Digital Workspace

The Right Content Management System Is Key to an Effective Digital Signage Solution

The CMS is what empowers businesses to deliver completely customizable digital messaging to their customers.

Kimberly Kutnick is the Category Supervisor, Digital Signage-PPM. She has been at CDW just shy of 7 years and has consistently expanded her knowledge across several categories of business.

Digital signage helps companies connect with customers and drive sales. There were more than 11,500 digital billboards across the U.S. in 2022, up 14 percent from the year before, making it clear that digital signage (and the content management system that drives the messaging) are crucial for business success. But it’s not enough to show images of products and prices on an endless loop. For digital signage messaging to work, it must be contextually relevant and directly applicable to customers.

In practice, delivering digital signage requires four components: the screen or display itself; media hardware that supports the content; content management system that lets companies push new videos and images to displays on demand; and the mounts or stands needed to support the display. The more complex the structure is, the more installation services are required.

Here’s how companies thrive when utilizing the right content management system.

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Reaching Customers with Relevant Content on Demand

Digital displays are the endpoint, while media players connect the physical display and the messaging. CMS tools allow companies to continuously change and update content with accessible user interfaces that enable time, date and messaging changes once those are programmed in.

Consider a customer who goes shopping and sees a “Big Sale Tomorrow!” sign on a digital screen. When they return the next day, the sign has changed to highlight products on sale. When they return a few days later, the sign displays information about a new product launch.

CMS tools are what allow companies to push relevant content on demand. They help businesses manage content across geographic locations, market verticals and customer segments. They are often used with analytics software to predict emerging trends and ensure messaging remains relevant.

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CMS Systems Share the Full Story with Consumers

Digital signage works. According to a study from the Journal of Advertising Research, when companies deliver contextually relevant content, they increase incremental sales by 5 to 25 percent.

But what sets average digital signage apart from its more effective counterparts is all about telling the story. Consider a retailer with both online and physical stores. Most customers’ journeys to conversion start online — they may visit social media pages and websites, or sign up for marketing emails. However, customers often want to see products in person. It’s this journey that offers an opportunity for digital signage.

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It begins online with details about a new product launch. It continues with pop-ups and marketing emails about in-store events supporting the new launch. Next is the transition: Customers visit stand-alone or shopping center locations in person.

This is where CMS-driven digital signage shines. Backed by a cloud-based CMS connected to company databases, teams can push time-sensitive content to customers. In our example, digital signs could provide information about the new product launch party in shopping malls, transit stations and anywhere else customers might see the content.

The result is a consistent narrative that starts online, draws in potential buyers and helps turn them into loyal customers.

Getting the Maximum Value of Digital Displays

With the digital signage market rapidly growing, selecting the right technology partner is critical, including for the display, media player, CMS, mounts and stands, and installation services.

Companies now have options, including cloud-based CMS providers Navori, Spectrio and Skykit, hardware sellers such as BrightSign and proprietary tech such as MagicINFO by Samsung. BlueStar, a distribution partner, can help bring it all together by offering solution architects to recommend a customized setup including the media player, digital signage and CMS. Companies such as Peerless, Chief and StarTech offer mounts and stands for the digital signage displays.

It’s worth getting a demonstration from multiple CMS companies to see how their products work and what they can offer. Once you have an idea of what you want, CDW and BlueStar will provide full-stack solutions along with suggestions to optimize your digital signage.

With the correct signage, media player and CMS in hand, companies can create consistent narratives that are contextually relevant and directly applicable, and they can continuously update these narratives to ensure customers are seeing the big picture.

This article is part of BizTech's AgilITy blog series. Please join the discussion on Twitter by using the #SmallBizIT hashtag.