Product News | October 11, 2021

Turn your in-store screens into revenue machines: How to monetize data through retail digital signage

Are you sitting on a goldmine of customer data but struggling to maximize its value across your entire retail ecosystem? You’re not alone. While many retailers have turned first-party data into profitable digital retail media networks (RMNs), extending these strategies in-store remains a largely untapped opportunity. By leveraging first-party data, you can turn in-store digital screens into a high-value revenue stream while delivering targeted, contextual marketing close to the point of purchase.

Integrating in-store retail media into your broader RMN strategy elevates the shopping experience, increases brand ROI, and drives greater retailer profitability. Public data from Tesco and Walmart shows that featuring products on in-store screens typically delivers a 7% product sales lift and a 4% brand halo effect. While digital still leads investments, in-store retail media is gaining traction, with ad spend projected to reach $1 billion by 2028, highlighting the growing value of physical stores as advertising platforms.

This guide explores why top retailers are doubling down on in-store media, how data monetization fuels new revenue streams, and what it takes to build a connected, omnichannel RMN strategy—so you can increase ad revenue, elevate engagement, and stay ahead in a competitive landscape.

Key takeaways for retailers:

In-store retail media networks transform physical spaces into valuable advertising platforms
First-party data enables relevant, privacy-compliant ad targeting to enhance shopper experiences
Integrating in-store digital signage and digital strategies creates cohesive, high-impact advertising campaigns
Measuring success through advanced analytics proves ROI and attracts brand partnerships

Understanding in-store digital signage

An in-store retail media network is made up of digital screens positioned throughout a store, including entrance displays, endcaps, checkout monitors, and areas with longer dwell times, like in-store pharmacies, that deliver targeted ads to shoppers at the point of purchase. By tapping into these screens, physical retail locations can be turned into impactful advertising channels for brands.

Walmart’s in-store network and Tesco’s plan to triple its connected screens show how leading retailers are betting on physical retail media. It’s a smart move—82% of purchase decisions happen in-store, and 62% of shoppers make impulse buys, underscoring the impact of in-store media on consumer behaviour.

READ ALSO: Learn more about in-store vs. online retail media, including how each one impacts the consumer shopping experience

The power of first-party data in retail digital signage

Unlike traditional in-store ads that rely on static displays, in-store retail media networks (RMNs) use first-party data to deliver dynamic, contextual messaging based on shopper behaviour. By tapping into insights from loyalty programs, past purchases, and real-time engagement, content can be tailored to store audiences and key moments in the shopping journey, creating a more personalized in-store experience that drives higher engagement, conversion, and basket size.

For example, you might promote high-margin breakfast items in the morning, surface seasonal or regionally popular products, or suggest complementary items based on purchase history. If inventory runs low, the system can automatically swap ads for alternatives, ensuring every placement remains relevant and effective.

READ ALSO: Learn how technology is disrupting in-store experiences and why in-store media is essential for forward-thinking retail media strategies

Revenue generation and integration strategies for in-store retail media networks

Successfully monetizing first-party customer data through in-store retail media takes more than basic screen placements — it requires the right tools, a clear strategy, and the ability to package high-intent touchpoints into larger, omnichannel campaigns that drive greater impact.

Common monetization streams include:

Selling ad placements on digital screens in high-traffic areas: A grocery store might offer screen placements near the produce section to endemic brands, like healthy snack or meal kit companies, whose products are sold in-store. Non-endemic brands, like a fitness app or credit card provider, might also buy screen time to reach shoppers while they’re considering lifestyle or financial decisions.
Sponsored product promotions: Brands pay for in-store ads highlighting specific products, like endcap displays or shelf-edge screens showcasing new items or seasonal offerings.
Cross-channel advertising packages: Bundling in-store ad placements with digital campaigns on their websites, apps, and email newsletters offers brands a unified way to reach shoppers across multiple touchpoints.
Retailer-owned brand promotions: Using in-store signage to promote private-label products can drive sales and increase profit margins on your own offerings.

READ ALSO: Learn how to use digital signage to enhance the in-person shopping experience, with actionable strategies and revenue-driving tips

Integration strategies for in-store and digital RMNs

Driving revenue and performance requires strategic planning and a strong infrastructure that delivers consistency, responsiveness, and clear performance insights. Here are four key areas where alignment and smart tech investments matter most:

Unified campaign planning: Consider designing advertising campaigns that span both in-store and digital channels. For example, a holiday promotion might combine ads on in-store screens, website banners, email campaigns, and social media posts, all reinforcing a consistent message across every touchpoint. This integrated approach is powerful—research from the OAAA and Comscore shows that OOH drives online activation rates 5 to 6 times higher than expected, outperforming other channels in generating digital engagement.
Centralized data management: Leveraging first-party data from both online and offline interactions provides a holistic view of shopper behaviour, enabling smarter ad targeting and more effective placement across channels.
Dynamic content delivery: Leverage programmatic technology to deliver highly targeted, contextually relevant content across in-store digital screens in real time. By integrating data sources such as inventory levels, shopper demographics, loyalty profiles, and external triggers like time of day or weather, messaging can dynamically adjust to align with shopper needs and behaviour. For instance, if a product is well-stocked, nearby screens can prioritize promotions or bundle offers to help drive sell-through.
Cross-promotion opportunities: In-store RMNs can be used to drive traffic to digital channels and vice versa. For example, an ad displayed at checkout might encourage shoppers to download the retailer’s app for exclusive discounts or reward points.

Target’s retail media network, Roundel, is a prime example of how integration drives success. Roundel combines in-store advertising with digital campaigns using first-party data from Target’s loyalty program and purchase histories. Brands can run ads on Target’s website and app while simultaneously promoting products through in-store displays and checkout screens, creating a cohesive campaign that reaches shoppers wherever they are.

Measuring success in in-store retail media networks

As in-store retail media evolves, accurate performance measurement is more important than ever. The key to success is combining traditional retail metrics with digital advertising KPIs to fully capture the impact of in-store campaigns.

To help streamline this process, the IAB In-Store Retail Media Standards—developed by IAB Europe and IAB US—established a framework to address the rapidly expanding in-store retail media opportunities and offer unified definitions, measurement standards, and guidelines for ad formats and store zones. These guidelines provide the clarity and consistency needed to evaluate in-store media with the same rigour applied to digital channels.

Measurement can be strengthened by leveraging incremental impact analysis, like holdout testing, to isolate campaign lift. For example, Kroger now offers incremental sales measurement to directly connect campaign exposure with ROI. By integrating loyalty data, online behaviour, and in-store activity into unified shopper profiles, brands gain a clearer view of the customer journey and can attribute outcomes more effectively.

Closed-loop reporting further enhances this by linking ad exposure to actual purchase data, while AI-powered analytics reveal meaningful patterns in shopper behaviour. Programmatic tools allow for real-time optimization of in-store campaigns, and multi-touch attribution models ensure that both online and offline touchpoints are accounted for in performance analysis.

Together, these strategies help retailers and advertisers demonstrate the value of in-store retail media while continuously improving results through data-driven insights.

Want to make the most of your data with in-store digital advertising?

At Broadsign, we help retailers and brands seamlessly integrate in-store digital signage, automate content management, and optimize retail media monetization.

Whether you’re looking to build your in-store retail media network or scale an existing one, we can help. Learn more today.

Product News | October 11, 2021

How 75Media increased its fill rates by 15% with the Broadsign Platform

2024 was a record-breaking year for out-of-home (OOH) advertising in the United Kingdom (UK). Total OOH revenue for the region grew 7.7%, pulling in a record-breaking £1.4 billion in revenue. While spend is expected to cool down slightly in 2025 at 7.2%, the medium will grow through technological innovations like dynamic digital billboards, interactive displays, and programmatic advertising.

Digital OOH (DOOH) now dominates the OOH landscape, accounting for 67.1% of total spend as brands seek the flexibility and creativity that digital offers. That being said, demand for static OOH – also known as classic OOH– isn’t going anywhere, remaining an effective medium for long-term brand-building campaigns.

With both formats offering distinct benefits to advertisers, the most effective campaigns combine both. This is where UK-based media owner 75Media comes in. As one of the leading providers of large-format static and digital roadside billboards in the region, 75Media makes it easy for brands, big and small, to tap into the power of OOH with the flexibility, scale and simplicity that modern advertisers need today.

How 75Media makes out-of-home simple for buyers

Wanting to provide brands with national reach through large-format, high-impact roadside billboards, 75Media’s sites are strategically positioned in high-traffic locations across the UK. These include key commuter routes and busy city centres, with placements carefully chosen for their proximity to gyms, shopping centres, supermarkets, and other points of interest.

Through a series of strategic acquisitions, 75Media has exponentially grown its network, going from 140 to nearly 1,300 digital and static billboards across the UK in just five years. Today, with just over 1,000 large-format static billboards, 75Media’s hybrid network is about 75% static and 25% digital.

75Media’s static and digital roadside billboards

In addition to their wide-reaching network, advertisers choose 75Media’s network because they make OOH measurable and efficient without compromising on quality. Wanting to deliver real audiences to clients as quickly as possible, 75Media focuses on minimizing the back-and-forth typically needed to book OOH campaigns.

75Media’s network attracts a broad mix of advertisers and campaigns, including major brand campaigns, fast-moving consumer goods promotions, as well as ads for local businesses, the public sector and charitable organizations. On the digital side of its network, there’s exciting momentum toward dynamic creative optimization (DCO) campaigns. Collaborating with their data partners, DOOH.com, Veridooh and Artbot, 75Media has been unlocking new ways for brands to engage with their audiences in real-time.

One notable dynamic, data-driven campaign that ran on 75Media’s network was Nike’s campaign featuring renowned Norwegian professional footballer Erling Haaland for the promotion of its new Mercurial football shoe. Leveraging the dynamic triggers available on the Broadsign Platform, the artwork and messaging of the DOOH ad would dynamically update whenever Haaland scored a goal during a match.

How Broadsign makes it easy for 75Media to run its network

One platform to efficiently scale, manage, and sell their digital and static out-of-home inventory

75Media has been using the Broadsign Platform since day one. Operations Director Alex Simpson—one of 75Media’s founding directors—had previously used Broadsign at his former company and saw first hand how reliable and effective the platform was. So when 75Media launched in 2020, continuing that partnership was a natural choice. And with their significant growth plans, they needed a platform that was capable of seamlessly scaling alongside their business.

In addition to the platform’s robustness and reliability, 75Media chose Broadsign for its content and network management capabilities. The manual work typically tied to campaign scheduling, booking and execution is now automated, freeing up the team’s time to focus on enhancing advertisers’ experience with OOH.

Moreover, managing their static and digital assets through the Broadsign Platform not only kept things efficient and organized, but also provided them with seamless workflows to plan, execute, and monitor static and digital OOH campaigns without unnecessary complications.

“The reporting capabilities provided by the Broadsign Platform for our digital and static assets allow us to be totally transparent with our clients. Being able to show brands exactly how their campaigns are performing in-flight is invaluable.”
Alex Simpson, Operations Director, 75Media

How 75Media optimizes fill rates with Broadsign’s flexible campaigns

Another key capability that 75Media has been leveraging is Broadsign’s flexible selling tools for their DOOH campaigns. This gives them access to our flexible campaign types, which are goal-based and data-triggered, allowing you to deliver more targeted results. In fact, 80% of DOOH campaigns that ran on 75Media’s network in 2024 leveraged flexible campaigns.

The most widely used flexible campaign type was the Campaign Average Share of Voice (SoV). This allows advertisers to define the average percentage of screen time their ad should get over the campaign’s duration. So what makes it flexible? The SoV on each screen can vary day-to-day to accommodate other campaigns requiring the same screens, but the target average SoV across all screens over the campaign’s duration will always be met.

This is made possible by Broadsign’s rebalancing feature, which leverages our optimization engine to modify the pace at which a campaign is delivered to guarantee targets are met. Since adopting these new flexible capabilities, 75Media has seen an increase of 15% in its screen fill rates and has strengthened its client relationships by offering more flexible solutions.

“Broadsign’s rebalancing feature helps deliver our campaigns efficiently while allowing us to maximize the space across our inventory. It’s particularly useful in ensuring everything runs smoothly without daily intervention from our delivery team.”
Alex Simpson, Operations Director, 75Media

The Campaign Average SoV campaign type is particularly useful for markets where flexible buying has not been widely adopted. Buyers can maintain the same fixed results typically obtained through slot-based campaigns while providing you with the operational flexibility to fill your network optimally.

What we can expect from 75Media in the near future

While 75Media will continue to invest in new digital and static sites to extend its coverage and reach, its focus in the near future is to become the most efficient OOH operator in the market. It plans to do this by investing in new technology and automation, removing the medium’s preconceived pain points, and providing the quickest way to buy OOH.

Additionally, as programmatic capabilities continue to evolve, advertisers will grow more confident in data-driven OOH. With demand expected to rise, 75Media is actively exploring new audience analytics and multiple data integrations to enhance targeting and boost campaign effectiveness.

Product News | October 11, 2021

Revolutionizing Broadsign’s Programmatic SSP: AI creative assistance and extended brand safety

According to GroupM’s 2024 End-of-Year Global Advertising Forecast, digital out-of-home (DOOH) advertising is projected to account for 42% of total out-of-home (OOH) ad revenue by the end of this year. One key factor of growth for DOOH is the integration of programmatic technology, allowing for real-time bidding and dynamic content delivery, enhancing targeting capabilities and operational efficiency.

As programmatic DOOH (pDOOH) only continues to grow in importance, we’re excited to unveil groundbreaking enhancements to Broadsign’s programmatic Supply-Side Platform (SSP), designed to modernize workflows, maximize revenue, and reinforce brand safety for our media owners. The introduction of our patent-pending AI Assistant, Broadsign Header Bidder Pro, and enhanced Competitive Separation features, is going to revolutionize the way you sell, manage and deliver programmatic DOOH campaigns.

Your AI Assistant has arrived

Unveiled at our annual customer summit, Broadsign Connect, in Barcelona, Spain, back in January, Broadsign’s AI Assistant is a patent-pending tool designed to reduce the time media owners spend on repetitive tasks. This includes reviewing, categorizing, and approving incoming ad creatives from programmatic bids sent through demand-side platforms (DSPs).

In 2024 alone, Broadsign media owners received between 32,000 to 43,000 unique OOH creatives each month that need to be manually reviewed and categorized. With that number expected to double this year, Broadsign’s AI Assistant will provide significant time and cost savings. As ad creatives are submitted to the Broadsign SSP, the AI Assistant sends an automated email with category and approval suggestions.

To ensure that it integrates seamlessly with your current review and categorization process, Broadsign’s AI Assistant learns your network’s unique categories to organize and review creatives. It will continue to learn and evolve over time, and you get to decide whether to use the AI Assistant to fully automate the process or to continue providing recommendations only.

By automating the categorization process, Broadsign’s AI Assistant can minimize common misclassification errors and quickly identify sensitive content that could hinder brand safety efforts. For instance, ads featuring alcohol on a screen near a school, or an ad that violates local laws like displaying a political ad next to a polling location, would be flagged by the AI Assistant with recommendations to reject the creative.

Priced-based auctions are now available with Header Bidder Pro

As part of the evolution of our Header Bidder offering, we’re excited to introduce the Broadsign Header Bidder Pro. As a refresher, we introduced our Header Bidder in 2022, which consolidates demand from multiple supply-side partners. This one-to-many programmatic approach allows media owners to simplify ad operations, maximize yield value, and increase fill rates.

With Broadsign’s Header Bidder Pro, you now have the ability to run price-based auctions, helping you get the most out of your programmatic campaigns through higher yields and fill rates, not to mention a simplified auction process. A key advantage of header bidding, or mediation layers, is the ability to consolidate your programmatic demand into one slot, freeing up valuable space on your network. You also get access to better content controls, creative caching, and synchronization capabilities that aren’t possible with container-based setups.

The combined benefits of Broadsign’s AI Assistant with Header Bidder Pro

As Broadsign’s AI creative assistant can categorize creatives more accurately, Broadsign’s header bidding solution will be able to easily match the right inventory with the right demand, resulting in higher-quality ad placements, improved buying satisfaction, and increased competition for premium inventory. Moreover, the combined features will facilitate the alignment of creatives with the varying compliance requirements across demand sources.

Enhanced brand safety for programmatic out-of-home campaigns

Broadsign media owners have long been able to set competitive separation criteria for directly sold campaigns. With this release, we’re excited to extend that capability to programmatic campaigns. More specifically, categories created in the Broadsign CMS will now sync with Broadsign programmatic and platform interfaces.

So, how does it work? Let’s say you have two fast food restaurants, neither of which want their ad to play next to each other. If these campaigns are booked directly, you can easily separate the campaigns with the existing capabilities mentioned above. However, if one – or both – campaigns were booked programmatically, there would have been no way to guarantee that the programmatic slot would not play next to the directly booked slot.

With Competitive Separation for programmatic campaigns, that’s no longer the case. The system will make every effort to prevent these two campaigns from playing one after another, regardless of channel: directly sold or programmatic. However, It’s important to note that competitive separation is only available for other SSP creatives if you are running Header Bidder Pro.

The combined benefits of Broadsign’s AI Assistant with competitive separation

With Broadsign’s AI Assistant, creatives can be categorized at a more granular level, identifying not just the brand but also its competitors and associated categories. The AI Assistant will also be learning directly from your existing categories and can apply your custom taxonomy onto your creatives, saving you time when approving creatives and automating the competitive separation process from programmatic back into your player.

It can also adapt and learn over time, recognizing nuanced relationships between brands and subcategories, such as differentiating between an “energy drink” and a “soft drink.” Moreover, as the AI creative assistant can enforce these competitive separation rules more effectively, advertisers will perceive your network as the more reliable option when it comes to protecting brand visibility and exclusivity.

How these enhancements will help you stay ahead in the rapidly evolving programmatic landscape

While these features were designed to solve a specific pain point at different steps of the pDOOH workflow, the real value comes from having these features work hand-in-hand for more efficient programmatic workflows, reduced errors, and to future-proof your programmatic revenue.

Broadsign’s AI assistant helps automate time-consuming tasks like categorizing creatives and identifying competing ads, allowing for faster decision-making within header bidding frameworks. Combine that with competitive separation, and you can guarantee strategic and compliant ad placements to advertisers.

Furthermore, failure to ensure competitive separation or effective creative categorization can lead to possible compliance violations, rejected bids, or damaged buyer relationships. Having all three features work together simultaneously can help minimize errors, ensuring a smooth and compliant workflow.

Finally, integrating these features into how you sell and manage pDOOH campaigns ensures that you stay ahead of the competition in today’s rapidly evolving programmatic landscape. Combining AI-powered categorization, header bidding, and competitive separation creates a robust ecosystem that drives revenue, enhances buyer trust, and delivers a superior user experience – all while operating at scale and with greater efficiency.

Learn more about Broadsign Programmatic SSP here.

Product News | October 11, 2021

Why travel marketers are turning to OOH for scalable reach and ROI

Tourism is thriving once again, and brands are racing to capture the attention of today’s travellers. As the industry continues to rebound and evolve from its pandemic dip, marketers are rethinking how to connect with multiple generations at key moments in the travel journey. Out-of-home (OOH) advertising remains a powerful, performance-driven medium, valued not only for its visual impact but also for its ability to deliver cost efficiency and broad market penetration across both global and local campaigns.

For travel marketers, OOH offers strategic ways to engage audiences in real time. From digital billboards near airports to transit ads and dynamic creative triggered by weather or location, the channel excels at reaching travellers on the move or those dreaming of their next escape.

With its focus on visual storytelling and contextual relevance, OOH is especially effective at sparking wanderlust, promoting destinations, and influencing travel decisions. High-dwell environments like airports, transit hubs, and city centres offer premium visibility where plans are being made, driving strong recall and engagement.

Travel marketers are doubling down on OOH: Here’s why

Out-of-home has become one of the fastest-growing channels for travel and tourism marketers. According to Broadsign data, travel’s share of OOH ad spend rose from 3.8% in 2023 to 5.7% in 2024, reaching 8% in early 2025—making it the top vertical for OOH spend so far this year.

According to the Out of Home Advertising Association of America (OAAA), major travel brands like Hotels.com, Expedia, and VRBO ranked among the top OOH advertisers in 2024. This surge in activity is being fueled by several key factors: growing demand for both domestic and international travel, renewed airline operations, and increased marketing investments from hotels, online travel agencies, and tourism boards eager to capture consumer attention.

Maximizing efficiency and reach: The dollar value of OOH

At a time when marketers are being asked to do more with less, OOH is proving to be one of the most efficient and effective channels for driving reach and results. For travel brands, it offers a rare mix of broad exposure, cost control, and message adaptability, making it a smart choice when performance and efficiency are under the microscope.

This efficiency is especially evident when comparing OOH to other media channels. The medium delivers high-impact visibility at a significantly lower cost per thousand impressions (CPM) than connected TV (CTV), paid social, or display. According to Solomon Partners and the World Out of Home Organization (WOO), OOH consistently offers a lower cost per impression, with average CPMs ranging from $2 to $9 USD, well below most digital formats. That makes it one of the most cost-effective ways to achieve mass reach, particularly in high-traffic, high-dwell time environments like airports, transit hubs, and city centres.

But cost efficiency doesn’t mean sacrificing performance. In fact, research from the OAAA and Comscore found that OOH drives online activation rates 5 to 6 times higher than expected, outperforming channels like TV, video, radio, banner ads, and print when it comes to driving digital engagement.

Even in a softening economy, travel marketers are maintaining or increasing their OOH investment, driven by sustained consumer demand for experiences and exploration. Domestic travel is gaining particular momentum—U.S. hotels and resorts ranked among the top 10 OOH product categories in 2024, accounting for 3% of total year-end spend. Tourism boards and airlines are also increasingly anchoring their media strategies in OOH, using it as the lead channel in integrated campaigns that blend broad awareness with measurable results.

At the same time, multi-city and international campaigns are scaling efficiently, allowing brands to build awareness across key markets while tailoring creative to specific audiences. Marketers can keep messaging consistent across regions while adapting visuals or calls to action for different cities or traveller segments—an essential advantage when engaging both global tourists and local visitors.

Finally, timing remains critical. Launching OOH campaigns ahead of peak travel windows or booking periods allows brands to influence decisions early in the planning journey. Many consumers start researching destinations weeks or months in advance, so a strong OOH presence during this window keeps your brand top of mind. Aligning campaigns with seasonal trends, long weekends, school breaks, or major events can further maximize reach and impact.

Measuring OOH’s real-world impact

For years, one of the biggest challenges in out-of-home advertising was proving its value beyond brand awareness. But that’s changing quickly. With the rise of advanced measurement tools and location intelligence platforms, travel marketers now have access to real-world insights that directly connect ad exposure to consumer behaviour.

Platforms like Arrivalist are leading this shift, offering new visibility into traveller movement and enabling marketers to understand how OOH influences actions like visits, overnight stays, and the path to purchase. By matching mobile advertising IDs (MAIDs) to campaign exposure, tourism boards can measure visitation uplift and identify which audiences are most likely to act after seeing an OOH ad.

These insights go far beyond impressions, helping quantify tangible outcomes, like increased foot traffic to cities, attractions, hotels, or short-term rentals following a campaign. Marketers can also layer campaign data with flight, hotel, or rental trends to better understand travel intent and booking behaviour.

This level of attribution is especially valuable for tourism boards, which often need to justify public or partner funding by demonstrating a clear return on investment. As DOOH adoption grows, more campaigns are integrating measurement from the outset, enabling smarter optimizations and more transparent performance benchmarks throughout the campaign lifecycle.

Scaling smart with programmatic DOOH

Many of today’s travel campaigns span multiple markets, and programmatic DOOH (pDOOH) is helping power that growth. It gives brands the speed, agility, and precision needed to launch quickly, adapt mid-flight, and respond in real time to performance data. Unlike traditional media, programmatic buying eliminates long lead times, allowing marketers to shift budgets, swap creative, or refine targeting based on changing market conditions or traveller behaviour—all while retaining the bold, visual impact OOH is known for.

Dynamic Creative Optimization (DCO) adds another layer of relevance by tailoring content in real time based on data like location, weather, language, or time of day. For travel marketers, this enables region-specific offers, weather-based messaging, and event tie-ins that drive stronger engagement.

Programmatic tools also streamline cross-market execution, enabling consistent messaging across regions while customizing creative for local audiences. This makes them especially valuable for multi-city and global tourism campaigns.

Out-of-home is no longer just a top-of-funnel awareness tool—it’s a performance-driven, scalable, and data-rich channel built for modern travel marketing. Whether you’re launching a global tourism campaign or targeting specific markets with dynamic, real-time creative, OOH delivers the reach, efficiency, and impact needed to move travellers from inspiration to action.

Ready to maximize your OOH investment? Contact us today to start building high-impact travel campaigns that drive real-world results.

Product News | October 11, 2021

What’s new on the Broadsign Platform: Highlights from our latest webinar

At our most recent webinar, our VP of Products, Francois Hechme, and Senior Directors of Products, Gavin Lee and Seamus Hunn, presented the 2025 roadmap for the Broadsign Platform. The presentation showcased the upcoming enhancements designed to optimize processes, improve productivity, and unlock new revenue opportunities for out-of-home (OOH) media owners.

Looking back on what we accomplished in 2024

Before we look at what’s to come, let’s highlight some of the changes we made in 2024 that helped you operate a little more efficiently every day.

Improved campaign planning and management to better meet customer needs

Enhancing our campaign planning and management capabilities was a big focus for us last year. The first notable change was the integration of the Guaranteed Campaigns module, formerly known as Broadsign Direct, into the platform interface. Another big capability that was brought onto the platform was creative management tools, allowing you to create, edit, manage, and assign campaign creatives with ease. Finally, we introduced new targeting tools and a map view to better visualize your inventory for directly-sold campaigns to provide media owners with the same flexibility and comprehensive targeting capabilities as online and programmatic buyers.

Campaign optimization tools to help you make the most out of your inventory

Another big focus of last year was campaign optimization, which was heavily driven by Broadsign’s optimization engine. Composed of two functionalities – campaign rebalancing and reallocation – our optimization engine is designed to ensure that your campaigns deliver on target while optimizing your inventory availability to boost sales. Below we highlight a few ways that media owners benefited from Broadsign’s optimization engine in 2024.

Campaign rebalancing

As a refresher, our rebalancing feature modifies the pace at which a campaign is delivered. It will speed up or slow down campaign delivery to help under or overperforming campaigns stay on target and meet campaign objectives.

In 2024 alone, 26% of all campaigns booked through Broadsign Guaranteed Campaigns required some level of rebalancing. Customers who leveraged our rebalancing feature had three times more campaigns on target and 37% fewer campaigns that were underperforming.

Campaign reallocation

The second functionality of our optimization engine is the reallocation feature, which is used at the time of booking. If an advertiser’s incoming request requires a screen that is already booked by another campaign, the system will automatically reorganize how screens are allocated to each campaign while ensuring that newly allocated screens still fit campaign requirements.

Given that each media owner’s network is different, the data varied for this capability. While most were able to accommodate on average 10% to 20% more campaigns with our reallocation feature, a few select were able to achieve up to 40% more campaigns.

Without Broadsign’s optimization engine automatically reallocating screens to optimize fill rates, media owners would have to manually reshuffle campaigns to accommodate incoming demand. Not only is that a time-consuming and inefficient process that cannot scale with your business, but it also can’t achieve the same results as our optimization engine.

Growing our trading capabilities to connect you to more buyers

Last but not least, one of the biggest moments for our programmatic business last year was the acquisition of OutMoove, which includes its business and DOOH demand-side platform (DSP) technology. This has enabled OutMoove to focus on scaling its unique OOH specialist agency workflows and support globally while giving Broadsign access to OutMoove’s expertise and specialist OOH clients.

Furthermore, we worked closely with media owners to expand our inventory, leading to 72% more screens that were onboarded onto Broadsign’s programmatic supply-side platform (SSP) and Header Bidder. The expansion of inventory led to 43% more unique advertisers transacting with Broadsign and 36% more impressions transacted.

What you can expect from Broadsign in 2025

Evolving campaign planning and management in the Broadsign Platform

One of Broadsign’s key focuses this year will be the continued evolution of our campaign planning and management capabilities within the Broadsign Platform. This focus is divided into three big initiatives: the first is the next enhancements to our creative management capabilities, the second is the continued modernization of Broadsign Guaranteed Campaigns’ workflows, and finally, the unification of static and digital workflows.

Creative management in the platform

When examining what creative management capabilities we wanted to bring in-platform, we extensively studied the use of creative capabilities within our standalone products. This allowed us to map out the rollout of in-platform creative capabilities in three separate phases. The first phase was released last year, allowing you to schedule one or multiple creatives for all line items within a campaign.

The next phase, which is currently in development and expected to be released in the first half of the year, will allow you to set multiple schedules for your creatives and be applied to all line items in a campaign. Finally, the last phase which is expected to be ready by the latter half of the year, provides you with full flexibility by setting multiple schedules for each line item in a campaign. Once these two phases have been completed, we’ll be shifting our focus to expand our supported content types from just accepting images and videos to also include HTML and web redirects.

Modernizing the line items workflow

The line item workflow within our Guaranteed Campaigns module is one of the most used workflows in our platform. This is where you typically plan, check availability, and book your line items for a campaign. In 2024, we created the Line Items list, which is easily accessible through the navigation bar. Since its launch, this feature has been well-loved by users, as ad operations teams can quickly sort and filter through the list, allowing easy identification of line items that need monitoring and troubleshooting.

This year, we’re working on further enhancing the line items workflow so that you can accommodate more campaigns, better tailor them to client needs, and work more efficiently. The new enhancements include a new view for when you’re creating new digital line items, making it easier to understand your inventory availability and how to optimally fill your network. We’re also adding a multitude of new targeting options, providing you with more flexibility in how you package your inventory to better meet advertiser’s needs.

Unifying static and digital workflows in-platform

At our last customer summit, Broadsign Connect 2024, we presented some key findings from our State of Static OOH report, which found that 69.8% of media owners operate a hybrid network, meaning that they have both static and digital OOH inventory. Given this data, another enhancement to our campaign planning and management capabilities this year will be to unify static and digital OOH workflows in the Broadsign Platform.

Doing so would allow you to book digital and static inventory in a single campaign, saving you time by eliminating the need to switch between modules in the platform. The unification of workflows would also allow for seamless planning as you’ll be able to book all inventory types in one place, as well as use map visualization and set impression goals for static campaigns. Finally, integrating the operations of both mediums would allow you to consolidate tracking and reporting, providing advertisers with a more holistic view of how OOH works to meet their objectives.

Expanding our trading capabilities to connect media owners to more buyers

Another key focus for 2025 will be continuing to extend our trading capabilities to connect media owners to more demand. We’re doing so by enhancing our real-time programmatic transactions with features that reduce friction, and increase demand and yield.

New AI creative assistance and extended competitive separation for Broadsign’s Programmatic SSP

Regarding upcoming enhancements to support programmatic DOOH, the first big item will be the introduction of our Header Bidder Pro. Building on our existing header bidding capabilities, the Pro version will support the execution of price-based auctions as well as brand separation features across multiple supply-side platforms (SSPs). This upgrade in header bidding capabilities will optimize your demand channels, help you increase programmatic yield, and consolidate your programmatic scheduling.

Another exciting update will be enhanced programmatic creative management workflows. This includes the unveiling of our new AI Assistant. This patent-pending tool is designed to reduce the time media owners spend on repetitive tasks, like reviewing, categorizing, and approving incoming ad creatives from programmatic bids sent through DSPs.

Automating the categorization process improves accuracy, as the system will learn and refine its recommendations the more it’s used. Broadsign’s AI Assistant can also minimize common misclassification errors and quickly identify sensitive content that could hinder brand safety efforts. Finally, with programmatic demand expected to increase in the coming years, the AI Assistant will seamlessly scale to support your growing demand.

Bridging the gap for reporting in OOH with our unified reporting module

In today’s advertising landscape, data drives revenue – access to real-time data helps keep you agile and ahead of the competition. Recognizing this need, another key focus will be to build a unified reporting module in-platform, providing you with a real-time view of how your network is performing at any given moment.

In terms of specific capabilities, the new reporting module will consolidate key data across all products, allowing you to evaluate all aspects of your business. The module will have an overview dashboard that provides quick and real-time data at a glance, but also a secondary view where you’ll be able to drill down into specific data points. You’ll also be able to set a schedule for when reports should be sent to you by email, as well as extract data from the module to import it into your BI tools.

This latest series of updates is another step forward in Broadsign’s mission to transform how brands, agencies and media owners buy, sell and deliver OOH campaigns. For media owners, the latest evolution of the Broadsign Platform will allow them to deliver more campaigns, more efficiently, and always with the same reliability.