WireSpring measures the impact of dynamic digital signs and interactive kiosks

A new article has been posted on WireSpring's weblog for dynamic digital signage and interactive kiosks. Today's fare:

"Measuring the impact of dynamic digital signs and interactive kiosks"

According to MediaWeek, possible ways of auditing digital retailing networks include relying on retailer information (like footfall traffic, etc.) and using a qualified auditing firm (think Arbitron or ACNielsen). Of course, neither of these take advantage of some of the benefits of digital retailing media. For example, with interactive kiosks one can log the events that take place on each device and use that as a very well-qualified means of recording traffic. Likewise, monitoring technologies can be used to supplement manual store audits, however these are still fairly immature technologies and are prone to errors (like this idea to basically put RFID chips into everything and track where they go).

How to charge?

The #1 question that I've been asked lately is how much to charge for a "slice" of time on a digital sign, or similarly, for a single customer interaction event (such as an application the customer submitted) on a self-service kiosk. The MediaWeek guys got a great quote from Hyperspace's James Davies (the digital division at poster specialist Posterscope), who notes that "[y]ou have big screens, little screens, screens with or without editorial, high frequency, long play. How you consume in the back of a cab is very different to how you consume walking down the aisle of a supermarket." Further, "a common trading currency does not equate to a shared pricing structure. The rate cards for both Vogue and weekly real-life title Pick Me Up are based on circulation, but an ad in the glossy monthly will be relatively more expensive because of the value of the audience and the worth of being in a lush environment with a longer lifespan." Relating the different kinds of digital advertising networks to magazines is a great idea, and immediately helped me to understand all of the pricing issues that surround these kinds of networks. Case in point: I've seen clients draw up invoices for their advertisers totaling anywhere from $125 to $125,000 per month. But in the former case, the price was per-screen, per ad, and the content running on the screen was entirely composed of 30 second commercials, while the latter case was a package price to place a 30 minute infomercial clip on several thousand captive audience displays. Thus, an apples-to-apples price comparison isn't appropriate at all.

You can read the rest of the article here.