Digital Signage Payoff: What Is A Challenge For TV May Be A Boon For Digital Signage Networks

A variety of forces, including technology, interactivity and demographics are buffeting the king of all media.

I had dinner the other evening with some friends from New England. The couple splits its time between a home in the southern part of New Hampshire during the winter and a scenic farm in northern Vermont during the summer. In the past, I've had opportunities to visit both places and travel with them between their homes.

As dinner progressed, the conversation turned to the Old Man of the Mountain, a natural rock formation on the New Hampshire landscape that serves as a symbol adorning state highway signs and license plates. I'd stopped on several occasions at Franconia Notch State Park to view the Old Man from a distance.

In May 2003, erosion, wind and weather finally took their toll on the Old Man, when in an instant the rocks gave way and the landmark slid down the mountain and into history. At dinner, I asked in passing about the event and my friends told me a few things I had never known about the landmark.

The Old Man of the Mountain had existed in a tenuous state for years, my friends said. In an effort to preserve the landmark, the state had wrapped chains and cables around portions of the face to keep it in place. Plastic was strategically placed in an effort to prevent rain from penetrating crevices, freezing, expanding and making the face more unstable. Volunteer quarryman even regularly inspected the landmark and did their best to maintain its integrity. However, despite everyone's best efforts, the Old Man of the Mountain collapsed in a heap May 3, 2003.

As my friends discussed the Old Man and the efforts to preserve it, I couldn't help but think about the similarities between the fallen-away landmark and TV, commercials and digital signage.

As a mass medium television is the undisputed champion, but I see signs of erosion, unstable features and steps at preservation that ultimately are likely to prove futile. TV is in a state of transition, and the medium as it's been known for the past 60 years or so is undergoing radical changes.

Sure there's the transition from analog to digital that the government has mandated for February 2009, but that's not what I'm talking about. I'm referring to a transition being forced upon the medium that's about as welcome as the rain and snow were to the Old Man.

Since it's inception as a commercial medium, television in this country has been linear. Programs have a set starting time and known finish -for the most part. In between show segments are commercial breaks; and in between shows are more commercials. Networks and stations have relied on this structure to build program lineups, audiences and desired demographics that advertisers wish to reach.

However, with the roll out of digital video recorders over the past few years, viewers -not network programmers- are in charge of when a show gets watched. Worst of all for the marketers and the networks, viewers can use the same recorder to "zap" or zip by commercials. Each time a viewer does so, it's like another drop of rainwater penetrating a crack in the Old Man's face, wearing away the underlying soil and rock holding the structure in place.

Add to that the growing availability of video-on-demand from cable and satellite TV operators, TV network Web sites that make popular shows like "Lost" and "Grey's Anatomy" available on-demand via streaming broadband connection, and the countless shows, movies and events available for download via file sharing, and it's easy to see the cracks are growing and the edifice is nearing a shift.

To be sure, the networks rolling out the chains, wrapping up their franchise tight to hold the status quo. Shows like "American Idol" garner huge ratings and encourage viewers to buck the VOD trend by asking them to call in and vote for their favorite performers live. But that strategy raises some interesting questions, like how broadly can it be applied, and doesn't it just feed the desire of viewers for interactive control over the content they view?

Technology and interactivity are only two of the elements eroding the status quo. The other is demographics. Closely tied to technology and interactivity to be sure, the highly sought after younger demographic is fluent in technology. From text messaging to gaming, on-line chats to music downloads, younger audiences are immersed in the stuff. Unfortunately for television networks and their advertisers, this group also appears to be less interested in television than older viewers.

All of these shifts, as gradual as they may be, are good news for digital signage networks. On one level, digital signage gives marketers who may grow uncertain about the stability of the Old Man of Television a refuge for targeted advertising. On another, digital signage bears a close resemblance to television and can easily take advantage of the cache of the medium without falling prey to the elements eroding its stature. On yet another, digital signage displays can be configured to work in hybrid mode, offering the benefits of linear program playback, which can be interrupted with something as simple as a touch of the screen and sent into an interactive, digital kiosk mode. This in particular, positions digital signage to capitalize on the propensity of younger viewers to feel at home with interactive technology, and thus offer marketers direct access to a highly desired demographic.

Will television slide down the media mountain just as the Old Man did in New Hampshire? Perhaps, but I can't say when with any more reliability than the surveyors 100 years ago who predicted the demise of the Old Man. What I can say is this: The forces buffeting the edifice of television are growing in strength. Whether or not that media landmark can withstand them in the long run, television and its traditional business model are likely to continue changing. As they do, the prospect of digital signage networks to offer marketers an attractive alternative will only grow.

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