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1. cccsecccseeeeceeeeeeeeeeseeeeeeeeeeeeeesseeeeseaeeeeaeeeseeeessaeeeseueeseaeeesseeesegeessensessneeess 55 POll VOUT aldience WH SMS VOM a O 55 Mede OR ads for Stan FO Mase seers a TT E T a 56 ADDITIONAL RESOURCE Sama illo 57 ACKNOWLEEDGEMENTS lt S SOURCES a 58 VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE PAGE 3 INTRODUCTION When we talk to our customers and prospective clients we hear a lot of folks who want to do better but aren t sure how to do it communication directors want to bring technology into their plan but they re overwhelmed by the choices administrative assistants want to design the best digital signage messages they can but they aren t trained designers and everyone involved wants to know if their communications are working but just don t know howto measure the results We hope we can help We believe our responsibility extends beyond selling software We want to give our customers as much information as possible so you can make good decisions and improve your communications long after you ve bought our products After all if you re not going to get the most out of our stuff why buy it In the following pages you ll find a plethora of information from both overview and close perspectives about digital signage systems technology decisions implementation demands networking considerations and visual communications in your environment These chapters were written to educate the user wh
2. Putting a plan together Because the health and safety of your audience depends on the speed and accuracy of your response you should plan effectively A crisis communications plan outlines what you need to communicate how when and to whom It is usually part of an overall crisis plan that includes emergency operations procedures and business recovery tactics Developing emergency strategies has to start at the top with executive cooperation throughout the creation testing and refining of crisis plans Without the support of every senior manager and department even a thoroughly crafted plan will be at best ineffective and possibly even confusing when it most counts Be sure your plan is clear and easy to execute Each member of your organization should be able to follow and carry out the plan in an emergency without convoluted directions or burdensome hierarchies to slog through Emotions often run high in these situations so providing simple visual tools like checklists to guide users can be a bighelp Be prepared A series of scenarios should be explored and prepared for with detailed instructions for each Consider every possible emergency on an organizational local state national and global level Fire Severe weather tornado warning Natural disaster Power outage blackout Workplace violence Bomb threat Terrorism alert Biological event toxic spill Evacuation Computer virus Breaking news Physical plant issues C
3. SEVERE THUNDERSTORM WATCH in effect until 5 00PM WEATHER ALERT er WEATHER ALERT SEVERE THUNDERSTORM WATCH d E in effect until 5 00PM j WATE type eee Email is not a timely way to communicate during a crisis because it relies on audience members accessing the information versus delivering it to them where they are If you use email be sure to have an established emergency email tag in the subject line so it is instantly recognizable to your audience Email can be valuable in later communications with the community at large If your audience is capable of reading email from personal mobile devices consider a messaging solution that will reach them More and more people use the web for everyday tasks so there is a good chance that your audience will be hooked up to the web at the moment a crisis develops Post information on your website and intranet and consider using some of the various social networking sites that are becoming more commonplace such as Facebook and Twitter Again alert them that something is happening and refer them to another place on the web for immediate details If your audience is at a computer pop ups screensavers and instant messaging can be effective ways to alert them even if they are not currently logged in to their email Include instructions as to where they can find more specific information for example an intranet or website page that contains more details They are already at a computer and
4. re communicating a major change the Larkins stress that face to face is the best method by far Plan before you communicate Just as you plan your marketing program or your calendar of events you should outline a communications strategy in advance An effective plan should reflect your organization s overall communication goals while continuously thinking about how to capture and retain audience interest A communications plan that s well thought out doesn t need to be documented at length The important thing is to work through the process and have a clear idea of what your communications will consist of what their purpose is when and how you will deliver them and how you will measure their success Possible structures for your communications plan could include Calendar The traditional and most popular organizational method for communications plans is chronological By outlining your strategies in an annual quarterly monthly or sequence it is easy to plan execute and review your communications in a logical timeline Other methods may include organizing under a topical system but still listing communication tactics in chronological order within those topics VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 39 Event Planning your communications around important dates that define your industry can be very useful Some entities have high seasons or special events that consume the bulk of their communications If your messages are
5. the phone number where people send their votes and a list of options with the a ili at sa corresponding SMS codes Viewers see your message and send an SMS It s that easy e Opera Smartphone Snaps Smartphone snaps are a fast easy way to drive traffic The destination can be a physical location social media site or photo sharing portal Simply ask viewers to take a snapshot of your message with their phone and tell them where and how to deliver it One creative idea is to have an animation or video running and ask people to snap an image of something that floats by like your logo or mascot to get a discount or win a prize Simply count the number of people who deliver the photo to calculate ROI Interactive Surveys amp Polls If you have touchscreen displays exploit the opportunity to get fast feedback from viewers on the go Surveys can be created as interactive media files or on the web for deliveryto digital signs Win this If you don t have touchscreens consider using QR tags to direct smartphone users to a poll or set up an SMS response system Providing voters with instant feedback in the form of a pie chart or graph will have greater impact on future votes Get great feedback and easy to measure ROI for your digital signage at the same time Social Media Drive viewers to your Facebook Twitter and YouTube pages by integrating them into your digital signage Post your social media URLs as often as poss
6. No matter which path you choose implementing a secure system requires a systematic approach It s important to note that whether you have a large IT team or just one person you need to engage resources from your organization for the planning and implementation There are simply too many issues to consider leaving it to someone else Assess your goals Well before you schedule implementation you need to consider what you want to achieve with digital signage and other visual communications devices You need to outline your objectives determine how it is likely to be used what your sources for content will be who will maintain the system s day to day operations and so on During this initial stage you should also work with your system provider or integrator to complete a pro forma budget and start up project plan The most important thing you can do at this stage is determine what your critical success factors will be What precisely are you hoping to achieve Articulating your objectives is important because it will help you measure your return on investment ROD Trying to justify the expense once the system is in place is certainly possible but it s a moving target Simply put we don t recommend it Wherever possible your objectives should be measurable If they aren t think about creative ways to measure them We recommend that you establish benchmarks against these objectives before implementation and then replicate those same mea
7. Retail increase revenues with targeting messages Digital signage is having major impact on the retail industry That s because digital signage complements traditional advertising strategies and they help you engage customers with m A SUMMER IS HERE A A JO up o gt relevant targeted and timely communications i SAVE 30 im A off your purchase gt Y Retailers can quickly and easily create attention getting displays VY creating unique combinations of text graphics video feeds and SER our collection tt trex ticker elements that maximize point of purchase opportunities They can also update advertisements and promote limited time offers and discounts that target audiences on site In store displays window displays and interactive kiosks attract customers attention direct them to areas of the store they may have missed and build brand loyalty Fire Generate revenues by advertising at point of purchase and point of servicedisplays Promote loyalty programs and registration benefits Run entertainment programs target niche groups Display community programs and charitable partnerships Advertise upcoming events and product release schedules Promote customer service gift programs and warranty programs Display store layout shopping guides and other helpful storeservices Share emergency alerts Display live weather traffic stock and sports information Supplement training and education efforts Houses of worship
8. The Georgia football team opened its 2011 A y ey ua SAN FRANCISCO STATE UNIVERSITY SPRING BREAK 2012 Reminder before leaving Clean out dorm refrigerators before leaving Park in designated areas towing enforced Empty all trash cans before vacating Do not encourage under age drinking Visitors must obtain a guest pass Have fun and be responsible Events 1 25 12 Sea Lion Bowl Volunteer Traini ng 6 8 pm A Conference Services is thrilled to offer new services gt PEED h WELCOME TO cus SMITHTON HIGH SCHOOL 11 24 AM 3 DAY FORECAST p Smithton mga Schoo A au a A MON TUE WED LIVE o Free School Calendar App Now available for smartphones Provides instant access to your school calendar FREE to all students School photos this Thursday October 25 in the Gym from 10 00 SCHOOL NEWS VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE PAGE 32 Financial institutions simplify promotions for complex offerings Take advantage of the physical space you ve invested in and get complex and changing financial information to the places where customers and employees gather NYSE MnFl 8 15 Milton Financial 0 07 0 87 oom Financial institutions that use digital signage are making the most bi of every opportunity to share more about their products and DOA services If customers are up to date on what you offer and your employees understand what s new revenues grow
9. and texts should be standardized and instantly recognizable One good idea used by the University of Iowa is branding your alert communications They have called it Hawk Alert and have a simple and easy to read logo that immediately identifies that the message about to come is an important emergency alert They have also included a standard script and voice for audio alerts Alert template severe weather This is UI Police Chief Chuck Green Please listen to this important alert Text to speech enunciated lt Date gt lt Time gt A lt severe weather threat gt is reported to be in lt location gt and heading in the direction of lt 2nd location gt Avoid lt locations gt or if anywhere near these areas take safe cover immediately See lt website address spelled out gt for further details as available Call 911 for emergency services or to report injuries SMS script lt severe weather threat gt in lt location gt and heading towards lt 2nd location gt Avoid lt locations gt or take cover See lt website address gt Test test and test again In a perfect world all these elements would be interconnected and centralized and you would simply push a big red button to send the alert out on all these systems However you probably do not have such a comprehensive emergency tool and so it is vital to test each method of communication regularly to ensure that everything goes smoothly Hopefully you will never need to use
10. bring your congregation together It s no surprise that today s houses of worship are leading the way in multimedia communications Modern congregations serve A ti a il many age groups all involved in a variety of activities and static presentations limit their ability to communicate effectively Many mad rbd r A Services forward looking congregations have turned to digital signage to Be va ee help them reach even more people 9 15 AM amp 11 00 AM gt 3 INTERGENERATIONAL WORSHIP 7 euline terttu Displays in the sanctuary lobby hallways classrooms j every day iS auditoriums and wherever else congregants gather can alert EUGENE 6 00 PM everyone to important announcements upcoming events classes dni and community news LOR OA N viart us onia Ago ore Easy to use even with limited technical or creative know how visual communication systems are attractive and keep people s attention Promote volunteer opportunities Personalize messages for visitors Promote upcoming events with detailed schedules Share sermon highlights and hymn lyrics to encourage participation Broadcast video clips Advertise video audio and bookstore offerings Promote community outreach and partner programs Display weather and traffic information Supplement training and education efforts For large congregations digital signage can be a cost effective way to coordinate and communicate various activities Many need to deliver dynamic and time
11. why not gather content in advance curate it so you have a stockpile to draw from when you need ideas Content curation is simply finding compiling and presenting groups of content organized by subject matter As you find interesting articles videos graphics blogs quotes anything online that might be of interest to your viewers gather it together by topic and store it for later reference VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE PAGE 49 You can use simple browser bookmarks to keep track of content but why not make it a bit more interesting and easier to navigate There are several popular sites that offer free curation like PearlTrees Pinterest and Bundlr to help you store and organize web content We ve used Scoop it to create four curation pages that give you lots of tips and sources for design inspiration design software tools and online generators and sources for free fonts graphics videos and music http www scoop it t design elements http www scoop it t fun with fonts http www scoop it t design inspiration http www scoop it t software generators When you decide to turn your curated content into digital signage content just draw from your library and make sure you add your own context to the topic to make it relevant to your viewers Getting your audience s attention is only the first step Keeping it is a constant challenge that you have to work hard to meet VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERE
12. you may find that native applications give you more powerful creation tools That s because much of the functionality in applications like Adobe Photoshop can be easily integrated into them For a number of technical reasons it is much more difficult to embed complex design tools in a browser That might change one day Technologies like AJAX that rely on scripting and browser object models are expanding what browsers can do Adobe Flash and Microsoft Silverlight are browser plug ins allowed by most IT departments that might someday bridge the gap between the user experience for web based and native applications But as of today these technologies can t yet match easy drag and drop and drawing functionality The downside to relying on a native application to create content for digital signage is that it s proprietary As a result the number of people familiar with it can be quite small and that limits your pool of content creators as well as access to update remotely Pairing web based software with popular applications like Photoshop Flash and even PowerPoint to create content provides you with more flexibility and a greater number of experienced users Many native applications allow you to import content from these third party applications But if you re not using the system s own application itself to create content you re squandering part of what you paid for Consider the total cost of ownership when evaluating these two fundamental
13. 39 Plan DeElOne VOU COMMUN CALC is ledad d 39 FUDISA VOUN Ol CIC Spot ce ctor aria E ese iar seen o so a ES 41 Higital SIGnade DOlCY examinan iaa 43 Watling TOF VISUal COMMUNICA NOA Sion iaa diia 44 Working Witi DIAG Standards viese R T ER 45 Recognition cues color code your MESSAQGES ccccccesceceeeeecescecsusecceueccseeeceeueecseeecsueeesueeesseeesseeeessueesseesesaaees 46 visual rules design Tor ING NUM iii 47 Contrast and eoliano 47 TES A E a A E E a A E a Gataiecasas 47 Tex E 47 Color and percep ION N aaea 48 FOCUS 1S CINE WS Seea a a diia ias 48 A E A AIN 48 Evaluating your visual effectiveness aiid a oo oa 49 Keep Your contents ii ESA A A AAA TA 49 CONTENTIDEA Se e e eee 51 Pixel to pixel content you already DaVe cccoooccnccccccncoconcnconononononcnnnnnncnnnnoncnnonnnnnnonnnrnnnnnnrnnnnnnnnnrnnrnnnnnnrnronannnnonanens 51 Fast access SOTO SUCESO E o e La 51 Help audiences by showing them knOW QOW occcccoccccccccnncccoconccononcnnnnnononnnononnnncnnnnnnnnnnnnnononnnrnnnnannnnonannnnnnananess 52 COnverung PATIO PIO Suit ete ocio 52 Keep moving with video and FIASN ccccccccssseccesecceeeecceucecsaeecseuceceueeecaueecsuseessueessueeesaueessaeesssaeessueeeseeeensaeeens 53 Bog ci A A 53 Reward an attentive audience with loyalty programs oocccccocnnnconoconocononncnnnnnnonnnnnnonancnnnnnnnnnnnnrnnnnnnrnnonanennonanens 54 Turn messaging into a profit center esa da 54 Provide a forum for community Work
14. DVI composite or component S Video and accompanying audio These signals can then be distributed to any number of digital signs using traditional audiovisual signal distribution products These products may include VGA distribution amplifiers and category 5 transmitters receivers If you choose to deliver visual messages to a network of traditional televisions the audio and video signals will need to be distributed via an existing RF distribution system using modulators and dedicated channels In these cases your digital signage messages appear on a particular channel of the televisions A network diagram should be created outlining the layout of the network for your digital signage system Here you will show not just outputs but system components and signal pathways Infrastructure components All components required for the content manager and each channel player should be listed and verified These could include Power Drops Network Drops e Channel player e Channel player e Content manager e Content manager e Output devices e Device Control e Device control e VGA over CATS VGX Other Cabling e Satellite or Video Window Signal device e Audio e Video Dedicated CATS drops e VGA over CATS extenders Network security policies Servers for digital signage systems are complex and your system provider should have carefully configured them to operate correctly and reliably But there s good reason to proceed with caution Many organiz
15. Displayed on digital signage in the center on an hourly basis over one day during opening hours vO AA N pH Hourly data 08 00 09 00 2 responses 09 00 10 00 0 responses 50 Bookstore Coupon 10 00 11 00 1 response 11 00 12 00 4 responses 12 00 01 00 9 responses 01 00 02 00 12 responses 02 00 03 00 8 responses 03 00 04 00 4 responses Enter online at 04 00 05 00 2 responses www su edu 50free 05 00 06 00 3 responses 06 00 07 00 2 responses 6 The center might conclude that messages published between I pm and 2pm got the most response and that responses are more heavily clustered around early afternoon But they might also want to extend the study to two weeks to determine which days are the most successful as well Tracking by every known variable can be intricate and complex but the depth of insight makes it well worth it Consider the environment of the display and the responding viewer when formulating measurement tactics In this example were there enough computers for students to access and so respond to the message If not more students may be paying attention to messages than you realize Another idea is to see which displays in your facility get the best response by using interactive touchscreens or pairing displays with web kiosks to let viewers take immediate action There are also informal ways of measuring success such as general conversation a lunchroom chat
16. Keep moving with video and Flash Whenever we present or train people on Visix software someone always asks about Flash animation Flash is a simple but extremely powerful tool that helps communicators add motion to digital signage without requiring in depth knowledge of video editing applications Digital signage content and layouts that include Flash can have a powerful impact on the overall look of your communications especially if they are scheduled among pre determined layouts Video gets noticed and it s especially important to incorporate when you re trying to draw attention to digital signage in bustling high traffic areas Movement draws the eye of onlookers and juxtaposing video near static communications ensures higher readership Nine out of ten Americans say that television is their primary news source and as sophisticated viewers they re accustomed to using video to glean information Incorporating video clips or streaming programs that are targeted to your audience is a sure way to pique their interest and influence viewing patterns Video topics might include Welcome video in lobbies reception Safety videos Training presentations News and sports channels Entertainment programs Recruiting videos Lifestyle spotlights Community appeals Product demonstrations Special promotions Targeted programming Video is the best medium for communicating a large amount of information or a complex idea in a short timeframe If
17. Visix provides our customers with a pre implementation checklist where we ask them to make sure that all relevant steps are completed before we arrive to help them withimplementation VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE PAGE 28 Common implementation mistakes You should be enthusiastic about getting your digital signage system up and running It s a powerful medium that can have a big impact on your communications But don t be so eager that you overlook some early steps A system that works flawlessly from its launch should be your goal and with the right planning you can avoid these common implementation mistakes Mistakes with planning and implementation Inadequate budget There s no way around it digital signage is a significant investment You need to make sure you ve got the budget not only for the initial implementation but also for maintenance and repair down the road You should also budget for the life expectancy of your hardware No screen lasts forever and if you re using yoursaround the clock you need to account for that workload Inadequate survey of network Management doesn t always know what s under the hood At each location you plan to install a system make sure you have a technician survey the power and network connectivity along with someone well versed in your network s security Consider locations In public areas like lobbies or cafeterias you may want to make use of sound But if you
18. YELLOW WHITE is combination of all three primaries and BLACK is the absence of light These colors are all used to provide the wide array of colors available in digital displays Our Perception of Color The human eye is most sensitive to GREEN with RED coming in second for optical sensitivity Our eyes are least sensitive to BLUE To improve your messages e Use contrasting colors e Understand what viewer s eye is drawn to e Control impact of information Focus techniques Use various techniques to pull the viewer s focus to critical information first Guide the eye and provide a visual hierarchy by utilizing the tips we ve provided on text styles and color Graphics flow and white space also give visual clues to guide viewing patterns Spatial arrangement of design elements determines the hierarchy for the eye What s more prominent your graphic or your text Very colorful and or high contrast items will pull the eye first Size will also play a part in determining what is considered high priority to the viewer A consistent presentation of information over time can help train your audience to look for important information in familiar formats Consider developing design templates or guidelines to preserve continuity Previewing When previewing your messages consider where your eye goes first and adjust your design to ensure that the most critical elements take priority Test readability and visibility on your monit
19. advertising to your audience VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 54 Provide a forum for community work Many organizations sponsor facilitate or even participate in community events and catastrophic events sometimes make those initiatives urgent For flexibility and maximum exposure to what is being done by companies and their employees digital signage gives organizations an upper hand in spreading the word A simple bulletin with essential information and directions for participation can help spur audiences to action and keep your viewers informed about ongoing civic efforts Presentation can help build a stronger sense of community because it informs your audiences about your non profit activities and invites their participation Even if your organization isn t formally involved you can still collect and advertise community programs from outside event calendars publications and the web Choose topics from your community your industry or your favorite regional charities Remember to keep messages clear and concise and start communications at least one month before an event or deadline Repetition is the key to awareness and it gives viewers time to remember andrespond Community communications might include Calls for volunteers Special events and fundraisers Community resources and contacts Blood and pledge drives Appeals for donations Committee or liaison programs Association news Poll your audience with
20. and turnover Better work time management and job performance Increased efficiencies through improved collaboration Better informed educated workforce More efficient crisis plan execution improved safety Impact on Bottom Line Higher customer satisfaction Lower cost of communications Higher employee satisfaction Lower cost of labor Lower insurance legal and workers compensation costs Higher output Increased revenue Lower recruiting and training costs Faster crises recovery For some practical advice and tools to help you plan your communication goals and gauge success the following sections cover both general and specific tips VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 16 Measuring success When you re evaluating your investment in digital signage you want to make sure you re taking in the big picture so to speak Most digital signage supports a variety of organizational needs and has many contributors You want to factor in your total costs and total benefit to see whether the investment makes sense for you First consider the full costs of operation Creating content is often an additional activity and does have some inherent costs Of course these can range from maintaining a large team of audiovisual designers to an extra few minutes a day for one system administrator Regardless of how it is done content must be created by someone Messages for digital signage are
21. are important to every organization but especially to campus and government users can be significantly bolstered by using digital solutions instead of print The sum of all this is that in addition to modest but real ecological benefits a dynamic digital signage solution offers more ways to reach more people at a lower cost per person After the first year you have no further component costs with a digital signage solution The system and all sundries have been bought and implemented and your continued costs are simply the electricity you use and any maintenance and upgrades needed There is also value though impossible to calculate on a spreadsheet in presenting your organization in a modern up to date way Adding sound and movement through video Flash television feeds and tickers just heightens your perceived value building trust and confidence in your target audience As the environmental and economic challenges of our times are more and more on people s minds they will naturally even subconsciously be attracted to more modern cleaner more efficient technology They will feel like they are moving along with the times rather than languishing in the past Additionally your audience will be exposed to your messages much more frequently than with printed materials how often have we received a company newsletter glanced at it briefly maybe skimmed an article or two and then either discarded it in the trash can or put it o
22. audience participation and feedback Rewards viewers for loyalty to your communications Continues to build relationships and open communication channels One simple method is to invite viewers to register for your loyalty program and then integrate contests and rewards for those members within your message playlist Including action items such as The first 15 Rewards Club members to call extension 230 will win a Starbucks gift card will give you a vehicle to measure viewing patterns and participation statistics Because this is the only medium where participants can gain these specific rewards they will become more loyal to the vehicle And because winners are restricted to loyalty program members other viewers will have incentive to signup As in all communication strategies it is essential that you consider your audience carefully and tailor the program and rewards to their tastes If your rewards are not enticing you will not likely see the results you re hoping for Turn messaging into a profit center Today s digital signage makes a higher volume of messages possible and opens the door for lowering costs by turning your messaging system into a profit center Generate revenues by advertising partner products andservices augment your content and offset some of the costs of operation Single Angus Cheeseburger 4 Spicy or Crispy Whether you already have a partner program or are creating a new one Bacon Angus Cheeseburger 4 Double
23. be sure to check the copyright terms of any feed you plan to publish Main advantages of targeted communications Reach audience immediately with critical updates and instructions Make information available to audiences on the go Jump ahead of traditional media so notices don t get lost in day to day clutter Reinforce other methods of communication Circumvent spam filters Create RSS strings that can be read anywhere Deliver high resolution images As technology has changed in the past few years so have people s expectations Today we all expect more more details more ways to interact and more ways to connect Communications are becoming democratized VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE PAGE 7 THE DEMOCRATIZATION OF COMMUNICATIONS When communications are perceived as top down they re never very effective In the age of the web we ve taken huge strides in democratizing how organizations communicate What seems to be an ever expanding range of new tools is impacting how we create share and consume information First of all we expect more more examples more background and more context We expect to be able to explore a topic more deeply and the depth had better be there or we ll go someplace else Yet we expect more from the messenger too Responsibility and accountability for effective communication have spread across the organization which reminds us that there are a lot of people out ther
24. centered on pre promotion advertising and follow up for specific events you may want to organize your communication plans within those categories Departmental Allow each contributing group to form a plan and then combine them for overall effectiveness This will allow you to develop themes and compare and contrast various planned campaigns It makes sense to also consider your digital signage plan within the scope of other organizational plans for marketing communications human resources and IT No matter how you choose to organize your plan remember to always cite your goals and your resources Do your homework Just as planning will improve your communications a little research will improve your strategies The level of detail to include in your plan depends on how much information you have and how you are able to organize it e Who is your audience Do you have statistical information about them so you can plan more effectively Plan around style and content that appeals to each audience Remember to address internal as well as external audiences Gathering basic data about their habits and preferences can help you determine when and how to attract their attention e Where is your content coming from Try to get as much information from contributing sources and map out your own sources for content in advance This will allow you to approximate the quantity type and timing of content that will be available to you e How many separat
25. concert with your network s standards for pop up blockers email clients and firewalls Using existing computer hardware is an affordable yet powerful tool for reinforcing routine information or alerting during emergency situations Messengers with live updates Really Simple Syndication RSS automatically broadcasts information updates to subscribers RSS feeds provide up to the minute news and other information and some advanced users have been using them for years for things like stock information and travel updates But RSS can be used on a variety of media to keep people up to date automatically whether it s via PCs digital signage or mobile devices In fact RSS is becoming even more practical now that newer platforms and networks are allowing people to take their broadband services wherever they go You can choose from existing RSS feed subscriptions or use an RSS publisher to deliver your own messages when and where your audience needs them including news feeds weather updates stock alerts announcements schedule changes business news emergency alerts Homeland Security information and sports and entertainment news Note that many sites have a disclaimer about commercial broadcast of their feeds You should contact individual sites for permission to broadcast or share the feed In most instances the copyright terms refer to rebroadcast on a website and generally do not mention use with digital signage but nevertheless you should
26. do I need to say whatever messages we craft go unread During each phase of a communication we should be thinking of the corollary what do I need them to know Only after we ve considered content and audience do we begin to think of medium Because we can t control our audience s viewing habits preconceptions or distractions we have to work hard to break through barriers to convey clear unambiguous communications that will be paid attention to and understood For every attempt to communicate these are the steps that should betaken Distill what you need to convey down to its simplest form Define who you need to get the idea across to Determine exactly what you want the viewer to takeaway Determine the best means to deliver the information Craft and deliver your message Follow up to be sure the recipient accurately understood Sk a obo Knowledge of the audience the form and method of the message and follow up all play a part in how communications are perceived Factoring in audience needs will help you make decisions about the appropriate medium for your message In their report Communicating Big Change available as a free download from www larkin biz authors TJ and Sandar Larkin show that the web is ideal for short and fast information retrieval Yet they assert that print communications despite many organizations pushing for paperless environments are preferable for new long or complex announcements And if you
27. even more visible and noticed and if they become stale and overused you may be doing more harm than good Cutting corners on content creation can damage the credibility of what could be an important tool and organizations need to consider their full costsdown the road Second take a broad view and consider the full benefit You may have a specific goal and already know how you re going to measure it like driving foot traffic in a certain direction But don t forget the additional often intangible benefits Gather feedback What are people saying about it Ultimately you ll want concrete measurement of costs and benefits Accurate measurement involves three essential components a definable goal an accurate view of before and an accurate view of after Before you implement a system and start measuring results see if you have enough data on past campaigns or processes If you don t you may want to run a campaign first as you normally would measuring results along the way so that you have a benchmark to contrast with communications after the system is in place Fully understanding your starting point is a huge advantage Measuring overall success So how do you even know if your visual communications are having the impact you want them to have Do you know what you want your audience to do after seeing your messages Do you have an effective method in place to determine how successful you have been To answer these
28. if you will where you simply ask people if they ve seen your messages and what they thought ofthem One of the easiest ways to measure the success of individual messages is to use built in design elements or calls to action that are easily measurable VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 20 Design Elements for Measuring Success Remember that ROI isn t all about statistics it s about results Now that you know the reasons and the basic steps here are some design elements that lend themselves to easy ROI measurement No hassle Savings QR Tags No monthly service charge 2 No minimum balance required No problem A Quick Response QR tag 1s a two dimensional bar code that embeds data to be read by smartphone cameras Creating a QR tag 1s easy using one of the many free online generators Simply input a dedicated URL you want the QR tag to point to and it will generate an image file with the embedded data Embed QR tags in digital signage messages to send viewers to a website have them vote in a poll or offer a downloadable coupon Track the number of hits to the QR tag s URL and you have your ROI SMS Response We talk in detail about SMS polls later in the guide but this is a great way to get feedback from your audience and measure ROI at the same time Text your CHOICE to 99503 Secure a polling plan with one of the many online providers Then design your message with the IE 1661 question s
29. statements should be shaped so that only the most essential factual details need to be added to press releases Emotions and time constraints dictate that communicators should not be hampered with cumbersome writing assignments during a crisis Be sure to include business recovery tactics in your plan Getting your organization up and running as soon as possible after a crisis is critical as is educating the communityat large such as remote employees investors and customers The first hour is critical Protocols and timelines for communications to all groups should be established in advance Be specific Instead of just listing the order of contact set deadlines such as Call emergency workers within five minutes and Notify all on site personnel within eight minutes Try your plans out before an emergency happens Testing is essential to getting your plan right so be sure to build in crisis drills during plan development and on a continuing basis to guarantee that everyone in your organization is well prepared Technology tools During a crisis though you can get the word out much faster with communications technologies than without technology should not be your only tool during an emergency Consider all channels at your disposal On site e Sirens loudspeakers Public address system fixed speakers mobile PA unit or both Fire panels with voice enunciation Digital signage Two way radio walkie talkie Personal contact an
30. the requested action If not was it due to poor understanding Without follow up to measure the success of your communications the process becomes the centralized push method that benefits neither you nor your audience Always be readyto adjust your strategies and tactics based on feedback for greater success VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 40 Publish your policies By publishing some standardized policies about how to create manage and deliver your digital signage messages you can streamline workflows and improve your messages content and look In addition to telling people how to go about creating and posting messages you can also avoid cluttered playlists and ensure that the look of all of your content meets your standards Policies are also useful because people can be self sufficient and not take up valuable staff time asking the same questions again and again Consider these tips in creating a policy for your organization Discuss appropriate and inappropriate content Consider who your audience is and what sorts of messages you want going out to them Many users prohibit commercial content and want only postings relevant to their organization Do you have any prohibitions regarding images language or topics Do you have to comply with FCC or other regulations Give some guidelines as to what is and what is not an appropriate message this will save you hassle embarrassment and even liability Include id
31. tools for sharing information throughout an organization Controlled centralized source of information Easy efficient interface accessible from any web browser Technologies familiar to and relied upon by audiences Timely relevant communications delivered quickly Concise communications with visual impact for instant recognition Targeted messages delivered to multiple endpoints Built in reporting authorization and security tools Alert mode __ Capability for crisis communications se Expected Effect on Culture Reinforcement of organization s identity and branding Decreased impact of rumors and water cooler communications Democratization of communications Increased number and type of employees involved in creating and disseminating information Motivation through timely performance updates and recognition Improved response time for action items and or feedback from target audiences Improved understanding of organizational goals and progress Establishment of central authoritative source of information Increased trust and reliance on corporate communications Expected Change in Performance Consistent identity and brand representation Establishment of formal communications processes and flow Less time spent creating managing and delivering communications Decreased importance of monetary incentives for employee satisfaction Lower employee absenteeism
32. w L Pst F FE EET CESTA i wil al t AN J J E Ti Ere d ib d Why digital signage is growing Video has been available for decades but its costs equipment know how and production time have limited its use to messages that can be produced in advance such as for training or formal announcements But when technology enabled audiovisual signals to be sent via the web everything changed Referred to as AV over IP the technology did more than allow people to view video clips online For the first time it allowed visual content to be created and shown nearly instantly on digital displays across networks Meanwhile flat screen technology large screen LCDs became more affordable and made monitors lighter and more easily mounted in differentlocations Digital signage has taken video a step further allowing us to talk about something we at Visix call dynamic visual communications Of course people have always communicated visually but visual communications that are dynamic systems that can create and revise content nearly instantaneously make for a whole new ballgame Digital signage content can combine multiple windows crawls tickers animations and much more into one unified presentation medium and that content can be controlled from a computer or other device Systems with these kinds of capabilities offer much more flexibility to deliver content to targeted audie
33. your emergency system but if you do you will want it to be fast and as effective as possible reaching the maximum number of people in the shortest amount of time Conduct regular extensive tests of the overall system not just isolated elements Remember even an unsuccessful test is a success A test is just that a test Identifying and the correcting weak spots is an important step to streamlining and perfecting your emergency alert system You should be constantly improving and updating your system It is not possible to have an alert system that is too efficient Repetition also makes the emergency system a part of the fabric of life at your facility much like the fire and old duck and cover drills we had in grammar school The point is to make reactions to emergencies predictable and instantaneous emotions will run high and having staff and others thoroughly trained will only help the situation Get the big boys on board Recent extreme weather events and incidents of random violence and alarm like the attacks on New York and the Pentagon on 9 11 Hurricane Katrina the Virginia Tech shootings and flu pandemics have highlighted the need for effective crisis plans Even so you may have to work to convince upper management to commit the time and resources needed to develop test and maintain a crisis plan The concept of lives being lost is so frightening and remote that people often can t commit to the idea but the conse
34. Bacon 5 Cried Chicken Sandwich G before you solicit advertising you should develop guidelines for file types od sizes and content restrictions as well as procedures for submission approval E a and invoicing By controlling the approval scheduling and delivery of advertisements your organization retains the exclusive rights to your audience s contact information You can even discourage spam email and unwanted direct mail by directing those advertisers to your visual messaging program Your messaging system will be interesting to anyone who wants to get in front of your audience Consider the following sources of advertising income for your organization Vendor or manufacturing partner ads featuring products sale pricing and or incentiveprograms Community businesses offering discounts to your employees or students Local food providers advertising meal specials Bookstores offering industry specific selections or motivational aids Registration drives for loyalty programs frequent flyer rental cars hotels etc Organizational merchandise clothing or other items branded with a companylogo Event promotions for conferences or trade shows Income can approximate classified ad rates or rival premier magazine rates It all depends on the size of your audience the number of displays and the frequency of the ad Whether you realize a profit or simply offset your communications costs you ll be able to provide quality controlled
35. Debbie Wilson our tireless copywriters who waded through the sea of material on these subjects and crafted it into something entertaining and informative Thanks also to Laura Moorehead with Blue Sky Integrated Technologies Inc Her contribution to the System Considerations section of this guide has allowed each of us to glimpse the complexities and brilliance of the AV integrator and to learn from it Visit www blueskyiti com Lastly thanks to each of our customers for continuing to educate us and motivate us to provide better software better service and better communications Sources 1 The AV Role in Security Gary Kayye s Rave Volume 5 Issue 18 September 24 2007 2 Watson Wyatt 2005 2006 Communication ROI Study November 2005 http Awww watsonwyatt com render asp catid 1 amp id 15362 3 12 The Elements of Great Managing by Rodd Wagner and James K Harter Ph D Gallup Press 2006 12 The Elements of Great Managing as summarized by Kent M Blumberg Kent M Blumberg 2007 The Elements of 12 Elements by John Moore Brand Autopsy 2006 4 Hawk Alert Emergency Notification System Update PowerPoint Mark Katsouros The University of lowa 02 11 08 http connect educause edu Library Abstract EmergencyCommunicationsMa 46211 time 1232968705 5 Ready for Disaster By Robert Holland and Katrina Gill CW Magazine March April 2006 Crafting a Crisis Communication Plan by Gerard Braud CW Bulletin July 2007 6 You can cal
36. MENTRY issues treatments and news With easy to use templates and gt HCU GRITICATGARE scheduling features even employees with limited technical skills can update displays in patient rooms lobbies waiting rooms and hallways a B ecause digital signage software 1S flexible and web Our Cancer Survivors Group meets every Tuesday at 7pm drop ins e based 1t can even tailor timely messaging to specific audiences Deliver important timely announcements Generate revenues with targeted advertising Welcome visitors with personalized messages Broadcast emergency alerts Share health programs with target audiences Advertise gift shop products and special offers Advertise upcoming events and vaccination schedules Promote community outreach and partner programs Display live weather traffic stock and sports news Supplement training and education efforts Hospitality and convention centers show better guest service Your staff works hard to get guests what they need Does your communications system do the same Well run facilities and events ARA members enjoy upto os o ee daly y 12 00pm iS make it easier for visitors to find what they re looking for learn of peat n updates or changes and spend more time doing what they came to EVENT J 41 r schedule Digital signage software makes it easy to complement your planning and execution because it delivers timely information through strategically placed digital room signs and di
37. NCE e PAGE 50 CONTENT IDEAS No matter how sophisticated your system and how committed the people are who run it it s easy to get into a rut particularly if your organization has limited access to creative professionals like graphic and AV designers It s a real risk because content that s stale is highly conspicuous on digital signage and can undermine your investment Nevertheless by seeking out new sources for content especially from within your organization you can keep your digital signage system engaging and new long past its initial launch Pixel to pixel content you already have You may not realize how much ready made content you have available to you With a few inquiries and some cooperation from colleagues you can repurpose existing resources into effective visual communications Comprehensive Expertise PowerPoint Your department teams work hard to prepare PowerPoint presentations that have valuable information for your audiences Much digital signage software allows you to import PowerPoint Slides directly select schedule and deliver them in just minutes With minimal preparation you ve got exciting new visuals loaded and ready to go Many software products also support PowerPoint animations and transitions so you won t lose any of your original settings A gt visix A Digital Signage Deployment Marketing teams are rich in presentation materials and can often contribute templates a
38. NS SUVEY ccccccsseeecceeceeeeeceeaeeeeeeeeseaeeeeeeseeeeeeesseeeeeesseaeeeeeeseaeeeeeesaaseeeeeaas 18 Measuring tactical SUCCESS as 20 Design Elements tor Measuring SUCCESS ii A ee eee ee 21 OY oO TENSONSIDERA TON S nera a a E a aceite eens 23 What is required to put a SYSTEM IN place ooocooncccccnccncccnncnnoconencnnancncnnnnnnononcnnnnnnrnnnnnncnnonnnnnnonnrnnnnnnrnnonanrnnenanens 23 Technol OY ODISEA 25 Shopping for content management software oooccncconccncccnnnnccononcnnancnnonannnnonnnononnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnrnnnnnnrnnnranrnnonanass 25 PlanorFUparade Suera Ie ta ia 25 IMPLEMENTA TION o dr 27 A A ctl pitc daut wis staa pret va cts a a eeaeUaatees 27 OV SIO MM o A EAE T 27 Intrastucltte COMPONG MUS stiaca a trad 28 Network security policies cccccccceececceeecceececeeececeueeceeeessueecseeessueessauseceueessugeesaueessaueessueesseeeessueeessetesseeessaas 28 Resource avala a a Lo 28 Pres de PIO VIMe Mt WO ss hestusedece re reese nas inasdeea E eo eee 28 Gommon Implementation Mistakes cuina iaa 29 VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE PAGE 2 DIGITAL SIGNAGE IN YOURENVIRONMEN Toa do 31 Corporate environments deliver messages with IMMediacy ooocccococcncononcncnnononononcnnnnnnnnnnnancnnonannnnonnronconannnnnnas 31 On campus get news across quickly and easily cccoooonccnncccooncnnnoconnnnnnnnnanennnonnancnnnononnnnnnnnnanennnnnnanennnnnnans 32 Financial institutions simplify promoti
39. SMS voting We ve all seen American Idol ask viewers to text their vote for the next pop star using their mobile phones Well you can use the same technology to poll your digital signage audience It s not just a great tool for voting it s also a terrific way to measure ROI and get audience feedback Which internet browser do you use most often Text your CHOICE to 99503 IE 1661 You can use SMS voting to poll on a number of topics like Firefox 1662 Chrome 1663 Safari 18664 Opera 1665 e General surveys e Audience choice polls a e Silent auctions Which internat browser de you use most often e Training comprehension checks EN eer e T Hall 1661 own Hall responses 1602000 Corsa 1663 A i Fund raising pledges an 168A w 1865 First you need to secure a polling plan with one of the many online providers A popular system is PollEverywhere com which works with SMS texting web surveys and Twitter Plans are based on the maximum number of responses you want to allow for an individual poll and it s free if you only need to collect 30 or fewer votes Also semester long plans are available for K 12 and higher education customers Creating an SMS poll for digital signage isn t much different than creating any other message Simply design your bulletin with the question the phone number where people send their votes and a list of options with their corresponding SMS codes Viewers just see your b
40. Take advantage of customer wait time to educate and engage e i Supplement training on current mortgage services investment Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet consectetur adiscin elit Morbi ti ESN opportunities and banking solutions Or trigger action in employees with instant updates Visual communication systems that are simple to use make creating a message as easy as filling out a form Even with limited creative or technical resources you can deliver messages to digital signage room signs or desktops and mobile devices Messages can be automatically scheduled and options like the RSS feed adapter means that live data can be displayed as bulletins or tickers It also gives you greater emergency alert capabilities in the event of severe weather or a security threat your administrator can instantly switch to alert mode and get critical information to people through digital signs desktops and mobile devices Combine video and bulletins Advertise financial products promotions and offers Deliver important announcements as they happen Enable critical financial decisions with on time data Post changing stock updates and rate information Promote community outreach and partner programs Respond quickly with emergency announcements Government facilities make visual systems easy to use Government communications need to reach broad and diverse audiences and visitors to their offices and service centers respond to a variety of media y Dyna
41. a whole but also for individual questions Put it online Using an online survey tool like SurveyMonkey com makes the whole process easier Participants access the survey on a web page and click through for their answers Responses are compiled into statistical data that s easy for you to interpret Repeat Repeat You can t judge progress unless you have a baseline for comparison Repeat your survey after adequate time has passed usually a minimum of 90 days Don t alter the questions or answers or you ll distort the comparison When crafting and implementing a method of measuring your communications effectiveness the idea is to make it a long term continuing process With constant feedback from your target audience you can fine tune your messages and campaigns to become better and better at reaching the specific people you are targeting and getting the results you want The following is a brief sample survey that can easily be tailored to your organization giving you an idea of the kind of things to include as you craft and customize your evaluative program Sample internal communications survey In which Visix office do you work C Atlanta _ Philadelphia C Portland _ Boston _ Denver _ Other In which department do you work _ Executive Management _ Administration _ Marketing amp Sales _ Financial Operations _ Manufacturing _ Development _ Customer Service _ Other Ove
42. ack from users to judge success VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 46 Visual rules design for the human eye Developing messages for digital displays is a fun creative process that lets you experiment with the design elements of color contrast text and arrangement In order to retain readability within an artistic presentation space several basic rules should be understood Contrast and legibility The best message may be lost if the viewer cannot easily see the information displayed on the screen Contrast is the primary factor for legibility poor contrast reduces legibility good contrast improves legibility Contrast background and foreground colors Dark backgrounds Light backgrounds should utilize should utilize LIGHT DARK 7 foreground colors foreground colors The 3 x 5 rule Words on the screen are there to communicate clear concise information Remember to keep messages uncluttered Keep the type size large for legibility at a distance and present only the most importantideas Try not to use more than three lines of text of five words each OR five lines of text of three words each Gettysburg Address Gettysburg Address Four score and seven years ago our 3 fathers brought forth on this continent Fathers created nation a new nation conceived in Liberty and 5 a dedicated to the proposition that all Conceived in liberty sresere creates emus Dedicated to equality How we are engaged in a gr
43. aragraphs Publish your policies in print form or on the web if you have an intranet with easy access for all users People often remember things visually so you may also want to include screenshots of forms templates or even the software interface itself Making your published policies available as a downloadable PDF or Word document may also be useful The main thing is that your policies should be clear and concise yet contain all the information someone needs to deliver and manage content in a way consistent with the needs and guidelines of your organization We ve created a sample policy below for a non existent organization VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE PAGE 42 OurOrgTV Our message system is a network of video displays that gives us an effective and fast means of communicating with colleagues OurOrgTV allows you to create and preview an electronic message to market particular programs and services that are available to our community This policy contains basic instructions for working with OurOrgTV These instructions are not all inclusive but they can help you in the initial phases of creation scheduling and maintaining messages for OurOrgTV From the Approval Reminder window other options are available but for the purpose of getting you started only bulletins and crawls will be covered in this manual Note additional online training and guidance is available Contact OurOrgTV administrators for details Conte
44. art with the PMS and equivalent RGB colors of your logo Again your marketing team can provide this information e Your designs can include other colors besides the logo colors Identity standards often have a color palette that complements the primary logo colors e Check the guidelines or develop a limited selection of six to eight colors including logo colors that harmonize with each other What fonts does my organization use as part of their identity package e You can still use fun fonts to make your communications exciting but remember to incorporate approved text styles where relevant e Remember to use a limited number of fonts when designing a single visual message Some organizations have a graphics library that you can choose from and their internet or intranet sites can be a good resource for photos and graphics that have already been through the approval process If you re selecting backgrounds from a library consider using those that complement your color palette or have your favorites tinted to match your color system VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 45 Recognition cues color code your messages With the volume of communications your audience receives each day it s Interface important to make the recognition of important information as easy as possible By helping your audience instantly identify and recognize the source and priority of messages you can dramatically improve your digital signage Over ti
45. ations have policies defining acceptable configurations for computers connected to their internal network Applying these security policies to the servers used for digital signage without consideration of the effects of those changes could result in the failure of the system you ve just bought Such a system failure might require rebuilding the operating system or digital signage system and those repairs may not be covered by your warranty They also might require you to return the server to the factory When choosing a system provider make sure they re able to work with you to satisfy your organization s security requirements Visix systems for example require a thorough understanding of the Windows XP Professional operating system SQL Server 2005 Internet Information Services and the NET Framework to properly and safely apply security changes Resource availability Visix strongly urges you to make your network administrator and other necessary staff available at the time of installation into your network That means it s important to confirm the installation schedule verify that the installer will have access at the right time and that the installer will be able to use the local network and confirm video distribution If not your own personnel should be available to do it for them Pre deployment work Another key step to keep implementation costs at a minimum is to verify that all pre installation work is complete By way of example
46. choices With most traditional software licenses users pay a licensing fee for each machine running the application A majority of web based solutions don t charge according to the number of users but only a one time fee for the application itself The SAAS or ASP models however are completely different they may require each unique user to pay a fee If you think only one or two people will be creating or managing content look at native applications If you want more people contributing you should check into web based solutions that harness the power of your existing network for distributed management capability When it comes to content management there are no real differences between web and native interfaces Either will allow you to work with calendars playlists tickers data sources and playback tracking Through a browser however users can manage content from anywhere via the web which gives you greater flexibility to grow the community of users Universal access particularly in the event of an emergency gives web based versions a significant advantage Regardless of which user interface is more appropriate to your organization the solution you choose should be able to accommodate the most common functional requirements At a minimum the product should support data feeds RSS XML FTP and others popular file formats Flash MPEG JPG and others remote diagnostics scalability N tier user and role administration layout manag
47. ck about the system particularly how it relates to any impact on the services youadvertise VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE PAGE 43 Writing for visual communications In our daily written communications we strive to be clear and grammatically correct However we need to be even clearer and more concise in the world of messaging Messaging should be just that a message not a lengthy narrative that packs too many words onto a small screen Your audience is on the go and needs to receive only the most important information in a compact format Keep in mind that the fewer words you use in your bulletins the more impact they will have You can increase font size instead of relying on your audience to read long sentences or paragraphs of information to glean meaning and relevance Delivery of messaging to smartphones and desktop messenger platforms require brevity Concise messaging allows you to rotate bulletins more frequently exposing your audience to more communications in less time How can we improve this message There will be a a Business amp E Communication Career Fair held all day in Sutter Hall on May 11 Business amp Communication Revision e Never bury the lead make sure that you present the most important facts first As you see in our example a brief title is a great way to grab attention and create interest e Highlight information by using color contrast and text styles as we ve don
48. content rotates should also be determined Whether a field moves e g scrolling as a crawl and how it is refreshed should be identified Actual layout may vary during the day and the individual displays themselves may present different content at different locations Talk with your system provider or integrator now about these possibilities Financial planning revenue potential Some companies use digital signage to deliver advertising exclusively and others use ads to lower operational costs If you re one of the latter and unfamiliar with advertising determining rates can be a challenge Retailers and other advertisers have finely tuned methodologies to determine the cost per thousand viewers of a targeted demographic In general rates are often comparable to other visual media such as TV which charges around 20 per thousand viewers Financial planning costs Costs can include administration acquiring content network deployment and operations When projecting these administration costs consider strategic and tactical planning content sourcing location providers or other partners funding providers and suppliers and financial forecasting and reporting Deployment costs include hardware displays mounts audio connectivity software content management systems room scheduling software and installation Operational costs include display layout and playlist management connectivity support and maintenance Connectivity Most sys
49. culate your car s emissions at the EPA website http www epa gov greenvehicles Index do jsessionid 8230e5dd701b7279533d 7 Digital Signage Consumes 7 5 Less Carbon Than Posters by Adrian J Cotterill http www dailydooh com archives 10265 8 Wikipedia http en wikipedia org wiki Electricity_generation Global_ warming and htto en wikipedia org wiki Environmental_concerns_with_electricity_generation 9 Carbon footprint assumes 1 35 lbs of CO emissions per kWh Replacing a regular light bulb with a CFL saves 150 lbs of COzeach year 10 Planning Your Digital Signage Network by Lyle Bunn www signindustry com http www signindustry com electronic articles 2005 10 03 LB PlanningDigitalSignageNetwork php3 Copyright 2009 2015 Visix Inc All rights reserved Visix the Visix logo and Announce are registered trademarks of Visix Inc ARPOINT MeetingMinder RoomBoard WayPoint and xtras are common law trademarks of Visix Inc All other trademarks contained herein are the property of their respective owners Visix reserves the right to alter specifications without notice at any time D COR 0000 001 11 15 VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE PAGE 58
50. d the same day if received during business hours and no corrections or edits are needed Special requests for custom backgrounds may delay publishing Wordy messages or grammatical and spelling errors will be edited or returned for revision Special requests for graphics or backgrounds must be requested and approved by the OurOrgTV team Distribution and display options OurOrgTV is for the promotion of upcoming services events meetings programs special events or other events open to the entire organization Each message will be broadcast to four plasma displays throughout our environment where you can get your message across to the more than 5 000 guests in our facilities every day For broad messages the Big Blue screen is available for broadcast in the main lobby In addition to messages about services a meeting and events directory will be updated daily Message crawls will be managed exclusively by the OurOrgTV team and are restricted to peaktimes Browser requirements To create bulletins from your own computer you will need to have the most recent version of Internet Explorer If your version of IE is not at least version 7 0 contact Tech Support User names and passwords Users must sign up for an account with OurOrgTV to get a login and password A brief training orientation will be provided for each approved user Additional questions If you have any additional questions don t hesitate to contact us The OurOrgTV team would love feedba
51. d word of mouth Sirens PA systems and other devices that use sound to alert and inform should all be placed in optimal locations for maximum coverage of the site area Having a mobile PA system on a truck for example could help ensure that as many people as possible hear the alert Of course deaf people will not be alerted by these means Digital signage is visual and one of its main advantages is its high visibility when placed in public areas Whatever software you use to drive your digital signage should have the ability to interrupt its service with crisis announcements Regardless of the digital signage technology you use be sure to develop some crisis cues such as unique colors symbols or text codes so your audience will immediately recognize emergency communications Some facilities have staff members who carry two way radios and a quick word broadcast out to these devices will further get the message out that there is an emergency situation Do not underestimate the value of personal contact and word of mouth as a means to get people informed mobilized This is often the first means of communication and sometimes the last resort Individuals should be trained in how to notify people near them of a crisis Emergency training courses can help prepare individuals for leadership under extreme circumstances Telephones e Voice and phone both mobile phones and land lines e Voice mail broadcast e Text messaging SMS Having an up t
52. dules or tell employees what s for lunch Networked digital signage not only gives management another vehicle to address the entire organization it gives them a way to narrowcast Maybe students at one campus are reminded that free flu shots will be available the following day while another audience learns that on Friday the west entrance will be closed for two hours As the workday comes to a close monitors throughout the system might display local weather and traffic so that people can plan their commutes Boosting security and business continuity Many organizations have turned their attention to security and drawn up plans for business continuity in the event of an emergency Digital signage and the applications that drive it can be critical tools to get instructions out quickly With many content management applications you can broadcast messages to everyone to select locations or even to the smartphones of key individuals When a crisis happens rumors and misinformation can spread quickly out of control Digital signage and complementary messaging systems help dispel rumors calm people down and issue explicit instructions These capabilities are invaluable where any large groups of people meet like college campuses or transit systems An enterprise digital signage system can quickly blast information to target audiences say for example to managers so that they re better able to handle the situation It can get critical
53. e Not exactly Participation is the key We know now that it s not enough to exchange information We want to help people act on what they know because when people become more involved they re more likely to get the straight story and to share it with others which builds community and reduces the damage of chatter And that of course has always been the inspiration for communications in the first place At Visix we believe that visual communication systems have a role to play in fostering that participation and feedback It s reinforcing Ask any communicator and they Il tell you that repetition is the only way to get an idea across But spreading a message through as many media as possible isn t simply a matter of playing percentages with broadcast coverage Different people take in information in different ways and presenting ideas visually reinforces the verbal communications you re providing elsewhere That s particularly important in an age when many messages get lost in the crowd Consider too the diversity of your audience Does everyone speak the language you re presenting in Does everyone know your vocabulary Digital signage and messaging systems are proving themselves highly effective at communicating procedures directions and training because people see what is being asked of them It s unifying For years now we ve been hearing about the power of a good brand But achieving unity in how a brand is prese
54. e channels of communications will you use at onetime Even within a communications channel consider your options In visual messaging for example you should consider how many content blocks tickers and other publishers are being used e What is the best delivery method for various communications You may want to assign content to specific media or ensure saturation by delivering to combined endpoints Some content is exclusively suited for a certain endpoint e g video where other communications are more versatile such as text bulletins that fit in displays smartphones desktop pop ups tickers or screensavers This attention to detail doesn t mean the end to spontaneous communications On the contrary your plan should be formulated with flexibility that allows for adjustments as needed Last minute communications are often essential to the timeliness of your bulletins and the subsequent success of those messages being understood Write it down Don t just think it out write it out As you solidify plans and ideas document them so you have them for future reference Consider how you can use your communications as tools to improve your relationship with internal and external stakeholders Follow up Keep your plan handy and be sure to dust it off regularly Count on making changes as your objectives and environments change Solicit and analyze feedback Measure understanding by looking at your audience s actions Did they perform
55. e in our design e Drop unnecessary words Eliminate unimportant phrases and prepositions as we ve donehere e Be specific Make sure places dates and times are complete and exact We ve changed all day to specific times and have included the level in Sutter Hall e Present all the facts Although we re tightening up the text we don t want to leave any important details out of the message Remember The more accurate your messages are the more your audience will rely on and look for them on a regular basis VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE PAGE 44 Working with brand standards A digital signage system has sophisticated capabilities but it s easy for novices to get carried away with their newfound creativity Using approved identity components and mixing in complementary design elements will improve the quality of your messaging while solidifying your organization s identity 3 YOUR LOGO Many large organizations work hard to maintain a brand that they want to put forward to employees and the communities they serve That brand usually includes an identity a highly specified visual look Yet employees outside of marketing and communications may not realize that they need to follow that identity when they create communications for a visual medium In all likelihood your organization has a team that maintains your organization s identity standards and they should be consulted even actively engaged
56. e submitting content how do they do that How long will messages stay in the playlist Are there any policies about special or custom backgrounds Explain distribution channels and display options It might be helpful to explain how you have configured your digital signage system Some playlists may go out to all displays or only to displays in certain areas Others might send to mobile phones as text messages Content creators need to know where their message will be received and in what form so they can create effective communications VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 41 Publish browser requirements Visix software is web based but depending on which software you are running you may need a particular version of a browser to avoid any problems Include user names and passwords You may have set up different levels of authority in your system administrators who can approve and publish content and users who can only create and submit content to the administrators How does each level log into the system Provide contact information for questions Hopefully your policies are clear enough that users will not have any questions but things can sometimes get hectic and unpredictable Tell your users who they can contact and when if they have questions orproblems These are just some of the things you can include in your policies You can write your policies as a bullet list a Q amp A format or simply as a series of short p
57. e who have something meaningful to say These forces have had a huge impact on organizations for some time now Intranet sites were a first step but then organizations began building different sites for different departments So many in fact that people in the relatively new field of knowledge management were scurrying to keep up and build tools that captured it all Another problem became keeping up to date Once those sites were built people learned that they had to be maintained Someone had to take ownership and others needed to continually supply fresh information Now blogs wikis forums chat rooms and other social media tools have advanced knowledge sharing even further With portals like these anyone who s part of a defined community can post opinions share best practices or simply broadcast something that s on their mind And that s the key point these new forums inspire good knowledge sharing habits because everyone can contribute Rather than being a barrier the much maligned corporate silo becomes a source on equal footing with everyone else But these new forums also make the individual accountable for the accuracy and soundness of what they re communicating They may spur greater participation and engagement but they also impact credibility Ironically these forums suffer from much of the same anonymity as top down communications Who exactly is behind the sentiment So does that mean we re back to square on
58. eat civil _ Tested by War war testing whether that nation or any nation so conceived and so dedicated Can we endure can long endure Text styles Unless you are duplicating a brand or logotype keep the font simple and legible Never use more than two font styles in a single message and use italics sparingly as they can be hard to read from adistance Popular fonts include Arial Tahoma and Times New Roman A serif font is a typeface having small strokes at the end of the main strokes of each character such as Times New Roman used for this guide Fonts like Arial that do not have serifs are referred to as sans serif Sans Serif fonts tend to be easier to read in short messages and serif fonts are better for large quantities of text a paragraph or more In long texts serif fonts help the human eye track from one word to thenext Keep in mind that text size and the use of bold can help improve readability VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE PAGE 47 Color and perception Color creates good contrast and color choices should place foreground elements perceptually in front of background Basic understanding of color is important for appropriate color selection in creating messages Understanding Color Three primary colors are used in digital displays for color mixing RED GREEN and BLUE All other colors are created from these primaries Secondary colors resulting from the primaries include CYAN MAGENTA and
59. efit of a digital signage system but such systems still use electricity generated by power plants that pollute and emit greenhouse gases In the United States electricity generation accounts for nearly 40 percent of emissions the largest of any source A display that is left on consumes power and often we would rather not take the time to walk around shutting them off when they aren t being used In June 2008 Visix integrated Extron s IP link with their AxisTV software This allows users to access IP link devices from a browser interface and manually control display functions and schedule on off cycles you can use the interface to schedule displays to turn on when your audience is likely to be around to see your messages and turn them off when they aren t For a medium sized digital signage deployment of 16 large screen displays you can potentially reduce your carbon footprint by nearly 27 000 pounds of CO a year the equivalent of replacing 180 regular light bulbs with compact fluorescent bulbs Depending on the size of the deployment users can annually recognize hundreds or even thousands of dollars in potential energy savings by turning displays off when not in use explains Trey Hicks Vice President of Sales at Visix Not only can users help reduce carbon emissions but they can extend the life of their displays and reduce the likelihood of imageretention VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 14 Device contr
60. ement and content purge services Of course first and foremost you need to define what you expect to accomplish with the technology The short and long term communication goals in corporate and campus settings are much different than those of retailers hospitals or public venues Plan for upgrades By keeping your messaging system current with the latest software releases you gain new features and access to optional capabilities that provide new ways to import create manage and deliver content Here are a few examples of benefits you should be looking for as you implement the most current releases for your messaging software Improved user experience New optional capabilities Greater support for video and audio streaming Improved tracking the display of ads Better support system assessment and reporting tools VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 25 If you keep relying on your original messaging system without paying attention to what s new you re missing out Most new features and capabilities come directly from client requests and the software provider s research into future technologies Upgrading to the latest version typically provides more and varied methods to communicate your message in order to stay on top and retain viewer interest And as audiences become more sophisticated in their use of media the most current upgrades give you the greatest opportunities for effective messaging If your current versio
61. entity guidelines for fonts colors and logos You may want more control over branded digital signage content Establish your organization s identity with specific fonts colors and logos This standardizes all of your messages and creates a cohesive look You could also create templates with specific backgrounds for maximum cohesion Give some basic design tips contrast colors etc Your messages may have good information but if they don t look good no one will stop and read them Not everyone is a designer so some helpful tips for creating bulletins can go a long way towards making your content pleasing to the eye and easy to read Generally high contrast works best lightbackgrounds with dark letters or vice versa You want messages to be eye catching but also readable even from a distance What sizes of font would be best for the displays If audio is being used what sort of physical space is the display in and what sort of sounds will be heard but not be overpowering Outline acceptable file formats to be imported Do you want all submissions to be jpegs What other sort of image files can be imported Do you want content created in PowerPoint and then imported Do audio files need to be mp3s Clearly define the submission and approval process Let people know who is authorized to submit content who approves that content and how long it will take for a message to be posted to the system If they must sign up to an account befor
62. es the print piece to provide you with an electronic version of the finished file Once you have it there are several options for converting it to usable content e Optimally your source can provide a graphic file in your desired resolution and size Simply import the file e If your creative team gives you a graphic that doesn t meet your specifications use some simple photo manipulation software to resize and rearrange the layout into a useable format before importing e If you are given a file that cannot be imported and you don t have access to photo manipulation software try this little trick o Open the file so that the entire graphic is visible on your computer screen Make it fill as much of your screen as you can without cutting off any of the desired image o You can capture anything on your computer screen by pressing ALT Print Screen This acts as a COPY command and will take a kind of snapshot of what s on your screen o Open PowerPoint and use Page Setup to create a blank slide that is the desired size of your finished graphic o Use the PASTE command to paste your snapshot into the blank slide Now use the Picture Toolbar to crop out unwanted borders and size the image to fill the PowerPoint slide area o With the Visix Import PowerPoint feature you can directly import your graphic You can also save your slide as a JPEG and then import it into your messaging system VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE PAGE 52
63. essfully deliver messages to specific audiences on media of your choosing These capabilities are even more critical as organizations and schools become more security minded Incidents of severe weather and campus violence have pressed upon people the need to broadcast alerts through all available media Organizations can deliver up to the minute communications such as security weather and travel alerts published whenever and wherever that information is most needed For maximum long term flexibility your messenger should offer a variety of endpoints such as text messaging SMS to smartphones screensavers or visual pop up messengers to individualPCs One primary advantage to messenger tools is that the capability to send messages to smartphones and desktops requires no hardware investment on your part It s also worth noting that newer devices make sending high resolution images worthwhile so for greater engagement and the most precise information you should implement a tool that works easily with multimedia Messengers for stationary audiences For stationary audiences you can instantly turn every PC in your network into digital signage that communicates vital notices or alerts via pop up messengers screensavers or tickers By pointing a small client applet to your content manager you can loop the latest graphical announcements and display them on all or targeted desktops These tools circumvent existing screensavers and are crafted to work in
64. ffective communication is a leading indicator of an organization s financial performance and employee turnover In that study companies that communicate effectively have a 19 4 percent higher market premium than companies that don t It also showed firms that communicate effectively are nearly five times more likely to report high levels of employee engagement and 20 percent more likely to report lower turnover What s especially interesting is how those firms achieve those levels of effectiveness In most cases responsibilities for communications are widespread Two thirds of the firms with high levels of communication effectiveness ask their managers to take on a greater share of the responsibility for communicating Unfortunately the study also showed that few companies are giving them the tools and training to be successful The study pointed out other pitfalls as well Global firms especially tend not to customize their messages to meet local needs or cultural sensitivities Digital signage can address both of these problems It allows you to include more people in the communication process creating more owners with the permission and ability to share information With pre approved templates and just a little training you can expand the number of communicators and even reduce the overall timespent This is not just a feel good management issue with intangible results Management must have a means by which they can communicate mission
65. goals and employee recognition Many workers do not feel that they have a clear understanding of their organization s mission or they see no clear path between their efforts and those goals When employees feel a direct connection between their job and the company mission trust in managers decisions increases on the job conflicts decrease and there is greater commitment to getting the job done Recognition too has measurable results Organizations showed at least 10 higher productivity and revenue and 50 lower employee turnover when their people said they d received recognition or praise for doing good work in the previous seven days In high performance teams praise outnumbered blame by a ratio of 5 6 to one and a previous study showed giving careful praise increased happiness and decreased depression in the givers The full Watson Wyatt study is available online at www wyattwatson com Having more media at your disposal to recognize employees is a great way to share the news of a job well done Today there is more media to not only recognize excellence but to alert people to unfolding emergency situations VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE PAGE 9 ALERT COMMUNICATIONS SAFETY IS ESSENTIAL Communicators must be prepared to leverage available technology to get the word out as fast as possible If an emergency strikes how will you communicate with your employees and customers If you don t know you re notalone
66. green building features animated data enabled illustrations of renewable energy and water systems and green tips for resource conservation Because the dashboard is animated and can even be interactive it captures attention conveys the information in a pleasing manner and leverages your digital signage for true dynamic content delivery Find out more at http www luciddesigngroup com No matter what sort of organization you have you will want you communications to look as professional and modern as possible VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE PAGE 38 PRODUCING PROFESSIONAL COMMUNICATIONS Communication essentials Who are you trying to reach What do you need them to know Communicating poorly causes confusion and results in missed opportunities If that misinterpretation is ignored it can go on to cause even moredamage In organizational communications we often need to deliver messages without personal contact and therefore don t have a chance to clarify Our goal should be to ensure not just that the audience receives information but that they understand the message as intended and act accordingly Communicate we should always remember is a verb It s more than creating a document It s an activity consisting of several steps and we often forget that when we communicate we are attempting to share something with someone else It s a mutual experience When we re obsessed only with one question what
67. he medium Their insight into your internal processes won t hurt either Mistakes with creating and managing content Trying to do too much with features You don t need to show everything at once First of all a good system is highly flexible so you Il be able to make modifications or add new content later Second a busy screen packed with content can be much less effective than a single message well presented Letting messages go stale If you ve left something in rotation too long because you forgot about it chances are your audience has too Digital signage is highly conspicuous that s the point but the downside is that messages or images that appear too frequently get noticed in all the wrong ways Keep your content fresh by creating new bulletins as frequently as is manageable or simply take some messages out of rotation for a period of time New content or content that is perceived as new is what keeps your audience coming back for more VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 29 Relying on the internet for content A system that provides up to the minute news is definitely part of the appeal but even under the best circumstances web connectivity can fail Failing to consider your current processes If you re planning to use digital signage or other messaging solutions to supplement sales promotions or enable scheduling make sure you know how sales and scheduling processes work You may be offering help
68. ible to gain followers and reinforce IN a communications e Comment tt http fb me 1 Integrating feeds from your social media pages into digital signage content is a great way to add followers and inspire them to participate so they can see their posts on the big board Drive traffic from social media to digital signage and back again VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 21 Coupons Codes One of the simplest ways to measure ROI is to offer discount codes or coupons in visual communications Just include a unique code in your message and direct viewers to take action Why not create a digital signage bulletin that IS a coupon Viewers can simply take a smartphone snap to claim their discount Simply count the number of people who redeem the coupon code for easyROI measurement Designated URLs Driving viewers to your Internet or Intranet sites is an easy way to track interest in a topic Make sure to designate a unique trackable URL in your message so you can measure traffic that is a direct result of your digital signage efforts If you want to send viewers to an existing webpage set up your unique URL to redirect to your chosen page so you can measure success Track your webpage hits to see real time ROI Bluetooth Near Field Triggers Every person with a Bluetooth enabled phone has a digital sign in their hands Take advantage of it Pairing your digital signs with Bluetooth transmitters allows you to reinfo
69. ime Let screens auto cycle through content when dormant Ask for alert message support to override screens Racine Building Room Name Number 1 Floor Racine Building Ird Floor 2nd Floor f m FLOOR MAPS VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 36 10 13 AM Wed Aug 22 2012 Social Media build community and boost participation Whether it s Twitter Facebook YouTube or Google you can build community and boost participation for one or all of your social media sites by incorporating them into your digital signage Many of the social media sites have either RSS feeds or simple APIs to allow you to pull your posts into a digital signage playlist If you want to show your whole page try using a webpage embed function You can either go full screen or simply include them in traditional layouts By advertising your social media efforts you not only create buzz and excitement around your posts but can attract more followers and A 17 entice people to participate on the sites mata es your QR Scanner on your phone for more info Advertise social media efforts Automate content for time savings Boost participation and awareness Run contests to track ROI Include QR tags for instant access via smartphones mee Design full screen layouts for impact nevana unvais 2013 A N Insert feeds into traditional layouts a Room Signs manage the when and the where If you have a large number of meeting r
70. in creating digital templates and messages YOUR LOGO Adress lee Leri Lex besl Plone voo aru cos Moble veo au 003 YOUR LOGO In general identity standards consist of a logo and supporting components commonly assembled within a set of guidelines These guidelines govern how the identity is applied and specify approved color palettes typefaces page layouts and other such methods of maintaining visual continuity across all physical manifestations of the brand Often those elements are created by professional designers so they help your presentation of consecutive messages blend and beeye pleasing But conforming to guidelines doesn t mean the end of creativity Bring in outside designs and graphics that complement identity components or play with layouts while incorporating a few standard themes If your organization doesn t have formal identity guidelines consider the following questions as you design your content Do I need to include my organization s logo If so make sure you have a quality copy of the logo to work with Someone in your organization has a high resolution clean copy of the logo Try the marketing department If your copy has a color background behind the logo you will need to eliminate it or design to that color Use caution when incorporating logos for screen layouts Take care to avoid image burn by altering the location of the logo Does my organization have a standard color palette e St
71. information to all audiences at once or at just certain locations such as procedures to shut down facilities or evacuation routes VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE PAGE 6 Going beyond the big screens Communication technologies have never been more instantaneous or more direct and with a modest investment you can get information to those who need it no matter your location or theirs But technologies and devices are also evolving so to target diverse audiences as they change and grow you need to have flexible tools To capture attention at the right time you need easy to use tools that target precisely Most organizations already have a messaging system and the most successful solutions are those that are easily incorporated Even as mobile devices and mobile networks evolve and become more advanced most organizations can implement an easy add on to their existing messaging infrastructure normally just a software upgrade a content manager and some publishers By leveraging your existing processes infrastructure and staff habits you keep your costs down and give yourself flexibility for future adaptation Reach them where they are Targeting audiences that are diverse fragmented and on the go is at last possible With the next generation of mobile devices people remain just as connected and informed as someone working from a computer Using the power of mobile devices and PCs that you ve already deployed you can succ
72. ing to involve yourself your budget time and creativity you ll want to measure ROI so you can justify those efforts Instead of thinking of ROI in strictly financial terms consider the effect on long term goals brand image and culture in your organization At a tactical level you want to know more than the frequency of publication for digital signage messages you also want to measure the success of those messages on your viewers Let s look at how measurement of impact for digital signage might work The biggest factor in measuring ROI is including a call to action in your content If you just put out a message without asking the audience to do something that says they saw the message you have no way of knowing ifit worked Measuring viewer attention is easy with some basic strategies andtracking e First determine a clear quantifiable goal Then create your message with a simple easy to track call to action Next set up a response tracker like a webpage web form or emailaddress Publish your message and look at how many people responded And measure the results against objectives Here s a concrete example to demonstrate that process Imagine a university visitor center that uses digital signage to keep students up to date Here is how they might follow the six steps above Question What is the best time of day to reach out to students in the ActivityCenter Bulletin with call to action Response Web form Published
73. it will take them mere seconds to connect to the page and learn what they need to do next RSS publishing is similar to text messaging in that it can simultaneously reach out to various already established endpoints RSS can feed web pages on intranets digital signage displays and some RSS enabled mobiledevices SMS text messaging to mobile phones and PDAs is one of the fastest ways to alert large groups to a crisis There are several technology providers who manage enrollment alert triggers and distribution of messages some tied into digital signage and other visual systems Television and radio e Video CATV e Emergency weather band radio e AM FM radio Video and CATV channels can be effective ways of getting an alert out as well Television and radio stations will have more information if the emergency is not restricted to the on site location events such as severe weather All available channels should be tuned to emergency frequencies as soon as possible to maximize the information coming available to you and your audience VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 12 Make it clear You want every element of your emergency alert plan to be extremely clear Sounds should be standardized and unique so people know instantly Oh that s an emergency sound Digital signage messages and computer pop ups should be made clear with a standard background perhaps bright red and large text fonts Telephone communications messages
74. lass cancellations work stoppage Each crisis has its own challenges In some instances you will need to prepare to execute your plan without the help of technology or from an identified off site crisis center All scenarios should have contingencies built in for the failure or unavailability of any or all communication technologies such as computer networks phones and power Time is essential The speed with which you communicate during a crisis can save lives and prevent injuries Your plan should target four main audiences On site personnel employees students customers and visitors Emergency workers police fire and EMS The community at large The press oh People on the premises should be immediately informed of the emergency and told precisely what is expected of them When creating and testing the plan every available means of communication should be explored to find the most reliable and efficient delivery method Every available communication channel should be employed to ensure maximum coverage Make sure email distribution lists and phone trees are regularly updated VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 10 A complete list of emergency contacts should be included in the plan and should be readily available to everyone in the organization at all times In addition to local fire police and EMS services don t forget to include less common resources such as HAZMAT FBI and IT recovery contacts Pre written
75. long term solutions The larger your audience the more cost effective communicating with them via digital solutions is In a single year printing individual newsletters posters and mailers may be cheaper than a digital signage investment However over multiple years a digital signage system offers a more effective and inexpensive option e The purchase price of a digital signage system is a one time cost whereas printed communications are a continuing revenue drain that seriously adds up over time e Print costs rise steadily each year due to increased paper printing and transportation costs e You have a potentially unlimited audience for your digital communications versus a set number based on pre determined print runs e Visual digital communications are dynamic not static like their paper counterparts digital signage systems can display video cable feeds Flash animations tickers and transitions to grab attention and keep audiences interested e Digital signage technology can handle hundreds of messages at once as opposed to the limited space you have to communicate ideas and information in printed materials e Digital messaging allows immediate corrections and retirement of messages versus lingering newsletters and printed retractions or apologies e Some visual communications options like desktop messaging and RSS feeds may be cheaper than printing even in the first year e Technology solutions save paper Green efforts that
76. me you can train users to look for colors related to specific types of information For example you could standardize blue backgrounds to relate to HR information E NETA red to facility security and green to important announcements This level of CA AN eee standardization helps your audience more efficiently locate relevant content gt Ml gt 5 A et ouremployees ourceo Color coding for emergency announcements is particularly important Whether information is presented as a bulletin or a ticker you can change the background and or foreground colors to indicate special circumstances Standard tickers often use light colored text on a dark background Reverse or brighten your color scheme for emergency announcements to gain instant attention It doesn t have to be an emergency that defines your color scheme Many organizations standardize within their approved color palette to identify messages from various sources Examples HR on a tan background Facilities on a black background IT on a blue background HR NOTICE FACILITY NOTICE iT NOTICE a Steps to a color coded messaging system 1 Establish an agreed upon color system for departments topics andemergencies 2 Publish the system and keep an updated copy accessible to all employees for continual reference 3 Be disciplined in your use of the color system making sure messages do not inadvertently use the wrong color codes 4 Test the system and get feedb
77. mic digital signage delivers important messages immediately effectively and affordably to federal government offices military facilities emergency services or community based government Because it s web based you can share the most up to date news and announcements and supplement training Security updates news feeds bulletins and ticker information can be delivered via user friendly interface that allows for easy creation scheduling and delivery of communications Update content instantly or manage content with advanced scheduling Deliver important news and announcements as they happen Share emergency announcements such as extreme weather or Homeland Security data Show event schedules with on time updates Target audiences with relevant programs Manage emergency call center traffic with on time data Show live traffic stock and sports information Supplement training and education programs VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 33 Healthcare organizations help visitors stay engaged The time that visitors spend waiting represents a valuable opportunity to reach them with important educational announcements programs and advertisements Hospitals clinics physicians offices and community health JOIN OUR TEAM POSITIONS AVAILABLE centers around the country are using video graphics and bulletins to reinforce messages and inform patients of important health CATH LAB TECHNICIAN ER NURSE TELE
78. munity s unique setting Deliver targeted messages and media to specific campus locations no matter how geographically dispersed or broadcast the same display campus wide Automatically display greetings instructions and updated scheduling throughout the day And if your resources are limited Visix offers creative backgrounds and templates for effective eye catching displays Campuses can deliver a virtually unlimited stream of content Deliver important announcements as they happen Post current event schedules and special events Deliver instant emergency announcements Announce changes to course schedules Personalize visitor greetings welcome notices and guest announcements e Advertise bookstore caf or other campus shop offerings e Broadcast educational programs or remote lectures Post administrative announcements and registration schedules e Advertise volunteer opportunities and community outreach programs e Share live weather traffic stock and sports information Sutton 6 12 PM SPEAKER MONDAY 6PMh AYORA 1 Whatare you really good at What are your passions Guest speaker Harriet Johnson offers great advice in making career Choices N Current CONDIMIONS m 81 F Y Fall registration starts this Wednesday Go online to get class schedules and more 10 00 AM Thursday May Sth 2011 A J Green WIDE RECEIVER f EGO PETAREEN DENT PO cc CMT ATHENS
79. n investment in digital signage is no different It offers benefits that ripple throughout the organization and effective use of a good system can impact your culture operational performance and ultimately play a role in contributing to the bottom line Take for example the benefits of a system that s accessible from a web browser and easy to use even to those unfamiliar with these technologies When people across your organization can contribute to a system of visual communications you democratize your communications processes In turn that lessens the amount of time spent on creating managing and delivering key messages lowers the cost of communications enhances credibility and increases employee satisfaction Moreover digital signage complements and enhances critical operations For example in recent years many organizations have implemented greater security and business continuity plans and an effective visual communications medium gives you greater capabilities to share alerts and manage a crisis A centralized system increases a culture s trust and cooperation and in terms of performance plans can be executed more efficiently Providing your organization with greater communication tools has multiple interrelated effects and the more effectively they re used the greater the benefits The following flowchart shows some possible effects on culture performance and the bottom line Benefits of Visix Technologies Suite of
80. n meets your needs and additional features aren t warranted you should still consider the advantages to software upgrades Future thinking is critical Most upgrades provide new tools to make system maintenance and software upgrades easier which translates into less downtime for your system and less utilization of valuable IT resources Keep in mind too that upgrades from a recent version are smoother than from older versions so when a major revision is released your transition will be easier Periodical hardware upgrades in messaging systems are recommended to support software upgrades New hardware typically ships with the latest software version already installed but in most cases an integrator can migrate customer data for a smooth transition Hardware that is showing its age can slow or degrade the performance seen in transitions crawls and video playback With hardware purchases such as content managers and channel players you need to be certain that they support your operating system When upgrading software or hardware components make sure your implementers understand how to accomplish it with minimal disruption to your communications Minor software upgrades are straightforward and are often accomplished without having to reconfigure each channel player which may be the case with a major release or long overdue upgrade Visix offers a Software Maintenance and Support Agreement SMA to their clients That way you enjoy the benefit of au
81. n the break room table or in the bathroom stall Digital messages on displays in high traffic areas expose them to your content in frequent short bursts that make a lasting impact over time through repetition and impactful design A final thing to keep in mind is that technology doesn t sit still people are constantly innovating and improving what already exists and inventing new things that do the same tasks better As our outdated power grid and electronic devices become smarter and more energy efficient the costs of running an electronic message delivery system will come down while the costs of continuing to use outmoded paper newsletters and the like will get higher and higher To prosper in the 21 century it is necessary to keep up with the pace of change and innovation The benefit is nothing less than the future itself for us and for our children Digital signage systems not only reduce the stress on our ecology they save you money in the bargain Now that s change you can take to the bank There are many initial benefits to a digital signage system but how can you tell if you are getting value AFTER your investment There are a number of tools and methods for measuring your success VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 15 THE REAL VALUE OF BETTER COMMUNICATIONS Most people recognize that communications can be more art than science but they also know that there are tangible benefits to organizations A
82. nces at specific times VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE PAGE 5 The technology behind the medium Digital signage is made up of three main components The first thing people think of is the signs themselves which can include scrolling message boards LCD or plasma displays electronic billboards projection screens video walls TVs and even desktop PC monitors It s also important to understand that digital signage has expanded beyond fixed displays to include mobile devices like PDAs and smartphones When it comes to the displays and devices that deliver messages new technologies are always emerging The second component is the software that allows people working individually or in groups to create manage and approve the content shown on these displays Content management software also generally incorporates routing and scheduling tools Content creation can involve sophisticated applications such as video editing software or tools as commonplace as PowerPoint If the device being used has an internet connection content can even be created and changed remotely The third component is the hardware used to distribute and play back content This canrange from media players distributed throughout a network to individual stand alone media players showing basic video loops which is an affordable option for people who need to update just a few displays With networked versions a digital signage network operator pushes content to mul
83. nd backgrounds for you to use Human Resources is often a great resource for training and SS a ores productivity slides And if you have the latest revenue figures productivity statistics or new Y schedules why not share them Web graphics Your online content can also be presented in digital signage Pull text and graphics from your internet or intranet pages or grab images from the web LAN or WAN Marketing and communications teams can often provide JPEG GIF and Flash files that make great bulletin additions S gt visix Fast accessible text resources You likely already have a wealth of information on your shelf and at your fingertips just waiting to be shared Press Releases If your organization publishes regular press releases or receives industry newsletters or press releases you have more content to draw from Just copying and pasting current headlines into bulletins and tickers is a great way to keep your audience engaged Viewers come to rely on displays as a trusted source of information if announcements feel hot off the press Not only do you keep internal and external audiences informed about the latest news on relevant topics your other bulletins receive more of the attention they deserve Remember to always cite your source include a web address in your bulletin or ticker so interested viewers can follow up on story details Publications Sharing third party editorial copy is an effective way to round o
84. ns and advertisements Any information that is relevant to your audience makes for engaging content Here are some sources for information interesting to general audiences Weather Forecast www weather com Current News www usatoday com Industry Headlines Visit association websites Entertainment www comcast net entertainment International www bbc co uk news Sports espn go com Business and Finance online wsj com public us Quotations www quotationspage com Health Topics www webmd com Today in History www history com tdih do VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE PAGE 53 Reward an attentive audience with loyalty programs Are you measuring the success of your communications Do you know how many people read your visual messages each day Are you their preferred source for information Loyalty programs are an excellent way to find answers these ongoing questions Loyalty programs are traditionally structured as marketing efforts that encourage and even reward loyal buying behavior Why not use this proven technique to encourage viewership Initiating a loyalty program will help you learn more about and reward your audience Educational e Allows you to build a viewer contact list e Enables collection of basic audience demographics e Monitors trends and preferences e Reveals which communications are working and which need adjustment Inspirational Lets viewers know that you care about their opinions Encourages
85. nt requirements Only one message per event promotion or activity is allowed Messages must be broadcast for a definitive period of time not to exceed two weeks Open ended or continuous announcements are not permitted Commercial announcements are not permitted Our organizational policy regarding political or adult content applies to all messages displayed on OurOrgTV Following OurOrg s identity guidelines Please follow these style guidelines for all bulletins Uncheck the Recommend Font Size option Select your background from that drop down menu Select Verdana as the font from the font drop down menu For your headlines 8 pt font boldface White color is ideal For your body text 6 pt font White color is ideal Copy should always be left justified whenever possible Sore TER Message design tips Color creates good contrast and color choices should place foreground elements perceptually in front of background To improve your messages Use contrasting colors Understand what viewers eye are drawn to e Control impact of information Importing files You can import slides from PowerPoint for OurOrgTV but no other file types will be accepted You must create your bulletin in PowerPoint or from within OurOrgTV itself Submission and approval The OurOrgTV team will be the approving authority and clearinghouse for messages Three submission accounts per department are available Most messages will be approve
86. nted and assigned for resolution Some choose to launch a pilot program at a few locations for a month or two This pilot should operate with the same hardware software and connectivity that will eventually be used This will help get your system owners oriented on the system determine optimal screen layout and content sourcing and identify any issues for resolution before a full launch You can also use this pilot period to begin measurement against the objectives you identified in earlierstages Throughout the actual implementation and pilot if you choose to stage one you should make sure to maintain close contact with your system provider or integrator Getting things right is easier and less expensive at the beginning especially with the help of experienced professionals VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE PAGE 24 Technology topics Shopping for content management software Industry observers believe there are more than 300 firms developing hardware and software for digital signage So how do you come to the right decision about a system for your organization The first major question to ask is whether the tools you use to manage your content for digital signage should be native that is live on your hard drive or should be something you log on to via the web The answer has a lot to do with user interface and how you expect to create content If you plan to rely on the software that comes with your digital signage
87. nted means that marketing communications training and other groups have to work together Digital signage software gives you a community forum to put that cooperation into practice But it also provides a controlled environment one where branded templates and presentation style can be predetermined Make sure your brand standards are being followed up front and then let your people do the rest It s more inclusive With good visual communications and digital signage software you can get more people involved in the process of sharing news You probably already have able communicators people who can distill the big ideas of a small group but they often lack a forum to share what they know Enable them to post content and you tap into their full potential Not only that with digital signage you re reaching a broader audience There may be people in your audience who are illiterate or non native speakers of English When you speak to them in media that aren t just verbal you greatly expand your reach VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE PAGE 8 A thirsty horse is no good to anyone When people lack clarity on issues that have already been covered it s easy for communicators to try and laugh it off You can lead a horse to water but you can t make him drink goes the oldadage But it s well worth our time to make sure he does The Watson Wyatt Communication ROI Study of 2005 2006 confirmed earlier findings that e
88. o date phone list is essential and you should use mobile phone numbers whenever possible as people are frequently not near a fixed landline Although telephoning is not very effective for contacting large groups it is essential to communicate with emergency services Also members of the community family members of students or employees etc will want to know what is happening and telephones are a good way to keep them up to date Even leaving a message on an answering machine or on voicemail can alleviate fears If your audience carries mobile phones text messaging is a very effective way to reach them in a crisis Distribution lists are already established through prior subscription and the messages reach people wherever they are However you should never rely on only one technology Some may not have SMS service their phones could be off or the cellular network could be overloaded GIS mapping technology allows communications to be limited to a specific geographical area usually a pre specified radius from a central point if the emergency is localized VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE PAGE 11 Computers E mail Computer pop ups and screensavers Instant Messaging IM Web Social Networking Facebook Twitter etc Intranet Website RSS feeds SMS alerts to mobile devices WEATHER ALERT SEVERE THUNDERSTORM WATCH in effect until 5 00PM WEATHER ALERT WEATHER ALERT SEVERE THUNDERSTORM WATCH in effect until 5 00PM
89. o isn t familiar with digital signage and wants a bit more knowledge about this exploding technology A large part of the guide deals with the process of communicating how you plan your communications design them and keep your content fresh We give you content ideas design and layout tips and some basic education for anyone struggling with how to put together a communications plan We figure that if you already have your digital signage system in place this is where you 11 spend most of your time Warning This is not a book If you re looking for a cohesive storyline or a how to guide to digital signage systems this isn t the right tool It isn t a narrative to be read from cover to cover it s a collection of valuable articles tips and ideas to help you through the digital signage process Also this is not a product guide user manual or specific to any Visix product If you want a user manual or technical documentation please contact us This is not a software manual or a user s guide It s a motivator Pick a chapter a day and read it Ingest it Think about it Get an idea and act on it Go ahead read learn enjoy communicate If you want to know Turn to page How digital signage can affect your culture and bottomline 16 What impact technology can have on your green efforts 14 More about alert communications 10 How to measure the success of your campaigns 17 What kind of digital
90. ol not only helps your displays last longer and reduce the amount of carbon equivalent your organization emits through energy usage it helps reduce the amount of power that needs to be generated at all Buildings use around 40 of all energy consumed in the US and 70 of total electricity all of which must be generated by energy plants that emit large amounts of CO2 and carbon equivalent Higher energy efficiency benefits not only your company but everyone your local community your country and the world as a whole Rick Duke director for the Center for Market Innovation at the National Resources Defense Council suggests that while we are waiting for cleaner power generation from renewable sources to take over the majority of our power needs we can create an efficiency surge now to help mitigate continued growth and demand for energy while not adding any new carbon molecules to the atmosphere Pixels vs paper Most companies when confronted with green considerations ask What s in it for me The bottom line is that digital signage solutions not only help in the ongoing effort to reverse the effects of 150 years of rapid industrialization but also are cheaper over time than traditional print mediums when communicating with a large diverse target audience They have something in common with the policies and procedures we will need in the 21 century to effectively correct current changes in our planet s climate they are
91. ons for complex offerings oocccccccncccnncconcncnnccononcncnncnnnnnnnonnnnnonnnncnnnnoss 33 Government facilities make visual systems easy to use ooooccccconocnnonoconconononcnnnnnnononrnnononrnnonancnnonnnnnnonnrnnnonarenonnns 33 Healthcare organizations help visitors stay engaged ccccccccssececeeecceseeceeseecsueecsueecseueeceueesseeessuseeseeeesseeeees 34 Hospitality and convention centers show better guest service oocccoccccccncconnconnccocnnonnnnnnnnonnnonononannnnnnnnnnnonanonos 34 Retail increase revenues with targeting messages coooccccocncoccnnccocnnonnnnononononnnnonannnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnonnnnonannnennnnnnanans 35 Houses of worship bring your congregation together cccsecccssecccseeeeseeeeeeeeeeeeeeecseeeeseeeeseaeeeseeeeseueeeseueenseeeens 35 Wayfinding get them where they need tO GO cccsscccccseseccceeeeeceeececcsueeceseseeeseaeeecseuecessseeesauseeeseaeeessueeeessaeeees 36 Social Media build community and boost participatiON cccccccoccnnnccconnnnnnnnonnnnnnnnanonnnonnannnnnnnnannnnononanennnnnnnns 37 Room Signs manage the when and the Where occccooccnccccccccccccnnccnncnnncnnenconnnnnnonnnononnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnrnnnnnncnnnnnnrnnonanss 37 TransLoc show real time transportation OPtIONS occccccccnccccncononnconnncnnnncnoncnonnnnonnnrononrnnonnrnnnnnnnnnnrnnnnnncnnnrnnnnens 38 PRODUCING PROFESSIONAL COMMUNICATIONS iscicoiaciososnicnin 39 COMMUMICAUOM YESS ON lS nd Deo LE
92. ooms why not extend your digital signage system to include individual room signs for each one Don t worry it s not as expensive as youthink 3 11 2015 MedAssets Room signs are usually interactive panelPCs that house both the media player and the screen That saves o sd you money on hardware and they should tie right into your digital signage software for easy content pu management Interactive room signs can display reservations from whatever room scheduling application you use and some allow you to create a walk up reservation with only a few touches to the screen If they can talk with your digital signage software that will let you create import schedule and publish a wide range of messages media and alerts to your meeting room signs in addition to eventschedules Business amp Communications Career Fair sge a Friday October 3 Consider the possibilities 9 00 am 6 00 pm Available Walter S Patterson Conference Center e Show conference and event schedules for one or more meetingroom Display greetings announcements and speaker information Incorporate interactive wayfinding maps for easy reference Keep everyone informed with news weather and RSS feeds Present live streaming content from your network Playback videos and other animated content Deliver critical alert notifications Tae Liberty Mutual Many room signs can be surface mounted or recessed in walls and some include decorative and 6 mounting acce
93. or before publishing orscheduling Previewing Tip Stand back from your monitor at least five feet this simulates your audience s perspective for viewing digital displays VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE PAGE 48 Evaluating your visual effectiveness It s easy to get into a rut by using the same formulaic backgrounds fonts and graphics for bulletins but without periodic updates your messages can be overlooked The first step is to review the effectiveness of your digital signage If you don t have a formalized communications strategy consider performance against these basic objectives am dl Capture attention Convey information Motivate action Encourage repeat viewing Choose a representative month of bulletins to examine Make sure it is within the last 90 days Examine the content you published during one day one week and then the entire month and ask yourself the following questions If you answer no to any of them you re content may need a cleanup Bulletin Design 1 Do our individual bulletins communicate information succinctly yet stylishly 2 Are we using good visual rules when designing our messages 3 Do bulletin colors fonts and graphics all look good together Overall Presentation 1 Is there a visual continuity to our communication an apparenttheme or identity 2 Do bulletins look good together when grouped in multiple window layouts 3 Is there appropriate variety in ou
94. our digital signage or messagingsystem e Validate required infrastructure items System topology First you need to diagram a simplified version of the system to be implemented You don t need to diagram all the components but it should include all the media players and displays you think you ll need tapes ad gt Wes OB O Graphics Video PowerPoint Weather Schedules News Alerts Twitter Facebook pF y Y t7 ol i lt XML gt Wayfinding Audio Cable TV Feeds Stock Data Excel SharePoint XML OR Tags Polls Webpages amp Streaming HTML5 Create manage and deliver messages media and alerts from any browser enabled device Endpoints Interactive Desktop Large Displays Interactive Displays Video Walls Room Signs Messengers Screensavers Mobile Devices Webpages In this diagram the players output signals to displays desktops and portable devices over a network Your diagram should similarly outline all of the outputs and endpoints you plan on implementing The specific components necessary to deliver all of these signals are not represented here VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE PAGE 27 In most networked solutions your system will be designed to integrate into a local or wide area network and the management and transfer of data is typically handled through a 10 100 1000 Ethernet infrastructure The output of your media players should be able to be configured to include the relevant VGA
95. pics Recipes Remember to keep messages clear and concise If you have a series of tips or complex instructions try referring readers to web resources or deliver tips in a serial format If your organization routinely trains any segment of employees or visitors digital signage is a great way to supplement those efforts Manufacturers and distributors for example are using their signage systems to show video of how to use new systems on the shop floor That kind of visual training is particularly powerful when the audience has limited English or literacy skills In fact it s easier for nearly all of us to see what s being asked of us rather than just being told Contact your HR or training department to see if they have content they d like to share Put short messages in rotation or feature more full length training sessions Converting print to pixels Outbound marketing messages are more effective when they re understood across the organization from the receptionist to the warehouse so that everyone is able to direct enquiries appropriately If you re printing posters or direct mailers you should be reinforcing them on your digital signage system Converting print materials to digital signage and other messaging is cost effective fast and easy With a little cooperation you can turn a print campaign into content for your messaging system that reinforces the organization s strategy The first step is to ask whoever creat
96. plan implement communicate democratize create measure improve digital signage desk reference a gift from Visix www visix com amp 800 572 4935 CONTENTS CONTENTS to a o o e E o a one 2 INTRODUCTON 2 a bio eee 4 WAY DIGITAL SIGNAGE e 5 Woas dora nade coa 5 Wiyagtaisignageis GROWING A A AAA A 5 Tnestechnology behind nm di a 6 Where digital signage is the Most effective cooocccconccccocncoccnnoconononannnnnnncnonnnonannnnnnnnonnnnnonnnonannnnnnnnenannnnnnanes 6 Boosting SECunty and DUSINESS COMMMUNY cats irtd 6 Going bey ONG Me DIG Screens a io enone 7 THE DEMOGRATIZA TONOFSOMMUNICATIONS 02 o 8 ALERT COMMUNICATIONS SAFETY IS ESSENTIAL eniai n aa a a a T A aA 10 Pating aplan TOG STEN esseri A ARS AAA A A 10 BODI A O A 10 SS AAPP O AA 10 TECANOIOOY OO Satin ic ld ld dai 11 Make Eleanor 13 Test test and testadalMinacn ista 13 Getine BiG DGYS ON DOI O anita iii 13 THE GREEN GAME ENVIRONMENTAL CONCERNS doccoooccccccnnoccnnnnnnoccnnononononnnonnncnnnnonnncnnnnonannnnnnnnannnnnnnnanennnns 14 Using modern technology to change the culture cccooncccccccconococcncncancnnononnnnononononnnncnnonannnonnnrnnnnnncnnnnannnnonanoss 14 PICS VS Dirt oc id asiatica ca 15 THE REAL VALUE OF BETTER COMMUNICATIONS ooocnccnnncnnnccccccnnnccnnoconnnonononnnonnonnnnnnonannnnnnnnannnnnnnnannnnnnonanennnns 16 Measuring Success a 17 Measuring Ovora SUCCESS aida 17 Sample internal COMMUNICATIO
97. quences of a poorly handled emergency are fairly easy to demonstrate It is better to be safe now than sorry later It is in everyone s interests to ensure that anyone who is at your facility is as safe as they can possibly be No one wants to have to say that they their emergency system was ineffective and flawed Make sure it isn t Every element of the plan should be pre authorized by management Executives and legal departments should sign off on the plan in advance so that there are no meetings or approval processes to slow execution Your entire process should be as streamlined as possible with each person who sends out alert messages clear on the chain of authority and that chain should be as short as possible The worst time to try to make decisions is when time is running out 5 Another emergency situation where digital signage can be of use is the current climate change challenges we are now confronted with A little goes a long way when it comes to the green game VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 13 THE GREEN GAME ENVIRONMENTAL CONCERNS Only when the last tree has died and the last river been poisoned and the last fish been caught will we realize we cannot eat money Cree Indian Proverb Climate change global warming global weirding global climatic disruption heavy weather call it what you will this is one of the key issues of our times and is much on all our minds mM Even skeptics are now convinced
98. questions it is necessary to first figure out exactly what the point of your communications is What are you trying to say and what should people have or do once they receive your message Your goals will most likely fall into one of several broad categories To compel charity drives student organizations and activities benefits enrollment To inform new policies at work classes and training dates wayfinding and directions weather andnews To motivate employee reward programs stock price and profit sharing schemes internal contests To include welcome messages new hire and birthday announcements community and social activities To recognize organization and individual achievements safety benchmarks sports teams stats o To warn severe weather fire and HAZMAT emergencies security threats Each reason for communicating will have its own method of measuring success Communications that are intended to get the audience to do something will see an increase in participation and enrollment numbers as well as a possible increase in traffic on your intranet or website If the goal is to inform casual lunchroom polls or water cooler chatter might measure how much information was taken in you might also see higher attendance for advertised training courses or meetings For motivational messages you should see an increase in productivity Messages designed to make your audience feel included or to recognize achievement
99. r bulletins to grab audience attention Effectiveness 1 Are we measuring the success of our messages 2 Are audiences paying regular attention to our digital signage 3 Are they responding by taking the requested action noted inbulletins Keep your content fresh Be creative and keep your messages fresh by incorporating new ideas and styles Keep your imagination fresh by seeking out new styles colors and designs buy a book of creativity exercises visit art galleries and look at award winning presentations and websites on the internet Some great sites for ideas are o www americandesignawards com o www worldbestwebsites com e www webbyawards com One easy way to solve the continuity problem while keeping your content fresh is to outline basic themes and then rotate them on a monthly basis Simply identify groups of visual elements that work together and create a variety of themes We recommend at least four themes so you can change your look every few months Even your standardized themes need to be examined and refreshed periodically e Choose a group of ten to twelve backgrounds that use a common color scheme e Select two fonts in two colors for headlines and body text that complement your backgrounds e Identify appropriate graphics photos clip art etc that you can use within the theme If you re finding it difficult to constantly come up with new and interesting messages Instead of always having to start from scratch
100. r display is running a message with audio repeatedly in an area where people are working and need to concentrate you may end up annoying your audience more than motivating them Expecting others to do your installation When Visix insists that you have someone actively engaged in installation it s not because we re lazy It s because we know from experience that every network has its own security considerations issues that we can t and shouldn t know about Not only that when your own people take ownership of your digital signage system you reduce long term maintenance costs Get your IT teams engaged early on Mistakes with making purchasing decisions Falling in love with hardware Maybe you have a certain look in the lobby or you ve found a supplier who s offering you a big discount But until you ve identified the software you ll use you shouldn t make any hardware decisions Remember it s the software your people will interact with and that s where the power of your system lies The screens as stunning as they are are merely the messengers Not involving the people who will actually use it Visix recommends that the people in your organization who are going to use and supply content to the system be involved from the very beginning and that includes purchasing Involving people in evaluating systems makes them more enthusiastic and enthusiastic users are much more likely to explore the full power of t
101. r the last 12 months do you feel that overall communications at Visix have improved _ Ihave not noticed any improvement _ I have noticed some improvement C I have noticed significant improvement C I have not worked at Visix for 12 months Comments Over the last 12 months do you feel that using technology to communicate has improved your awareness _ I have not noticed any improvement _ Ihave noticed some improvement C I have noticed significant improvement _ Ihave not worked at Visix for 12 months Comments VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 18 How often do you reference the following technologies for Visixcommunications Less than once 1 3 Times 1 Time per 2 4 Times More than 4 Technology Never per week day times a day Digital Signage Comments Please rank how frequently you would like to see Visix use the following technologies to communicate with you in the future Digital Signage ee wd Desktop Messenger instant Messenger Samea S G a Comments Please tell us how we can better use technology to communicate with you use back of survey if necessary VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 19 Measuring tactical success When we talk about ROL it can be return on investment return on involvement or just how to know your digital signage is working A lot of people don t think about measurement when planning their messages and the fact is if you re go
102. ransloc com Building Dashboard encourage energy savings If your audience can see the resources they re using they can adjust their behavior accordingly to reduce consumption This also lets administrators track and analyze energy spikes and trends Building Dashboard Kiosk enables occupants visitors and the public to view energy and water use information on touchscreen displays Comparative graphs glowing orbs and other exciting visualizations make it easy to understand the performance of buildings and organizations A variety of modules including competitions green features events and more make Building Dashboard Kiosk a feature rich visibility enhancing solution for monitored buildings Wed June 13 2012 10 24am Download University Shuttle Information at hip Mo yale edu shuttlie 4 Looking for a carpool partner The university has partnered with NuRide td Per ucan ni Consumption pa EMORY Kilowatt of electricity consumed today UNIVERSITY e dual e View real time energy and water use information on publicly accessible touch enabled displays Compare the performance of many buildings all on the same screen Express consumption in intuitive everyday units e Show breakdowns by floor or end use track the status of participants in real time energy reduction competitions check weather forecasts and browse calendars of events with a variety of add on Modules e Explore photo galleries of LEED or
103. rce your messages bytriggering a wireless signal that downloads content to viewers phones Instead of waiting on the viewer to take the next step you do it for them saving time and effort Increase ROI not just with great content but with more endpoints Alumni y s r Z this Fri ca Take a picture of this coupon and bring it to the Student Union Spirit Shop to get a FREE T SHIRT This week only www SUspirit edu Have you heard the latest Get updates on class schedules activities clubs and more ner Graduates Graduation fees H are due April 12th m D Congratulations to y si all of our future ke A However you choose to measure your ROI make it a long term continuous process so you can fine tune your messages to become better and better at reaching people and getting the results you want It seems rather clear that implementing a digital signage system is a good idea The next step is getting down to the nitty gritty and choosing the right elements to help you with what you want toachieve VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 22 SYSTEM CONSIDERATIONS What is required to put a system in place Once you ve decided that a visual communication system is right for your organization you need to start planning implementation Some organizations choose to work with a systems integrator while others have their own IT department to manage it with minimal help
104. rsonalize visitor greetings semen y id Show event schedules aa a HEADNG a Promote special offers yer DAN ORT oe OF ag Me Supplement knowledge sharing Advertise loyalty programs and sign up procedures pa No matter how geographically dispersed digital signage offers a dramatic branded presence in Lobby and reception areas Interactive kiosks Training centers Meeting rooms Break rooms Hallways Manufacturing and warehouse floors Auditoriums VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 31 On campus get news across quickly and easily Nearly every educational community has events that could use more exposure and today sharing campus news has never been more critical Campus communications are no longer just about quality of life they can also be about saving lives Digital signage systems make it quick and easy to push urgent updates even to mobile devices and remote campuses It s also a medium that keeps up with the times Students staff and visitors are savvy when it comes to technology and they re more responsive when notified visually Visual communication software also makes it possible to share sophisticated multimedia presentations that enhance campus life by engaging and informing audiences about the many details of residential life social and athletic programs administrative announcements and promotions from retailers Digital signage can be tailored to any educational com
105. s Audience members with a camera phone simply download free reader software to interface with QR codes Their phone s camera captures the image and scans it for data which causes the phone s browser to launch and redirect to your designated URL Keep in mind though that you need to keep your QR tag on screen long enough and position screens so people can take the photo The most popular destination for QR tags is a webpage you ve created However you can direct your viewers to Google Map locations social networks email addresses or downloadable coupons andimages This is a great way to track ROI from your communications For every download or webpage view you get you ve got proof that people have seen your message VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 56 ADDITIONAL RESOURCES e Watch our short videos on YouTube for more digital signage advice e Attend free webinars and watch past educational webinar recordings e Read our blog for expert articles tips and tricks e View our Creative Services gallery of digital signage designs e Sign up for our monthly newsletter for webinar invites and articles e Follow Visix on your favorite social media sites o Find us on Facebook o Follow us on Twitter o Watch us on YouTube o Connect with us on LinkedIn o Follow us on Google VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE PAGE 57 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS amp SOURCES Special thanks to Ray Walsh Derek DeWitt and
106. s ought to see an increase in morale and participation in programs After alert communications you should see people following your set procedures and policies that are designed to limit panic and injuries There are informal ways of measuring your success such as gathering information through general conversation with peers and audiences a lunchroom chat if you will in which you simply ask people if they have seen your messages and what they thought of them Another method is to use formal surveys to ask specific targeted questions to ensure that you are communicating exactly what you want A few things to keep in mind when crafting a formalsurvey VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 17 Keep it short People are usually happy to spend five minutes or so of their time filling in questions but will look at it as a chore if it takes much longer than that Remember this is a quick survey not a test or a focus group Focus on one topic Let the questions flow intuitively around the subject matter If the survey is scattered or confusing you ll get fewer results and less participation Consider demographics Make sure you ask questions that segment your audience People in different locations positions etc have different exposure to technologies and different communication needs andexpectations Leave some wiggle room Always include comment boxes so your audience can give you comments not just on the survey topic as
107. sensitive information reach out to a diverse audience and handle a variety of content Because their staff is usually made up of volunteers they often want their system to be easy to use accessible flexible expandable and affordable VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 35 Wayfinding get them where they need to go Effective wayfinding is essential for every organization corporate and college campuses healthcare facilities government buildings hotel and conference centers and more Custom interactive wayfinding maps lead your visitors through your facility and give your audience a convenient one stop source for information Most interactive maps are custom builds but some vendors offer plug n play solutions that either let you create within the software or use Google Maps to provide localized wayfinding Custom builds allow for much more flexibility and range of both design elements and interactive content specific to your needs e Create 3D or flat map renderings e Show campus wide building specific and area maps e Enable point to point directions and visual paths e Tie in personnel and department directories to map locations e Map your event locations e Incorporate ADA controls e Build in support for multi touch screens to allow pan and zoom Include general facility information Display digital signage announcement playlists Show weather news and other data and RSS feeds Incorporate date and t
108. signage policies to put in place 41 How to improve your communications planning 39 Where to find content ideas 91 How to improve your message designs 4 Where to learn even more about digital signage 9 VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE PAGE 4 WHY DIGITAL SIGNAGE What is digital signage Digital signage is the use of any display to present information digitally Our apologies if that sounds glib but digital signage is used in such a variety of applications that it s nearly impossible to generalize When people say digital signage they re talking about digital displays used to inform and persuade and it s popping up in public spaces and places of work all over the world Retailers and transit systems using digital signage are increasingly common and every day more and more campuses government institutions and corporations are finding their own ways to benefit from this relatively new and increasingly affordable technology Now that digital signage is no longer such a rarity maybe a better question is this what can you achieve with it First digital signage has added an additional and powerful communications vehicle for security and weather alerts saving time and potentially lives Second it s proving to be an effective supplement to organizational communications and helping resolve the ever present problem of reaching target audiences effectively cE i P Ls E 1 UH Tv f i cl E i I oie A e L
109. splays Content that s up to the minute and easily seen gets delivered to displays dispersed throughout your facility and many systems can even send content to displays in remote locations and mobile devices mem A Advertise loyalty programs and restaurant or loungespecials provide up to date event schedules and keep guests informed with breaking news Use of creative templates allows even a novice to build attractive multimedia displays that can include text bulletins video feeds graphics and tickers Digital signage supplements the guest services you provide and demonstrate your commitment to a satisfying visitorexperience Casinos Welcome groups with personalized messages Generate revenues with advertising Promote loyalty programs and registration benefits Deliver important announcements as they happen Advertise upcoming events and entertainment schedules Share emergency alerts and live weather traffic stock and sports information Supplement education and training efforts Use digital signage to recognize winners and attract attention to gaming areas of your choosing Advertise on site shops restaurants and shows with limited time offers and special package rates for loyal guests Recognize special visitors with lobby displays broadcast action from the gaming tables and communicate important announcements to staff using exciting visuals and instant updating capabilities VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 34
110. ssories in a range of color choices However 1f you can surface mount the displays that neemen in will save you a lot of construction and hassle ae If you can use Power over Ethernet PoE room signs that allow you to run one Ethernet cable to the meeting room sign to supply both power and data so you don t have to worry about concealing power bricks VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 37 TransLoc show real time transportation options Digital signage can be a major asset to transportation managers especially on college campuses Incorporating real time shuttle and bus maps into your digital signage not only provides useful information but boosts campus safety and comfort by allowing riders to wait indoors for their ride TransLoc is a next generation passenger information system It offers riders a safe comfortable and convenient wait for the bus and gives transit operators a more efficient more appreciated transit system Riders get e to see their buses actually moving online a detailed map estimated arrival time access via mobile phone more time to relax work or grab some coffee a safe comfortable convenient transit experience Transit Administrators get e areal time view of their transit system insightful reports fewer complaints less radio chatter a better way to promote important announcements a turnkey solution a more efficient more appreciated transit system Find out more at http t
111. surements after In other words start out with a concrete snapshot so that you can compare before and after Without that preliminary assessment there s no way to definitively show what you ve achieved once your system is inplace The objectives for digital signage systems are as diverse as the organizations that use them The following are some of the goals companies have addressed with a visual communications system e Generate new revenues by Y Increasing sales v Improving cross selling Y Processing more enquiries into new products or services Y Collecting advertising revenues e Reduce perceived wait times e Improve brand perceptions or experiences e Increase awareness of products or services e Speed up transactions or other interactions e Reduce costs by Delivering information more efficiently Reducing the cost per communication Improving the reliability of communications Leveraging past investment in infrastructure and resources Reducing costs and time in message creation and distribution Reducing training costs Minimizing reliance on printed materials LN NNN A Imagine how you ll use it Once you have concrete objectives you should outline in some detail how the system will operate in your organization What kind of content will you display What will the system components be and where will they be housed Who will actually operate it and from what budget does maintenance come For every use that
112. tems operate with a connectivity of 500Kbps A DSL IP or satellite network can provide this level of connectivity although connection speeds network outages or interruptions file size limitations traffic prioritization and security measures can impact operations for the system Support Maintenance and upgrades should be planned and budgeted for Most providers offer a range of support options and you need to budget for a level of support appropriate to your IT resources Many providers offer telephone support at low cost Remote diagnostics are a little costlier and on site support costlier still Consider a support or service contract Purchasing a system often entitles you to support for a fixed period but opting to extend support beyond the initial warranty often lengthens the system s lifespan Implementation When finalized your project plan should cover all the stages of implementation which obviously includes installation How your system gets deployed will be unique to your location your objectives and yourresources In many cases installation help is provided but on site support can be expensive You can save money by mounting hardware beforehand and opting for remote support Visix for example creates a web session for your system operators and then proceeds with the planned implementation including the initial software setup and configuration of the content manager and channel players If any issues come up they re docume
113. that things are not the same as they used to be with the Ny weather though they may argue as to the causes of these changes and we are all becoming N A familiar with the sometimes shocking statistics e The average passenger car emits one pound of carbon equivalent per miledriven e We currently have 384 parts per million of CO in the atmosphere when for all of human history before the Industrial Revolution it had been 280 parts per million and we are currently on track to hit somewhere between 450 and 550 ppm by mid century e Average global temperatures have risen 0 8 C since 1750 and could rise another 3 to 5 C in the next two generations as the temperatures rise the oceans warm and emit even more CO thus hastening the whole process in ways we are currently unable to predict The list goes on and on Naturally businesses around the world are starting to look at ways to reduce their carbon footprints and do their part in becoming part of the solution instead of continuing to contribute to the problem In good faith we can t make the claim that using digital signage will save the earth yet it can be an important first step in being responsible members of society and stewards of the planet Think about the following topics when you consider how your organization will fit into the new green economy digital signage systems help drastically reduce paper usage and Visix products also have device control options for managing your energy
114. that wasn t wanted and a tool that will go unused Entertaining rather than informing remember the call to action In such a dramatically visual medium it s easy to forget your primary purpose as you try to capture attention Make sure messages direct people to sources for additional information or make clear what you want them to do in response to your message Once you have all the details worked out your digital signage system will give you unprecedented ways of reaching your audience no matter who they are or what kind of organization you have VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 30 DIGITAL SIGNAGE IN YOUR ENVIRONMENT Whether they re commercial non profit educational or service oriented organizations are using digital signage to break through the barriers of audience attention span information overload and even language and literacy No matter how mobile diverse and busy your specific audiences may be you can target and reach them like neverbefore Corporate environments deliver messages with immediacy To get through to diverse and mobile audiences today you need to be bz TREVOR INC Ky direct and timely Ee Digital signage and messaging systems give you a path to your a Emplovee y audience that s flexible and strongly visual They deliver for example 91 pa of the month graphical and video content to a range of room signs stationary screens or mobile devices The
115. tiple players at once or allows players to pull content from a server asneeded Large retailers and advertisers were among the first to adopt digital signage typically using them to promote products in stores or in dramatic exterior installations But as monitors and related hardware have become cheaper more organizations have begun exploring the technology as a communications vehicle Where digital signage is the mosteffective Traditional media has limits No matter how well placed your communications are some people simply don t receive them or aren t paying attention when they do Different people are reached in different ways and digital signage software is proving itself to be extremely versatile For example take people s learning behaviors Some people are more inclined to learn from texts others prefer auditory or visual cues and experiential learners prefer to interact with the subject matter Because digital signage can present such a variety of media it helps get information across to all learning types and complements any other communications you might be doing Digital signage is also timelier Not everything can be printed in time and when up to the minute communications are needed people look to dynamic sources for instructions For sharing breaking news digital signage systems have no rivals For these reasons digital signage use is growing rapidly Organizations use it to greet visitors display conference room sche
116. tomatic software upgrades for both major and minor releases You should also ask about hardware trade in programs that allow you to upgrade components at a greatly reduced cost VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 26 IMPLEMENTATION The most powerful digital signage systems are simple to operate and flexible across an entire working community But to achieve that they must be thoroughly integrated with your IT network and your organizational processes Every organization is unique and that means that every implementation of digital signage is also unique Building a system so that you get the most benefit with the lowest cost of maintenance requires thorough planning and careful consideration of your organization s needs No matter the size of your user base or audience you need to anticipate as accurately as possible how the system will be used from day one and you need to engage your IT resources to make sure that your implementation is functional secure and flexible The following outlines a more comprehensive list of considerations before and during implementation Your system may involve only a few of these but every implementation will involve at leastsome Overview In order to execute an effective implementation you along with a third party system integrator if you re working with one should complete these planning steps e Review the topology of your system e Create a network diagram as it relates to y
117. ulletin and send a text message It s that easy Polling services can also send a reply message directing voters to a URL where they can see the overall results Or you could schedule the results web page in your digital signage playlist to let your audience track results on screen as votes are received Why not hear from your audience and create a two way dialogue using SMS voting VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 55 Include QR tags for instant ROI QR tags are a new thing that you may have seen in print ads but they can also be used in digital signage You can embed QR tags in your bulletins to prompt action from viewers send them to a website have them vote in a poll or offer a downloadable coupon It s a great way to track ROI for your messages p Follow AUMazing Fans on Facebook A QR or Quick Response tag is a two dimensional bar code that embeds data such as a website URL Mobile phones can read this code with their cameras The tags can be put on any visual medium that can be photographed print materials emails web pages t shirts and of course digital signage content Generating the QR tag is easy There are a bunch of free online generators you can use Simply tell the generator the destination you want the QR tag to go to and it will generate a square image file with the embedded data usually a PNG image file Then you just insert the image file into your bulletins and media design
118. use Using modern technology to change the culture Obviously getting your messages out to audiences using a digital signage system requires less paper than traditional methods like bulletin boards posters banners printed newsletters mail flyers and so on A recent study states that digital signage consumes 7 5 less carbon than posters Digital messages are just that digital They do not use paper so no trees are cut down no water inks or solvents are used and when the message is no longer relevant it doesn t go to a landfill to decompose and emit methane but is simply deleted Visix has several customers who use digital signage to reduce their overall paper usage The University of Virginia was approached by a concerned student body to find a digital paperless solution for student organizations to get their messages out on campus We have a generation of environmentally conscious students who wanted a sustainable way to deliver information says Bill Ashby Associate Dean of Students and Director of Newcomb Hall and Student Activities If you want to use more environmentally sustainable methods to reach students you basically have two options The first is punitive you know No Posting and then going after violators The second is to use modern technology to try and change the culture That s what we decided todo Device control an ON OFF switch at your desk Not using paper is certainly a major ben
119. ut your digital signage adding a broader quality to the content that your audience experiences Step outside the boundaries of the bullhorn to provide more expansive topics that your audience can connect with Reading an interesting book on work life balance Spotted something in today s Wall Street Journal How about the feature article in your monthly association magazine If you find subjects interesting and relevant to your environment it s likely that your audience will too Again remember to always site your source and check out any copyright issues before using publication excerpts in a commercial setting VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE e PAGE 51 Help audiences by showing them know how Just a quick sentence or a few bullet points outlining how to information that s valuable to your audience does a great deal toward making your system a trusted resource When information is engaging and interesting no matter how small it helps build loyalty and credibility for your organization Instead of simply pushing information include useful advice in your messaging strategy to gain loyalty and increase viewership Choose topics from everyday surroundings and don t feel you must limit yourself to business Consider a fuller range of your audience s needs what topics are relevant to them Some popular topic areas Software use Internet or intranet tips Community resources Technology help Study tips Health to
120. y allow you to reinforce messages and target key 7 VArnOCCA di Targa lala WEI AO LAICA METE Strategic Business audiences Manager vice Wi Team member Be Y Regardless of their location people get what you need them to know since 2007 ae including urgent alerts training greetings directions or recognition Whether you use attention getting screens where people gather or desktops and mobile devices where they work your content managers are able to get the message out with little technicalknow how When they re strategically placed TVs large screens interactive IVY JOHNSON e kiosks and other displays deliver your message to customers on target and on time They keep larger groups abreast of important events al nye AY performance data or emergency alerts and they start selling as soon as _Moon Robot lE customers walk in the door z ed Get everything you need at Pa Intranet JIT and on JIT Mobile The possibilities for corporate digital signage are endless Promote events and HR information Supplement training or product announcements Facebook and Googie two ofthe wei biggest and most nfuenta cine companies are dung R out in a very P Boost morale and improve communications Deliver emergency announcements more effectively Incorporate live information like weather traffic and stock price Broadcast performance and inventory statistics Display industry news or other RSS feeds Y 57 TENE Pe
121. you have physical tasks that you need employees students or any audience to perform video is a great medium to communicate those steps in ways that greater numbers of people can understand It has been shown that there is a 51 greater understanding of a subject through video It s largely effective because it engages the audience on a number of levels visually aurally emotionally and analytically Video combines images motion and audio to provide more impact than any of these components presented alone There are a multitude of advantages to using video in conjunction with static communications speed aesthetics impact and influence being just a few Combining video topics with creative bulletins is a great way to produce attention grabbing and attention keeping communications Deliver data feeds Data feeds are the most efficient way to ensure the information you present to your audience is up to date Topics that are continually changing such as breaking news sports business weather finance health entertainment and more can be routed automatically to your digital signage system as crawls or bulletins Because data feeds are delivered via RSS you can deliver to any RSS enabled device including displays desktop messengers email inboxes smartphones and other portable devices If you don t have the capability to receive data feeds you can make your own Grab headlines from sources on the web or from local and industry publicatio
122. you identify take note of the critical success factors It s never too early to identify sources of content These could be select individuals entire departments outside vendors or suppliers or external automated sources or any combination But now is the time to engage them No one wants to find out they re responsible for populating an information system after the decision has been made VISIX DIGITAL SIGNAGE DESK REFERENCE PAGE 23 At this stage you should outline a pro forma budget that takes into account project costs potential revenues and necessary cash flow Expenses can include network hardware software installations and operations but they can also include legal ad sales collaterals and commissions and profit sharing with location providers Writing the project plan Once these steps are taken we re ready to start drafting a project plan In the most general terms it should describe the key activities timeframes and resources needed At Visix we work closely with our customers to create a project plan whether they re working alone or with an integrator During this stage operational aspects of the system are documented Consider the following when writing your plan Display layout and rotation Although most systems are flexible you should define how you re going to allocate display space Will it include paid advertising information such as news or weather organizational news or branded content How

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