Shop Sinage

With major retailers like Wal Mart and other big investments in POS digital advertising, we can safely say that digital signals have come indeed as a merchandising and product promotion tool.

The strengths of digital advertising are well known. One of the commonly cited weaknesses is the lack of effective means to measure not only the traffic walking by a digital signal, but also the response of a customer and the level of commitment to the sign.

As interactive digital advertising begins to supplant traditional digital signs, new opportunities are emerging for measuring audience volume and response.

Gauging customer responsiveness

People of a certain age is likely to be remembered arrested in a mall by someone with a clipboard in search of participating in a survey on buying habits. If I remember right now, you probably also remember being somewhat annoyed or brushing the person with a polite "too busy "as you pointed at his watch.

Retailers know then, as you know now, that intruding on shoppers in this way detracts from their shopping experience and can create resentment in the long run.

Instead of live interviews, some retailers now ask shoppers to participate in surveys online, with links usually provided at the bottom of the income of the store. Buyers are enticed with chances to win gift cards or other prizes. The drop there, of course, is participation. As in the clipboard carrying inspector mall, online surveys are easy for buyers ignore.

In this environment comes digital advertising. Before the addition of interactivity, the evidence of the impact digital signal behavior had on shoppers was rather anecdotal - a loop video played on a certain given time and, coincidentally or not, sales for the advertised item went up.
Interactive or hybrid digital signals, on the other hand, are tailor made for tracking customer data. They can tell if retailers or customers are not responding to the signs and, if so, what triggered their response.

How Digital Advertising Customer Behavior issues

To demonstrate how digital advertising systems can track customer data, let's look at three methods of interactivity:

• Interaction indirectly. This interaction is not initiated by the customer. Usually involves some kind of motion sensor that triggers content to change when a customer stops near the sign and, in theory, takes a closer look. The digital advertising system can capture data about what was playing when the customer stopped so the retailer know what content is most effective.

• The touch screen. This interaction is initiated by the customer and as such, is more potent as a tool research. The customer is attracted to a digital signal and provides the option to touch the screen for sales and marketing information, to print a coupon, to check product availability and so on. The software that runs the digital advertising system can track what was playing when the customer touched the screen and the selections that the client shows that the more choices customers engaged. Follow-up time of the day against this data paints a picture of what type of buyers are in the store in several parts of day, so that advertising can be more specific for them.

• next generation. This option involves the use of cell phones and PDAs. Cell phones are part of the "next gen" in digital advertising. A call to action shown on the signs, prompting viewers to text to receive a coupon or a competition. As described in an article in 2006 on the media Canada Website, this method is similar to monitor the rate of clicks on a web page ad, as it says that the retailer exactly how many responses were for each call to action.

With interactive technologies capturing the kind of data that advertisers and marketers want to see, digital advertising - is already gaining popularity as a marketing tool - is about to become a stronger presence in today's retail landscape.

About the Author:

For more information on
Digital Advertising
and
Digital Merchandising Products
visit
http://www.ek3.com/digital-merchandising-products.htm

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Digital Advertising Captures Customer Data With New Interactive Technology