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Point of purchase merchandising is a very big industry that takes many forms. Digital signage is a newcomer in this area that brings additional capability to the product manager hoping to influence the customer at the point of sale. No doubt you have seen LCD screens displaying movie trailers where you buy DVDs because this is an obvious application where showing videos enhances sales. Video is becoming common for advertising products as the cost of screens comes down but there are other uses as well. For example, the food court restaurants in your local mall have lighted signs that display pictures of the food and menus. One mall restaurant chain uses six digital screens in each location as light boxes to display pictures of the six food dishes that are featured each day. The screens have seventy-five pictures of different food dishes in their internal memory. Every morning when the menu is decided, they pull up the appropriate picture on each screen and the picture is displayed all day or until they select a different picture. The six LCD screens in this restaurant provide much more flexibility than a light box for about the same cost. An LCD screen doing the job of a light box is a very good idea for several reasons. In our restaurant example they kept one picture on the screen all day. Most people use LCD screens to show more than one thing in the same space. You can show your product but can also go through a list of features and options. Automobile dealers use digital displays to draw attention to the accessories and financing plans for your new car purchase because they make more money in these areas than on selling the car. Supermarket chains use digital screens to highlight sale items as an LCD sign can be changed easier than a printed sign. In all of the applications mentioned so far, the LCD screen is replacing traditional signage by offering more features. Point of purchase displays that interact with your customer can do far more than traditional signage. No doubt you have seen kiosks that print your airline boarding pass or used the automated teller in the US Post Office to mail a package. These are specialized machines to improve customer service. Kiosks in the above examples are complicated computer based systems that interact with data bases, process financial transactions and are far too difficult for the average person to deploy. A simple LCD screen that costs less than US$1,000 can do many of the same functions as a kiosk system. If for example you are trying to show your product features and offer your customer an option to receive more information on several products, this can be done with an interactive LCD media player. A system like this is ideal for point of purchase displays because they can be made very rugged, very reliable and at a cost low enough for widespread deployment. A display like this cannot swipe your credit card or print out a receipt like a kiosk can but it can do other functions that are important in point of purchase sales. Take translation for instance. All across the USA and throughout the world immigration has created multilingual societies. A simple LCD media player with an interactive option package can allow the viewer to see and hear his selection in his language. All for less than US$1,000 and depending on screen size – much less. Interactive displays are ideal for product comparisons and allowing the viewer to get the information he wants quickly. Customers are not willing to watch a long video or narrative that covers every attribute of your product. If instead the customer has a choice of quickly accessing the information he wants, he is more likely to engage with the display, make his initial inquiry and if it is favorable be drawn deeper into other product attributes much like you would with a website. Point of purchase displays take on many forms as product marketing people and advertisers are very creative. Interactive displays can be made automatic so the customer does not have to push a button for more information. For example, a screen built into a camera or cell phone display can be playing some general product information but when a customer picks up a display camera for a closer look, the screen automatically switches to show more information on that particular camera. Earlier I mentioned that point of purchase digital signage should be rugged and reliable. There are two important factors; the first and obvious one is that an unattended video screen in a public place can be a good target for an eight year old boy to hit with his metal truck. The display must survive encounters like this because they are common. The second reason is just as important and more to the point of why you are deploying the point of purchase display. You have a very short amount of time to get your customers attention. If the customer already buys your product you have no need to attract him so in all likelihood you are trying to attract new customers or help undecided customers make a selection and opt for your product. Your display must be operating when the customer approaches it; must quickly make a good impression on him, show him the information he selects and get him engaged. Your display should be self contained because internet connections are not always present. It should quickly recover from power outages unattended. It should not be obnoxious to the store employees. A simple motion sensor that turns off the sound when no customers are present can prevent a store employee who is tired of listening to it unplug the power. There is a lot of interest in operating LCD displays on batteries. Many screens that are 20 inches or smaller operate on 12 VDC so they can operate on a battery or in a car or bus. The rules of physics still apply however and screens that are big enough to make a good impression on your customer need a big battery and the maintenance required to recharge or replace it. You can add a motion sensor or push button to turn on the display and conserve your battery power but this wastes time in the critical moment you are trying to get the customers attention. In the case of a push button the customer is being asked to engage to receive more information so something else has to get his attention. Motion sensors that turn on the video cause an unacceptable delay to most viewers. The majority of users just let the motion sensor turn on the sound because at that point the video has already got the viewers attention. For your next product launch consider digital signage as part of your POP display. It is cost competitive for many applications and reusable. With new media and printed graphics an investment in digital merchandising can last through many marketing campaigns and do things printed media cannot. Tom Gullo is a business and new product development professional who is marketing digital signs that anyone can use. http://www.tjgtechsigns.com tom@tjgtechsigns.com Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Thomas_Gullo Continue reading →