Give the customers an improved impression of the PVM

Security cameras have been around for a long time. And you see them everywhere, the PVMs (Public View Monitors). These monitors are there tell that there is surveillance and nothing else. However now, digital signage can add a new dimension to the previously quite uninteresting and sometimes quite ugly PVM. Now you can digital signage to make the PVM screen much more interesting, flexible and useful to the customers than ever before.

Public View Monitors, PVM are common in stores and other public places. The appearance of PVMs is not only a way to decrease theft but also to get people to feel more secure. However, today’s large flat panel monitors give an opportunity to combine security camera images with other messages. This makes the screens more interesting.  Adding other messages make it obvious that the monitors do not only serve as a way to warn potential shoplifters and to assure the customers that they are in a secure environment but also make the screens more useful to whomever is watching them.  

To the retail chains, the combined digital signage- and security camera monitors creates an opportunity to advertise their offers and to communicate with the customers. On top of this the monitors also get more attention if the screens, on top of security camera monitoring, contain other useful information such as weather reports, news or stock market information. The MultiQ digital signage system contains all the tools needed to make your PVM much more than just a PVM.

A simple way of increasing the value of the PVM to the customers is to add a text ticker at the bottom or the top of the screen. The ticker can contain manually added text or pull text directly from an RSS feed on the Internet and only occupies a small fraction of the screen. There are RSS-feeds available that covers news, weather, sports, economics and lots of other subjects. RSS feeds are a valuable source of information ideal to digital signage but still unknown to many people. The MultiQ digital signage system pulls the RSS information directly from a source on the Internet and creates the ticker on the screen. As the RSS feed is updated the ticker gets updated as well. You can choose the appearance of your ticker when it comes to font size, colors and speed (how fast the text moves across the screen).

The security camera part of the screen can present a sequence of spots from several cameras as well as quad views containing four simultaneous cameras. The spots can be arranged in any order and the selection of each view can be chosen freely. You can have an unlimited number of full screen camera spots and quad spots played in any combination you like.

A simple way to add information and advertising is to mix the video from the cameras with other images and video clips. This can be done in a pre-determined sequence or in a random way using shuffling between the camera spots and the advertising spots.

It is possible to schedule when to monitor different cameras. This makes it possible to automatically change between different views at different times of the day or different weekdays. The scheduling feature is of course valuable when it comes to deciding at what hours to display specific advertising or when running advertising campaigns. Signs containing instant messages can be added at short notice by the local staff.

Digital Signage allows the screen to be split into several areas. One area can be used to monitor the security cameras while the other areas can be used for advertising and information. This makes it possible to display security camera images, advertising and messages simultaneously. You can decide freely how to split the screen. I.e. that it is possible to determine exactly the size of the area where you put the security camera monitoring in relation to other messages. The PVM can occupy a large portion of the screen or a very small part of the screen.

Live TV delivered by a streaming device can be used as an alternative to camera monitoring and video clips. This way you can schedule live TV events to be shown on the screen. In the MultiQ system, security camera streams, live streams, video clips and images are all regarded as media spots that can be mixed to play in the same sequence or be scheduled to play at any time you like.

In most PVM applications the audio is not used. Then the audio part of the MultiQ media players can be used to provide an in store radio channel since the audio can be completely separated from the video. Hundreds of songs can be stored in the media players.  By shuffling the songs, an in store radio channel is created that adds to the atmosphere at any location.

You can run a MultiQ PVM as a single unit (without the need for a central server) that can be locally or remotely controlled and supervised via the Internet.  Alternatively you can manage a number of screens as a group (up to thousands of units) located at hundreds of sites using a central server.

The MultiQ digital signage system lets you combine the security camera images with all kinds of messages on the same screen. It can also provide you with an in-store audio channel.

 

Lars-Ingemar Lundström

Documentation and Training Manager, MultiQ

Get an introduction to digital signage and kiosk content creation

Use the opportunity to learn about digital signage content creation. Two new quick guides give the answers to some of the common questions about how to start with design content for digital signage and kiosks. You will learn how to set up your own content using inexpensive drawing-, video editing- and web development quick-to-learn tools.

The MultiQ Digital Signage Creation Quick Guide Part 1 & 2 can be
downloaded from the MultiQ website along with sample files.

The MultiQ Digital Signage Creation Quick Guide tells about how create your own digital signage content using external tools that are easy accessible and inexpensive and then how to distribute and present the content in Full HD format using the MultiQ digital signage system.

Part 1 of the guide covers the key elements in setting up digital based on photos of your products.

Digital signage is in many cases based on the simple elements of a trademark or a logo combined with a product image and some selling text. You will learn how to set up a sign using these basic elements. After having produced your first sign, you can make more signs and create a slideshow.

Easy-to-use video editing software let you add professional effects such as transitions including stunning effects and animated text. You will also learn how a number of photos can be put together to form a collage that adds to the atmosphere in the store. Special graphical effects and animated text will increase the impression on the customers even further.

Take the opportunity to use the media players for in-store audio. Playing shuffled music in your store is only a few mouse clicks away.

Extend your digital signage into video walls with dynamic use of the monitors. Learn how to easily produce content covering the whole video wall with a common message. The minute after, let the wall display a mosaic of individual messages on each of the monitors.

For the ambitious, an unlimited number of media players can be synchronized to produce stunning environments with high-resolution animations that move across several screens in high definition. Par 1 of the quick guide tells you how.

You will also learn how to go the other way around and split a screen into separate areas with content originating from different sources. Adding an RSS ticker is perhaps the most well known example but all kinds of content ranging from images to video clips and online web pages can be used.

Finally, part 1 of the quick guide covers how to introduce live content from cameras and live TV services using sources on the local network as well as external streams available on the Internet. You can also combine the live feeds with commercial spots and signs.

Part 2 of the quick guide introduce you to the fascinating world of kiosks. Kiosks are intended to activate customers and make it possible for them to find the information they wish for. Using a web kiosk you can promote your website into your store and let your customer find the right information at the point of sale.

You will also learn how to create touch panel information kiosks and getting the right touch-and-feel into your applications. There are alternatives to create interactive touch buttons using drag and drop WYSIWYG tools as well as using more traditional text editing methods described in this guide.

The MultiQ Content Creation Quick Guide is a shortcut to effective digital signage.

The MultiQ Content Creation Quick Guide along with content files used and created can be downloaded here;

• Part 1, Get a start with Digital Signage (pdf)
• Part 2, Activate your customers with kiosks (pdf)
• Content (zip)

Lars-Ingemar Lundström

Documentation and Training Manager, MultiQ

Schedule your message

Dynamic content is better than static content. But why not adapt the content to the time of the day or the day of the week? To Show the right content at the right time is crucial to advertising.

Digital signage is very versatile in the way that you can plan your advertising campaigns down to the minute. You can start using particular content at a specific date and then have it all replaced at another date. This is very practical since you can prepare holiday advertising in advance and you can be sure that the right content is shown at the right time. Unlike traditional signage you do not need to rely on local staff or other personnel to get the messages updated.

Lars-Ingemar Lundström
Documentation and Training Manager, MultiQ

Low power consumption -Economical and “green” digital signage & kiosks

In a pilot system involving a limited number of media players and monitors at a handful of sites, the power consumption of each unit is perhaps not the first thing you think about. But in a fully operational system with perhaps hundreds of media players it should to be taken into consideration.

A successful digital signage or self-service kiosk system will grow. By numbers the total power consumption of such a system can be significant. Therefore the power consumption of media players and media monitors used as kiosks are an important part of the total cost of ownership. Unfortunately many people forget to calculate the total energy costs for a system during its depreciation period. Both from an economical and environmental point of view, this should be taken into account.

Conventional PCs may have power consumption up to 150W depending on various factors. Industrial PCs with passive cooling may have a power consumption of 35 watts and more. Sometimes you may get better performance from a computer with higher power consumption but it comes with a cost. 

Each 50 W of power consumption means 432 kWH/per year. With an electricity cost at 0,1 Euro/kWh (which is only applicable in European countries with a very low price tag on the electricity) this means 43,2 Euro/year. During a 5 year period this corresponds to 216 Euro which is a considerable part of the initial cost for the individual media player.

To make more calculations on power consumption you can use the “MultiQ Kiosk Cost and Environmental Impact Estimation calculator”:

http://multiq.com/doc/developers/cost_saving_using_multiq_media_monitors.xlsx

The MultiQ media players consume less than 10 W and the media monitor with integrated media player consumes less than 50 W.

The power consumption is decreased further by scheduling the display hours. This means not only saving energy but also increase the lifetime of the monitors since the panels are preserved when the monitor is set to standby mode.

Also, electronic equipment that consumes less power emits less heat. In most cases less power dissipation means longer lifetime expectancy. Calculating the total energy consumption during the entire lifetime of the system is good both for the wallet and the environment.

Using media players and monitors with low power consumption (media player <10W and media monitor with integrated media player <50W) combined with scheduled display hours (outside which the monitors are set in standby mode) assures for low total power consumption.

Lars-Ingemar Lundström
Documentation and Training Manager, MultiQ

 

Reliable digital signage -Never a black or a blue screen

Black or blue screens, messages about failed security updates; those are most certainly among the nightmares of any digital signage- or self-service kiosk system operator. How to avoid this happening to you?

Today’s digital signage technology makes use of all advances that have been made during the last decade to ensure flexible and adaptable computer solutions. However, digital signs are used for 24/7 operation which is quite different from home appliances or computers and equipment used in an office. Therefore conventional PCs are not suitable for this task. Just as you have professional demands on kitchen stoves and other machines used in a restaurant kitchen compared to appliances in a home kitchen, there are special demands on computers used for digital signage and kiosks in stores and in other public environments.

There are a number of things that may cause problems in a digital signage system.

There are several reasons for avoiding fans in media players. Apart from being noisy, dust is dragged into the media players and is accumulated there which eventually calls for vacuum cleaning to avoid fan failure and overheating. In most cases the fans need to be replaced after about three years more or less. This causes a lot of maintenance. Due to low power consumption, the MultiQ products only use passive cooling resulting in noiseless operation without maintenance for many years.

All moving parts result in noise and maintenance. To completely avoid this, the hard drive can be replaced by a flash memory. Today these memories are inexpensive and have large capacity. The MultiQ media players and media monitors make use of these advances. With a system based on an economic distribution of Linux, which fits into less than one GB, the remaining flash memory is enough to house even commercials shot in full HD format. If needed, the internal memory can easily be expanded using an external flash memory.

Security update messages and security updates that fail are common in Windows based systems. When using Linux, you do not have these kinds of problems.

Computers tend to hang themselves sooner or later. A corrupted file gets downloaded to a media player and gets stuck, power transients affect the computer or something never tested before may occur in the software. We all know that PC users are very patient people that accept to do some maintenance work almost every day such as taking care of error messages or restarting the computer now and then. In a public environment the local staff should not and do not want to restart the media players now and then. To solve this, the media players or kiosks must be able to reboot themselves autonomously. In the MultiQ media players and media monitors there are two watchdogs monitoring each other and rebooting if there has not been any signs of life from the other watchdog for a certain amount of time. The watchdogs see to that the media player or media monitor reboots before anyone grabs the phone to call for assistance.

The MultiQ media players and media monitors are based on hardware and software specifically designed for digital signage. They are based on Linux, and do not use any moving parts for cooling or storing the content. This assures for a long and lifetime with no worries and no or limited maintenance. The units have 3 years standard warranty and 5 years as an option. This is similar to the lifetime expectancy for cash register systems which are 5-7 years.

In the long run, reliable hardware and software that require a minimum of service is the key to successful digital signage and kiosk systems. As the number of units in the system increases, these aspects become more and more crucial.

Things that assure for long-time operation free form maintenance and worries.

Lars-Ingemar Lundström
Documentation and Training Manager, MultiQ

Start off simple when it comes to content

To create content to be used in a digital signage or self-service kiosk system is not as hard as you might think. You probably have much of the content already.

Digital signage and kiosk systems have both been around for some time but still people often feel a bit confused when it comes to producing the content. Perhaps one of the reasons is that there is a multitude of possibilities. However you do not need to embrace everything at once.  In principle, you can start off with a screen that displays a simple slideshow and then move on from there.

Lots of people ask themselves:  -How can I obtain content to use and who is going to make and support the content? Do I need a special department in my company handling all this?

Actually, introducing digital signage or kiosks in your operations is quite comparable to introduction of web sites. Today, the website is a natural part of the sales and information systems of all companies. With a digital signage system that supports web content you can basically let your own staff or your web bureau use their existing tools to make content. A typical slideshow can either be images, such as photos or a sequence of web pages. Your existing printed signs almost certainly exist in an electronic format and you can say that what you do is to replace the printing process by electronic display. The quality requirements when it comes to image resolution is in most cases less in digital signage than in print but higher than is the case for web production.

Yes, you will need to produce more content than for print (since you can show several signs in sequence on the screen), but on the other hand you will not have the printing costs. Also, if there is a mistake done during the production you do not need to throw away the printed material and it only takes seconds to correct the problem.

Set your ambitions according to your actual needs

Some years ago, qualified advertising bureaus where needed to produce content. This meant that small businesses could not afford qualified advertising. Today however there is something for everyone. If you have a small business with just one store you can regard digital signage the same way as you do with your website. Simple signs and even HD video clips can be produced using a simple video camera and easily accessible software such as Photoshop or Pinnacle Studio. On the other hand, in large companies or retail chains, the best choice can be to let the same people as is handling the website to be in charge of the digital signage content as well.

Producing video clips is not as complicated and expensive as it used to be. Online video distribution, such as YouTube, has paved the way.

Since content basically consists of images, video clips and web pages, conventional content creation tools can be used. Therefore existing knowledge in these areas can be reused.

Try to check what kind of content is already available in your organization; probably there is a lot that can be reused.

Digital signage content consists of conventional media files such as images, video clips, Flash animations and web pages.

Lars-Ingemar Lundström

Documentation and Training Manager, MultiQ

Reflections from Suomi/Finland

Hi, just got back after visiting Finland 2 times in a week. I have meet potential new clients, conducted a seminar with one of Finland leading media agencies and trained sales personal at our partners office. There are some things I find extra interesting:

• Not many screens, I did not see a single screen in food markets and hardly any in retail environment.
• The Digital signage I saw was driven by advertisement (free monitor in exchange for showing ads from other companies) and some menu boards in fast food chains. Not even with moving content to make impact. I wonder why?

On the other hand there is a huge interest and many intelligent questions asked, thoughts and ideas are in the front line. Evaluation and proving benefits in figures is very important. Business models for new "not ad-driven" digital signage are reasonable and focused on revenues. Schools are planning courses in digital signage.  My impression is that platform suppliers that can offer 24/7 solutions, open API:s, service and support, extended warranties fit very well in that model .

Niklas Forslund

Business Developer, MultiQ

Who is to create and publish content, do installations and maintain digital signage within your organization?There is really very little difference between managing a website and managing a digital signage or self-service kiosk system.

One of the most common worries I have found among customers is that they worry about who is going to handle digital signage in their organization? It is not as complicated as you think.

In a previous blog spot I mentioned the initial problem of getting different departments within an organization to work together. When it actually comes to starting up a pilot project there are many worries about who is actually to do the job to get everything up and running. Things may seem to fall between the chairs which eventually may jeopardize the project.

The important thing to remember is that to handle a digital signage (and self service kiosk) system that has a central server is very similar to handling a website.

When it comes to content, this may be handled by the same people as are in charge of the website. Content is similar and much may be reused from the web activities. Many websites already include videos and the technical quality of video on the web has increased considerably during the last years. Today HD quality video clips are commonly used and handled by the same people that are handling the website.  Therefore much already existing content can be reused. When it comes to publishing, handling the content management system is really quite similar to maintaining a website. The main difference is that in a website you work with a tree structure to organize the content while in digital signage you work with loops of content. One thing that is much easier than in conventional website development is the fact that when using web content you only have one kind of web browser to take into account, the single kind of web browser that is used in the media player. This is to be compared to websites on the Internet where you need to consider all kinds of web browsers that are in use.

Another worry is how to handle the server system and security issues. The answer to this is the same as before. The similarities to handling the web make it possible to use the same solutions as for your website. The management server of the digital signage system can be hosted by you or by a hosting company (MultiQ can also provide this service). Just as for the website the server can be placed outside your company firewalls. It is always the media players that address the central server and not the opposite and you will not get any firewall problems at the sites. It is the media players that surf to the management server. All very similar to how your website works.

Installing the monitors, media players and kiosks is very similar and even easier than installing other similar equipment in the stores such as cash register systems and security camera systems. Digital signage is based on the well-known existing technologies of today such as broadband-, local area network-, computer- and display system techniques. Digital signage and kiosk systems do not include any unique components that cannot be handled by installers dealing with public areas. It is more or less just to plug in the power and network cables.

Setting up and maintaining a digital signage system is obviously very similar to running the company website and installing and maintaining the already existing equipment in the stores. Even though you may think that digital signage and self service kiosks are something new and strange, you have probably done it all before.

There is really very little difference between managing a website and
managing a digital signage or self-service kiosk system.

Lars-Ingemar Lundström

Documentation and Training Manager, MultiQ

Where does digital signage and self-service kiosk systems belong in an organization?

Who is the best suited to handle digital signage and self-service kiosks within an organization? Should it be the marketing department, IT department or somebody else?

In most cases it seems as it is people involved in marketing activities who start up digital signage and self-service kiosk projects. Suddenly there is someone that sees the potential of modernizing the marketing and bringing it closer to the products and the customers. It’s often in the marketing departments where you find these visionaries when it comes to new marketing and sales methods. However digital signage and kiosks are often regarded as new and unknown tools. This may be compared to the days of website introduction. In those days using the web was something new and untested. There were lots of discussions about the profitability and value of entering such a medium. Despite the many doubts by many in the early days, the website is today a natural and necessary part of any marketing organization. The questions in those days were the same as you will hear today regarding digital signage; what are the benefits in relation to the costs, and who in our organization is going to maintain the media content used in the new system?

In many companies there is a sole person driving the new ideas. This person, often someone in the marketing department, then tries to start up a pilot project. This may cause some debate within the organization and the early adaptor may need quite a lot of help from the supplier of the digital signage system.

In some cases there is someone in the IT department that starts the discussion about digital signage. But in most cases the IT department is involved at late stage in the process. This may cause some resistance to the introduction of the new system. A better solution is that the marketing and IT departments start working together at an early stage. Unfortunately I have seen cases where IT departments have been forces to use systems that they cannot fully support.

Introducing a digital signage or kiosk system is very similar to handling the company or retail chain website. Also, there are many synergies between the two.  In a digital signage system there is a central server that may be compared to a web server and the server may be hosted internally or externally. Many questions are the same when it comes to content. Much images, video clips and text used for the website can be reused in the digital signage or kiosk system. In kiosk systems the kiosks can even be regarded as extensions of the web activities since web pages and database content may be reused. This means that it is useful to get the IT department and the people involved in web activities involved at an early stage to see the benefits of the new possibilities brought by digital signage and kiosks. By using open standards and relying on external industry standard creation tools, that are already used by content producers and web developers, the MultiQ digital signage system paves the way for a smooth entry into this new medium.

In most cases it is the marketing department that is most eager
to introduce digital signage and self-service kiosks.  

Lars-Ingemar Lundström
Documentation and Training Manager, MultiQ