Is digital outdoor living up to the hype?

Consumers writing billboard copy by SMS; content downloads via Bluetooth; branded games played on giant open-air screens; at the cutting edge, the world of digital outdoor is one of marketing’s most exciting frontiers. But to what extent is Asia’s digital outdoor industry living up to the hype?

In this regard, Asia is much like the rest of the world: while some truly impressive examples of digital outdoor execution exist, they remain the exception rather than the rule. And while spend on digital outdoor is undoubtedly growing, there remain significant hurdles to more widespread adoption.

The question of how much is actually being spent on digital outdoor is one of the hardest to answer. Few organisations track digital outdoor as a sub-sector of outdoor; there are too many types of screen, too many vendors and too much overlap with traditional outdoor to make it easy to research. Chris O’Donnell, CEO Asia-Pacific at Kinetic, points to figures from research firm PQ Media that show digital outdoor spend having reached US$2.2 billion in 2009, up from $1 billion in 2004, translating into annual growth of 16.9 per cent. By way of comparison, GroupM estimates the total outdoor market in the region at $13 billion in 2009.

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The full article was originally published as part of the Outdoor Report in the 25 March 2010 issue of Media.