Urge Digital Sign Template with airSlate SignNow

Urge digital sign template

allow all attendees to hear you this system will notify you once you begin your broadcast [Music] all attendees are in listen-only mode hello my name is Lyle Bunn and welcome to this the sixth part in a seven part series of Education events for resellers and integrators the intention is to provide you with the tools and the capabilities and a level of comfort and competence necessary for you to add digital signage to your portfolio and deliver to deliver successfully against projects that you'll identify so again this is the sixth of a seven part series we've covered a lot of ground already and I encourage you to go back and look at some of those previous sessions we're going to stand on the shoulders in in this number six session as we talk about the process of planning proposing and fulfilling we're gonna stand on the shoulders of what was presented in sessions 1 & 2 so I really do encourage you to go back and look at some of those and that will assure that we don't cover ground again what I'll be sharing with you today is based on the the experience that I've had on literally hundreds of projects working with hundreds of end-users thousands of end-users actually and many many many integrators over the past 14 plus years in digital signage I've captured some of this in the papers that I published and so what I'm going to share with you today is really what is the current level of best practices in the areas in which we're going to focus and so the point is the point as we start is is really this that planning proposing and then fulfilling on projects are all inextricably linked what you're providing is a customer experience a staff experience a visitor a traveler a student experience based on the use of this visual media we've come to know and love as digital signage your success is based on the value that you bring so I hope that as we move forward in the few minutes you'll look beyond providing products and services on which you have to have the lowest price and instead look at bringing value in the core constructs of a digital signage project as we've spoken of already they have three phases objectives content and technology all of these are very closely linked and the why of digital signage for any installation is determine when the objectives are clearly identified and the and the nature of the content which will achieve these objectives is clearly articulated part of moving forward in a program of digital signage with your prospect or your customer is assuring that they're well grounded in terms of the objectives of what they expect to get out of their investment in digital signage with you and the expertise that you bring is really in the how area the digital signage is a is a technology enabled capability and so the why and the how our as inextricably linked as our objectives content and technology and as you look at these you're going to be looking throughout the process the the examination that you'll bring to each aspect of the of the project is is the assurance that before jumping to the technology solution there are clear clearly defined and documented objectives and bear in mind that these objectives will probably change over time and so as much as can be planned in advance for how objectives can reasonably be a imagined to change change over a period of time and how content requirements will change over a period of time allows you to determine the technology that's going to serve the long-term needs of that project here is what a digital signage project typically looks like think of it as moving forward in five phases and I like to use the analogy of getting on your ten-speed bike in the springtime to to get the rust out as you first start riding your bike the fact is you would put it in a very low gear and you'd probably have more turns to the pedals than you would of the of the back wheel and so it is with digital signage where the initial work is really in the front end and the quality of that front-end work in initializing the project in getting the right stakeholders around the table in defining what is required of the digital signage Network in order to achieve those business objectives even going to the initial installation a proof of concept is is really still one of the early phases and of course everybody wants to get to the point where the digital signage is in place and it's a matter of turning the crank and pulling the trigger to issue more points of display on the network the time frames that I'm providing here are very typical of what is experienced don't be daunted by the long periods of time that it can take within some organizations to get people focused around the table the fact is there is usually not a budget for new projects related to digital signage and so it has to find money from some other budgets and it does so by presenting itself as a better investment option for communications and messaging it can take a while to get people around the table but we're going to focus a little bit more on that now even as we did in a previous module where we really did fully focus on who needs to be around the table as far as your advancement of a digital signage project is concerned but I don't want to lead this yet why because you may decide as you position digital signage in your portfolio where you really want to come into the project some integrators decide that they really want the end user to have determined all of what they expect of the digital signage before they issue a sourcing a sourcing document a request for information or a request for proposal you know in fact that really doesn't come in until the conclusion of the third gear and in those RFI RFP documents you're going to be looking for the degree to which the planning has been put in place that will assure that the purchase actually does move forward and that that purchase results in a in a digital signage program that's really successful and has the the opportunity to grow into the future so examine this slide more carefully and determine where you want as an organization as a provider and integrator to engage with the digital signage process moving forward it wouldn't surprise you to know that by the time fifth gear arrives which can be just a few months out for some deployments that the firm's that were involved in making that project happen putting in place the proof-of-concept the pilot project though I I hate to call it that if the planning has been well done it is much more a proof of concept rather than a pilot project and it's at that fourth gear that refinement to the plan really happens when end-users get a clear sense of the value that they can get and what it takes to get that value so those organizations that are involved in the early stages of making digital signage happen in an end-user organization are very often the ones that are well positioned to provide the ongoing technology operation and support for that network it's all about contributing to the team in terms of moving the process forward the planning the design and then ultimately the fulfillment there's always a requirement to work with that end user organization and as we described in a previous module with different departments or different elements of that end user organization so here are some suggestions to you that have proven themselves to be a very very high value the middle one in particular I draw your attention to and that is making visible contributions as a provider as an integrator one of the major contributions you can provide is by is by finding and providing case studies of similar situations these are valuable because they help that end-user to mitigate their risk to avoid problems and so that's a very very valuable contribution that that you can make to the project as it's going forward and by the way that has the inherent benefit of getting your team up to speed and being able to speak at a level that may even be a few steps ahead of that end-user that you're looking to serve but it's very much a team environment and I'd encourage you to get into the position where you're standing shoulder to shoulder with that client prospect organization to determine how this new medium is really going to change their world and and deliver on the productivity gains that they want to achieve rather than being across the desk and and being asked what you can supply the more quickly you can get on the same side of the the desk the same side of the ledger and be moving forward arm and arm in a lockstep basis with information being shared in a very candid way the greater will be your prospects of being selected to provide that technology and the related services when it's when it's read when it's required at prices and margins which recognize the value that you are to the process we've spoken about this previously and this is what a typical project looks like I I'm not going to go too far into this because you can look at previous modules to here to here what we've said about this slide but the line of business manager in marketing or staff or student communication is typically the point person and the the champion for the for the program that champion will take the idea to others within their organization to achieve their buy-in and and get their sign-off they'll probably be reaching out to others within the organization whose goals could be benefited by the investment that they're about to make in digital signage as well so I'm not going to go too much further into this but but - but to note in particular that there are differences in the goals that various stakeholders have again this is a slide that we focused on previously in the module about who should be around the table when you when you develop and define digital signage but throughout the process you will probably encounter these different departments gone are the days when digital signage was the single silo of an application that was put in place under the leadership of a single individual organizations are acting much more collaboratively and in particular as we're realizing the extent of the impact that digital signage has within an organization and the way that it can support the goals of different departments within that organization really is a testament to to the quality of engagement and representation that you're going to need to bring to bear to be as successful as you can be as an integrator again I've referenced the the outline for the network description we focused on this in the previous module and I would urge I would urge you with with with the strongest urging possible to document what the system is supposed to look like what its intended to do what the framework of its existence is within that end-user organization what the technology architecture looks like this is the document that's going to guide the sourcing and so your input into the network description is you being able to position yourself relative to the sourcing exercise and and the ongoing purchases that are going to be required for products and services as the network builds out further I've already referenced that this network description is one of the templates available in the digital signage planning guide it's in native Word format and it's a couple of these sections are really fill in the blank fill in the blank sections so if you reach me at the email address I'll provide at the end of this session we can get you connected with that digital signage planning guide you've also seen this in previous module so I'm not going to I'm not going to drive into this in in very much detail but the fact is that your role as integrators should be that of a counselor and and and and guidance to each of the principal phases including defining the objectives its return on investment or return on objectives defining the content bringing perspectives about the kind of content including the interfaces that might be used with other operating systems or even RSS feeds such as weather for example as you define the optimal technology needed to to fulfill the the requirement as it is defined I would urge you as you look at this simple model to really think about not just the requirement as defined today but this is technology that will have a mean time to failure of three to five years so the technology that you provide in the configuration you provided is probably a four year on average investment for this organization so encourage your end user and you should be thinking as well about the future proofing of the requirement well purchasing people God love them always want to provide a minimum specification which they think correlates to a minimum price the fact is an organization can very quickly outgrow its digital signage infrastructure capabilities by being too narrow too narrowly focused on fulfilling their requirements as they might be defined today so think about the future proofing and the degree to which audience targeting or day parting or the use of other kinds of content and interfaces to systems will emerge as the end user realizes that this medium really does work it really does move the needle in all of the core business objectives that they have in their communications program as you're focusing on the planning and the design and the fulfillment you will focus on total cost of ownership you do not want to get anybody caught into the struggle of lowest cost digital signage there is only one ultimate winner in that and cost generally correlates to functionality so think importantly about the cost of operating that Network where the cost of technology continues to decline the costs of staffing continues to rise and so have in the front of your mind and bring to the conversations what it might take in terms of the staffing to operate the digital signage network that's being contemplated and the perspective ROI should be as broad as possible there are some good documents in that digital signage planning guide that really are shopping lists of the kinds of ROI that will be impacted from the use of the medium so here's the reality if you've got technology or providing that's going to have a four year life on average as a mean time to failure by the way I still see systems out there that have been operating for as many as nine years but if you're targeting a four year mean time to failure the difference between $100 and a hundred and ten dollars for an element of the system you're you're going to provide has very very overall impact if it's considered with amortization over a 48 month period that said the ease of operation is a critical success factor in terms of the success of the network and the price is based not just on the capital expenditure but the effects as well the operating expense that will be incurred if a system requires a lot of workarounds or it may require a lot of workarounds to ingest media in the format that is required if the elements of operation are definitely a cost factor but minimizing those operating costs should be the intention that you have you want to turn it on you wanted to operate easily you want their staff members to be trained up very quickly as it could easily be contemplated that staff members working on the digital signage network would change over the over the course of that investment being applied and measure this against all of the benefits that are going to be realized even if they're not easily quantified for example it's not easy to quantify the impact on brand awareness or a perception of brand that might come off of the use of a video wall in the lobby of a building it's very difficult to quantify these however even though they cannot easily be quantified put them on the list of benefits that are expected to be achieved and then obviously you're going to way and they are going to weigh the benefits against the overall cost on this generally what you'll find with digital signage is that the ROI period is fairly rapid it's not uncommon for systems to pay for themselves in a three to six month period and and be continuing to deliver benefits against the cost of content upgrade over the over the ensuing over the ensuing period so here are a couple of questions that I think it would be valuable to ask and and these will during your planning and design and fulfillment process really engage that end user with you as as an integrator of choice and an integrator of option even two to have them realize the degree of understanding that you bring about the application of technology within business and so it's not just about knowing the the technical details of the elements of the solution that you want to provide it's really being able to frame the importance of these technology elements in terms of the value that they're going to bring to to that organization the the the indicator by the end user of the contributions that they seek for you to make or that they would welcome you would you making really provides an ongoing barometer of the degree of relationship that you have with that end user and that barometer is a direct indicator what could be expected when the sourcing phase of the technology happens you want to be continually asking those who are involved in the project how familiar they are with the elements too often we see for example that consumer grade flat panels are applied for a digital signage and why is that it's because there's a failure to appreciate the economic benefit the lower total cost of ownership that comes with a commercial grade display that has features and capability and a level of reliability that's going to serve that end user for a long time to come so you're being able to explain features in terms of their benefit to the total cost of ownership and lowering cost of operation over time is what's going to help assure that the solution that you propose to provide is the one that has seen with highest value by that end user along the way each organization has its idea of the kinds of elements of operation that they want to outsource versus what they want to keep in-house what's been real interesting to see in digital signage over the years is the degree to which playlist administration is out sourced after a very short period of time so most digital signage initiatives have their own life for the first hundred days but after that initial three months of operation there's an inclination to revisit how that digital signage is operated and at that point there will likely have been incidents of hardship that were encountered by that end user organization imagine for example the requirement to post new content at a time when a staff member is dedicated to other activities or may even have been off may even have been off ill so the ability to put in place a plan B for administration very quickly emerges given the given the use of the medium we've also seen an interesting phenomena with digital signage in public sector and unionized environments where because of the increased amount of work and the training required to do the work of playlist administration and network operations the staff member has asked for pay upgrades because of their new knowledge their additional contribution they even asked for training days to assure that they can be successful in the work that is expected of them so looking forward asking questions introducing elements that will minimize the grief and the burden related to the use of digital signage is going to position you very well during the planning and the design and ultimately into the fulfillment phases and last question that I'd listen really carefully to the answer on and that is how do you assess value versus price some elements of the organization are very budget sensitive and so being able to position value the value that you bring in terms of expertise suitability of design thoroughness and depth of planning ability to integrate the right elements for the optimal solution for its use case by that end-user are really important elements that will move the the buyer as well as yourself as providers away from just simply looking at the price as the determinant factor in in what comes into their organization along the way you're going to want to position your objectivity and and enhance the awareness of your competencies and your capabilities and so here are six points to help you that that path these six points I have found in working with end users to be very very core to the development of their confidence in moving forward with the use of the medium and the firm's with which they decide to move forward so one of the one of the key tactical approaches is to take the the the lead or the or the the digital signage project team out to locations where they can see similar similar applications so if they're in the food service business plan to take them on a tour and explain to them how digital signage is being used well or not well by organizations to whom they can relate and in those visits take them to locations that are suitable for digital signage but where it is not yet being applied through these site visits it's possible to expand the awareness of the kinds of objectives that can be achieved and provide answers to questions that naturally come up when they have that screen in front of them and they begin to contemplate its application within their own organization so a couple of suggestions to you I really want to really want to emphasize one point using the simple visual and it is your positioning in terms of integration and supply capability and here's the simple message from this graphic it's if it's on their plate it should be on your plate and so on the plate of the end-user are these are these five areas of key consideration yeah they want the right technology that will be future proofed and and it's not going to have them waking up in cold sweats in the middle of the night they will want locked down high-quality quality of service at levels that correlate to their standards within the the organization with digital signage they will probably want interfaces to operating systems they will have a keen interest in the kind of analytics that the system can use in order to optimize content but also the kind of analytic that can be delivered by the digital signage system and of course content is very very much on their plate and so if it's on their plate I'd encourage you to have it on your plate well you may not deliver all of these elements you would want to combine your efforts with that of partner organizations to bring these capabilities to the table the MOOC the closer you can get to turnkey in both supply and operations the better is going to be your credibility with that end-user to source from you why because you've contemplated and you're bringing part of a solution to them that they may not even have awareness of the importance of so along this path then here's my here's my final point of advice to you and that is to draw from draw on information and draw on partners in terms of companion vendors of associations of publications draw on what you can learn at trade shows and then position yourself to deliver this capability to the end users in other words you're the one who's going to stand up and say I will be that throat to choke in providing the digital signage to you let's make this as easy as possible let me draw upon the capabilities that I'm aware of the information that I'm aware of the connections that I am aware of and can make so that you can see me as the best choice of providing value in your digital signage and and I would encourage you to connect early on every opportunity with the team at LG who can be a valuable resource to you in bringing these additional points of information and case study design and and and other elements to to the solution so finally I will offer this my email address is here if you have questions don't hesitate to email me and if I don't know the answer I probably know somebody who does and we'll put in best efforts to connect you with the resources that you need to succeed a best of success in adding digital signage to your portfolio and then expanding that digital signage in a way that best serves your clients your prospects and additionally your business thanks for being with us on this instruction today best of success to you