Retail just wouldn’t be retail without a sign that tells everyone, “We’re retail! We sell stuff!” Everyone knows that not having a sign in some form on your store is not only wholesale counterproductive to your business, it just looks terrible to those who know that, well, you’re a retailer. It begs the assumption that your joint somehow couldn’t afford one, and you’ll likely be going under soon because of it. Truth be told, that’s not a mark of confidence or business acumen.
On the whole, signs are not only affordable, but they’re also one-time advertising investments that work 24 hours a day, seven days a week. There are various types of signs you can use, depending on location and the size of your business, including:
• Chain-Letter
• Cloud
• Post and Panel
• Monumental
• Digital
Here, we’re going to focus more on the benefits and prevalence of digital signs for retail purposes. These are the signs that use LED pixels to generate billboard images, like a giant screen. Some use color, others don’t. Gas stations tend to use these to display prices, and they’re usually found in monochrome red or green. To save on expense, certain shopping strips may share a single digital sign to cycle advertisements for each store located therein. However, depending on where you live, it may be common to see banks and other high-class locations utilize electronic billboards for their own advertising.
Digital signs have a few noteworthy benefits that no retail chain can ignore. Let’s go over them in detail:
1. They’re modular. You can quickly change their content from a computer without the hassle and fuss of taking a ladder out to the sign to swap out magnetic panes or adjust hanging banners. This not only saves on time and manpower, but it also allows you to update them with important information at a pace that other sign types just can’t compete with.
2. They’re flashy and durable. They catch the attention of drivers and pedestrians from afar, especially at night. They’re also more colorful due to their illumination and immunity to sun-bleaching. Other signs tend to wear out over time, appearing faded; digital signs don’t suffer from this. LEDs are also functionally long-lasting, meaning dead pixels are less of a concern than you’d think — if anything, that comes down to manufacturing defects.
3. They’re inexpensive. “What’s that? I thought they broke the bank!” While they may cost more up front, they pay themselves off quickly in the amount of advertising space they offer, since a digital sign can be an infinite number of signs all at once. They’re also more efficient than back-lit signs, even accounting that digital signs are illuminated constantly while their back-lit brethren are only activated at night.
4. They’re icons of modern taste and confidence. We’re in a world now that’s enamored with lit screens, equating them with tech-savviness and competence. Even if it’s only subconscious, we tend to think that screens in any form will show something interesting. Digital signs also inspire a sense of “getting with the times”, telling customers that your retail chain is a clean-cut and practical choice. First impressions are everything.
Let’s face it: If you’re going to aim high, you may as well shoot high. The cost of digitalizing your business has come down dramatically over the decades; it used to be high as a kite to get so much as a mainframe in your brick-and-mortar establishment. Nowadays, it’s hardly an excuse to not go for the finer and more practical option of including a digital sign on the premises, provided you have space.
