In my interactions with customers and partners, I have seen that a lot of interest is shown in the software, its features, the hardware and the network.

All good. However, one thing that is almost always left out is CONTENT.

Does not really matter what you have in terms of hardware, software etc. What matters most is the content.

Do not get me wrong. The internals of the system have to be rock solid. One definitely needs to worry about all the internals to make a rock solid system. But if the content is not right and to the mark, everything will come to a naught.

Consider showing a half hour documentary on a screen that is visible only while going up on the escalators. How will your audience ever get the picture? Believe it or not, I have seen people doing this. Or just showing a TV news channel at such a location. This is a total waste of the investment on the digital signage network.

Many folks have also been showing movie previews on screens, but the locations are just not suitable enough to support that content. What use there is to show a movie preview in a train where there is no audio? Believe it or not, it is there in some digital signage networks in various countries.

Digital signage spots should, in my opinion never be more than half the attention span of an average viewer. And that too extreme care should be taken in knowing where it will be shown and how much time the audience has in assimilating and reacting to the message. You have to give enough time to the audience to first understand what the message is all about and then figure out whether the information is good enough to act upon.

The use of video in my opinion is overrated when it comes to digital signage. At least videos longer than 20 seconds. An average person would probably never get the hang of a commercial greater than that length.

Another pitfall to avoid is dishing out multiple messages at the same time. Just trying to put in as much information as you possibly can in one screen shot is again a sheer waste. It would probably get you more revenue in the short term, but your advertisers will not be happy at all with the effort in the long run.

Content creators now need to gear up to this new medium. During the early days of the internet, there was not enough thought in the kind of content people would like on the internet. Same for the digital signage revolution. Not enough thought is going into the kind of content people would assimilate through this medium.

Doing a good audience analysis with an added dimension of the speed with which your viewers are passing your digital screens would probably do a world of good. Another added factor is that the content would need to be pushed through the sub conscious mind of the viewer. After all the viewer is not paying attention and you have grab his attention. That is what digital signage and out of home media is about anyway!

I have some more ideas on this. Will try to write more on this soon.