Video wall content creation — it is, and has been, one of the biggest business opportunities for AV integrators. Especially so in the current climate.
According to Lionel Felix of Felix Media Solutions, no matter how gung-ho your client is about a video wall, it’s highly likely that they don’t know what content should be displayed on it and don’t have someone earmarked to provide the content.
“If they do, it’s often some unsuspecting intern in the marketing department, and they are not using a structured proper Madison Avenue ad agency to do that. So there’s an enormous amount of opportunity in helping them focus their scope,” Felix says.
Inevitably, he says, your client won’t be prepared for what needs to go on the wall, so somebody very hurriedly puts together a PowerPoint and gives it you on a memory stick.
A case in point
Many of Felix’s customers used to do small-screen, static page-flip-style solutions. But recently, his company has provided sectioned screens that allow them to take a portion of the screen and put content into it.
“You divide the screen up and you create a schedule, and you create different screens and pull content, whether it’s Twitter feeds or YouTube playlists or videos,” he says.
They develop the system end-to-end, delivering it as a package, to show the client what is possible.
Listen: Video Wall Content Creation, But Easier: Episode 21 of AV+
“What we have done is say, ‘Well, let’s work together on a Pinterest board to do a mood board of what you think the overall concept should be.'”
“So asking them what the experience is, what the expectation is, is the most important part. I know that the CEOs might want a dashboard. Dashboards have to be designed, every single element on that has to be created, and it has to be interactive as to pull data from somewhere.”
Video wall content creation opportunities from COVID
As a result of COVID, what Felix says he’s heard most from his customers are questions about which metrics can they can pull to display on these systems that will be of use to people that are coming into their facilities. Mask protocols, whether there are parking restrictions, elevator protocols, and other important data have been important to these clients.
“Being able to point at data sources, using something like html5, or using an integrated tool has been super useful. If you don’t have the capacity to do this in-house, you could find an amazing designer that can help ask the right questions and put screens and deck together.”
Sometimes, he says, customers are just looking for page flips. If you can configure the reconfiguration program, and ask someone how they want it to work, you can do the same thing with content.
The key is asking them about what experience they want, and collecting their content and getting ideas from them on what they’ve seen that they liked.
“Making sure there’s a person in the company who is going to be the tech savvy, responsible party for uploading the new content when it gets there, unless they want the full white glove, totally managed service, is really important.”
Building relationships now can lead to managed services later
“One of my salespeople said something really smart the other day,” Felix says. “Sometimes you’re not going to lead with the product that you’re going to really blow out the relationship with. And I think that showing the customer that you can manage their signage is also an entry into, ‘Oh yeah, they manage our signage, why don’t they manage our Wi Fi?'”
“Once you’re a vendor for a monthly billing thing, you’re in the system and the finance people just see that you’re just a pay in their system. Once you’re a payee on their monthly billing cycle, you can be anything you can sell them.”
“It can go from page flips once a quarter, to creating a Slack channel where you’re taking the input directly from your customer and creating far more interactive and more frequently updated content, which then drives up that MRR for you.”
