DailyDOOH

In the latest Outfront Media Front Street YouTube episode their VP, Head of Digital Creative, Chad Shackelford discusses how QR codes have made a comeback as consumers rely on touchless interactions. He told us “Today, marketers have a unique opportunity to engage and excite customers through the QR code”.

First released in 2020, the platform has launched six different category channels with over 21 episodes that include various content types and themes to help earn the attention of commuters and audiences. Content experiences through engagement, contextual relevance, and editorial content provide commuters an exciting journey as they move throughout NYC transit systems and traveling along roadside digital billboards across the country.

Front Street is billed as “A Place Where Out Of Home Learning Happens Fast” and is currently releasing new episodes each week that cover different topics, techniques, and discussions happening in the OOH industry. You can see all of the Front Street episodes with one click here.

With news in this past Monday that the local Spanish show in Barcelona, June 1-4, 2021 is going ahead, I am of course, talking about, #ISE2021, it seems that the organisers may have offered their exhibitors a deal, in allowing them to pull out of the show with no penalties, which is simply too good to be true.

The organisers are giving exhibitors, we quote their statement from Monday, “the opportunity to choose if they wish to continue to be part of ISE 2021 Barcelona, without hindrance” by: –

• No penalty fees will be due for any withdrawals that are made before 5 March (this Friday)
• Those companies that decide not to continue and have paid in part or full for ISE 2021 will have the option of a full refund of their monies or be able use this as a credit towards participating in other ISE events in 2021 or even as a deposit/payment for ISE 2022.
• All exhibitors will retain their priority points from ISE 2020 and be able to participate in the rebooking process for ISE 2022 as dependent on their points and priority ranking.

I suspect that the offer to any company that does exhibit that it will receive 2x the points for their participation at the in person Barcelona event will fall on deaf ears – as we said earlier this week, exhibitors are starting to wake up to the fact that the whole points system is a revenue maximisation plan for the organiser and gives little value to them (much like airline loyalty schemes).

We now know of two dozen exhibitors who have pulled out and no doubt there will be many more before the deadline this Friday. I am sure that many a CFO will have been involved, drooling at the opportunity to get that money they spent or promised, back into their own bank account.

As one prominent industry observer state-side has been saying for many months now “If as a manufacturer/provider I struggled during the pandemic, can I afford to go? And, If I flourished and made a lot of money, do I really need to go? It’s Hobson’s Choice”.

Interestingly the discussions we have been having with exhibitors has not been whether is it safe to go / will I catch #Covid19 but more along the lines of whether their will be anyone there in-person to meet. With so many corporate travel bans in place (something that the organisers must surely know about) and with doubts still surrounding what each country’s own international travel bans are, then attendance can only be one thing and that’s low. As you may have guessed from the title of this blog post, it could well be that, if it happens, then it’s a show for the Spanish.

A Hobson’s choice is a free choice in which only one thing is offered. Because a person may refuse to accept what is offered, the two options are taking it or taking nothing. In other words, one may “take it or leave it”

Certa Fuel and Wide Eye Outdoor have launched a first-of-its-kind partnership that will see advertising screens deployed at all pumps across 22 of Certa Fuel’s stations.

Photos by Sean Brosnan | www.brosnanphotography.com

In total 162 of the 17” screens have been rolled out across the nationwide network of fuel stations. Using the latest technology, the content on the screens plays in response to the customer’s engagement with the pump and all screens have sound.

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The UK is to get its first Amazon Fresh store in Ealing, West London today. The mainstream press this past weekend guessed right and reported that Amazon was opening a checkout-free store this week but got it wrong when assuming that it was an Amazon Go store.

In the US Amazon has approximately 25 Amazon Go stores in Seattle, Chicago, New York City and San Francisco but a mere handful of Amazon Fresh stores.

The Grocer writes ‘Planning documents indicate Amazon’s first UK store will be Fresh format’ which you can read here.

The checkout-free concept first came to life in 2018 and it was reported last year that Amazon was possibly planning as many as 30 physical stores for Amazon Go in the UK.

There are of course, no checkout workers but there will be some employees on the shop floor to replenish stock and assist customers.

All are invited to join the United Kingdom AVIXA Women’s Council Local Group for an online panel discussion on the return to normal, what is it, when will it happen and how you can be optimistic and successful during these times.

This will be followed by a presentation from Monique Wintle-Camp who will be using her experience in the AV sector, mixed with her work in coaching and neuroscience, to tell attendees all about the link between optimism and success.

Panel Members include:

Faye Bennett, Managing Director, Faye Bennett Consulting
Amy Cronshaw, CEO, Beyond Workplace Consulting
Sammi Bewes, UK Education Sales Manager, LG
Jane Hammersley, SVP Global Alliances, Collabtech Group
Moderated by Sadie Groom, Managing Director, Bubble Agency

You can sign-up here to join for this exciting opportunity to celebrate International Women’s Day!

March 10, 2021. 17:00-18:00 GMT

Leading Enterprise Video, IPTV and Digital Signage manufacturer, Tripleplay has withdrawn from the Integrated Systems Europe 2021 show which is still scheduled to be held in Barcelona in June.

Their statemtent said “With ongoing global uncertainty over the #Covid19 pandemic, and employee safety being a key priority, Tripleplay has made the difficult decision to withdraw from ISE for 2021 and will not be participating in the event”.

Steve Rickless, Tripleplay chief executive told us “With continuing pandemic-related concerns over travel restrictions, variable vaccine programs, and safety for our team and their families being of paramount importance, we’ve made the tough decision not to attend in 2021. Clearly this is hugely disappointing as ISE is always a great place to bring our team together and to demonstrate our Tripleplay, Reserva and ONELAN solutions to a global audience. However, we will do all we can to continue to support our industry and customers in many other ways. We wish the ISE team all the best for June and look forward to being back again next year.”

We are aware of two dozen other exhibitors who have pulled out of the event since Monday.

Captivate, North America’s leading location-based digital video network, has announced the Women In Business series in celebration of International Women’s Day and Women’s History Month. This hand-curated series highlights the contributions of women in history, culture & business, results from the latest Office Pulse survey and quotes from leading executive women in the business industry.

Kate Scanlan, Content Director at Captivate told us “As the role of the working woman continues to evolve and be redefined, we are very excited to bring this important and timely series to the network. While the personal and professional responsibilities have gone up, women are proving their resilience and we believe this series will provide uplifting, inspirational, real-life advice that encourages further camaraderie not only during Women’s History Month but going forward.”

While Women’s History Month continues to gain more recognition over time, this year marks a historical milestone. As the unemployment rate continues to be disproportionately skewed with women accounting for 100% of job losses in December 2020, those still in the workforce are juggling an unexpected amount of personal and professional tasks in the wake of Covid-19. This series will shine a necessary light on the vital roles women have and continue to play in business. Candid responses from prominent figures of top brands such as Hulu, Verizon Media, OMD, Initiative, Accenture and Hyundai will be featured throughout the month as they were asked to provide tips on time management, conquering stress, climbing the corporate ladder and advice they would provide to their younger selves.

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Posterscope has launched PSMind, a new tool that uses machine learning to analyse more than five million data combinations in real-time to forecast and track population movement, to inform and deliver the most effective OOH campaigns for clients.

Christopher Ho, Posterscope Innovation Director and creator of PSMind, said “Throughout the pandemic we have tracked mobility levels and witnessed significant changes in people’s movements and behaviours, but in order to create plans that capitalise on the increased mobility we expect to see as lockdown restrictions ease, we wanted to be able to predict not just how many OOH impacts will be available to advertisers, but where the audience movement is taking place at each stage of the Government’s roadmap.”

The tool ingests data from sources including Oxford University, Google, the Department for Transport and Three Mobile, and analyses everything from weather forecasts, international travel and Government restrictions to enable Posterscope to forecast and understand National Mobility levels (England, Scotland and Wales), POI visitation and Traffic indicators with up to a 90% accuracy rate.  Mobility forecasts will be published on a weekly basis from today.

At March 1, 2021, PSMind predicts that national mobility will increase as follows at each point in the Government’s roadmap to lifting lockdown:

March 8 – 69%
March 29 – 73%
April 12 – 83%
May 17 – 95%
June 21 – national audience mobility predicted to be at 111%

(Figures are based on a pre-lockdown baseline of 100 in January 2020).

Gill Huber, Chief Client Officer at Posterscope, said “It is more important than ever for brands to be able to understand consumer behaviour, what changes are permanent and what will change over time. We are constantly developing solutions to better understand what people are thinking, feeling and doing when out of home and PSMind is a great step for us to allow our clients to forward plan with confidence.”

The launch of PSMind follows the launch in May last year of Posterscope’s weekly ‘Mobility Index’, a weekly barometer providing advertisers with a headline picture of the movement of audiences in the OOH space, and Posterscope planners with the industry’s most detailed understanding of population mobility. Using first-party telecoms data from Three Mobile, Posterscope analyses every postcode sector up and down the country on a weekly basis to gain a barometer of peoples’ movement, and understand the journeys they are taking out of home. The ‘mobility index’ uses Three Mobile’s first-party telecoms data which enables Posterscope to robustly segment by key buying demographics and with no ‘lag’ time.

This month, leading Out of Home media and infrastructure company Clear Channel celebrates the installation of their 2,500th Adshel Live panel.

Richard Bon, Clear Channel UK’s Joint Managing Director told us “Despite the uncertainty and challenges of the past 12 months, Adshel Live has been hugely resilient as a format. Thanks to its growing presence on local high streets as well as in larger city centres, it continued to be a vital broadcast medium for public service messaging and supporting local businesses. Now, as we’re looking towards a spring and summer of dramatically reduced restrictions, and people are desperate to get back outside, Adshel Live is there stronger than ever and will undoubtedly become an icon for the renaissance of Out of Home. The timing of this landmark could not be better.” 

The completion of the build in Leicester helps solidify Adshel Live as the UK’s largest Digital Out of Home network, capable of eight million impacts daily and a, nearly 50% weekly reach.
 
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The first in the World Out of Home Organization’s 2021 webinar calendar will be ‘Recovery and Opportunity’ with industry expert Mark Boidman. kicks off tomorrow.

Mark Boidman needs no introduction to industry stalwarts, he is Managing Director/Head of Marketing & Media Tech Services at New York investment bank PJ Solomon. He is an acknowledged industry expert, specialising in M&A and strategic activity.

Mark told us “This is a great opportunity to bring WOO members up to date on Out of Home industry prospects as we see them in what will, initially, be a challenging year but one full of opportunity. One of the benefits of the new Zoom era is the ability to communicate more regularly and I look forward to hearing the views of WOO members as well as sharing my own.”

We understand that WOO plans to hold these every two months throughout 2021. The webinars are part of an ambitious WOO programme which also includes regular monthly calls with members, quarterly calls with national associations and three regional Congresses covering Europe, Asia and, in Q1 of 2022, Africa.

A WOO member only event, it will be held Thursday March 4, 2021 at 13:00 GMT. More information can be found here.