Out-Of-Home Media Archives - Infillion https://infillion.com/blog/category/out-of-home-media/ Humanizing the Connected Future Tue, 05 Sep 2023 16:36:54 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.4.2 https://infillion.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/cropped-favicon-dark-32x32.png Out-Of-Home Media Archives - Infillion https://infillion.com/blog/category/out-of-home-media/ 32 32 4 Key Insights On Pro Sports Marketing, from AMA Atlanta https://infillion.com/blog/pro-sports-marketing-insights-ama/ Tue, 05 Sep 2023 16:28:55 +0000 https://infillion.com/?p=59136 We are proud to have been the sponsor for AMA’s Atlanta chapter’s event “Marketing Is A Team Sport,” a sold-out panel that featured leadership from all of the city’s major sports teams. Here are four insights leaders shared during this exciting panel.

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4 Key Insights On Pro Sports Marketing, from AMA Atlanta

There are few audiences more captivated and engaged than live sports fans – they’re excited to be there, they’re less likely to be distracted by work or other priorities, and that’s a huge opportunity for brands to get in front of them. But brands also have to understand the strategies and philosophies of the marketers for the teams and arenas whose fans they want to get in front of.

At Infillion, our InStadium product helps connect brands to flighted advertising opportunities in 97% of the pro and college sports stadiums in the U.S., and we understand how important it is to grasp the priorities and nuances of sports team marketers. That’s why we were excited to sponsor the AMA’s Atlanta chapter’s event “Marketing Is A Team Sport,” a sold-out panel that featured leadership from all of the city’s major sports teams – Melissa M. Proctor of the NBA’s Atlanta Hawks; Adam Zimmerman of MLB’s Atlanta Braves; Ryan Mucatel of MLS’ Atlanta United FC and the NFL’s Atlanta Falcons; and Morgan Shaw Parker of the WNBA’s Atlanta Dream.

Here are four key insights from the panel event.

 

Marketers for professional sports teams need to accept a lack of control.

As moderator Joe Koufman, founder and CEO of Setup, pointed out: “sports marketers have absolutely zero control over their product.” They don’t have any say over whether the team wins or loses, or who gets drafted each year – the closest they have to an influence over the team’s performance is that higher revenues can mean the ability to draft better players.

How do they best grapple with this? The panelists agreed that it’s all about getting to know the ethos of a city. Get to know who the fans are, and what they want. Listen, learn, talk, and engage – and remember that sports loyalty is deeply emotional. People plan their weddings so as not to miss major football games, for example.

In other words, it’s not just the players who are in charge; it’s also the fans. And this, too, isn’t entirely rational and measurable. Several panelists pointed out that when it comes to content marketing, the “community” content – publicizing outreach to different cultural groups in a city, or local community service on behalf of a team – is often the lowest performing social media content that the team’s channels publish. But it’s that content that means the most to the niche groups they connect with.

 

Commercial real estate and retail are now key parts of sports marketing strategies.

While sports team marketing leaders have to contend with the fact that they can’t control how well their teams perform, they often have some additional assets that other CMOs don’t. While typical revenue sources for teams have been ticket sales, merchandise, media rights, and sponsorships, commercial real estate is now emerging as a new revenue stream and marketing platform. Stadium space is now regularly booked for conferences and other private events, in addition to concerts and music festivals, when teams aren’t playing.

And gone are the days of stadiums surrounded by parking lots on the outskirts of city limits. In Atlanta, the in-development Centennial Yards project is anchored by several sports arenas and will feature apartments, hotel rooms, and retailers. This isn’t just a revenue source – it’s also a key platform for fan engagement, providing an opportunity for teams to be a bigger part of local life and recreation even when they aren’t watching a game.

 

Pro sports marketing was always seen as old-school – but data is changing everything.

Just as how TV sports were seen as slow to make the jump from linear TV to streaming, marketing live sports was historically seen as more analog than other sectors of the industry. That’s changing fast. Teams now have “chief technology innovation officers.” AI chatbots are used to drive ticket sales. Brand opportunities in sports arenas are now more flexible and dynamic than traditional full-season sponsorships and naming rights – Infillion’s InStadium, for example, brings branded 3D video and augmented reality experiences to pro and college sports venues.

Then there’s the sheer amount of data that marketers now have. Data allows sports team marketers to know more about their audiences, and also to get closer to the “holy grail of marketing” – reaching consumers with something they didn’t know they wanted. Meanwhile, fans are accustomed to personalized, customized experiences and that extends to what they expect from their favorite sports teams.

 

The sports landscape is also changing like never before.

Just days before the panel, the ownership of the Atlanta Falcons and Atlanta United announced that it had acquired a team in TGL, the new arena-based golf league that aims to bring the sport to a new generation of fans. TGL is moving incredibly fast; there is not yet a media distribution strategy, several teams in the league have yet to be announced, and yet the first season kicks off in just a few months.

Women’s sports, too – like the WNBA – are growing fast. The WNBA announced a new capital raise last year, and at the midpoint of the 2023 season, viewership was up 67%. What we think of as pro sports is changing, and similarly, the idea of what constitutes a “sports fan” is changing, too. Marketers are learning how to reach more diverse audiences, to tell authentic stories of their players and fans on owned media channels, and to consider themselves stewards of a community, not just a team.

The key trait marketers need in this fast-moving environment? Curiosity.

 

Infillion’s InStadium is the easiest, most flexible way for brands to get in front of highly engaged live sports audiences. Learn more about it here.

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Marrying LED Display with Beacons: Understanding the Customer https://infillion.com/blog/marrying-led-display-beacons-understanding-customer/ Mon, 08 Aug 2016 10:09:46 +0000 http://infillion.wpengine.com/blog/ Marrying LED Display with Beacons: Understanding the Customer Retailers and other consumer-facing businesses are just starting to get their heads around utilizing beacon technology and other location-sensing technologies to reach their customers at a particular time and place. But up to this point, leveraging beacon technology has been a one-way conversation, where companies sent out […]

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Marrying LED Display with Beacons: Understanding the Customer

Retailers and other consumer-facing businesses are just starting to get their heads around utilizing beacon technology and other location-sensing technologies to reach their customers at a particular time and place. But up to this point, leveraging beacon technology has been a one-way conversation, where companies sent out a message to the customer without a true understanding of how the message was received. This “conversation” usually occurs in the form of couponing. A customer walks into a store, the store’s beacon technology recognizes an SDK on a mobile phone, then calls to the cloud for a mobile marketing engagement. These mobile messages are very often used to drive in-store purchases through coupon delivery.

But, the use of beacon technology can be so much more, and beyond couponing, it can be used for analytics purposes or to create smart, seamless experiences. By marrying LED display technology, CMS and beacons, businesses can have a two-way conversation with their customers while learning more about them. NanoLumens has partnered with Gimbal, an industry leading location intelligence and mobile engagement platform, to fully maximize the potential of cutting-edge LED displays.

By embedding Gimbal’s top-flight beacon technology into our displays, the beacon can trigger the content on the display to change into a relevant message for that particular audience, allowing the display to communicate to the customer in front of it one-on-one.  This proximity location enablement is a true bridging of the divide between in-store and mobile, while allowing for an entirely new level of personalization.

Even if a retailer chooses not to change display content according to the customers nearby, beacon-enabled display technology offers a rich opportunity to learn more about them. Through beacon technology, a company can data mine information on every person who walks into a store. For example, a company may learn that a significant number of customers are sports fans or health food nuts. In addition to understanding store traffic, dwell times and more, this knowledge can be used by businesses to optimize physical locations in ways similar to their efforts in digital mediums.

Businesses can also take the information gleaned through the use of beacons to understand the customers’ journeys throughout their brick-and-mortar store. Do they tend to move through the space in a predictable pattern? Do they head right for the sale rack? This information can help a business better stage merchandise for increased conversions. The information can also be heat mapped for increased awareness of consumer behavior. Further, in the push to have Omni-channel strategies, these insights can be combined with other channels to have a more unified view of customers.

Businesses are just beginning to realize the possibilities of leveraging beacon technology in a way that provides a deep, rich understanding of customers and their preferences. The potential is limitless. Our partnership with Gimbal is on the forefront of maximizing these possibilities. To find out more about how NanoLumens LED displays, powered by Gimbal’s Bluetooth® beacon technology can improve your relationship with customers, please sign up for our free webinar, here.

https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/3057469532748828162

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NFC vs. BLE – Which is Right for You? https://infillion.com/blog/nfc-vs-ble-right/ Tue, 19 Jul 2016 00:55:21 +0000 http://infillion.wpengine.com/blog/ Near Field Communication (NFC) and Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE); both are two of the leading technologies powering modern services in our smartphones, yet they are designed with very different user experiences in mind. If you are in the process of recreating your mobile app experience, consider how the technologies differ from one another and which […]

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Near Field Communication (NFC) and Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE); both are two of the leading technologies powering modern services in our smartphones, yet they are designed with very different user experiences in mind. If you are in the process of recreating your mobile app experience, consider how the technologies differ from one another and which will ultimately allow you to create the mobile experience you are striving for.

Active vs Passive Use Cases

Example of NFC using ApplePay

Active Use Case through NFC

One of the key differentiators with the technologies is that NFC requires a user (e.g., your shopper) to pull out their phone and “tap” it onto a NFC reader. In Gimbal-lingo, we refer to this as an “active” use case since it requires the end user to actively be using their smartphone before any activity can occur. One place you probably see this in use today is through mobile payment systems like ApplePay or SamsungPay.

Conversely, Bluetooth (in the form of our beacons) has the capability to be used in either “active” or “passive” modes. A “passive” mode refers to when a user has a locked device that is not in use, perhaps in a pocket or purse, and a notification or experience occurs. In addition to enabling your smartphone to pair with your wireless speakers, car and more, Bluetooth is also increasingly used to alert your smartphone to nearby happenings or offers in your proximity (whenever your smartphone comes into range with the Bluetooth signal). Our beacon solution has been meticulously engineered to allow you to engage with users whether they are “tapping” on a receiver (like with NFC), or up to 50 meters away. We do this by allowing you to change the signal strength of your beacons so you can create the user experience you have in mind.

 

Left: BLE in active (foreground) mode. Right: BLE in passive (background) mode

Left: BLE in active (foreground) mode. Right: BLE in passive (background) mode

Let’s do a quick exercise to see which use cases you are more interested in, and as a result, what technology is a better fit. Imagine temporarily that you are an executive for a leading grocery store chain, tasked with updating your mobile app to keep up with changing consumer habits. You initially identify a handful of use cases that you want to integrate. In particular, you want to:

  • Increase exposure: Highlight specials to nearby shoppers
  • Surprise & Delight: Send users who spend a certain amount of time in an aisle a recipe with the other needed ingredients for the dish
  • Improve Loyalty: Remind shoppers at checkout to use their loyalty card to continue accruing reward points
  • Harness Data: Gain in-store analytics such as time spent in each aisle and part of the store
  • Easier Payments: Allow mobile payments at the register

 

Can you guess which of these would be enabled through Bluetooth vs. NFC? In actuality, all but the mobile payments piece would likely require a Bluetooth beacon.

Summary

While NFC and BLE are both valuable technologies that will increasingly be leveraged to create more mobile-friendly experiences, we believe Bluetooth beacons offer unprecedented flexibility and opportunity for mobile-oriented organizations. Still have questions on how you can meet your proximity (and macro-location) needs? Contact us and get connected to industry experts.

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Using Gimbal to Maximize Enterprise Locations https://infillion.com/blog/using-gimbal-maximize-enterprise-locations/ Fri, 13 May 2016 16:58:26 +0000 http://infillion.wpengine.com/blog/ We are at an inflection point in our industry- ripe for explosion and the path towards ubiquity. In the not too distant future, location solutions will be as common for enterprises as having a web domain and email marketing program. While location technologies (e.g., beacons and geofences) were initially in their hype-phase, leading enterprises took […]

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We are at an inflection point in our industry- ripe for explosion and the path towards ubiquity. In the not too distant future, location solutions will be as common for enterprises as having a web domain and email marketing program. While location technologies (e.g., beacons and geofences) were initially in their hype-phase, leading enterprises took notice, and many are starting to leverage the solutions on a large scale. In a time when devices, people and locations are becoming increasingly connected, it is only a natural evolution.

However, the industry is also full of misinformation, much of which could skew a prospect or adopter away from the correct mindset for maximizing the value these solutions can create. As an early innovator and thought leader- and the most vetted, tested solution being used in primetime by many of the world’s biggest retailers, financial solutions, entertainment venues and festivals– we at Gimbal want to help steer the conversation in the right direction so you too can be successful.

Without further ado, here are some quick and easy ways for you to get started:

Step 1: Macro-location                           

In our vocabulary, we define macro-location as a solution that helps engage and understand customers in areas of 50 meters and greater. If you are familiar with our platform, this is achieved through geofencing. If you need a quick review on the technology, check out our blog post here. Without getting too technical, this allows a practitioner to create virtual boundaries around the areas they are interested in (their store, restaurant, shopping malls, etc.).

So why is step 1 to use macro-location geofencing? Because it is simple, easily deployed and the results can be immediate. Without being tied to any hardware limitations (e.g., beacons), geofencing is a great way you can begin understanding and engaging your customers in ways you would not traditionally have available.

We’ve built our geofencing to be easily configured and scalable, meaning it is simple and painless to go from testing to a full roll out with various options to upload the macro-location places you are interested in.

Step 2: Micro-location

While geofences do the trick for large macro-locations, they have their limitations. Bringing insight and engagement capabilities into tight quarters (particularly indoors), requires some creativity. To address the challenges of engaging customers from centimeters to 50 meters, we developed Bluetooth® Low Energy beacons. While we began creating our beacons in 2011 within Qualcomm, we are now producing our sixth generation products that feature unmatched security, support and flexibility. You can learn more about our beacons are deciding which ones are right for you, here.

But why did we expand on our macro-location solution? Early on, it was clear that as mobile experiences becoming increasingly granular and relevant for users, the valuable of those interactions increase exponentially. Once an enterprise effectively understands and harnesses macro-location, it is appropriate for them to begin layering in micro-location. The opportunities are huge to engage with someone at precisely the right time and place.

 Step 3: Real-World Analytics

Geofences and beacons together are complimentary solutions. Once you have an array of both active  comes the real fun part (especially for the data-geeks in your organization). The range of new insights these technologies provide can be profound and mind blowing. In itself, the analytics capabilities may be all that certain enterprises are interesting in attaining initially.

With these location solutions come an unprecedented ability to understand how customers interact with their physical locations, and what their behavioral trends may be. Drawing the analogy to digital sites (e.g., web sites), every modern enterprise puts significant time and energy to understand traffic flow and usage behavior, and takes these touchpoints to further optimize and improve the property. How a modern enterprise evaluates their physical sites should not be any different.

You can learn more about what some of Gimbal analytics capabilities are by checking out our post here.

Step 4: Omni-channel programs

Omni-channel marketing, once a thing of myth like the holy grail, is suddenly becoming reality. Talk to any marketing executive and an Omni-channel strategy is likely a top priority and something they are trying to implement across their organization at neck-breaking speed. In many instances, the Gimbal solution can fill the void in these programs by layering in real world insights created by our macro and micro-location tools.

Because of that, the fourth and final step to using using location is to plug it in with disparate systems and data sets- such as CRMs and other marketing automation platforms. This enables enterprises to have a more unified view on customers whether they are interacting with them through digital or brick-and-mortar channels. It also allows them to seamlessly trigger smart experiences that use the aforementioned insights to make engagements individualized, personalized and relevant.

Conclusion

While the roadmap and deployment strategy will vary client-to-client, the four steps mentioned above should serve as a good starting point to begin considering implementations for your own enterprise. Most importantly, your program should be guided by clear business objectives, and KPIs to define and measure success (some more ideas on that can be seen here).

Still have questions? Reach out and talk to an expert on our team, and we will gladly discuss how our solution can meet your needs.

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Beacon Security – Why It Matters https://infillion.com/blog/beacon-security-matters/ Wed, 04 May 2016 20:16:53 +0000 http://infillion.wpengine.com/blog/ We recently announced support for Eddystone-EID (Ephemeral ID), which provides beacon owners with a secure option for transmitting beacon signals and provides control for which applications are able to access their beacons. Google’s release of Eddystone-EID underpins the need for secure options when deploying beacons in high value locations. Similarly, Gimbal has seen security as a […]

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We recently announced support for Eddystone-EID (Ephemeral ID), which provides beacon owners with a secure option for transmitting beacon signals and provides control for which applications are able to access their beacons. Google’s release of Eddystone-EID underpins the need for secure options when deploying beacons in high value locations. Similarly, Gimbal has seen security as a core component of beacon technology and has offered secure-mode functionality in our beacons since we commercially launched them in market in 2013. Gimbal beacons have always included a 128 bit AES encryption key and a continuous random ID scheme to enable beacon owners to have “digital ownership” of their assets and locations. We believe security is fundamental to offering an enterprise grade solution.  Let me highlight some key examples as to why security should be top of mind for leading enterprises looking to utilize this promising technology.

Today, there are companies out there who are “war driving” physical locations and mapping out radio signals for finer-grade geolocation targeting. This has already been broadly done with Wi-Fi access point signals and cell towers, but now companies are trying to do the same by mapping out beacon signals and locations, which allows for a much more granular view.

Retailers have been early adopters of beacon technology. Business Intelligence estimates that 85% of the top 100 U.S. retailers will have tested or deployed beacons throughout their stores by 2016. This transformation occurring in retail is sparked by changing consumer habits. Particularly how shoppers now consult their smartphones for product info, ratings, price comparisons and more. On a high level, beacons offer a huge advantage to combat showrooming by proactively sending location-triggered information at the right time and place, thus eliminating the need for customers to look elsewhere for it. However, without necessary security features, third party apps can solicit a customer looking at a Samsung Smart TV in a retailers store, and instead lure them away with a cheaper, better offer.

Now in some cases the retailer may want a third party app such as RetailMeNot or Shazam to engage their customers in the store with location-triggered content in an effort to leverage massive audience size of these mobile apps. However, it is important for the retailer to have an easy way to control which beacons can be accessed by those apps and for what duration.

Sports and entertainment venues were also early to leverage beacons to enhance the fan’s in-venue experience with better location & proximity targeted messages and content. These venues are high value locations, which command premium rates from brands who are looking to sponsor and be associated with a team, league or venue. Venue owners are missing out on incremental revenue dollars if they deploy non-secure beacons that can be accessed by any application or advertiser. This not only runs the risk that fans will be receiving messages and brand offers from apps that aren’t compensating the venue owner or team, but that fans may be receiving illicit offers and content from businesses nearby. Or simply, all of these messages may inundate the attendee’s phone with too many irrelevant offers, causing discontentment.

Outdoor Advertising companies have also been early to embrace the beacon ecosystem as this provides them with the ability to bridge the physical and digital world while providing new ways to engage consumers with content and offers. Outdoor Advertising assets are typically deployed in high value locations and when paired with consumer lifestyle apps it provides a compelling new engagement tool for helping brands reach their target audiences and drive higher conversions, such as driving people into nearby retail locations. These Outdoor Advertising companies have invested millions of dollars to secure these locations.  Therefore, they need to be in control of determining which mobile applications are able to access their beacons and the flight time for when those apps will be engaging consumers. Deploying a non-secure beacon on these assets opens up for any mobile app to leverage for advertising or engaging users, while not compensating the beacon owner for providing such access.

There are many more scenarios that play-out with similar conclusions as to why secure access for beacons should be a priority for enterprises interested in the solution. Beacon use has proliferated across a broad range of verticals beyond the examples above and also include financial services, hospitality, industrial, smart city and many more. All of these verticals will face similar challenges on deciding whether to leave their beacon networks open or secure, however opting for a secure beacon ultimately allows for a more curated, controlled mobile experience for your customers. Regardless of the choice, Gimbal is ready to service customers with our industry leading location solution, including secure beacons.

 

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