The Power of Static and Digital OOH with Samy Naidu

00:20:38 · Kirsty Carlson, S1, Samy Naidu, S3Play from here

[00:20:38] S2: I love that. [00:20:39] S1: I think that's an important point. The other piece that I also want to just add to this is, you know, from a client perspective, if the client's opinion is that they don't want to book digital out of home because they're sharing with other brands, are they booking TV, radio, digital online because you're sharing with other brands there. [00:20:55] S0: So [00:20:56] S1: I think it's also a perspective on what are you actually buying? So from an out of home point of view, if you don't want to share because it's a roadside platform, then you can look at static options. But, you know, you wouldn't not book radio because you don't want to share with other brands. It will be other brands flights on the radio too. So I think that that's also an important point around justifying the case for for digital. [00:21:22] S3: Brand equity is not built in the moment. It is built in what people see consistently. Our strategically placed billboards put your brand where the audience is with 600 billboard faces across all nine provinces, delivering over 300,000,000 vax per month. We spread the ooze and ahhhs about your brand. That's Outdoor Network.

00:21:22 · S3, S1Play from here

[00:21:22] S3: Brand equity is not built in the moment. It is built in what people see consistently. Our strategically placed billboards put your brand where the audience is with 600 billboard faces across all nine provinces, delivering over 300,000,000 vax per month. We spread the ooze and ahhhs about your brand. That's Outdoor Network. [00:21:49] S1: A natural kind of build on question to this whole section we're discussing now is around measurement, right? So we understand that measurement is one of the factors that come into play when you are putting together your out of home strategy and considering formats and environments and clients are looking for ROI. And we've discussed measurement a lot on the podcast before. But Samy, I wanted to ask when it comes to looking at OMC data specifically from a road 2.0 and your VACS when it comes to analyzing that type of measurement for out of home, how does the measurement methodology differ for digital out of home and for static out of home? And why is there a difference? And why is that difference important when you are considering measurement for digital out of home versus static?

00:22:31 · Samy NaiduPlay from here

[00:22:31] S0: So as we're aware, OMCs adopted the VAC, which is your visibly adjusted content. And our measurement matrix is sort of transitioned, if you wanna call it for a better word, from simply just counting vehicular traffic to a much more focused methodology of how, you know, static and digital is viewed. Okay. Things like proximity to the billboard, time of day, localities, all now play a part and immediacy within a specific meterage from the billboard, etc, all play a specific role in measurement of that VAC, okay, together with SDK data, which they've overlaid now. So I think one for for me is we look at static advertising, we know that that advertising is on there. It doesn't change too often. So your measurement is based on a single panel visibility in that respect. While digital is slightly different, it depends on a number of factors. One, what is the length of that loop? How many advertisers are in that loop? And how how long is that billboard operating for? Because not all digital boards operate twenty four seven. And that's some of the criteria that's taken into consideration when a VAC measurement is done on a billboard. So you will find that if you have a static board and a digital board in close proximity, the digital board vac would be based on an impression model based on each of the of the flightings instead of the entire board. The importance of that is one, having a robust measurement system because it leads into so many other things. As we're aware that buying right now on out of home has become impression based, it's become audience based. We've now transitioned from everything else that was measurement in the past. The second thing is the importance of that is what it gives you is flexibility in terms of dayparting, programmatic buying. It gives you a whole lot of new options that were were never there previously without a robust OMC measurement format. Of course, yes, you know, you you still have a one in six or one in 10 a VAC number versus static, but it is still the most accurate measurement out there at the moment.

00:25:13 · Kirsty CarlsonPlay from here

[00:25:13] S2: Thank you for sharing that. And I think it gives great perspective as to how those differ and why, what is put into the model, why it's important. And I think something else to just raise is for those that do have access to RDS and use the tool to do performance runs, you know, we're talking about the combination of static and just out of home working together and how they work perfectly and strong on their own and how they work well together. Something you can do in the tool is you can layer your static out of home with your desired of home runs and upload your desired of home spot plans into the tool so that you can see your combined performance. For example, if you had, you know, your digital out of home was only running for two weeks because it was a tactical burst, you were driving price and product and promotion as an example, and you had your static that was on for three months, you could do that combination through the RDS tool and you can see your combined performance. So you don't always need to always look at your static out of home and your digital out of home separately, which I think is really fantastic. I think it's really important that the measurement has come to this evolution of factoring in all these elements that you were speaking about now, Samy. And it also even facts in the speed of the road. The speed to the as well as any fixed obstruction. So if there's an actual building that blocks half the screen or corner of the screen, that's also factored in. So it's not just ignoring what is actually in the landscape that's factored into the satellite imagery and into the model. And I think it's important that the measurement has come to this evolution. Very exciting to see what we layered into the new releases of the measurement. But I think we've reached a point in our industry where not having measurements is not acceptable anymore. I think as an industry, I think there is so many measurements and data offerings in the market. There's multiple partners, we know MC is our currency, and a robust authenticated survey methodology. But there's a lot of other players and I know we've spoken about all Unite before with Provantage and the type of data that they provide. We've spoken about other data players. There's no excuse anymore not to have measurement for out of home.

00:27:08 · Kirsty Carlson, Samy NaiduPlay from here

But I think it's important that when we talk about digital out of home, that all those aspects that Samy was mentioning is factored into that methodology. [00:27:18] S0: And I think there again, you know, certain people try and compare a static VAC to a digital VAC. And the questions get asked, and I think that your digital VAC is a lot less than a static VAC. But but there's reasons for that because of the number of advertisers and the loop, etcetera, that all has a factor in terms of that measurement. And I think people need to understand that. But what what's brilliant about digital is that digital provides the immediacy. While static, the ad stays static, as it may say, you change it once a month if you're lucky. With digital, the agility comes in, and I think that's what's so key mixed with that audience measurement. [00:28:06] S2: I would like to move us on to some campaign examples. As we head towards the close of this episode, I think it's really important that we talk about some amazing use cases of the combination of the power of static and digital out of home. Just to spark something for the industries, for some of the brands that might be in categories for their planning for the 2027 strategies. So, Samy, top of mind, what are the subtypes of categories or brands that you feel can find this amazing mix and balance between the use of both of these? Or have you got any campaigns that you'd love to share with us that have inspired you in this space?

00:28:37 · Samy NaiduPlay from here

[00:28:37] S0: So firstly, I think from a global perspective, and we know and I just want to touch on that as well, with regards to the evolution of digital and where it's actually progressed globally. So two things. I mean, one, we, you know, digital out of home has sort of transitioned to more than 50% of the total out of home inventory currently globally. And I think that's set to grow. So so we're going to see static sort of, you know, shrink a little bit more in time as new digital screens come come on board, and less static inventory being available. But it's definitely static hasn't lost its, essence and ethos, and I think it will always remain there for many years to come. Second thing for me is is that, you know, programmatic digital has started to catapult globally. I think last year, the the spend on programmatic has been in excess of 1,300,000,000 US dollars globally, which is amazing. But and the reason why I say that and why I actually sort of frame that is if I look at countries like The US, Northern America, Europe, etcetera, where they've utilized both digital and static quite effectively and strategically is in the launch of car brands and keeping key car brands top of mind in those communities, etcetera. And I've seen that work very well. Where, you know, the likes of Ford, Chrysler, Kia to a certain extent, Hyundai, and you've seen Hyundai do a lot of promotion and sponsorship events, etcetera. They've kept the brand top of mind through static advertising. But what they've clearly done as well is utilize digital for the car brand, model releases, for bringing in, you know, pricing strategies for countdown on new your features, countdown on new models being launched, as well as hyper local in terms of where, car dealerships are located, etcetera, and advertising those on the digital format. If we look at South Africa, and within my context and within our business, I think for me, one vertical that really stands out is the retail vertical. And I take it back to a few campaigns that we've executed and undertaken. The very first one that comes top of mind for me is ShopRite. ShopRite's done an amazing job where they've static branded or branded taxi ranks and they've branded commuter corridors that lead onto retail locations and transport nodes.