How Can Retailers Use Digital Signage?

How Can Retailers Use Digital Signage?

Digital signage is a broad category of displays and signs, so there’s no end to the different ways you can use it in your store.

Digital signs can do so much more than traditional printed store signage. They can be interactive, boosting customer engagement. You control every sign throughout your store in one place, so they’re always accurate and updated. Because they’re so easy to program and change, digital signs open the door to more timely and seasonal store displays.

Here are a few of the ways you can use the increased capability of digital signs to boost your customer experience and grow your bottom line.

Draw in Window Shoppers and Boost Foot Traffic

The benefits of digital signage begin before customers even set foot in your store. Digital signage can help you to create more powerful and engaging window displays.

For example, you can use digital signage software to update window displays to reflect whatever focus or sales are happening in-store.

But one of the biggest benefits of digital signage in the window is movement. Because digital signs can move and change, they’re way more likely to catch the eye of shoppers and passersby. Printed signs only capture shopper interest for as long as it takes to read them. When signs change and move, you can draw shoppers in, both visually and physically. That means you’ve piqued their interest and you have a literal foot in the door.

Tell Your Brand's Story

With printed signage, you’re limited by space. Even if you wallpaper the entire store in signs, you still only have so much space. Digital signage erases those limits. That means you can do more with your store’s signage than just label different displays. You can better tell your brand’s story.

Today’s most successful retailers have become more than just a store to consumers. Retailers like Toms and Ben & Jerry’s are known more for their brands than their products. It’s your story that draws customers in and keeps them coming back. Digital signage frees up the square footage to tell that story right in your store, and offer you a high-tech, visual way to relay your brand story to shoppers.

Pop-in stores are another use case for digital signage. When your square footage is really limited (because you’re in someone else’s retail space), they can help draw customer attention to your products and displays with messaging that’s simple to change.

Share Product Information and Upsell

You have floor staff who can answer customer questions about any product in the store. But isn’t their time better spent encouraging sales than answering the same questions — about product features and benefits — over and over?

With digital signage, you have the real estate to display more product information for customers to reference. You can also engage customers with interactive displays that give them the information they’re looking for, freeing up floor staff to use their time more productively. You can even offer robust product comparisons, making it easier for customers to make a buying decision.

Speaking of productive time, digital signage enables you to boost sales through upselling and cross-selling — without having to double your staff. You can program digital displays to offer recommendations and promote add-on items and packages. That means you can have five digital stations throughout the store that are working to grow your store’s revenue, even if you only have two sales associates on the floor.

Bring Your Online Efforts In-Store

As we mentioned earlier, many retailers are working to differentiate the ecommerce and brick-and-mortar experiences. We’ve seen that competing with ecommerce on factors like ease and convenience isn’t a winning strategy for retail, but with tools like digital signage, it doesn’t have to be one sales channel over another.

Stores that sell online put a lot of effort into digital marketing — and rightfully so. Digital signage empowers your physical store to benefit from those efforts, too. You can pull in valuable social proof (like social media posts from customers and online reviews) and repurpose strong online content for viewing in your shop.