After getting numerous weekly calls putting it into the role of consultant on the DOOH sector, New York-based Adcentricity [1] has formalized its consulting services specifically for network operators, retailers, real estate owners and prospective network developers looking for network business modeling insight and education about the evolving DOOH space.
Graeme Spicer
“We were fielding at least 10 calls a week from a variety of sources like investors and emerging networks asking for our advice on how to enter or expand in the DOOH market,” says Rob Gorrie, Adcentricity’s CEO.
“We realized we needed to formalize the consulting offering as a practice area of our business. With 85 partners, we have regular contact with more networks than any other organization and our expertise, balanced with our deep understanding of the needs of advertisers and retailers, makes us a great resource for companies looking to either enter or become more successful in the space.”
Gorrie says that the new offering is “not to take over the role of all the consultants out there. We’re only dealing with the advertising side of the business, but we’ve seen a lot of successes and a lot of failures, so we want to help where we have a lot of expertise. If somebody is launching a network, they may be looking for advice on how to evaluate the pricing, for example, or what is the best content strategy based on their potential target audience.
“We won’t recommend a specific software solution or vendor. That’s not our place. It would be presumptuous of us to dictate. DOOH can be very complex. Our role is to help companies wanting to build a business model to understand and to bypass a lot of the learning pains.”
Profitable Channels recently stated that infrastructure investments in the DOOH space were $640 million in 2008, with that number projected to grow by 33% in 2009, despite the difficult economic conditions. By 2013, investment is expected to approach $1.4 billion.
Retail environments are also primed for the proliferation of digital technologies within their environments. Research has shown that DOOH is one of the most effective merchandising solutions, delivering an array of tools for retailers to use to communicate with shoppers in-store where they are making product and brand decisions.
“We hope to help stakeholders assess the DOOH landscape prior to them making major investments and committing resources to the space,” says Spicer, who has many years of senior level retail marketing and merchandising experience.
Adcentricity’s consulting services include:
- Business model assessment and revenue modeling;
- Creation of pro forma financials for business plans or investor presentations;
- Assessment of marketable advertising rates;
- Audience research recommendations and project management;
- Understanding DOOH vendor options;
- Development of endemic and non-endemic advertising sales strategies and organizational structures;
- Content strategies and solutions.
While Adcentricity currently operates mainly in the U.S. and Canada, its consulting service is available for companies from everywhere.
“Our most recent call was from Brazil,” says Gorrie.
Recently, Adcentricity launched Research Lite [2], a market research offering for advertisers to garner insights into the effectiveness of their DOOH campaigns. Last year, the company launched its AdVenue platform, a robust solution that helps marketers plan campaigns based on business objectives and goals and target by region and venue type, along with specific demographic information.