DS for airport outlets

Printer-friendly version

Aldeasa Stores in Palma de Mallorca airport, Spain, have deployed a multi-channel, multi-screen digital signage network as part of a proposed global rollout strategy, using software from Scala and content from AS Video, a video production company offering creation and editing services to the digital signage business sector.
 
In this display network, a total of 16 screens are distributed in key areas of the store to ensure that customers are likely to see all the screens and all the messages throughout their visit to Aldeasa. The store is split into two key zones, with nine screens located in the high footfall, duty-free zone containing perfume, tobacco and alcoholic drinks (zone 1), while the six further screens are located at other key points around the store (zone 2) to achieve good visibility and high impact.
 
Research into customer buying habits and their movements within the store were used to create the four zones within store, from which seven channels of content were also produced to reflect each core product category. A customer information point located at the cashier’s desk uses a screen showing the same content distributed around the store in zone 2 in a sub-window within the screen. This meant that a new space (zone 3) within the screen was opened up where staff could upload their own messages, like tickers. A large rear projection screen located in the front window (zone 4) delivers high impact messages into the airport’s own concourse to attract customers into the store. This displays only one supplier’s content for the duration of a promotional period to avoid conflicting messages being shown here.

An understanding of customer dwell time, both by category and by the total time spent in store, determined length of the slots within each channel. Currently, the Duty Free zone’s total channel length is three minutes, whilst the rest of store is longer, at five minutes, to reflect different customer dwell times and browsing habits. The whole creative solution was informed by an understanding of customer shopping habits – like where customers were in store at any given point during their shopping journey, how long they browsed or spent in a particular area – to shape the content length and style which is designed to influence customer viewing positively rather than detract or annoy them.

Aldeasa had two main objectives in installing this digital signage network: they wanted firstly to provide an engaging, informative and significant digital channel to promote their brand, products and services to their customers and, secondly, to provide a viable commercial platform from which to generate peripheral supplier revenues through airtime sales. Javier Menendez, AS Video’s CEO, explained, “Aldeasa’s marketing team was looking for a way in which to animate existing in-store offers and provide a suitable platform for suppliers to promote products and services in addition to existing point-of-purchase. They therefore decided to use digital signage to accomplish that goal.”

Their second objective, to generate additional revenue through suppliers promoting their products on the Aldeasa digital signage network, has so far proved a very successful strategy, with many brands, including Chanel, Elizabeth Arden, Biotherm, YSL, Bacardi, Absolut, BossPure, Clarins, Carolina Herrera, and Hugo Boss, buying airtime on this channel.
 
Airport customers are in a more pressured environment than shoppers in other retail environments, as they ultimately have a plane to catch. This meant that Aldeasa’s digital signage system needed to ensure that customers would receive information quickly, clearly and in a relevant area of the store to the one they are shopping in at the time.
 
The evidence so far certainly suggests that Aldeasa’s digital signage network has had a positive impact on the customer experience and that customer engagement has been good. In due course, additional formal research will be carried out to measure its impact more fully.
 
The Aldeasa network is managed via a network operations centre in Madrid, with all content requirements (acquisition of Aldeasa promotional content and supplier content, design, scheduling, broadcast and playout) managed remotely by AS Video, which makes it very easy to update.
 
Oscar Elizaga, VP, Scala EMEA, comments, “Due to the sophisticated capabilities designed into the network to reflect the customer journey and in creating content to match customer needs, Aldeasa has proved popular with its suppliers, commercial partners and staff and we are delighted to be the engine that sits behind this successful initiative and look forward to contributing to further expansion.”
 
AS Video and Scala are to continue this positive relationship with Aldeasa, as it expands its network to include stores in Barcelona and Madrid in advance of a global rollout.