The future is now!
Video Walls and Digital Signage are all around us; how much of it do you notice?
Having fast food for dinner tonight? Take a look at the menu on the wall behind the counter; it just might be digital signage. Going to the bank on your lunch break? Monitors will be bringing you up to date on the latest banking products while you wait in line or you might be getting up to date information streaming from your local news.
From hospitals and airports to your local restaurants – so many businesses are taking advantage of the benefits of Video Wall Solutions and Digital Signage.
It’s a growing way to captivate customers with amazing visuals, to relay ever-changing information or to simply entertain while they wait.
Video Walls and Digital Signage are giving businesses an affordable way to deliver a higher volume of customizable messages every day.
What is the Difference Between the Two?
Video Wall Solutions consist of four components: displays, controllers, senders and streamers.
A display is two or more monitors positioned together to create a larger display. The bezels (or monitor frames) are super thin to minimize space between monitors – so that the display appears to be coming from a single source.
The controllers are computer servers that run on a network. They accept and process the input from various sources such as cameras, DVD/VCR players, computers, satellite imagery, etc. and transport those images to your video wall display simultaneously.
Controllers are designed with the durability to run 24/7 and can control up to 252 (or more) displays.
Popular movies like “Bladerunner” and “The Matrix” used video walls to give us the impression of a “futuristic trend” and I would agree; a decade ago they were futuristic and very expensive, and as a business owner it would have cost hundreds of thousands of dollars to have.
Today, it has become much more affordable to install and operate video walls as a powerful tool to captivate the consumer.
Digital Signage is the screen (or screens) you see in a waiting room that displays news and traffic updates, or it is a menu in a fast food restaurant.
It can be billboards and advertising, product or flight information, demonstrations, announcement boards and much more.
This format of signage is beneficial because sometimes information is updated weekly, monthly or even by the second.
With Digital Signage, you can schedule different monitors to display signs based on the time of day! The days of re-printing signs and menus every time a product has changed are gone! You can simply update your information remotely from a personal computer or server.
Saving you time, money and cutting down on your ecological footprint.
I remember the first time I encountered Digital Signage; it was at a fast food place. I was fascinated by it! What a great idea, having video screens displaying menu items instead of having to constantly update the information by hand, pairing new information with old, faded photos or having to use a backwards 3 when you run out of E’s.
Not only that, but it provides sensory advertisement for your customer.
Imagine this:
You’re at work and all morning it’s been so busy that you haven’t been able to get up from your desk. Finally, it’s your lunch break and you escape to the nearest deli.
You walk in the door and welcoming you on a screen is a large coffee cup with a fresh pot of coffee. The coffee pours into the cup and you can see the steam coming off the beverage – to top that off the smell of coffee is everywhere in the building.
Suddenly that coffee is an instant desire.
Now think about your industry. What could you do to create an instant demand for the product you want to sell?
With the integration of interactive displays such as touch screens, movement detection and active image capture devices; the overall impact of digital signage has the potential to be enormous for both the business and its patrons.
With video walls and digital signage becoming more affordable and easier to use it will certainly become more commonplace in every industry.
Remember where we’ve come from, see where we are now and imagine where we can go from here!
