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

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

Using a digital display instead of a static display is as easy as 1-2-3. Over the years, we realised how a large percentage of retail owners are hesitant and reluctant in using a digital display because no one took the time to clearly explain what the benefits are in using digital signage. The majority of them are still installing and purchasing static displays i.e lightboxes and posters which is a bit of a waste of money.

Yes, its true that the cost of digital displays is generally higher than the static display – there’s no doubt about that. But here’s why you should still consider in using a digital display:

1. Printing costs – there are no printing costs involved with digital displays. If done correctly, you don’t even have to spend too much money with design costs as you may already have existing content from your website or marketing material.

2. Resource costs – how much time is spent replacing static images. Wouldn’t it be more effective if your staff was actually serving customers rather than spending time hanging posters?

3. Animation and engaging content – this is used to attract more customer into your store.

4. Live information – e.g news, weather, twitter posts, facebook information, you can’t do this with static display!

The switch is easy… just contact advertise me and we’ll take care of everything for you.

Category: Digital Signage Blog Info

This week, advertise me decided to put together our own TOP 10 reasons why you should use digital signage and here’s our list in no particular order:

• The “wow” factor, if you want to stand out from your competitors, digital signage attracts attention and it’s definitely a way to attract customers into your store
• Because the other guy down the road has it – this may sound childish but it’s human nature to feel as though you need it because someone else has it
• For large shopping centres, digital signage is a revenue driving tool to generate money from advertisers. Digital signage can also used as a tool for notifying customers of information/sales/events to get more customers coming into the shopping centre
• It helps engage the customers at the point of sale – sales have increased with this approach (you can easily find proof of this from case studies that can be found on the Internet)
• Eliminates the cost and waiting time compared to printing. Content can be updated at any time and almost instantly
• Digital Signage gives the user the ability to run campaigns at certain time blocks during the day, and switching over to show relevant information depending on the time of the day. That means you’re in control of what is displayed to your audience
• Digital Signage can be used as a tool to interact with your customers. At times this can act as an extra sales person when all staff are busy – it definitely keeps customers entertained rather than waiting to be served.  Especially something for the blokes while they wait for their partners trying on countless clothes, it keeps everyone happy
• It’s cool and makes the environment more “livelier”. If done correctly it creates a unique atmosphere
• You will be able to display different types of content (advertisements, live TV, images, news, weather, basically whatever you want) on the same screen
• It helps your marketing team effectively and efficiently communicate messages with your customers, clients and employees

Do you agree or disagree with some of these reasons? Let us know of any other reasons why you should use digital signage.

Feel free to submit your answer as a comment.

Category: Featured Post

In one of our previous blogs http://www.digitalsignageblog.com/2009/11/24/shopping-centres-battle-of-the-big-screens/, we talked about the largest screens in shopping centres and apparently we saw another one the other day in the Parramatta Westfields centre. continue reading »

Category: Digital Signage Blog News

We came across an interesting article about an outdoor LCDs that  is able to cope in different weather conditions. 

Screen NT has installed a 42in outdoor LCD display to cope with the snow and ice of an Austrian winter. The display not only has to deal with the extreme Austrian winter but the hot temperatures in the summer as well.

The LCD display is installed at the Hotel Tirolerhof in the town of Zell am Ziller, in the Tirol region of the Austrian Alps.

Transreflective screen harnessess the sun to increase the brightness f the picture while a filter system protects the liquid crystals from the sun’s IR and UV rays.  The unit also features an automatic air-conditioning system to ensure safe operating temperatures are maintainined throughout the year.

Article and Image Source: avinteractive.com.uk

Category: Digital Signage Blog News, Featured Post

Most digital signage players on the current market will support the ability to import or use RSS feeds to display dynamic content. If you don’t know what RSS is and the copyright laws governing its use then keep reading.

What is RSS?

RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication and is used mainly for syndicating (updating) content on websites and readers. In digital signage, RSS can be used to dynamically grab information such as news, weather, stocks and any content on a website that supports RSS and display this on the screens. Normally, the RSS feeds are in XML format so they can be easily read by most RSS readers or XML compatible applications.

Copyright issues?

As digital signage players makes it easier for us to add RSS feeds, have you really stopped for a second and checked whether you are allowed to use the feed. For example, quite a number of news websites provide its readers with the option to feed content so they are able to receive the latest news information via their RSS reader. So for a digital signage network this is great feature to have as you will be able to entertain your viewers with dynamic information. Now here’s the complication, if you used the feed without obtaining approval from the content owner then you are most likely breaching copyright laws. If you carefully read the fine print on most websites you’ll notice that the feed can only be used for personal and non-commercial purposes. Are you getting worried now? This goes with many online websites such a this one. As a rule of thumb, it is always best to contact the website owner and obtain their approval to use the RSS feed even if there are no terms and conditions.

This blog receives over 100 rss requests per day so hopefully no one is re distributing this content without properly referencing the source.

So the next time you add an rss feed as part of your digital signage solution make sure you read the fine print.

Now if you need help in sourcing a news feed or any other RSS feed contact us and we’ll be more than happy to help.

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Do you use rss in your digital signage solution? If you answered yes, fell free to let us know what you use rss for by adding a comment.

Feel free to submit your answer as a comment.

Category: Digital Signage Blog Info, Digital Signage Blog News, Digital Signage Polls

It has been almost over a year since we had the intention of buying the domain name http://www.advertiseme.tv and we finally got it.

If I recall correctly, sometime last year we started receving promotional material about the availability of the .tv domains, so we did a search for advertiseme.tv and the domain name was available. We decided that we should include an agenda item in the next team meeting so that we could discuss whether to buy this domain name or not and determine how we were going to use this domain name.

During the meeting we all decided that it would be beneficial for us to have this domain name so we decided to purchase it but within a week someone else ended up buying that domain name. We were quite dissapointed and somehow I had this subconscious feeling that the domain search records for domain names were being tracked – big brother was watching.

But this year luck was on our side, the domain name expired and without hesitation we ended up purchasing this domain.  We intend to use this domain name for our digital signage online TV channel and potentially use it for syndicating content. This basically means that we want to enhance our clients digital signage signs by having more content available e.g. news, trivia, music clips, sports, stocks, weather and anything that people might be interested in watching.

We will hopefully launch our online services in 2009… so watch this space.

If you’re a content provider and would like to add your content or services to our porfolio just send us an email to info@advertiseme.tv

Have you ever let your domain name expire and regretted it?

Feel free to submit your answer as a comment.

Category: Digital Signage Blog Info, Digital Signage Blog News