STRATACACHE announces service to track and document consumer traffic patterns

Posted on May 13, 2009 by Jane Goodwin at 12:05 am

From Digital Signage Today comes this excellent article about in-store consumer traffic pattern analysis:

DAYTON, Ohio — STRATACACHE, provider of the digital signage platform ActiVia for Media, has launched a new service providing in-store/in-branch consumer traffic pattern analysis for new digital signage customers.

In-store consumer tracking technology uses highly intelligent IP cameras to analyze the ongoing consumer traffic pattern within the retail store or branch location. This technology counts patrons, tracks their flow and dwell through the retail environment and helps companies select optimal locations for digital messaging based on the consumer’s in-store/in-branch behavior. The data generated by the system provides valuable intelligence for retail environments and bank branches to analyze placement of digital signs and their success.

With this intelligence, retailers and bank branches can improve customer service, respond to consumer shopping or traffic trends, and determine which promotions and products are most effective at generating interest and stimulating action. Traffic analysis offers banks and retailers a competitive advantage that can make a critical difference in their digital signage project, dramatically improving the customer experience and increasing message effectiveness.

STRATACACHE’s new program leverages the traffic tracking technology and pattern analysis both pre- and post-digital signage installation to optimize the placement decisions being made for digital displays within the retail environment. The traffic pattern technology remains in place post-digital signage installation (two to four weeks) for continued analysis of consumer traffic to help determine changes in flow triggered by the digital signage as part of the consumer experience. When used in concert with ActiVia Audience Measurement, the system can determine not only where customers travel within the store or branch and how they get there, but also what digital messages they focus on during their visit.

STRATACACHE’s ActiVia for Media is a highly optimized solution for retail digital marketing that manages the entire digital signage lifecycle for multi-layered playlist creation, distribution, audience measurement and monitoring of large-scale digital signage networks. ActiVia is massively scalable and capable of managing networks containing up to 250,000 concurrent media devices.

ActiVia combines STRATACACHE’s patented content delivery platform with state-of-the-art digital media technology. ActiVia can be purchased as a customer-deployed solution, through a Software as a Service (SaaS) arrangement, or as a managed service via STRATACACHE or STRATACACHE partners worldwide.

Datacasting For Digital Signage

Posted on Feb 23, 2009 by Jane Goodwin at 12:05 am

The following article, from Digital Signage Today.com, is by Lyle Bunn, principal and Strategy Architect for BUNN Co.  Bunn is highly regarded as an advisor and educator in North America’s digital signage industry.

Datacasting is emerging as an attractive alternative to DSL, satellite and cellular connectivity for digital signage/DOOH network operators because it combines the cost-effectiveness of multicasting with the addressable media transport associated with DSL/Internet. Datacasting offers the rapid, low-cost deployment that makes cellular attractive, but can provide much higher connectivity capacity and speeds.

One of the major players in this area of the digital signage industry is National Datacast, a commercial, wireless data broadcasting subsidiary of the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS). NDI has acted as a content delivery provider since 1988, but is turning its capabilities in connectivity service and media management to the digital signage and digital out-of-home sectors. National Datacast provides regional or national connectivity through partnerships with PBS member stations and their satellite networks.

While digital signage software from firms such as BroadSign, EnQii, Harris, Scala, STRATACACHE and others can provide flexibility and ease of use in designating display groups and specifying content spots for playout on even individual displays, I believe past connectivity options have not offered a cost-effective combination of network-wide media fueled with fast, player-targeted download.

Today’s connectivity model is a fundamental element of digital signage, in-store TV and DOOH dynamic displays since centrally-controlled networks are “media-fueled” to present information or ads according to pre-defined, often day-parted playlists.

The typical architecture is to forward media spots and a playlist file from a network operations center to media players at display locations, and then to add live inputs from databases or external feeds such as weather, news, sports scores or financial information.

Internet connectivity, such as DSL, and cellular treats each media transfer as a separate connectivity transaction, and as such requires large connection capacities to process network traffic.

Multicasting, the transmission of the same files to multiple locations at the same time, can offer media transfer value, but can add an overhead to media management at each location.

The datacasting model NDI’s datacasting network (short for “data broadcasting”) uses digital file transfer techniques that are similar to delivery of content via other means – that means a digital signage player can readily utilize content files delivered by datacasting. Datacasting applications are numerous and include transfer of video and audio files, corporate digital file transfer, updating of software, gaming and information, training and education, alert notification, safety and security and information services.

Datacasting empowers the capabilities of available software tools and offers operational cost-effectiveness that can allow digital signage/DOOH network operators to expand networks and better apply their day-parting capabilities.

This reliable, national infrastructure of commercial-grade digital connectivity has been used by a long list of clients such as Movie Gallery, Update Logic, TV Guide, Microsoft, Disney, VISA, IBM and others.

The receiving equipment is also very simple in nature. A standard antenna is connected using coaxial cable to a specialized digital television receiver which is then connected by USB to a media server or on some other type of content processing computer/ display. The antenna and receiver typically costs under $200 retail.

Other datacasting service features important to digital signage/DOOH network operators include:

Nationwide coverage that allows network operations in multiple regions to be provided by a single connectivity operator.

Transmission reliability is not affected by user volume, cable breaks or environmental conditions such as rain, snow, smog and dust.

Multicasting allows satellite transmission to deliver value to a large network deployment.

Multiple file formats can be transported, reducing the need for transcoding or file re-formatting, which increases overheads and can degrade playout quality.

Security at the highest level associated with an enterprise application.

The NDI Network Operations Center (NOC) can manage media distribution in any predefined display architecture.