Nice mix of vinyl and digital spotted over the weekend in Planet Hollywood, London. It’s a Monster Media UK install, window vinyl by tomas@c3londoncity.co.uk and sold via Wrigley’s USA direct by Monster MedIa.
The installation will be up until the end of March and is the first of several campaigns planned for this summer.
Interesting snippet from Futuresource Consulting who tell us that Digital Photo Frames (DPF) are now In 10% of UK homes.
Simon Bryant, Principal Consultant, Futuresource Consulting told us “Fuelled by a glut of low-cost 7-inch 16:9 offerings from a number of brands and retailers – including pureplay onliners – sales grew 60% in 2008 from 2007” – it seems that digital photo frames were once again one of the hot-selling products of 2008, shifting more than 1.8 million units at an average retail price of around UK PDS 90.
While demand is heavily reliant on gifting and impulse purchasing, the industry is watching closely for signs that consumers are actively using the products and that they will eventually replace units or purchase additional units.
Interestingly Simon Bryant also says “As many other products will incorporate the basic function of DPFs: TVs able to show photos, Apple’s Touch, Netbooks and the like – we’ll see crossover products that will beg the question ‘is it a photo frame or an alarm clock radio, a personal multimedia player or a portable TV?’”
About Futuresource Consulting
Futuresource Consulting is a specialist research and knowledge-based consulting company. With more than 30 years’ heritage, Futuresource provides its clients with expertise in consumer electronics, digital imaging, entertainment media, broadcast, optical manufacturing, storage media and IT.
Adrian J Cotterill, Editor-in-Chief
Author Thomas Fitzsimmons’ new crime novel, ‘City of Fire’ came to life on the Adspace Digital Mall Network last week.
It’s a 15-second spot that will run for 4 weeks in 105 Class A malls in the US to promote the March 3 national release of the book.
Adspace tell us that this is the first publisher to advertise on their network. Kyle Avery, a spokesperson for Forge Books told us “Most malls now have major booksellers among their anchor stores, so it makes sense to advertise in the mall to reach consumers”
Kyle added “The campaign is a great complement to the promotions using front-of-store visibility and floor display placement in bookstores located in participating malls.”
William Ketcham, executive vice president, chief marketing officer, Adspace Networks told us also “According to ShopperTrak, mall common area traffic in large, enclosed malls, is up almost four percent in February versus last year, so we continue to reach a mass audience near the point of purchase … we are confident we will drive traffic into bookstores and sales of this novel.”
Adrian J Cotterill, Editor-in-Chief
Premier Retail Networks won an ADDY award from the Greater San Francisco Ad Club for this endcap segment promoting Listerine Agent Cool Blue.
The award was a Bronze in the Out of Home/Outdoor Board/Digital or Animated category for a series of six video segments promoting Listerine Agent Cool Blue and designed to play on endcap screens on Walmart’s Smart Network.
The ad club believed that the creative demonstrated in a simple, effective way how the pre-brush tinting rinse works (used before brushing, it tints teeth blue so kids pay attention when cleaning their teeth).
PRN tell us that “the most effective strategy for endcap executions is to create a series of short format modules to keep the attention of the shopper”
For Listerine Agent Cool Blue, this involved producing a number of different segments that featured a mom and two kids that helped keep the creative fresh and compelling.
The ADDYs are the advertising industry’s largest and most representative competition, attracting more than 50,000 entries every year. The San Francisco ADDY Awards is the first of a three-tier, national competition, conducted annually by the American Advertising Federation (AAF).
Richard Fisher, PRN president told us “Given the high caliber of the San Francisco advertising community, we are extremely proud to be recognized with this award”
He added “It is a tremendous achievement for PRN as a whole and particularly our Creative Strategy and Production team. Special recognition goes to creative director Dylan Jones, Animators Adam DeGregorio and Scott Hess, and producers Jeni Sanborn and Rinchen Lama.”
These days we don’t often use the term ‘Captive Audience Network’ – in fact only recently Screens.tv questioned the validity of using this terminology.
Well, a swift visit to Oslo last week shows that the Captive Audience Nework, or CAN for short is still alive and well, as seen on the Flytoget Airport Express train service from Oslo’s main airport into Oslo itself.
Flytoget Oslo Airport Express
Item lengths ranged from 10″ to 60″; what we in the business might call ‘editorial’ or ‘long-form’ content: works well in environments with the appropriate dwell time and where viewers can give the presentation some attention but clearly not the right strategy for a retail environment where as a ‘glance media’, visuals need to work hard and quickly.
With no sound to annoy us or fellow passengers provided something of value to watch as we sped quietly and swiftly through the snow covered vista.
The presentation of content was clear (I could make sense of most of the content from 10ft away), with only train arrival times hard to read (pictured). What worked very well was the integration of the screens into the build of the carriage, in this case as part of the luggage rack and by virtue of its central position made the screen easy to see by all seated passengers along the entirety of the carriage (note all of the seats face the same way, towards the screens).
The Norwegians certainly seem to know how to create and deliver transport media, as was also highlighted by a previous post Airport Express Coaches, Norway
The media owner is JCDecaux.
Adrian J Cotterill, Editor-in-Chief
Exactly a week ago we saluted all those who had contributed to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_signage in our post on the same here and we highlighted the first introductory paragraph…
Digital signage is a form of electronic display that is installed in public spaces. Advertising using Digital signage is a form of out-of-home advertising in which content and messages are displayed on digital signs (such as LCD, LED or Plasma), with a common goal of delivering targeted messages to specific locations at specific times. This is often called Digital Out of Home or abbreviated as DOOH.
‘DOOH’ is pretty much an industry term these days but it didn’t take long for idiots to get involved and try to promote the term ‘adfotainment‘. The entry now reads…
Digital signage is a form of electronic display that shows information, advertising and other messages. Digital signs (such as LCD, LED or plasma displays) can be found in public and private environments, such as retail stores and corporate buildings.
Digital signs are used to advertise, inform or entertain, together known as adfotainment. Advertising using digital signage is a form of out-of-home advertising in which content and messages are displayed on digital signs with a common goal of delivering targeted messages to specific locations at specific times.
Luckily Wikipedia is somewhat self-policing and the ‘adfotainment’ page carries a proposal that the article be deleted because of the following concern:
Hats off to Barnaby Page who seems to be carrying the good fight on behalf of the industry here.
Various Atlanta newspapers seemed to be the first to report last weekend about Coca Cola erecting interactive advertising panels fitted with digital cameras at bus stops in seven Spanish cities. The panels let passers-by take photos of themselves designed to ‘capture people’s own unique moments of happiness’ and then in true UGC / VC2 style chosen photos will then be displayed on (said) panels.
Picture courtesy of LA noCONVENCIONAL
Our own people in Madrid tell us that technically it worked well but on a communication level not so – a lot of people did NOT know that the cameras were there for example.
There was also criticism from some that the surrounding poster was static and that you could not download the photo or do anything else with it.
Still, it’s another example of an interactive bus shelter – we think there will be more to come throughout the year.
Adrian J Cotterill, Editor-in-Chief
There are a couple of ‘gems’ from a rather upbeat RNS yesterday (no. 93370) in which Vision Media Group (International) PLC gave a trading update to the UK’s Alternative Investment Market.
Mike Cottman, Executive Chairman, of VMG told us “Our top line revenue streams, driven by our ground breaking ten year contract with Clear Channel, have begun delivering consistent and growing income … the Company remains optimistic that it can meet the current liquidity challenges of the next few months and trade through to reach the point in the Company’s history where it can develop sufficient cash to leverage the new model into a growing and profitable business.”
VMG admitted that “the installation process has been slower than planned due to the logistical challenges in gaining access to sites during the pre and post Christmas retail sale periods” but also said that “the remaining panels awaiting installation are now scheduled for roll out commencing in March 2009”.
BF Group Ltd (Stand #F39) is exhibiting for the first time at Screen Media Expo giving visitors the opportunity to showcase some of its elegant and sophisticated products. BF Group is giving centre stage to their new and exciting product – a black, 57-inch, double sided Architectural Sculptured Unit, designed to capture audiences with its unique and stylish look. The company will also be showing off their “Iconic Pod” which was produced for VMG and is currently being rolled out to shopping centres around the UK.
We understand that demand for the Iconic Pod panels has been brisk with national brands such as SkyTV, Unilever, Fox Films, 3-Mobile, “3” and UK Living all running campaigns. It seems to us that the UK media buying agencies are demonstrating an increasing appetite for using (all) digital panels (D6’s etc) as an accepted media format.
Late last week Digicom, the UK based Out of Home Digital Media Sales startup issued a comprehensive RFP for what it describes as a ‘Digicom Business System’ or (DBS) for short.
The software solution required will need to automate a number of internal and external business processes whilst providing web based access to Digicom’s media agencies, network partners and eventually its advertisers.
The RFP deadline is 27th March 2009.
Adrian J Cotterill, Editor-in-Chief
We would like to welcome and thank BookingDOOH and C-nario who are advertising with us for the rest of the year and the next few months (respectively).
BookingDOOH is the first global online booking platform for digital-out-of-home advertising and brings thousands of screen displays together on a single platform and organizes them by geographical location, installation type and format. It’s also free: network operators and media buyers can share the same market place at no cost and reference their advertising media or plan and book their next DooH campaign.
C-nario is setting the standard in digital signage software through innovative end-to-end products and solutions and is used in the retail industry, finance, media, entertainment and out-of-home advertising. C-nario provides a complete digital signage display, distribution and management platform for digital signage networks at any shape, size and resolution at pixel-perfect quality.
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