Category: Digital Signage Events

Product News | October 11, 2021

“Welcome to the New Normal” – Research findings [video]

For marketers and media buyers, navigating our unprecedented times has definitely been challenging, both professionally and personally. Long gone are the days when we could plan months in advance. And, if you work for an agency, client pressure is at an all-time high. You’re likely being asked to react to rapid changes and back up your media plan recommendations with local insights that are often difficult to find.  It’s a lot, but don’t worry – we’ve got your back!

In our Welcome to the New Normal webinar, we go over the results of a national survey of over 1,000 Canadians that we, in collaboration with Caddle, ran in July. The objectives were to better understand Canadians’ changing attitudes regarding the pandemic, returning to the office, activities they look forward to doing, back-to-school shopping, and much more. We also surveyed consumers on media fatigue, as well as on OOH-specific questions.

The goal is to provide you with valuable insights that you can use to better inform your last-minute fall marketing and media plans. Enjoy the on-demand version of the webinar we hosted on August 19, 2021 below. If you would like an editable copy of the presentation, please don’t hesitate to reach out.

Caddle regularly takes the pulse of the marketplace and provides its partners with access to recent, relevant and robust insights through reports and events. Sign up for its newsletter to regularly stay in the know, and get access to exclusive reports, events and content.

Product News | October 11, 2021

Meet Ari Buchalter, Broadsign’s new Chief Strategy Officer

As Broadsign enters its next phase of growth and transformation, we’re excited to welcome Ari Buchalter as Chief Strategy Officer. Ari joins the team at a pivotal moment, focused on aligning strategy, platform direction, and growth priorities as Broadsign and Place Exchange move forward as a more unified organization. 

Ari brings a long track record of building and scaling technology at the intersection of media, data, and automation. As the founder of Place Exchange, he helped advance programmatic buying in out-of-home and has spent his career in leadership roles across out-of-home (OOH) and programmatic advertising, focused on making complex ecosystems more connected, accessible, and effective.

We sat down with Ari to talk about the year ahead, how the platform is evolving, and his perspective on bringing Broadsign and Place Exchange together under a shared vision.

As Broadsign and Place Exchange come together, how would you describe your role and main areas of focus across the combined organization?

As Chief Strategy Officer for the combined entity, I’m excited to explore the many areas where we can create and capture value from the combination of these two incredible organizations. Some of the opportunity areas I’m keen to focus on include leveraging our leading global supply footprint to unlock more demand for programmatic DOOH, accelerating growth in emerging markets, and delivering innovative offerings that complement existing buyer and seller tools with more data, analytics, and insights. Additional opportunities include:

  • Combining our industry-leading monetization and technology solutions to unlock more value for media owners
  • Expanding our PerView offering to new markets and customers
  • Simplifying how buyers and sellers can layer the benefits of programmatic onto direct buys
  • Technical innovations that open up new sources of demand for DOOH inventory

What excites you most about joining Broadsign at this moment, and how do you see our combined strengths accelerating innovation in DOOH?

This is a fascinating moment in the industry. What was once a market made up largely of independent players has shifted, with many of those companies now having been acquired by larger players. Those new partnerships have manifested different strategies and challenges: some players are now focused on building omnichannel advertising platforms, drawing their focus away from OOH. Others face the challenge of being owned and controlled by a large publisher, which can pose a potential conflict of interest in the eyes of other publishers.

The combination of Broadsign and Place Exchange creates the most comprehensive solution in the industry for managing and monetizing OOH inventory, instantly amassing the largest global aggregation of programmatic supply and demand, and bringing together the two most talented and respected teams in the industry. Those “raw ingredients” alone are extremely compelling. But unlike our competitors, we are the only company that is both focused solely on OOH and not owned or controlled by a large publisher. I think that focus, independence, and objectivity put us in a unique position to succeed if we can deliver what our clients and partners need. 

What are the biggest opportunities ahead as we work toward a unified SSP for media owners and buyers?

The media landscape is not just fragmenting in terms of the number of channels; it is becoming more advanced (and complex) in terms of the technical capabilities and consumer experiences that each channel can deliver. Think of CTV, with innovations like shoppable overlays, pause ads, and product placements; or gaming with in-world ads, branded skins, and rewarded video – those are just a few examples of how individual channels are transforming. With location data, real-time dynamic creative triggers, anamorphic ads, augmented reality, and more, OOH is no different.

To me, that means the role of SSPs will need to evolve beyond a connection pathway between supply and demand, towards the development of channel-specific technology that helps media owners and buyers ideate, develop, scale, monetize, and optimize consumer experiences that deliver growth for publishers and results for advertisers. In other words, a strategic technology partner to navigate the complex new landscape that is emerging. That is the real opportunity of the “new SSP,” and our combined business puts us in a strong position to deliver against it.

As we look to unify our SSP technology, what guidance can you give customers on what to expect?

If you are already integrated with Place Exchange – on the supply side or the demand side – expect the same, but more. The same high-performing technology, but with more ideas and innovations to grow your business. The same excellent service, but with even more tools and resources to support you. The same level of premium demand and supply, but more of it. 

If you are a partner of the Broadsign SSP that will be migrating to Place Exchange, expect the best of both worlds – to keep the features and benefits you have today, while opening up new opportunities for innovation and growth. We will provide a glide path for our partners to deliver a smooth and seamless transition, along with the chance to explore how we can open up your integration to even more scale. 

Programmatic DOOH has undergone significant shifts over the past few years. What trends do you think will define 2026 and beyond?

There are three interesting trends that I think will shape 2026 and beyond, all of which saw seeds planted in 2025.

First, I think OOH media owners will increasingly embrace programmatic across their business. Historically (in all channels), the push for programmatic was usually led by the buy-side, given the massive buyer benefits it brings in terms of targeting, measurement, and efficiency. As traction grows, the benefits to the sell-side become more apparent: programmatic is not just a sales channel but a technology that can deliver benefits across all sales channels, including direct. In other channels, programmatic started off focused on non-guaranteed buying, but over time, the hybrid benefits of programmatic guaranteed (PG) buying became evident. In 2025, we saw forward-leaning publishers embrace buyer demand for PG with tremendous success, and I think PG / in-advance buying will cross the chasm in 2026. While it may take a few years to overtake non-guaranteed buying, I think that will happen in the not-too-distant future. 

Second, I think we will see a lot more intentional demand for DOOH inventory coming from other media channels. By that, I mean CTV buyers looking to buy CTV inventory in public places (for example, during live events), retail media buyers looking to buy retail media in stores at the point of decision-making purchase, and audio buyers looking to buy broadcast audio inventory heard by many people instead of a single person on a personal device. The challenge, however, is that a “regular” programmatic DOOH integration won’t cut it; to meet the needs of these CTV or retail or audio buyers, we have to instrument the connections to DOOH inventory differently and with full transparency across the value chain. We spearheaded innovations in all of these areas in 2025, proving the revenue potential is there, and I think 2026 will begin to see these new demand sources scale.

Lastly, I think a lot of focus in 2026 will go towards understanding exactly how AI interacts with programmatic. The initial hype cycle has (naturally) focused on the many opportunities, which are likely to be fundamentally transformative for the industry. But what’s received less attention thus far are the many challenges and risks that AI-driven media buying could bring. I think 2026 will be the year where important work gets done, rolling up sleeves to build, test and learn where, when and how AI can go beyond press releases and snazzy demos and begin to come up alongside billions of dollars of ad spend to add real value to the business of advertising.

What data advancements or opportunities are you most optimistic about as we start 2026?

We’ve proven that the impact of OOH – at any stage of the funnel – can be measured like any other channel. That’s a big deal and leaps ahead of where the industry was not too long ago. The challenge is that measurement still requires separate, siloed data, systems, and processes (e.g., one-off measurement studies). 

Programmatic has already unified targeting, creative, and execution of OOH with other channels – measurement is next. Imagine if you could report on the impact of an OOH campaign without having to set up and run a separate measurement study; instead, what if OOH performance just automagically showed up in the systems and methods buyers use to measure the performance of every other channel they buy? The ability to unify the data and measurement for OOH with other channels is probably the last major hurdle to OOH capturing a larger share of ad spend. I don’t think we’ll get to that endgame in 2026, but I believe we’ll make some big moves in that direction.

Stay tuned for more news and insights from Broadsign and Place Exchange on the Broadsign blog.

Product News | October 11, 2021

OOH in 2026: Key trends shaping the next era of out-of-home advertising

Out-of-home (OOH) advertising continues to gain momentum as marketers seek real-world reach that complements digital channels. With total OOH revenue surpassing $9 billion last year, growth is being fueled by consistent year-over-year gains and the rapid expansion of digital formats.

That momentum shows no signs of slowing. Digital out-of-home (DOOH) now represents a significant and rapidly growing share of the market, projected to account for 45.2% of total OOH ad spend by 2028, up from just 22.0% in 2016. As brands lean into more dynamic, data-enabled executions, investment in DOOH is expected to continue rising. And by 2026, programmatic DOOH (pDOOH) spend is projected to reach into the billions, reflecting a broader shift toward automated buying and audience-based activation that’s making OOH more measurable, addressable, and integral.

As we look ahead to 2026, the question is no longer whether OOH belongs in omnichannel strategies, but how it continues to evolve. From automation and audience-first planning to tentpole moments and retail media, the trends shaping the year ahead point to a channel that’s becoming smarter, more intentional, and more accountable than ever before.

Dynamic creative will move from experimentation to strategy

Dynamic creative optimization (DCO) gained real momentum last year as more media buyers leaned into its ability to make DOOH campaigns more relevant and responsive. Stronger support from media owners and technology platforms helped remove friction, making it easier to activate dynamic creative at scale and extend impact in the physical world.

In 2026, campaigns will increasingly rely on data signals like location, time of day, weather, and product availability to adapt messaging in real time. This shift will move brands beyond one-size-fits-all creative toward ads that better reflect audience context and intent at the moment of exposure. While executing DCO in DOOH will still require coordination across buyers, media owners, and platforms, along with early alignment on creative approvals, the groundwork laid by DSPs, SSPs, and publishers will make dynamic execution far more practical and scalable than in years past.

Looking ahead, DCO is moving from experimentation to strategy. As buyers become more comfortable with the technology and workflows continue to improve, execution will be faster, easier, and more cost-efficient. At the same time, AI will play a more active role in the creative process, accelerating ideation and enabling variations at scale, expanding what’s possible with DCO and supporting more always-on, data-driven DOOH strategies.

Automation will unlock more ways to buy OOH

Programmatic already dominates display advertising, with guaranteed transactions accounting for a growing share of spend, and OOH is beginning to follow the same trajectory. Over the past year, guaranteed OOH buying has gained momentum as inventory digitization, more mature programmatic guaranteed tools, and automated in-advance booking have come together. That shift is expected to accelerate in 2026, making it easier to secure premium OOH inventory programmatically while preserving the certainty of direct deals.

As buying tools evolve, planners are increasingly managing guaranteed and non-guaranteed OOH from a single platform, choosing the right mix of RTB, PMP, PG, and in-advance models to match campaign goals. This flexibility allows OOH to be planned alongside CTV, mobile, and online video using familiar workflows, shared KPIs, and consistent reporting. At the same time, automation is raising expectations across the ecosystem, with advertisers seeking the same seamless, data-driven experience they get from other programmatic channels, supported by standardized workflows, faster execution, and greater transparency that help lower barriers for new and mid-sized buyers.

In 2026, automated, in-advance transactions stand out as one of the most meaningful shifts in OOH buying. While real-time bidding introduced flexibility, there’s still a need to secure high-demand inventory well ahead of time. In-advance automation closes that gap, combining the certainty of direct deals with the efficiency of programmatic infrastructure. As this year unfolds, it’s expected to move from an emerging option to a standard part of OOH planning, reshaping how premium inventory is secured and how the channel fits into omnichannel strategies.

Retail media will push OOH closer to the point of purchase

Retail media continues its rapid rise, and this year, OOH will play a larger role in how brands influence shoppers along the path to purchase. As retailers seek new revenue streams and rethink the in-store experience, retail environments are evolving from static aisles into dynamic, data-driven media channels where messaging can adapt in real time.

Digital screens at entrances, in aisles, and near high-intent areas like pharmacies or checkout zones allow brands to reach shoppers when purchase decisions are being made. In 2026, these in-store networks are expected to expand further, adding more touchpoints and supporting creative that adapts based on store context, time of day, or product availability.

Yet many media buyers still underestimate the value of retailer first-party data in powering smarter OOH targeting and measurement. Retailers hold rich insights tied directly to purchase behaviour, and when ad exposure can be connected to real sales outcomes, OOH gains a clear advantage as retail media budgets continue to grow. As in-store OOH becomes more tightly integrated with broader retail media networks and off-site channels, screens near and inside stores are increasingly proving their ability to drive measurable outcomes, not just impressions.

Audience-first planning and measurement reshape the medium

Out-of-home is entering a new phase in 2026, defined less by physical locations and more by the audiences and moments brands want to reach. Rather than planning around where screens sit, marketers are focusing on real-world moments that align with audience mindset and intent. As a result, success is being measured beyond reach and impressions, with greater emphasis on signals like dwell time, interaction, visitation, and experiential impact that better reflect how OOH performs within the omnichannel journey.

First-party data is central to this shift. Brands are bringing insights from their own customers, loyalty programs, and digital touchpoints into DOOH planning, using signals like shopping patterns, app usage, and purchase intent to guide when, where, and how messages appear. When paired with contextual signals such as time of day, location type, and environmental triggers, DOOH creative can feel timely and relevant without being intrusive, enabling more dynamic, moment-driven messaging.

At the same time, evolving DSP capabilities are making it easier to activate first-party data consistently across digital, CTV, mobile, and DOOH within unified workflows. This alignment helps maintain consistent audience definitions across channels and brings OOH earlier into the planning cycle using familiar performance frameworks.

Tentpole moments will take center stage

2026 is shaping up to be a defining year for tentpole moments, with global events like the Olympics and the FIFA World Cup driving not just scale, but a shift in how brands approach cultural moments. Rather than treating these events as single-day activations, marketers are increasingly planning around extended arcs, building anticipation, capitalizing on peak moments, and sustaining momentum after the event ends.

This shift is pushing OOH earlier in the planning process. High-impact inventory near transit hubs, fan zones, retail corridors, and entertainment districts will be secured well in advance as brands look to lock in presence where attention naturally concentrates and avoid last-minute scarcity.

At the same time, OOH is expected to play a stronger role in extending omnichannel tentpole campaigns. Brands will use OOH to reinforce messaging already live across CTV, mobile, retail media, and social, bringing digital narratives into the physical world at moments of peak attention. This continuity helps bridge online exposure with real-world action, supporting outcomes like foot traffic, in-store activity, and app engagement.

Looking ahead: Why this is a defining year for OOH

As 2026 gets underway, out-of-home is being shaped less by where ads appear and more by how thoughtfully they’re planned, activated, and measured. Automation is bringing OOH into the conversation earlier, creative is becoming more purposeful, and audience-led planning is changing how brands show up in the real world, signalling a more mature and powerful channel.

As OOH becomes easier to buy and integrate alongside other channels, it’s moving from a supporting role to a more strategic one, opening the door for brands, agencies, and media owners to rethink what OOH can do in 2026.

Ready to explore how DOOH can elevate your next campaign? Contact us to learn more about planning and activating DOOH media.