Retailers are always looking for new ways to get more customers through the door. Competition is thick, and it’s about to ramp up for the season with Black Friday and Christmas shopping just around the corner. Retail digital signage draws in customers, allows retailers to advertise their offerings, improves overall customer experience, and streamlines internal communications.
Focusing on Customer Experience
Focusing on customer experience and bringing a digital element into shopping ultimately allows retailers to stay modern and competitive. Interactive digital signage software gives retail customers more control over their experience. Customers view digital content from their phones after scanning QR codes, or interact with kiosks in-store to find the products or services they’re interested in purchasing. If the product they want is unavailable on location, they often place online orders through kiosks, and their items ship right to their doors.
Giving customers more control reduces the need for help locating items. This results in an improved customer experience, but it also allows employees to focus on other tasks like picking and packaging online orders or merchandising.
LEARN MORE about the benefits of the touchscreen experience.
Greater Convenience
Consumers are looking for faster and more convenient shopping experiences, now more than ever. Many prefer not to leave their cars, or even their homes if possible. The drive for more convenient retail experiences was present before the pandemic, but convenience and zero contact shopping became dramatically more important after the onset of COVID 19. Retailers are adapting, introducing curbside pick up for merchandise, food orders, and groceries, as well as buy-online-pickup-in-store options.
Retailers use digital signage software to show customers their place in line and when their orders have been fulfilled. They offer add-on or similar products on screen as well. Experts believe digital experiences will continue to increase in importance.
LEARN MORE about digital experience and its impact on the retail industry.
Entertaining Customers
In addition to convenience and speed, shoppers and diners are looking for more fun in their retail experiences. Retailers are introducing new rewards programs and individualized coupons to add excitement. Retailers use social media feeds and content feeds on digital signage to keep customers entertained and up to date as they shop. Shoppers browse through weather feeds, live sports, news feeds, and videos.
LEARN MORE about digital entertainment in the retail industry.
Task Assignment and Tracking
There is a lot of delegation and teamwork that goes into a successful retail venture. Keeping track of tasks and progress can be difficult. Teams need to be ready to unload trucks, set merchandise properly, process online orders, and of course, take care of customers who are on location. Retail managers use digital signage software to assign tasks, check for completion, and to report progress in meetings. Managers are able to schedule tasks for the week, month or year, and set up recurring tasks. Making tasks and progress more transparent leads to more accountability and, in turn, better results.
Training and Onboarding
Working in retail can be overwhelming, especially for new hires. Retailers have sophisticated training and onboarding procedures designed to show new hires the ropes and grow confidence quickly. A variety of different methods are used in the process, from E-Learnings, to buddy training. Retailers use digital signage software in the onboarding process to help new hires keep up to date with company news, current promotions, and best practices.
Advertising Applications
Digital signage software gives retailers the ability to customize their advertisements by region, store, and department. Advertisers use digital signage software to stand out with custom animations, QR codes, and interactive displays. Digital signage allows retail advertisers to be more flexible and efficient, which is important because opportunities move fast in the retail industry, and goals change constantly. Updates to ads on digital signage take seconds to deploy, far easier, faster, and more environmentally friendly than traditional paper counterparts.
Staying Modern and Relevant
While retailers still use paper advertising to some extent today, the future is digital, and customers want the ability to access coupons and retail content from their phones. Customers are going to continue to demand better experiences. That means retailers need to deliver more convenience, entertainment, speed, and simplicity. Digital signage software is and will continue to be an excellent tool to deliver better retail experiences thanks to its flexibility and end user focus. Digital signage extends from screens in store to customer cell phones, putting the user experience in the palm of each customer’s hands. Retailers will need to continue to focus on improving digital experiences if they want to stay modern and competitive moving forward.
The fitness industry was worth around $160 billion in 2021 and is expected to grow 171.75% by 2028. While gyms, health clubs, and other in-person fitness related businesses suffered during the pandemic, digital and online fitness organizations boomed. The digital fitness market saw revenue growth of around 40% in 2020. Although most gyms are back open today, COVID19 fundamentally changed the market. The fitness industry is using digital signage software as a tool to deliver content to customers in greater frequency, and they’re having some great results.
LEARN MOREabout the recent changes in the fitness market.
Business Critical for Digital Workouts
It’s one thing to have access to a 24 hour gym, but what if you could have access to a 24 hour trainer? Fitness organizations like HOTWORX use digital signage software to display fitness content around the clock. Hotworx is a virtually instructed exercise program where workouts take place inside an infrared sauna. There are Hotworx locations throughout the globe open 24 hours a day. Hotworx is able to give their clients the flexibility to exercise with instruction 24/7 thanks to digital signage software.
Digital signage software with Chrome Enterprise is business critical to digital businesses. Instead of employees, they rely on software and Chrome hardware to reliably and continually give their clients what they pay for. With hybrid and remote work, being able to work out at any time became the new normal. Adding staff to work 24/7 is unrealistic and keeps the business from being a reality.
Gym Staff Communications
Gym owners and staff have a lot on their plates. They have to schedule consistent cleanings for their gyms, maintain equipment, and monitor members to make sure they are being safe. They also need to check everyone in and sign up new members.
Fitness centers use digital signage software to keep employees up to date on cleaning days, events, and tasks. Digital signage software scales to any device with an internet connection, so changes to content can be made off location by managers at any time.
Digital Signage for Gym Members
Fitness centers use digital signage for a vast variety of things, like displaying upcoming events,gym closings, and infotainment for their members. Some gyms even use digital signage for member check-ins. Content feeds integrate with digital signage software to display current weather, news, and sporting events. Members use interactive digital signage to navigate through different content feeds, and they use digital signage to set timers for workouts. Timers display alarms and notify members during certain time intervals so they can switch between sets.
Marketing Applications
Digital signage is used to market to both current and potential gym members. New introductory rates are offered for potential members, while additional classes and training sessions are offered to current members. With interactive digital signage, people actually sign up on screen by entering email addresses or even credit card information. Gyms also sell merchandise, like t-shirts, jump ropes and weight-lifting belts. Digital signage software integrates with Point-of-Sale (POS) systems to process payments for merchandise and memberships.
Digital Menu Boards
Some fitness centers have cafes on site, so members can get something healthy to eat after they exercise. Fitness centers use digital signage to display menus which are much more environmentally friendly and a lot easier to update than traditional paper menus. Digital signage displays wait times, pricing, and payment options in gym cafes.
Fitness Tracking
Technology has significantly improved the accuracy of fitness tracking metrics like heart rate, calories burned, and time elapsed throughout a workout. Gym members are using devices like FitBits, Whoop straps, and Apple watches to gauge the effectiveness of their exercise. Gyms use digital signage software to integrate with these fitness tracking devices so members can view their results on the big screen mid-workout. These fitness tracking devices along with digital signage can be used to put on competitions throughout the year.
Recently, digital signage software has integrated with “magic mirrors.” A magic mirror is essentially a screen that shows your reflection, and on screen you see yourself, but also animations or content feeds. Gym members can watch their form in these mirrors while simultaneously viewing digital signage content. The interactivity and digital nature of magic mirrors makes them perfect for fitness applications. LEARN MORE about magic mirrors.
The Future of Digital Fitness
With the exciting digital fitness integrations available today, like magic mirrors, fitness tracking devices, and virtual training, gyms will need to integrate more technology to stay modern and competitive.
Digital signage software is being implemented by gyms around the globe, both for internal communication and member usage. Digital tools will continue to be embraced and used with great frequency in gyms, and fitness monitoring and technology will continue to improve. As fitness becomes a 24/7 tool, software and hardware has become business critical. A permanent integration into many businesses.
Making decisions at an enterprise level certainly can be stressful and difficult. One decision often affects thousands of people, whether they are employees, shareholders, or customers. Even decisions that may seem straightforward on the surface quickly become complicated. Enterprise businesses are using digital signage software as a tool to communicate more effectively with employees and customers, helping them obtain better feedback, which they use to make better decisions.
Tools to Fix Complex Problems
The sheer number of workers enterprises employ is astounding. Walmart is estimated to have around 2.3 million employees. Amazon, governments and large financial institutions have multiple locations and employees working differently.
From hybrid, remote or in-person, communication becomes more important. Clear and quick information is easy with digital signage. All the same information coming from one location. No emails to wade through or miss.
This LIST ranks companies by number of employees. All of the top 100 enterprises have over 180,000 employees. When you’re dealing with a massive amount of people, communicating effectively and efficiently can be a real challenge.
Enterprises often have locations across the country, or even worldwide, with employees working both onsite and remotely. Digital signage software allows enterprises to distribute information to everyone simultaneously, or to specific groups of employees as needed.
Enterprises are faced with a complicated problem: making sure that hundreds of thousands of people are up to date on health insurance, company news, metrics, and industry laws just to name a few. Domain based emails, time clock applications, and digital signage software are all important tools enterprises use to help employees get the information they need on a daily basis. These tools are kept fully secure, protecting employee and proprietary information. Many enterprises use Chromebox devices for digital signage because of their various security features like kiosk mode and verified boot.
LEARN MORE about Chromebox digital signage security features.
The way that enterprises use digital signage software is unique. No two enterprises seem to use it exactly the same way. Some display the same content on all screens throughout all locations, whereas others have different content for each building, or even each department. Others don’t use digital signage internally at all. Instead they use it for advertising or to improve customer experience. Some companies have a larger remote presence than others, and they need to extend digital content to employees around the globe. Digital signage software is flexible, scaling to each individual enterprise’s needs and adapting when those needs change.
Enterprise Templates
Digital signage software is a great tool for enterprise business communications, but content needs to be updated. That means someone is going to need to take the time to design, edit, and update content throughout the year. Digital signage software often comes with premade TEMPLATES for different displays. For example, cafeteria signage templates are common.
The person in charge of managing an enterprise’s digital signage picks a template and then adds in custom content, like menu items for the cafeteria signs.
Digital signage software allows users to integrate spreadsheets, automating the process even further. Enterprises often create their own custom digital signage templates. They create a template for each quarter, each month, or even each week. These templates allow employees to make a few quick changes to dates and announcements, and display up to date professional content.
Reliable Emergency Alerts
Enterprises spend a lot of time and resources on emergency planning, and rightfully so, they have a lot to lose. Even with an airtight plan, when disaster strikes, people panic. Enterprises use alerting and digital signage software together to display emergency messaging with one click. Clear instructions are displayed on digital signage throughout buildings, and instructions are also deployed to employee cell phones. Messaging is customized for each emergency. Digital signage equipped with webcams even livestreams different parts of the building during emergencies and dangerous situations. Managers use their phones or other mobile devices to take over screens and distribute instructions as needed. Digital signage software gives enterprises complete control over how they want to display emergency messaging and what devices receive those emergency messages.
Employee Wellness
Employees are an enterprise’s most valuable asset. Many enterprise level businesses have onsite gyms and cafeterias with healthy food options. Many of them have mandatory group stretching as well, particularly manufacturing enterprises. Enterprises use digital signage as a tool to promote employee wellness, displaying air quality levels, health facts, healthy recipes, and other health data like COVID19 infection rates. Health related digital signage content helps employees make more health conscious decisions.
Intelligent Enterprise Solutions
Digital signage is an important communication tool in an enterprise’s toolbelt. It streamlines communication internally, and it also improves customer experience. Chrome devices are an excellent choice for enterprise digital signage because of their robust security features. Google has a list of Chrome Enterprise Recommended solutions which can be found HERE. Secure and streamlined communications help managers make more informed decisions and distribute vital information to employees globally and instantaneously.
For better or worse, COVID19 changed the way work gets done fundamentally. Employees started working from home out of necessity, and since the pandemic, many work from home out of personal preference. Employers are faced with the challenge of engaging and connecting employees no matter where they are physically located.
Today, employers are improving employee communications by using digital signage software. Digital signage scales to businesses of all shapes and sizes, and it displays pertinent information to employees across the globe.
Remote Communications
Connecting with remote workers can be difficult without any face to face interaction. Employers use video conferencing tools like Zoom, Teams, and Google Meet to meet virtually. Digital signage implements these tools for improved employee communication.
Managers livestream meetings to digital signage, displaying meetings in the office and on company provided devices in remote locations. Company news and updates are displayed as well. Employees receive a clear and updated line of communication while working from the comfort of their own homes. Arreya can be deployed to digital devices as a progressive web app, just like apps on your phone. These apps give employees quick access to the Arreya channel. Employee communications become streamlined and universal across multiple locations.
LEARN MORE about adapting technology to remote workstyles.
Sharing Corporate History
Many businesses have a rich corporate history that they want to share with their employees. Corporate history illustrates where a business came from, and it gives employees a greater understanding of what they are working towards.
Digital signage communicates corporate history in an engaging and satisfying way with images and videos. Employees interact with digital signage, navigating across corporate timelines on touchscreen displays or on their phones. Giving employees a better understanding of the organization’s story makes work more meaningful and fulfilling.
Corporate history also helps with hiring new employees. The foundation of a company can be a factor on people applying or accepting a position. Digital history can be accessed from anywhere and dynamic content with timelines, photos and videos will engage more viewers.
Employee Recognition
Employee recognition programs are excellent for making employees feel valued. Businesses are using digital signage for communicating wins to employees, recognizing them in front of all their coworkers and even stakeholders in some cases. Digital signs display employee of the month programs, sales contests, and customer reviews. Displaying wins for everyone to see is a great way to boost morale. It tells employees that their work matters, and that they are valued.
LEARN MOREabout improving employee communications with digital signage.
Team Building
Team building exercises are very beneficial in terms of improving employee experience and engagement. A small investment of time to allow employees to get to know eachother often leads to less turnover and higher productivity. When coworkers build healthy professional relationships, they become more invested in each other and in turn, more invested in their work.
Business owners are using digital signage to improve communication and team building by allowing them to meet with each other virtually, communicate through bulletin boards, and even play games together. Team contests are displayed on digital signs throughout the office, creating excitement and some healthy competition.
Display Key Company Metrics
It’s important that employees understand how their performance is evaluated. Businesses are using digital signage for communicating results to employees, displaying key company metrics in real time. Pinpoint Arreya channels to specific departments or centers to personalize digital content to the audience. Call centers can track calls answered, development can watch real time use and which devices are connected. Posting of safety and equipment data sheets can be easily integrated for real time statistics.
Digital signage displays sales targets, customer reviews, new leads, and any other relevant key performance indicators. Displaying metrics in real time allows employees and managers to prioritize effectively and meet their goals.
Employee Safety
Employee safety will always be a top priority, but it’s tougher to keep people safe when they’re working remotely. Companies need tools to alert remote and hybrid employees to danger when they are not in the office. Digital signage integrates with alert software to proactively warn employees of impending danger like inclement weather, fires, or security breaches. With one click, emergency messaging is deployed to all digital signage simultaneously, keeping employees safe no matter where they are physically located. Business owners set up different emergency messages designed for every dangerous scenario. Emergency messaging includes escape routes, rendezvous points, and steps to take to stay safe in the event of a natural disaster.
LEARN MORE about triggering emergency alerts on digital signage.
Work Calendars and Schedules
Keeping track of meetings, deadlines, birthdays, work anniversaries, and employee schedules is time consuming and overwhelming. Digital signage keeps everyone up to date through integrations with calendar software like Google Calendar, iCal, and Calendly.
Businesses can display multiple calendars simultaneously, or schedule calendars to appear at different times throughout the day.
Presentations are personalized for work anniversaries and birthdays to recognize employees and make them feel valued. Managers use digital signage for communicating deadlines and meeting times on calendars, and updates to meeting times happen automatically.
Impactful Employee Communications
Employers are making more impactful connections by using digital signage for employee communications. Digital signage extends beyond the physical office, keeping remote employees in the loop no matter where they are located. Business critical information is displayed reliably, and updates are easy to make. As remote work becomes more common, and the way we do work continues to evolve, modern tools like digital signage will continue to elevate communication.
