Mike Strand Reports on His Meetings with Customers and Partners

Mike Strand has been talking with many customers, as well as people and organizations that influence how the digital signage market develops. This “trip report" recaps some of Mike's findings…

Over the last few months I attended several tradeshows and conferences and have met with prospects and customers from several industries. All of these encounters are helping us refine our thinking about the future of the digital signage market. These insights are reflected in the new product development that we are working on and the marketing programs that we are putting in place. Naturally, however, the best way for us to get feedback on our products and learn how to best address industry concerns is through our partners and customers. Feel free to call me at 715-235-SIGN (7446) or email me at mjstrandweb anytime with your comments, questions and suggestions.

Here's my report:

Activity in the digital signage arena continues to grow. Most everyone in the industry understands that this technology is very early market and that there is a lot of potential in terms of both market expansion and in the ways that organizations use digital signs. Even big players like IBM, Sony, Panasonic and Richardson Electronics are learning, even while they invest money and manpower to be well positioned when the market explodes.

We are seeing an ever increasing amount of interest in many unexpected industries, which is allowing us to generate more good quality leads to pass on to our reseller channel. We have been thinning out resellers who don’t recognize the growth of Digital Signage market. If you are a potential StrandVision partner, please contact Amy Hansen to discuss your capabilities for assisting all of these prospects. We need your help to handle all of the opportunities coming our way.

Digital signs are continuing to be embraced by large chains in the retail industry, however retail profits continue to get squeezed by these big players. StrandVision can be an attractive, low-cost way for small and mid-sized retailers to get into the money-making benefits of digital signs for a much smaller overall investment.

One of the biggest trends that we see is medium to large company implementation of digital signage to communicate with their employee base. Along with daily communications to keep employees on track with company goals and missions, they are adding information on employee achievements, upcoming activities, photos of employee events and, of course, safety and production statistics. Employees are also interested in the weather, news and trivia - all capabilities that our system provides.

Financial institutions continue to be great opportunities. Looking for a way to better communicate with younger customers, StrandVision digital signs make it easy for banks and credit unions to update all of their branches immediately with dynamic and eye-catching content that entertains while informing about lesser-known products and offerings.

Automotive service centers and dealers are thrilled with the opportunity to communicate with their current customer base while shortening the perceived wait time of getting a car serviced or doing the paperwork for a car purchase. They use this captive time to entertain customers with news, reinforce the values that customers can expect from them, publicly congratulate them on their purchase, up-sell their current customer base and remind them of all the special things that their company can provide long after a vehicle is purchased.

The higher education environment continues to grow its interest by providing multiple pieces of information at one time using the split screen and video capability. They have identified that student unions are a great source for funding of digital signage projects. Digital signage also often fits naturally into their normal marketing budgets.

We'll be continuing our outreach over the rest of the year and into next year. We'll be attending several tradeshows in 2007 including InfoComm in June in Anaheim, CA. I hope I get to meet some of you there and in my other travels.

Mike Strand