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Aug
11
Less Reach on Traditional OOH? VSS/PQ Says Yes OAAA Says No
Filed Under Advertising, Digital Signage, digital ooh, metrics | Leave a Comment
As a follow up to my last post on gas prices affecting OOH performance, Mediapost has an article on exactly this topic. Apparently the OAAA issued a rebuttal to VSS and PQ Media’s report saying Reach/Frequency was down on Outdoor ads.
Apparently the OAAA claims that absolutely nothing has changed, even though consumer patterns have. Hmm…well um…okaaaay. I find that a little hard to believe but they assert that they have just as much in public transportation, subways and the like that they still get the coverage. I’d hate to be an outdoor company with just interstate oriented billboards at this point. The OAAA haven’t stated any data or support to back up their claims but as the author of the article mentiones, it’s kinda funny to see the OAAA on the defensive only a year after they happily pronounced some of their best auto traffic increases - don’tcha hate the taste of crow?
This does however support my point that DOOH in retail and place based areas should see definitive traffic pattern shifts to their benefit.
The interesting thing is VSS remains positive on OOH and has increased their forecast for the entire OOH sector to 12 Billion, double every other traditional medium
But VSS remains positive about out-of-home advertising, forecasting a cumulative annual growth rate of 10.3% through 2012. At this clip, out-of-home ad revenues should rise from $7.9 billion in 2007 to $12.9 billion in 2012. That’s more than double the projected growth rate for advertising in general, which VSS pegs at 4.3% per year through 2012.
Jul
16
Will Gas Prices be a Burden or Boon For Digital OOH
Filed Under Advertising, Digital Signage, digital ooh, metrics | 2 Comments
Sometimes, there’s just a strange confluence of events that end up culminating in me writing about things.
My business partner, Jeff Atley, had a conversation last week with a gentleman who owns an oil field (why? I know not.). This guy mentioned in passing that gas prices could go up to $4/litre as soon as January and possibly up to $7/litre sometime in ‘09/’10. Now, the US is used to $4+/GALLON right now (which translates to about $1.30 per litre) so, to put that in perspective, that would be over $12/gallon for gas.
So I was going to write about it anyway as it has impacts on consumer patterns and therefore advertising purchase patterns, but then I saw this article on CNN, detailing the meteoric rise in Public Transit and the inability for cities to service the demand. Ridership is up huge. According to the APTA, in the first 3 months of this year…:
[Consumers] took 2.6 billion trips on public transportation during that period, an increase of 85 million more trips compared with the same period last year.
Jul
14
OAAA/AAAA DOOH “Proof of Play” Redux
Filed Under Advertising, Digital Signage, digital ooh, metrics | Leave a Comment
Both Dave Haynes and Bill Gerba have commented on the OAAA/AAAA DOOH Report Requirements in the past but I wanted to take a brief moment and look at them myself. The original release from the AAAA is here. The reporting post centers on “Digital Billboards” but I think may be able to be scaled out a bit.
I’m amazed sometimes at how people like to reinvent the wheel when a lot of work has already been done in the standards space…sometimes to much deeper levels. Between COMB, POPAI, OVAB and others, there’s lots to choose from.
Many organizations/associations have been trying to come to terms with what a valid POP (Proof of performance) looks like over the last few years.
I’ve written in the past about how POPAI’s standards committee has assembled a full proof of performance standard spec for the industry. It’s a VERY healthy read and spec that goes into a lot of depth.
Jul
11
Entertaining DOOH Content on NY Taxi
Filed Under Advertising, Digital Signage, digital ooh, humor | 2 Comments
As much as we all love talking heads from the news room with “kitchy commentary”, I take so many cabs in NY, I see the same loop over and over again. It gets dull …and I’ve already read my news (the stuff that interested ME) that morning anyway.
So it was nice to see some content that was actually entertaining yesterday evening in the cab! Looks like NY10 got a sponsor (Dave Middleton show and Loopt at http://www.loopt.com/) and they went bonkers with their intro sponsor wheel, which was …maybe 3 minutes long?
Two things I want to call attention to:
1.) I like this content. It was entertaining and at the very least DIFFERENT. Is it really that hard to come up with something other than repurposed and retranscoded wheels from TV? You’ll find the talking heads at the end of the video if that’s your thing. The sponsor also had some social relevance (again, to me) and they had a clear call to action that could be completed RIGHT THEN, via phone. They are, of course, a mobile service.
2.) You will get an idea of what driving in an NYC taxi is like. Sorry for the vertigo. Hey - you try holding the camera steady going 40 around corners with no suspension!
Video:
Jul
11
Tough Day On 8th Avenue - Screen Down!
Filed Under Advertising, Digital Signage, digital ooh | 1 Comment
As much as it’s nice to know that whatever system is powering the screens over the Port Authority on 8th is protected, apparently when this particular firewall wakes up with some error message (this particular message read “Your firewall definitions are out of date!”) and shuts down the software.
The result? A nice black screen with an error dialog. I wonder how much they’re going to have to give up in “make good” ad plays…
Not sure who manages this particular screen but tough love.
Jul
1
A Traveler’s Day in the Life With Digital OOH
Filed Under Advertising, Digital Signage, digital ooh | Leave a Comment
I travel. Ok….I travel A LOT and have recently begun taking the time to smell the roses and video instances of Digital OOH as I go about my merry way. Note that I’m not actually changing my patterns to go SEE Digital OOH, I’m just recording it where and when I run into it in my daily life.
So I was blown away when I assembled what I had recorded over a recent 24 hour travel period which took me from Newark to Toronto To Vegas, on my way to InfoComm 2008.
I ran in to 11 separate ad networks run by 11 separate companies. …and that’s just the stuff I actually spent time recording. There were several times I was on the phone and couldn’t use my Blackberry’s nifty new video features ro bring you the goods.
Note that the video is grainy and I’m a crappy cameraman but you’ll get the idea as you go along…
Video after the break…
Jun
4
Outdoor Promotions - Shiny New Vegas Bus Shelters
Filed Under Advertising, Digital Signage, digital ooh | 3 Comments
Alex Belensen and crew over at Outdoor Promotions just fired out a release detailing the launch of their VERY cool network in Las Vegas along the strip. They’ve got 2 types of displays and from what I remember they’re putting in about 100 of them.
The guys there beat out a number of the major outdoor companies to lock a 20 year ad deal with the Regional Transportation Commission of Southern Nevada (RTC). The 70″ screens themselves were provided by Samsung.
I’ve added some videos after the break and I’ve re-printed the release from Business Wire below.
Jun
1
More Attacks On TV Ad Budgets - But Turning the Titanic Ain’t Easy
Filed Under Advertising, Digital Signage | 2 Comments
Ad Age has an interesting article this week on some work that MediaVest (a Publicis Co) has been trying to do in shifting some of their client ad dollars in to new mediums (Cinema advertising specifically)…without much success.
The article is focused on the Cinema advertising business, which I consider a bit of a cousin to the DOOH business, although National Cinemedia is referenced in the article. Cinema advertising is much older than DOOH, although it met a lot of resistance when it was first launched (folks throwing things at the screens and such). It’s much more accepted now. It does raise some interesting points about the state of the media business and how hard it is to change Brand perceptions on where to spend their dollars. It’s ALWAYS easier to do the same thing as last year than bring new media into the mix, even if it seems smarter…
May
12
Adobe to make life easier for Digital OOH content design?
Filed Under Advertising, Digital Signage | 1 Comment
While the article on techcrunch about Adobe’s new “Open Screen Project” isn’t explicitly targeting Digital OOH, they have an interesting project and opportunity ahead of them.
According to the Project:
Adobe is making a big play to make Flash the de facto viewing environment not only for Web apps on your PC, but also on your mobile phone, your TV, and any other screen you can think of. It is announcing the Open Screen Project to make it easier to develop applications across devices—using Flash, of course. David Wadhwani, general manager of Adobe’s platform business (which includes Flash/Flex, AIR, and Cold Fusion), says:
We believe it is time for an industry-wide movement for a consistent way to develop across the Web for PCs, mobile devices, and TVs.
Dave Haynes has written about the potential for Adobe/Macromedia to pull rank on its license and force all those players out there who are illegally using Flash on their players to cough up but this move makes it look like they really want folks to make use of the technology….and making a “write once, run anywhere” version of their software is a darn good start.
Especially in the creative agency world, if you can transcode one piece of content and easily port it from one platform to another, it takes away some of those arguments on why not to use the medium (no $s to port content for a new medium) and makes the lives of folks like OVAB and POPAI a little easier in identifying format/content standards for Digital OOH.
More info after the break:
Apr
24
April 2008 Digital Signage Mixer - Toronto
Filed Under Advertising, Digital Signage, Event | Leave a Comment
Per the honourable Dave Haynes (hey! give me (and him) some latitude…I’m in a good mood); the monthly mixers have begun yet again!
DSE, TAB, Mediapost and more (the OutFront conference is tomorrow) have all made it a point to over-do the DOOH conference agenda in the last couple of weeks…and given (from what the agency planners are telling me) we’re all tired of hearing the same thing over and over, it’s about time we have a little cocktail party back on the home front and do it up again like we Canadians do.
The next Mixer is at Alice Fazoolli’s this thurs. An all round romp and good time. Feel bad but I’m out of town for the festivities but if you’re in town, I highly suggest you attend
I’m actually moving to NYC in a month and am thinking we should start the same thing in the City. I’ll pay for apps and food if anyone is interested in starting this round table in New York for May/June? Send me an email or comment below if you want to join/participate
