Digital advertising in the shopping center

You encounter them more and more often, the digital advertising spaces. At train stations, airports, gas stations, pharmacies, post office counters and retailers. Clear Channel is also increasingly relying on the moving image. For several years, the company has been marketing digital screens at Zurich Airport and Euro Airport Basel-Mulhouse-Freiburg. Now it wants to conquer the shopping centers.

While the majority of providers such as Goldbach Media advertise in stores, Clear Channel places its screens outside the stores, in the mall. Starting immediately, screens are being used in four shopping centers - the Löwen Center in Lucerne, the Centre Meyrin near Geneva, the Perry Center in Oftringen, and the Wankdorf Center in Berne. For the time being, free-standing pillars with integrated displays will be installed. However, it is also possible to integrate screens directly into walls or existing structures, as Jürg Rötheli, CEO of Clear Channel, explained to Werbewoche.

With its new offering, Clear Channel is primarily competing with the "digital out-of-home" provider Neoadvertising, whose advertising spaces can currently be seen in 48 shopping centers - 28 of them in French-speaking Switzerland, 19 in German-speaking Switzerland, and one in Ticino. The main competitor APG, which already markets eBoards and ePanels at train stations, does not yet offer a comparable service. But there could soon be more competition. Digital advertising in shopping centers is definitely considered interesting and as a contractual partner of the ten largest shopping centers, APG is examining corresponding possibilities, says Beat Holenstein, Head of Partner & Product Management at APG.

More attention with moving images

Among other things, Clear Channel expects the integration of digital advertising spaces in the shopping center to result in more targeted guidance of visitor flows. By combining posters and digital advertising, consumers could ideally be guided from outside the shopping center, through the parking lot, and into the center or individual store, according to Rötheli.

In addition to still images, animations and film sequences run on the screens. In contrast to TV commercials, however, this is without sound. The spot lasts 10 seconds. No coincidence. To accommodate clients, the spots are offered the same length as APG, says Rötheli. "So that clients who book a mix consisting of shopping centers, train stations and airports, for example, don't have to produce separate spots."

As a first step, Clear Channel now wants to add more shopping centers to offer national coverage and thus become attractive to larger advertisers running nationwide campaigns. Rötheli is confident that the digital advertising sector is capable of massive expansion. "There is an irreversible trend toward digital underway," the CEO said. Clear Chanel, for example, expects to generate around 10 percent of its global sales from digital advertising by 2014. In Switzerland, the share is likely to be lower. Things are also underway in the outdoor advertising sector, where billboards are increasingly being replaced by digital advertising spaces. Together with APG, Clear Channel is currently in talks with the city of Zurich about a digital pilot. The aim is to start the test phase before the end of the year, says Rötheli.

Isabel Imper