was at the training area theater. The digital signage system is used as a communication tool for staff and students.

One of the screens was installed in front of the training area theater that has a high traffic area. When we finished installing the screen, one of the training sessions also ended and within just a few minutes some of the visitors walked up to the screen and made some interesting comments. Most of asked us if they can take the screen home and how much it would cost. We responded that the screen was commercial and it wasn’t something they would want for their home.

The other interesting comment was can they watch TV. Being a commercial grade screen it didn’t come with a TV Tuner, so simply the answer was NO… and once again it’s a commercial grade screen. I guess from this, we realised how most people are not educated about the difference between residential and commercial grade screen. But what was more interesting is the fact that quite a number of people noticed the screen… it actually grabbed the visitors attention.

Now this was the same case when we installed the second screen at the student lobby area. Most of them were students and they too asked whether they can watch TV on this screen, unfortunately NO. What we did notice is that after 30 minutes of installing the screens students gathered around the digital signage screen and talked about some of the images that were displaying… that’s the power of digital signage and how it can be used to grab peoples attention and it really works.

digital signage student area

student area watching after 30 minutes of the install

Category: Digital Signage Blog News

Today I stumbled across a video from CyberTouchAV at the digital signage Expo 2011. This video showcased the Mitsubishi touchscreen panels – we’re actually resellers of the Mitsubishi screens so we’re more than happy to showcase this video. Single and multi-touch panels are now becoming more affordable and easier to implement. Here’s the video:

If there’s any other videos from the Digital Signage Expo let us know and we’re more than happy to share this with our readers.

Category: Digital Signage Blog News, Digital Signage Blog Video

What a great start to 2011. This month we will be working with clients in different industries; one is a large government agency with a roll out of 17 screens and players. Another one is in the real estate industry and the last one is a University. We will blog more about each project in the next couple of weeks.
digital signage is constantly growing and becoming more popular in Australia. Let advertise me help your business realise the benefits of digital signage and digital technology.

Category: Digital Signage Blog News

I have been asked this question quite a number of times and thought I’d give my opinion on which areas you can make money in the digital signage industry. I have broken this up into the following areas:

Selling Hardware/Software

I believe this is an area that the majority of the IT and AV companies are getting into which has now become over saturated and too competitive. With the growing number of digital signage manufacturers and developers, choosing the right solution is also now becoming more difficult. There are too many options available on the market. Each system has it’s own features and issues so choosing the most suitable solution has now become more difficult. I don’t believe there is a one size fits all solution on the market and please don’t try to convince me. I’ve seen and tested quite a number of products, both hardware and software packages and they seem to be either too limited in it’s capabilities or too comprehensive which equates to being too expensive. If you’re starting a business in the digital signage industry, selling hardware and software packages is not where the bulk of the money is unless you started at the early stages of the digital signage boom, or if you became a distributor of a well know digital signage company in your country. I don’t believe resellers make a lot of money just by selling another company’s equipment or software.

Now if you’re thinking of developing your own player then that’s worse. You’re going to struggle selling and and penetrating the market unless your solution is innovative and different from the others.

Maintenance

This is an area or service you would generally offer to clients who are purchasing hardware and software. The only drama is that a large percentage of clients do not think or budget for this particular service. It’s pretty much like selling life insurance to someone who doesn’t want it so if you have a good sales pitch and provide your client with this service then you may be able to earn some yearly revenue. The only catch is to make sure your hardware is reliable so that you don’t have to spend the time, money and resources to replace failed equipment. If its software, you may be able to charge an additional fee for upgrades and maintaining patches etc. I don’t believe there’s much money to earn from this aspect of the digital signage business.

Installations

This involves anything from installing the screen, digital signage player, configuring the software, network, cabling etc. These are one off costs and generally its for paying the labour costs – either charged per hour or per screen. So if your an installer you can make a bit of money from this but it’s not where the big $$$ are.

Content

There’s no point in installing a digital signage system if there’s no content. The saying “Content is KING” can be misinterpreted but in in the digital signage world content is important. There are different types of content e.g video, images, text, RSS feeds, MRSS feeds, news, TV and if you’re a designer, content producer or provider you can make quite a bit of money especially when content needs to be refreshed on a daily or weekly basis.  

Advertising Network

I strongly believe this is where the “secret treasure chest” is. Simply put, an advertising network is a collection of screens and an operator manages the contents on all of these screens. I know most advertising networks struggle in the first few years to make a reasonable profit but once they expand their screen and viewer coverage then they will be able to make a considerable amount of money. Advertisers are always looking at ways of marketing their new products and services and digital out of home advertising is an area that most advertisers are looking at spending their marketing dollars.

Building a advertising network can become costly at first (the operator covers the costs of all of the above areas) but the ROI is high if done well. It will be the most difficult and the most challenging but at the same time it will be the most rewarding.

Category: Digital Signage Blog News

You’ve seen these at retails stores, venues, restuarants, lobbies and propably you’re looking at one right now. They are everywhere and the popularity of these screens are growing at a tremendous pace. Yes, we’re talking about the Panasonic Plasma screens. Panasonic this year launched the 20 Series screens and they also included the release of 42″ and 47″ LCD screens.

In this post (one of many) we will showcase some of features of the Panasonic Plasma screens. Most of this information can be found on the Panasonic website or their brochure.

MODELS

Firstly, lets look at the two of the latest models of the Panasonic Screens:

PH20W – these are high definition screens with the SLOT 2.0

PF20W – the main difference between the PF and PH is that the PF is a FULL HD (1080p^) plasma displays and uses NeoPDP* technology.

*NeoPDP technology is a newly developed cell structure, an innovative drive technology, a new discharge gas and a revamped panel that has four times luminous efficiency compared to their 2007 models.

^1080p means that the screen will deliver a moving picutre of 1080 lines for sharp and clear display of fast-motion images.

SIZE

The size of the Panasonic Screens range from 42″ to 103″. You can purchase one of the following size: 42″, 50″, 58″, 65″, 85″ and 103″.

ENVIROMENTALLY FRIENDLY PANEL

The Panasonic products are more friendly to the environment. All plasma display panels are mercury and lead free. The display panel also offers a long life of up to 100,000 hours under normal operating condition. This basically equates to 11.42 years if the screen was left on 24/7.

NATIVE CONTRAST

Category: Digital Signage Blog News, Digital Signage Blog Products

Have you ever spent time looking at the packaging labels on the plasma/LCD boxes? I have about 5 boxes of Plasma  screens near my desk and when I looked at the boxes I noticed that there are quite a number of labels on the box. Some we actually need to pay particular attention to – especially if we were to transport the boxes.

So today, I decided to investigate what do some of these labels mean; some are self explanatory and you don’t need to be a genius to figure out what they mean but then there are some that seem unusual.

Let’s have a look at the images (note:I have provided my interpretation of what they mean – if it’s incorrect then let me know):

	The first image means to always have two people to lift the box since its approximately 40kg – this is normally a OHS requirement so whatever you do and now matter how strong you are don’t lift the screens by yourself. The middle image shows you to remove the plastic clips at the bottom of the box which is used to hold the top and bottom sections of the box. The last image, gives you a breakdown of all the components you need to remove in order to get to the screen.
	The top left corner image means not to stack anything on top of the box. The top right hand corner image means to keep the box upright i.e this way up. The bottom left image is a picture of a glass which obviously means that the item inside is fragile and there’s glass inside the box so take care when transporting the box. There’s also an additional message on the side of the box stating “As a glass product, treat it with extreme care.”. The bottom right image gives you an indication that the weight of the box is 40kg and it’s heavy.
	The first image means not to transport the box  laying flat and to make sure it’s in the upright position (middle image). Also make sure you don’t drop the box because there’s glass in there. Once again, there’s the message “As a glass product, treat it with extreme care.” and the Caution message: “Transport only in upright position”.
	The first two images are the same as above. The last two images indicate how to best clamp the box.

I wonder how many courier or freight companies transporting these goods actually understand these label mean and adhere to the instructions. I have seen some couriers take down the screens and had them in a vertical position… ouch. Fortunately the screen still worked but it’s best to follow the guidelines provided on the boxes.

Category: Digital Signage Blog News