What a year it’s been for Out-of-Home (OOH) advertising. The industry has embraced innovation and technology, collectively investing to upgrade digital and interactive capabilities around the world to take advantage of the convergence of online, social and mobile media. Quite simply, OOH advertising is now a highly effective, highly engaging advertising platform, accelerating and amplifying online, social and mobile advertising campaigns by allowing consumers to interact and transact with brands.
One of OOH advertising’s greatest strengths has always been its ubiquity, reaching consumers where other media don’t go, wherever and whenever they commute, work, shop, travel and play. When you layer on top of this screen technology like interactive touch screens, Near Field Communications, and a host of other advanced technologies like geotargeting and augmented reality, advertisers now have the ability to interact, engage, and inspire like never before, to create genuine, two-way brand relationships.
We’ve seen many online advertising and marketing strategies start to creep back into the OOH media picture. The use of interactive displays has allowed OOH campaigns to tie into digital and online campaigns well. Compared to traditional OOH campaigns, using interactive displays on LED screens and other formats allow companies to increase their chance of conversions by promoting more instant interactions with the customer. LED technology is also expected to play a big part in this shift, as it’s great for viewing from long distances; it also allows for interactive capability and will be implemented across different locations from shopping malls to highway billboards.
We’ve seen some truly innovative campaigns on our streets and in our shopping centres that have been interacting with consumers and getting them to linger that little bit longer. The Google Outside project took search from a desktop or mobile to the real world. Or, more specifically, to 160 sites in London. The outdoor panels placed in bus shelters and subway stations provided real-time, location-based info on weather, travel and local curiosities. In South Africa we saw the launch of the new Toyota Etios with a charming installation - a tweet-sampling machine which rewarded South Africans for stopping and tweeting with the designated hashtag (#etiossmile) with sweets that were released and delivered, through a Rube Goldberg-style machine, as a direct result of the social engagement.
Apart from interaction and digital displays there are many strategies being applied online that will soon be helping OOH advertising innovate once again. For example, social media platforms such as Foursquare have already begun letting customers check into displays and receive corresponding benefits. This allows for different deals to be given out at different locations, which relates back to targeting. The use of interactive screens will also allow OOH campaigns to seed further into digital and online campaigns as well. Imagine social media contests and check-ins, being combined with displays in places like shopping plazas where brands can directly boost spend. This cross-platform marketing would allow for companies to experience a level of interaction with customers and deliver potential for conversion that’s been previously unattainable for a long time.
The quality of technology has helped boost the capability of brands to target consumers through engaging their senses. Cinema-quality, digital showcase screens along with full screen surround wraps and the latest sound technology can fully engage with shoppers. Ensuring that the location is on the shoppers’ journey is important here too because they’ll already be in the right frame of mind and be more receptive to entertainment. When a watch brand wants to target shoppers, what better place to elicit engagement than with screens in a shopping mall minutes away from an H.M.Samuel or Goldsmiths?
The future is bright for the OOH sector, with a beautiful combination of both analogue and digital offering up endless opportunities for the industry. Next year should see the industry continue to develop new interactive ways of engaging consumers, meaning Out-Of-Home is going to get even more Out Of The Ordinary.
By Romain Greze, Managing Director of Limited Space.
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