The 5 Best Digital Signage Players [Ranked]
Digital signage kits let you automatically, wirelessly and remotely manage the television and monitor displays in your business (Source).
This makes it super easy to keep your customers informed about your store hours, pricing changes, social media feeds, and much more.
Best of all these, are pretty cheap devices that come with quality support, particularly the teams at Oalla and doPublicity.
Digital signage kits are a great and efficient way of displaying information to your customers. Perhaps you run a restaurant, movie theater, police station- running a digital signage kit can dramatically cut down the time required to provide customer service and support (Source).
Our Top Pick: The SmartSign2go Digital Signage Player
- Easy to use, plug and play setup lets you turn any TV with an HDMI port into a digital sign for your business
Many consumers are unaware of how modern, intuitive and responsive these devices have become the past several years.
They are now wireless and remotely accessible, with strong product support teams behind them ready to assist you with technical support.
SmartSign2go Video Overview
Contents
Comparing The Options
| The Kits | Price | Our Rating | Dimensions | Weight | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
  | The KDLINKS Digital HD Signage Media Player | $ | 4.1 | 9 x 2.5 x 6.5 inches | 2.9 pounds |
  | The Monitors AnyWhere Digital Signage Display Kit | $$ | 4.2 | 3.7 x 3.7 x 0.8 inches | 1.7 pounds |
  | The VideoTel Digital Media Player | $$ | 3.9 | 4 x 1 x 3.1 inches | 1.4 pounds |
  | The doPublicity Digital Signage Player | $$$ | 4.3 | 5.6 x 3.8 x 0.8 inches | 0.6 pounds |
  | The SmartSign2go Digital Signage Player | $$ | 4.5 | 5.75 x 3.8 x 0.94 inches | 1.3 lbs |
DoPublicity Interface Demo
Signage Advantages
- Digital signage kits frequently like the doPublicity model include hundreds or even thousands of fully customizable templates.
- Suitable for a wide variety of needs, from restaurant menu boards, to generic event promotions, community slideshows, live weather condition displays, and innumerable other options.
- They enable you to remotely manage a TV or computer monitor using a phone, tablet or PC, and across all modern operating systems like Windows, Android and Mac.
- Automatic displays of your stored content- even if there is no Internet connection.
doPublicity Customer Feedback
- One doPublicity purchaser is actually the IT manager of a police department. He writes that he uses one of the digital signage players in the lobby to display important information for those entering the police station.
- Another player is located closer to the sergeant on staff and displays department policies, photos, community notifications, news and weather updates-he loves that they are an inexpensive solution to disseminate important information to the public.
- Another customer who purchased the doPublicity digital signage kit runs an Indian restaurant and uses the displays to feature happy hour specials. He comments that set up was easy and that all you do is upload his pictures from his computer to be doPublicity website to get started.
- He also appreciated that the signage kit was able to connect via Wi-Fi to his router that was over 50 feet away in a back office.
- Many consumers were also satisfied with the doPublicity warranty and technical support.
- One writes that all of his concerns and technical problems were addressed quickly and efficiently.
Oalla Customer Feedback
- The Oalla digital signage kit is an especially robust option that includes a variety of apps like menus, an Instagram feed, Twitter feed, RSS feeds, webpage displays as well as a ton of different templates that can be customized images and text.
- The Oalla is also equipped to play videos through YouTube. One user to purchase the Oalla digital signage kit runs several movie theaters.
- He writes that he had needed to upgrade his concession menus into something more modern and digital.
- He lauded their customer service as well as the quality of the product and reports that even though he is used several of the kids nonstop for several years but they still continue to run smoothly.
- An important consideration for him was the user interface, since he frequently has to update prices, change movie theater items, adjust social media settings and he is happy at how responsive and quick the digital signage kits are to update.
- A particularly cool feature that he enjoyed was the ability to run polls through his digital signage kit-enabling him to ask which movies his movie theater customers enjoy the most as they waited online to purchase concession food.
- Another Oalla reviewer writes that they love it because it is wireless and doesn't require any network cables, merely a power plug and an HDMI input.
- They also appreciate that is web driven and not a screen casting or screen sharing device- it actually pulls content from your account but you run apps, which is a modern solution.
- The ability to schedule which apps run when and have multiple apps on screen at a time is another fantastic solution that the Oalla provides.
- Finally another plus for the Oalla is that it is constantly being improved.
- A dedicated team of developers solicits customer feedback and delivers new product features, which is great if you're planning to make a long-term investment in this particular digital signage kit.
Top Factors To Consider When Choosing a Digital Signage Menu Board
To win your audience, you have to consider branding your digital signage before even deciding on the content that will appear on your screen.
This will also enable you to expand your branding opportunity and to reach out to a wider audience. To enhance your branding, you should be able to make maximum use of all possible screens, from desktops to mobile devices. This will enable your network to meet communication and marketing needs.
When it comes choosing a digital signage menu board for your business, you have to identify the necessary tools to get the best results. Choosing the right menu board to adapt to your restaurant will help to improve your business in terms of automation, advertising and inventory control among other areas. When it comes to selection, there are some factors that you have to consider to streamline your daily operations.
Some of these factors include:
The level of brightness
Consider this factor if you want to install an outdoor screen. Go for a screen that is readable in sunlight, preferably not standard screens. Finding a screen that provides additional brightness will help to enhance your display.
Another essential factor to consider is the glare of your screen. Get a screen that won’t make glare an issue because of blurriness. In this case, a glossy screen with a matte touch up would do fine.
Weatherproof factor
For a menu board that you plan to install outdoors, you have to ensure that the board is not affected by weather. In this case, you have two options. You can decide to house your menu board – this works best for traditional display. If it’s a modern display, you should opt for a screen that is specifically designed to work outdoors.
Considerations and preferences
With advancements in technology, digital menu boards are becoming more and more popular. Your tastes and preferences will also guide you in choosing a board that will best suit your interests. You might want to consider other additional factors such as size and shape. To find a unique display technology in your premises, you will have to go for something with unique features.
The refresh rate
You do not want your displays to have crisp motions. Display technologies such as menu boards usually have content that is relatively static. Thus, you can go for standard refresh rate.
Size of the screen
You will want your display texts to be easily readable, not just for people standing close to the screen, but also for those who are several feet away from it. The screen should also be viewed with the utmost comfort without straining. When talking about size, you have to consider other factors such as:
- The number of items that you’ll need to display
- The viewing distance
- The available wall space
The type of screen
You should ensure that you choose the best monitor for your digital menu board. As much as LEDs are always a bit more expensive than LCDs, LEDs are a far much better option because of their pros which include:
- Generating less heat
- Less power consumption
- Lightweight that makes installation easier
Before installing any digital menu board for your restaurant or business, you need to know what you are seeking to achieve. Is the system meant for product promotion? Are you attempting to educate your audience? Are you aiming at getting higher sales and engaging your customers more? You should be able to answer such questions before having the technology installed.
If you are seeking to make the most profits out of the display technology that you attempt to employ, you should consider digital signage to shoot up your sales.
Location of the boards
Ensure that you identify a strategic position to install your digital menu board – a place where your audience can quickly view your displayed texts even from a far distance or amidst crowds. The signage should be very much visible.
The quality of content to be displayed
Digital signage does not mean that you have to employ the best restaurant menu board signs and the most expensive technology. As a business manager or owner, you can have the best equipment but lacking the content to display will not be profitable. If you do not possess the necessary skills that are required, you should consider working with a content creator or writer who is familiar with the industry.
Control and management of the signage technology
Having more than one location means that, you have to have one centralized control system to control all the content that will be displayed on the menu board. This will help to save time and eliminate the hassle of controlling content from different locations.
What is digital signage?
Wikipedia defines digital signage as a sub segment of signage. Wow, that's helpful.
They further helpfully explain that digital signage utilizes technologies like LED, LCD as well as projection technology to display different types of content that includes streaming media, information images and video.
They note that digital signage is frequently found in public spaces-these include retail stores, corporate lobbies, using and transportation systems to enable customers to find their way more easily, learn about exhibitions store hours, and receive marketing information.
Wikipedia also describes an industry shift as more and more businesses opt to use digital signage as opposed to static signage like billboards.
Because digital signs can be remotely updated using a content management system and because of the interactive capacities of modern digital signage equipment, which includes high-tech touchscreens, image capture, and movement detection, they are seriously trending in popularity.
While the term digital sign has become the term of the realm, some industry insiders still preferred terms like place-based media, digital media networks, narrow casting and screen media. An interesting fact is that China currently is the world leader in digital sign displays. And ABI research reports that the digital sign market is poised to grow 33% in 2009.
As well, Nielsen has claimed that digital signage screens inside the United States have produced more than 237 million monthly exposures.
The most common purposes for exposure include the presentation and application of digital signs for:
- building brands,
- advertising,
- restaurant menu information,
- internal corporate promotions,
- customer behavior influencing,
- customer experience enhancing,
- dressing room fashion applications,
- public information display
Most commonly the sign displays are on LCD, plasma screens, projection screens for LED boards. While JPEG and MPEG-4 videos have persevered as the predominant means of digital content formats for the industry.
