Ask the Experts: The Power of Place-Based DOOH with Vertical Impression
Vertical Impression is an elevator advertising network with a story like no other. The co-founders were in class together at university when one of them had their car towed for missing a notice that was posted on the building’s bulletin board. The experience led them to question if there was a way to improve how buildings communicate with tenants. From there, the idea of putting screens in elevators to display important, targeted messaging was created.
Today, Vertical Impression is the largest residential elevator network in Canada with over 1700 screens across 30 major markets. With rapid growth in Quebec, Southwestern Ontario, and across Canada’s east coast, the company is showing no signs of slowing down as they project a network of over 2000 screens by the end of the year.
We sat down with Nicolette Leonardis, Vice President and Co-founder of Vertical Impression, to get her insights on the role place-based DOOH has on reaching the right audience at the right time with contextual messaging.
How digital marketers can adopt DOOH in their campaigns
What sets Vertical Impression apart from other out-of-home networks is the fact that its screens are powered by privacy-by-design certified AI, enabling ads to be served in real-time based on who’s looking at screens or riding in an elevator. This provides valuable information by allowing the company to capture first-party data on their audience’s engagement.
There are a lot of metrics that can be acquired when running a digital campaign. Marketers often prefer digital advertising thanks to its flexibility, targeting, and measurement capabilities, but OOH is quickly becoming a more popular channel as technology advances. The ability to purchase OOH programmatically is enabling more and more marketers to include it in their strategies, but as Nicolette explains, there’s still a lot of education missing to get advertisers to look at OOH as a strong data capturing method:
DOOH as a location-based performance channel
According to Nicolette, marketers who include OOH in their campaigns should shift their focus towards measuring actual engagement over exclusively looking at impressions. Going beyond measuring how many people saw your ad to really evaluate the quality of an impression is important in understanding if audiences can recall what they saw.
For Nicolette, large format out-of-home messaging is the best route to take if a marketer’s goal is to drive mass reach and impact. For a more targeted approach, or to reach more segmented audiences, indoor ad space like elevator screens should be considered. Check out what she has to say:
The evolution and future of DOOH
Thanks to increasingly sophisticated and innovative advertising technology, DOOH has evolved extensively in the past 5 years and will continue to do so in the future. With the looming elimination of third-party cookies, digital marketers will have less data available to them than they’re used to, amplifying the importance of capturing contextual data through OOH channels.
We’d like to thank Nicolette for taking the time to chat OOH with us.
First-party data in digital OOH: What it is and how to leverage it
Digital out-of-home is growing fast, with global spend expected to surpass $20 billion by the end of the year, according to the World Out of Home Organization. As the medium scales, it’s also evolving from broad-reach awareness to more data-driven, audience-first strategies. This shift is making first-party data more important than ever, especially as third-party cookies dwindle and privacy regulations tighten.
Put simply, today’s advertisers are looking for more than just reach—they want precision, personalization, and contextual relevance, even in a traditionally one-to-many channel like OOH. First-party data delivers on that need, offering a privacy-safe and cost-effective way to engage real customers based on actual behaviour and intent. And with modern DOOH platforms making it easier than ever to activate data, brands can now drive better targeting, stronger performance, and a more connected omnichannel experience.
To understand how to make first-party data work in digital out-of-home and outdoor advertising, it’s important to start with the basics, unpack the common barriers, and explore the tools and tactics that make activation possible today.
What is first-party data, and why is it so valuable?
First-party data is information a brand collects directly through its channels, based on real customer interactions or touchpoints. Examples can include actions like pages viewed, time spent on a website, items added to cart, app usage patterns, purchase history, loyalty programs, and more. Because it’s based on actual behaviour within your own ecosystem, and not inferred or purchased, first-party data gives brands a reliable, privacy-safe foundation for targeted, high-impact campaigns.
Tailoring messaging to real audiences and high-value prospects leads to more relevant and effective campaigns. This kind of personalization drives stronger performance, from increased engagement to higher conversion rates. It’s also more cost-efficient, since the data is already owned by the brand and doesn’t require additional spend to access—just the opportunity to activate it more strategically.
Barriers to smarter DOOH campaigns
Despite the growing potential of first-party data, many advertisers still face structural and technical challenges when it comes to putting it into action, especially in outdoor advertising and DOOH environments. Here are a few of the most common barriers:
Data silos between CRM and media teams: In many organizations, the teams responsible for customer data, like CRM, loyalty, or analytics, operate separately from the teams planning and executing media. Without shared systems or workflows, valuable first-party data often stays locked away in internal platforms, disconnected from the tools used to build and target DOOH campaigns.
Technical limitations have made first-party data harder to activate: Bringing first-party data into DOOH hasn’t always been straightforward. Many demand-side platforms (DSPs) lacked the flexibility to support custom data uploads, limiting brands to pre-packaged third-party segments. When activation was possible, it often required custom integrations, manual workarounds, or higher campaign spend—barriers that slowed adoption and limited the ability to fully tap into valuable audience insights.
Perceptions around cost and complexity still linger: Brands may assume data onboarding is expensive, time-consuming, or reserved for large-scale campaigns. But many platforms now offer flexible, self-serve tools or managed support to help teams onboard everything from simple geo lists to advanced CRM segments.
Key considerations and best practices for activating first-party data in DOOH
With the right foundation, audience data can be a powerful driver of performance in DOOH. From preparing your data to choosing the right platforms, here are key considerations and best practices to help you activate it effectively.
Start with a DSP built for data-driven campaigns
Activating your own audience data in DOOH campaigns used to be a heavy lift, requiring custom integrations, technical support, or large-scale media budgets. Today’s DSPs, however, are built to be more flexible and data-friendly. Modern DSP platforms like OutMoove, for example, make it easier to activate customer data with minimal friction, giving advertisers full control over how data is used, where it comes from, and how it impacts campaigns.
Advertisers can use data they already have, like postal codes tied to customer addresses, loyalty program lists, or CRM segments based on purchase history. Many also incorporate behavioural signals like recent website activity to build high-intent audience segments—all without needing to reinvent their targeting strategy.
The benefits? Smarter targeting, stronger performance, and more efficient spending. By using audience insights to go beyond broad awareness, advertisers can connect with people who are more likely to take action. This reduces waste, helping teams focus their budget on audiences that have already shown interest or intent.
Expand reach with multi-layered targeting
Platforms like OutMoove support layered targeting, allowing you to start with your own audience, like loyalty members or recent store visitors, and expand reach by adding third-party segments based on foot traffic patterns, purchase intent, or lifestyle traits. For example, a brand could target its existing in-store shoppers and layer on third-party data to find others who frequently visit similar retail environments. This kind of multi-layered approach unlocks more precise, personalized campaigns without relying solely on broad demographic filters.
Deliver ads at the right time with real-world triggers
Moment targeting allows brands to activate ads based on real-world conditions like weather changes, traffic flow, sports scores, or time of day. These dynamic triggers help ensure your message appears when it’s most relevant, making your media spend more efficient and impactful.
Beyond standard conditions, many platforms now support custom triggers powered by business-specific data. Whether tied to a regional promotion, local event, or time-sensitive inventory, these inputs can be used to control when and where ads appear. This flexibility allows campaigns to align with meaningful moments that drive both relevance and results.
Align with data standards and industry guidelines
While fragmentation across buying methods and data standards has historically made it harder to apply audience data in DOOH as seamlessly as in digital, the industry is making important strides toward alignment, especially around measurement, data integrity, and audience definitions.
Initiatives like the IAB’s Digital Out-of-Home Measurement Guide are helping set a foundation for scalable, data-led campaigns. Introducing standardized metrics gives advertisers more confidence in campaign performance and supports better data collection, impression validation, and privacy compliance under frameworks like GDPR and CCPA. This growing alignment strengthens trust, improves transparency, and simplifies automated buying, making it easier for brands to activate audience data and run more effective, measurable DOOH campaigns.
As digital out-of-home advances, audience data is becoming a key driver of smarter, more impactful campaigns. With the right strategy and tools in place, advertisers can move beyond broad awareness to reach the right people at the right time.
Ready to see how your data can drive smarter DOOH campaigns? OutMoove gives you the tools to plan, activate, and optimize with ease. Learn more here.
Product News | October 11, 2021
From prime locations to real-time content: How MIB powers effective DOOH campaigns in Indonesia
In Indonesia’s dynamic advertising landscape, PT Media Indra Buana (MIB) has established itself as a trailblazer and one of the country’s most influential players in the out-of-home (OOH) and digital OOH (DOOH) advertising industries. As a region pioneer, MIB continues to redefine urban media spaces with innovation, strategic placement, and a commitment to sustainability.
Driving growth and innovation in OOH advertising
MIB’s mission is deeply rooted in driving the growth, innovation, and effectiveness of Indonesia’s OOH advertising sector. Its focus goes beyond traditional display solutions—the company is committed to developing advertising strategies that maximize engagement and visibility, while actively shaping the industry’s future through ongoing innovation.
From being a pioneer in digital formats that captivate audiences to securing prime high-traffic locations like the façade of Grand Indonesia (GI), Plaza Sentral, and IDX, MIB ensures its clients’ messages reach the right eyes at the right time. The company also leads the charge in sustainability by using eco-friendly materials and adopting energy-efficient digital display technology.
In addition to cutting-edge practices, MIB prides itself on forging strong industry partnerships and maintaining a customer-first service philosophy that has solidified its reputation as a trusted partner for brands.
Harnessing the power of digital OOH
MIB’s digital screens are more than just advertising platforms; they’re content hubs designed to capture attention and inform. Viewers encounter a variety of programming, including advertisements, public service announcements, live event streams, weather updates, interactive campaigns, and programmatic content, all curated to fit the rhythm of Indonesia’s bustling public spaces.
For MIB, the most exciting aspect of DOOH advertising lies in its adaptability. Real-time content updates, interactivity, and advanced analytics empower brands to fine-tune their campaigns on the fly. Integration with digital campaigns ensures advertisers can deliver cohesive and responsive marketing messages that resonate across channels.
Strengthening strategies with Broadsign
The company’s pursuit of digital excellence led to its partnership with Broadsign, a global leader in OOH software solutions. Commenting on this collaboration, Ruri Liasari, Head of Marketing at PT Media Indra Buana, shared:
“We chose to collaborate with Broadsign due to its outstanding reputation in the DOOH ecosystem. Broadsign’s robust software enables seamless content management and real-time delivery across our digital signage platforms. This partnership perfectly aligns with MIB’s goal of optimizing advertising strategies and enhancing operational efficiency.”
Broadsign is helping revolutionize MIB’s advertising operations through state-of-the-art content and network management service solutions that dramatically simplify digital signage management at scale. With effortless content scheduling powered by automated workflows, the Broadsign Platform enables MIB to manage and automate its entire DOOH media operations across its network.
The platform’s intelligent media management capabilities allow MIB to simply set the rules for when and where content should play, while providing full visibility into network performance through comprehensive, in-depth reporting capabilities. This advanced content and campaign management solution not only streamlines operations but also empowers MIB to effectively monetize its screens by seamlessly integrating advertising content, transforming its network into a highly efficient, revenue-generating advertising ecosystem.
A bold vision for the future
Looking ahead, MIB plans to strengthen its position as an innovator in the space by continuously exploring new creative formats, securing more high-traffic locations, and expanding its renowned after-sales service. With iconic landmark locations already part of its portfolio, the company’s growth strategy is firmly rooted in offering visibility and value.
As Indonesia’s urban environment evolves, MIB remains committed to pushing the boundaries of DOOH advertising, delivering campaigns that are not only impactful but also sustainable and future-ready.
Want to grow your out-of-home network? Schedule a demo to see how we can help make that happen!
Product News | October 11, 2021
Leading DOOH innovation in the Dominican Republic with Signmaster
Signmaster is one of the leading digital out-of-home (DOOH) operators in the Dominican Republic, with a rapidly growing presence across major cities and tourist hubs. Its mission is to strategically and creatively connect brands with audiences through innovative, sustainable, and tech-forward outdoor advertising.
Through its partnership with Broadsign, the company has streamlined operations and adopted scalable programmatic solutions, advancements that have been central to its continued growth and transformation.
A DOOH network built for impact
Since its founding in 2010, Signmaster has steadily expanded its footprint across the Dominican Republic. A 2021 merger with another major player accelerated that momentum and further cemented its position as a leader in the DOOH space.
Today, the company operates a network of more than 250 digital screens in high-traffic, high-visibility locations nationwide, including:
Santo Domingo, the capital and commercial hub
Santiago, a key residential and business center
Bávaro and Punta Cana, two of the Caribbean’s most visited destinations
Punta Cana International Airport, offering access to both local and global audiences
Screens are strategically positioned along busy avenues, retail corridors, residential areas, and key transit points, ensuring brands can reach diverse audiences throughout the day. With over 102 million monthly impressions, Signmaster delivers one of the region’s most scalable and impactful DOOH networks, featuring ad campaigns, public service messages, and real-time updates like weather and traffic. It also supports programmatic campaigns, interactive content, and even traditional print-style campaigns, giving brands the flexibility to tailor their messaging for maximum impact.
Expanding creative possibilities with 3D screens and programmatic innovation
Signmaster continues to push the boundaries of DOOH through investments in creative formats and smarter advertising solutions. By the end of the year, the company plans to launch 10 new 3D digital screens, starting with a marquee installation at the Aloft and Marriott Hotels in Santo Domingo. Modelled after the iconic 3D billboard in Los Angeles, this debut is part of a broader push to deliver immersive brand experiences in premium, high-traffic environments, helping advertisers stand out with high-impact storytelling designed to captivate audiences in real time.
Looking ahead, Signmaster is also exploring building mapping as a next-generation format, turning physical structures into interactive canvases and extending DOOH beyond the screen. All new formats, including 3D and mapped displays, will run on the Broadsign platform, enabling centralized control, flexible scheduling, and seamless integration.
To meet advertisers’ evolving needs, Signmaster is advancing its data and programmatic capabilities. Through a trusted third-party provider, it offers transparent audience insights that help brands better understand reach and performance, crucial in a region where programmatic DOOH is still emerging. As one of the few providers enabling programmatic buying in the Dominican Republic, Signmaster is leading the shift toward automated, data-driven media by educating the market and simplifying the buying process.
Advertisers also benefit from end-to-end support, including technical guidance, creative recommendations, performance reporting, and placement evidence, all designed to ensure a smooth, scalable, and accountable buying experience.
Powering performance and scale with Broadsign
As Signmaster’s network has expanded, so has the need for a reliable, flexible platform to manage operations and enable smarter, more efficient buying. Since partnering with Broadsign in 2023, the company has streamlined how it schedules, manages, and monetizes its inventory.
Today, 100% of its inventory runs on the Broadsign Platform. The system delivers the scalability and automation needed to keep pace with rapid growth, allowing the team to schedule campaigns efficiently, centralize screen management, and enable secure, flexible programmatic transactions. It also supports emerging creative formats like immersive 3D experiences and data-integrated campaigns.
Broadsign powers more than content delivery; it supports Signmaster’s broader tech ecosystem by enabling audience analytics, real-time content like traffic and weather, and seamless programmatic integration. This has allowed the company to streamline operations while unlocking new opportunities for creative execution, measurable performance, and automated sales, laying the foundation for continued growth and leadership in the Dominican DOOH market.
“We chose Broadsign for its robustness, automation, and scalability. It allows us to schedule campaigns efficiently, centralize control of the entire network, and enable programmatic sales in a secure and flexible manner,” says Yesica Abreu. “It has also helped improve incident management and operational efficiency, thanks to responsive support and consistent communication.”
Want to grow your out-of-home network? Get in touch to see how we can help make that happen!
Product News | October 11, 2021
How Québecor’s DOOH campaigns deliver 99.9% on target with the Broadsign Platform
Advertising is woven into nearly every aspect of our daily lives. Whether you’re scrolling on your phone at home or walking down the street, ads are everywhere. With audiences exposed to such a high volume of messaging, breaking through the noise has never been more critical.
At the core of every successful campaign are two key elements: personalized content that speaks directly to the audience, and a channel that effectively reaches them where they are. Tailored messaging plays a crucial role in building meaningful connections between brands and consumers. According to McKinsey’s Next in Personalization 2021 report, 71% of consumers now expect personalization, and 76% are more likely to consider purchasing from brands that deliver it.
When it comes to reaching consumers where they are, few channels do it better than out-of-home (OOH) advertising. By engaging with audiences in the real world, like during a commute, while shopping, or at a live event, the medium delivers messages where consumers can take action. When looking at the effectiveness of personalized content with OOH, Leger and COMMB’s joint research study shows that 51% of its respondents state they enjoy seeing OOH advertisements that are personalized to them.
One media owner that makes it easy for advertisers to deliver personalized content directly to their desired audiences is Québecor. With a combined inventory of over 17,000 static and digital out-of-home (DOOH) assets across all major Canadian markets, Québecor has firmly established itself as a leading force in Canada’s OOH advertising landscape. With its unmatched national reach yet strong local presence, advanced targeting capabilities, and premium inventory, Québecor makes it easy for advertisers to reach a wide variety of audiences across a broad set of points of interest.
Why advertisers love Québecor’s network
Flexible outdoor formats that provide broad reach and hyper-local impact
Québecor OOH offers advertisers a wide range of high-impact DOOH screens across both indoor and outdoor environments. Its outdoor inventory includes large-format static billboards, static and digital bus shelters, digital gas pump screens, mobile static faces on buses, mobile digital screens on taxis, and window displays in pharmacies and convenience stores.
In fact, the Canadian media owner operates the most extensive street furniture network in Quebec, where its headquarters are located. This includes 150 digital bus shelter screens across key cities like Montreal, Sherbrooke, Laval, the South Shore and Lévis, providing targeted and strategic community presence at scale.
One unique offering by Québecor is its Express Video Station network, which is available across Quebec and Ontario. This network features digital screens with audio at gas pumps, allowing advertisers to run 15- to 30-second video ads in a high dwell-time environment, an average of 4 minutes with minimal distractions. The Express Video Station creates a rare opportunity for mass visibility while fostering high-engagement, one-to-one interactions with audiences in a brand-safe, clutter-free environment.
Another distinct offering is Québecor’s fleet of 50 Mobile digital screen – taxi top. Travelling 77 000 km per week and generating over 1M impressions weekly, the double-sided LCD screens provide advertisers with an extended reach into areas with limited billboard availability. Available programmatically, this mobile inventory gives advertisers the flexibility to quickly launch contextual campaigns, bringing dynamic messaging to high-traffic zones.
Influencing decisions indoors with high-impact screens in high-traffic areas
Québecor also maintains a strong footprint in strategic indoor environments through its Shopping Destination, Fitness Destination, and Express Destination networks. These networks are designed to reach consumers at pivotal moments in their day when they’re most receptive to advertising and most likely to make purchasing decisions. Its indoor screens can be found in shopping malls, gyms, convenience stores, and drugstores.
Large-format indoor inventory includes the Toronto Pearson Airport, featuring eight 65” screens that play in synchronization thanks to Broadsign technology, available exclusively through a programmatic private marketplace deal. Québecor also has a premium network of large-format digital screens at Montreal’s Palais des Congrès, ideal for reaching attendees during major events and conferences.
Furthermore, Québecor’s indoor screens have the same ratio as its outdoor screens, making it easy to create a seamless experience across both indoor and outdoor environments that delivers a cohesive and consistent message. Québecor is also the only pan-Canadian indoor advertising network that offers consumer content, national news, weather, and content tailored to its different environments.
Some iconic campaigns that ran on Québecor’s network
Beyond delivering results for advertisers, Québecor has also leveraged its network to showcase how OOH can drive meaningful social impact. For Earth Day on April 22, 2025, they launched an eco-conscious campaign promoting sustainable transportation. With messages like “Every public transit trip is a step towards a common future” and “The electric taxi, driving towards a common future,” the campaign appeared across digital bus shelters and mobile digital screens, raising environmental awareness while highlighting the agility of Québecor’s formats to support timely, contextually relevant messaging.
Another notable campaign was Molson’s “Sponsor the Parents”, which was a heartfelt tribute in support of Team Canada at the Olympic Games and the parents cheering on the athletes behind the scenes. Running across Québecor’s indoor networks located near the athletes’ hometowns, the campaign masterfully combined sentiment, relevance, and geographic targeting. It demonstrated not only the power of Québecor’s network reach but also how OOH can create authentic, personal connections on a national stage.
Why Québecor chose the Broadsign Platform
Increased network reliability and stability
Québecor chose to run its network with the Broadsign Platform due to the company’s longstanding experience and recognition as one of the leading out-of-home software providers in the industry. Since adopting the Broadsign Platform in June 2020, they’ve noticed greater network stability thanks to the platform’s network monitoring capabilities, which have allowed them to quickly identify and resolve system issues, reducing potential downtimes.
Some of Québecor’s favourite features include Broadsign’s campaign delivery, inventory management and reporting capabilities, which when used together, offer real-time insights on how to maximize network performance. Additionally, Broadsign’s multi-frame feature has been especially useful for its digital bus shelters, enabling dynamic content delivery, like live transit schedules to play alongside ads.
Flexible selling tools that deliver campaigns 99.9% on target
However, the standout advantage to being on the Broadsign Platform has been its flexible selling capabilities, which they leverage for most of its large markets, like Montreal and its neighbouring areas, and for networks with 10 screens or more. Since adopting Broadsign’s flexible selling tools, Québecor has been able to open up its network to more advertisers thanks to goal-based campaigns.
For clients with smaller budgets or occasional DOOH buys, Québecor offers Play Goal campaigns as a more accessible buying option. With this campaign type, advertisers can book a DOOH campaign with a set number of ad plays based on their budget, and the Broadsign Platform will optimally distribute the plays across the selected screens throughout the campaign’s duration.
For Québecor, flexible selling gives them access to Broadsign’s optimization engine. Composed of two features, the optimization engine reallocates campaigns to maximize inventory usage and rebalances ad delivery to guarantee results to advertisers. While the flexible buying approach required an initial adjustment for both Québecor and its clients, the results quickly proved the value of flexible campaigns with ad delivery rates of 99.9%.
“Broadsign’s optimization engine has allowed us to deliver flexible campaigns 99.9% on target, and to say yes to revenue opportunities that we previously wouldn’t have been able to.”
Évannick Godbout Villeneuve, Manager, Business Solutions and Technological Development, Out-of-Home at Québecor.
What’s next for Québecor
Québecor’s dynamic team of seasoned professionals are looking to drive growth by expanding the company’s footprint across the Canadian market. They’ll be focused on developing and optimizing their existing networks while forging new partnerships that will help them deliver an even more impactful experience for advertisers.
