The Sign Connection: Evolving Trends in Marketing and Advertising that Impact our Industry

Digital signage is here to stay and the value will be understood as our customers and prospects see a dramatic increase in digital billboards. In the sign industry, if we don’t get in front of our customers first with the digital signage value proposition, someone else will own the digital signage space. Digital signage is not complicated. It has three components: a screen (the substrate), a player (provides the message to the screen), and the content. We have the opportunity to make some margin on the screen and the player. Our biggest opportunity for generating repetitive revenue results from managing and serving fresh content. We understand content and have created it for our customers for years. We just need to learn how to update and maintain content on digital screens. If you can create a good PowerPoint or keynote presentation, you have the skills to create content for digital signage.

The “Green” Message

Companies and people want to do the right thing for the planet and future generations; however, we may not yet be at the point in the U.S. where customers are willing to pay more for an environmentally friendly product. However, now that we are past the recession, “green” will become more important to a subset of customers at a certain time. More environmentally-friendly solutions are becoming available. Options include purchasing latex printers and printing on recycled or other substrates that reduce the impact on our environment. On the most basic level, turning off printers, computers and lights when possible is a step. On a deeper level, printing on materials that biodegrade, using wrap films that eliminate chemicals of concern and implementing bio-based, renewable products that reduce our carbon footprint are steps to be taken in the future.

Measuring Marketing ROI

We live in a metrics driven society; companies want to measure their marketing ROI performance. Although we measure more today than ever before, we realize that not everything can be measured. Web activities, particularly if you sell products online, are the easiest programs to measure as you can view website visits, actions and key word performance. Brand awareness campaigns are more difficult to measure since they do not always result in a timely sale. We can measure the effectiveness of QR codes on our customers’ signage and we can build a customer or prospect database using the SMS number we place on customer’s signage. We can meet with our customers to find out if QR Code and SMS campaigns are successful and providing more ROI information on their marketing. When we provide this kind of value to our customers, we truly become their strategic partner.

Getting Started on Reaching Your Goals

The New Year marks the perfect time to reevaluate your marketing and advertising plans as well as the products and services you offer to prospects and customers. Now is the time to take the first steps. It all starts with learning and stepping out of your comfort zone.