Digital Signage: Why It's Essential for Your Business in 2025
November 18, 2024
In 2025, digital signage emerges as a crucial tool for transforming business communication. This powerful visual tool allows you to modernize interactions with your employees, customers, and visitors by offering attractive, personalized, and instantly updatable content. Whether it's attracting the attention of passersby in your storefront, efficiently informing visitors in a waiting room, or strengthening your brand image in a corporate space, digital signage meets diverse needs with unmatched flexibility.
In businesses, it plays a key role in enhancing the customer experience and boosting team engagement. With intuitive digital solutions, it becomes easy to broadcast impactful messages that capture attention and enrich communication. In a world where responsiveness and innovation are paramount, integrating digital signage into your strategy is an essential choice.
Discover how a digital signage solution can transform your communication today.
What is digital signage?
Definition and basic principles
Digital signage is a technology based on connected digital screens, designed to broadcast visual, interactive, and customizable content. Unlike traditional signage, it enables instant updates of messages, ensuring relevant and engaging communication at all times.
In businesses, digital signage plays a strategic role. For internal communication, it facilitates the sharing of key information, strengthens employee engagement, and supports the dissemination of organizational values and culture. Whether displaying announcements, results, or news, it creates a more connected and motivating environment.
Externally, it enhances the company’s image and identity through modern and attractive visual presentations. This tool helps project an innovative image while capturing the attention of visitors, clients, or partners, making it an essential solution for effective and impactful communication.
The content distribution and screen network management are handled through a digital signage software, which oversees the entire system. This software provides complete control!
Additionally, a player may be needed to manage local displays. These players ensure optimal performance and control of the display. They can be plug-and-play or require more advanced configuration. Some players, like our Disign player, are available for under €100.
For more modern screens, depending on the embedded technology, no player is required. The digital signage software application can be directly installed on the screen. In such cases, no additional hardware is necessary.
To summarize, here’s what you need to get started:
- A screen
- A digital signage software
- A player (optional)
- An internet connection: Many digital signage software solutions can operate offline, ensuring uninterrupted management even during connection disruptions.
Types of digital signage and interactive displays
Digital signage encompasses a wide range of devices tailored to various uses and environments. Touchscreens enable direct interaction with content, offering users an immersive and engaging experience. Interactive kiosks are especially useful for navigation, information retrieval, or browsing product catalogs in stores or public spaces.
Digital totems, with their imposing design, are ideal for lobbies, trade shows, or commercial areas, instantly capturing visitors' attention. Lastly, outdoor touchscreens and kiosks provide weather-resistant solutions, perfect for outdoor environments requiring durability and interactivity.
A modern digital signage software must be compatible with all these devices, regardless of the manufacturer, ensuring smooth and centralized management of interactive and visual content. This flexibility is crucial for meeting diverse business needs.
Why is digital signage essential in 2025?
A modernized external communication tool
In 2025, digital signage has become an indispensable tool for modernizing external communication. It offers a unique opportunity to strengthen brand image and capture attention effectively through modern, animated screens that instantly engage passersby and visitors.
Modern image and increased appeal
A well-placed dynamic screen creates a lasting memorable first impression. It conveys a sense of innovation and professionalism, attracting new customers. Whether it’s animated storefronts for shops, digital totems in lobbies, or interactive displays at points of sale, digital signage enlivens your spaces and draws attention. By enhancing the user experience, it enriches the customer journey while showcasing your products or services.
Navigation, signage, and user experience
Interactive kiosks and digital totems provide effective solutions for guiding visitors in complex locations such as shopping malls, train stations, or hospitals. These tools simplify navigation and enhance the user experience, while delivering essential information, like schedules, events, or important messages, clearly and promptly.
Decoration and immersive ambiance
Digital signage goes beyond information sharing; it contributes to enhancing your premises. Screens can display immersive videos, inspiring visuals, or personalized atmospheres, transforming your spaces into modern and welcoming environments. Whether in public or private spaces, indoors or outdoors (DOOH, Digital Out Of Home), these tools create a unique experience.
Content diversification and precise targeting
With digital signage, businesses can broadcast a wide variety of content: promotional videos, real-time news, brand storytelling, or personalized messages tailored to the context (POT - Point Of Transit or POW - Point Of Wait). This precise targeting helps reach the right audience, in the right place, at the right time, boosting the effectiveness of communication campaigns.
Adaptability and scalability
Whether you are a small business or a large organization managing a network of screens across multiple locations, digital signage adapts to your needs. It offers a scalable and connected solution for remotely managing content, ensuring smooth and effective external communication across all your touchpoints.
Digital signage isn’t just a tool—it’s a revolution that enhances your business’s value and grabs attention in a world oversaturated with visual messages.
Enhanced internal communication
Digital signage is much more than an external communication tool. Internally, it provides unique opportunities to transform how businesses engage with their teams. With its modern features and strong visual impact, digital signage boosts employee engagement, increases involvement, and helps build a strong and cohesive corporate culture.
Collaborative engagement: motivate and involve teams
One of the main advantages of digital signage is its ability to capture attention and spark employees' interest. With a retention rate of 52% for screen-displayed messages, compared to only 10% for traditional displays, it’s an effective way to share important information clearly and attractively.
Screens can showcase motivational content, such as project progress, achieved goals, or recent successes like winning a major contract. Celebrating collective or individual achievements, such as anniversaries or milestones, fosters team spirit and creates a positive work environment.
By launching challenges or sharing messages that value employees’ efforts, digital signage helps motivate, unify, and involve staff around the company’s values and objectives. This participatory dynamic improves workplace morale and boosts collective performance.
Strengthening corporate culture
Digital signage is also a powerful tool for conveying company values and strengthening its identity. Creative, humorous, or emotional content can be displayed to unite teams around shared projects and inspire a sense of belonging. Screens can showcase strategic achievements, internal initiatives, or messages about the company’s core values.
This visual communication helps create a strong and cohesive corporate culture where employees feel valued and involved. They are more likely to align with strategic goals and embrace the organization’s broader vision.
Employer branding: attracting new talent
A well-crafted and modernized internal communication strategy also enhances the company’s appeal. Well-integrated digital screens project an innovative and engaging image that attracts candidates seeking a connected and motivating work environment. Digital signage becomes an asset for employer branding, helping attract top talent.
Harmonized and scalable communication
One major advantage of digital signage is its ability to centralize and automate internal communication. Managers can update content remotely, ensuring consistency and uniformity of messages. Essential information—such as KPIs, schedules, inventory levels, or promotions—can be automatically updated through the company’s information system.
This ensures that all employees, regardless of location, have access to the same information simultaneously, strengthening organizational cohesion. By replacing traditional displays, digital signage modernizes and streamlines internal communication while adapting to evolving business needs.
In summary, digital signage is an essential tool for motivating, unifying, and involving your teams, while solidifying the culture and coherence of your internal communication. A modern and strategic solution to transform your employees’ daily experience.
External communication: examples of placements
Digital signage adapts to a wide variety of locations to meet specific needs. Each space benefits from tailored, engaging, and relevant visual communication.
Digital storefront signage
Storefronts are a prime location to grab the attention of passersby and attract potential customers. With high-brightness screens, you can display promotions, new products, or captivating animations. Stores, real estate agencies, and shopping center storefronts frequently use these tools to maximize visibility. However, choose professional-grade monitors with automatic brightness settings to avoid glare and ensure optimal performance day and night.
Digital signage in waiting areas
In waiting rooms, digital signage is an excellent way to entertain and inform visitors. Educational videos, news updates, or promotional messages improve the client experience while making wait times feel shorter. This approach is highly popular in medical offices, salons, and garages, turning waiting moments into opportunities for effective communication.
Restaurant digital signage
Restaurants greatly benefit from digital menus, which simplify updating daily specials or promotions. Whether for drive-thrus or dine-in areas, screens can also tell the restaurant’s story or highlight specific dishes. Digital menus are attractive for their flexibility and ability to capture customers’ attention.
Educational institution digital signage
In schools, digital signage simplifies sharing important information, such as class schedules, event announcements, or institutional messages. These digital boards, often located in hallways, libraries, or common areas, enable modern, centralized communication while blending seamlessly into educational settings.
Pharmacy digital signage
Pharmacies use digital signage to promote health tips, discounted products, or operating hours. By optimizing waiting areas with engaging and informative content, they enhance the customer experience while reinforcing their image as accessible healthcare professionals.
Retail digital signage
In retail stores, digital signage energizes the customer experience. Interactive storefronts, product demonstrations, and in-aisle screens create an immersive shopping journey. Modern and appealing, these solutions contribute to revenue growth while supporting promotional strategies.
Key trends in digital signage for 2025
Artificial intelligence and personalization
Artificial intelligence (AI) is revolutionizing the field of digital signage. By 2025, AI will play a key role in numerous tasks related to digital signage.
Digital signage software is already capable of analyzing real-time data from sensors or external databases to adjust displayed content. However, AI will further enable content creation and seamless adaptation to available data. For example, an advertisement can change based on the weather: showcasing promotions for winter clothing during cold days or refreshing beverages on hot days. Additionally, AI will allow for dynamic content management, automatically updating messages based on predefined schedules (dates, times, specific events, etc.), significantly simplifying content updates.
In reality, digital signage software is already highly efficient in handling these tasks, but generative AI takes this to a new level by automatically creating content. This eliminates the need for manual preparation.
Another area where AI is making significant strides is content creation. Generative AI tools enable the swift production of text, images, and soon even videos. This opens up a wide range of possibilities for marketing teams, who can now produce visual content in large quantities at lower costs. The ability to generate visuals in seconds is a major advancement, allowing companies to adapt quickly to marketing needs and ever-changing trends. Businesses must be ready to fully leverage these innovations to maximize their visual and engaging impact on customers.
Immersive and interactive experiences
Customer experiences in 2025 will increasingly be immersive and interactive. Touch screens, interactive kiosks, and augmented reality (AR) will become essential components of digital signage, allowing customers to directly engage with content. These technologies aim to enhance engagement and create more personalized, engaging experiences for users.
Integrating interactivity into digital signage not only captures attention but also addresses the growing demand for consumer autonomy. Touch screens enable users to search for information, personalize their experience, or even complete specific actions, such as making purchases or requesting information. Augmented reality takes this a step further by allowing customers to interact with virtual objects or access additional information by overlaying digital elements onto their real-world environment.
To ensure these technologies function effectively, digital signage software must support application creation and seamless integration with third-party solutions. Communication between the signage system and other business applications should be smooth and transparent. APIs (application programming interfaces) and webhooks (to trigger specific actions in other applications) are crucial tools in this process. Additionally, SDKs (software development kits) enable easy integration of third-party applications into digital signage systems, delivering tailor-made solutions for each business.
Integrated omnichannel strategy
By 2025, digital signage will integrate into a connected omnichannel strategy. To stay competitive, businesses must synchronize their physical screens with their digital campaigns by connecting displays to social media, CRM systems, and other marketing tools. This omnichannel integration ensures a consistent message across all channels, delivering a seamless and fluid experience for consumers, whether they interact with the brand online or in the real world.
The use of QR codes and interactive elements is becoming a powerful way to connect digital signage to users' smartphones. For example, in-store digital signage can display a QR code that, when scanned, redirects users to a specific webpage, exclusive offer, or additional feature. Touch screens allow customers to directly access the content they need autonomously, thanks to the integration of third-party services via APIs.
This omnichannel approach not only ensures smoother and more personalized communication but also tracks user interactions with displayed content. This generates valuable data that businesses can analyze to refine their marketing strategies and deliver even more targeted and engaging customer experiences.
Which digital signage software suits your needs?
A complete and intuitive solution
When choosing digital signage software for your business, one of the most important criteria is combining ease of use with powerful management features. With SaaS (Software as a Service) solutions like Disign, you gain access to a simple and intuitive dashboard for managing all your connected screens directly from the cloud. This solution allows you to centralize and seamlessly manage your content while optimizing the operation of your screen network, regardless of the number of locations you oversee.
The software should make it easy to orchestrate content, meet the specific needs of your digital signage project, and maintain the operational condition of your entire screen network. Its flexibility and user-friendly interface also enable the right teams to be involved in the project.
Your IT department's involvement is essential, as digital signage extends beyond simple visual content management. It is also a technical project involving security, data management, and integration with other systems. Your IT team must ensure that equipment is correctly installed, configured, and secured to guarantee continuous and flawless content distribution.
The communications team plays a vital role in creating and distributing visual messages, ensuring the content aligns with the brand's identity and communication strategy—whether internal or external. Finally, your business teams, with their industry-specific expertise, can identify relevant needs and determine the right information to display to reach your target audience.
Adaptable to all use cases
A digital signage solution must be flexible enough to adapt to various use cases. Whether managing a restaurant, a waiting room, or an interactive storefront, Disign is designed to meet these needs while offering an all-in-one solution. You are not limited to a single application or industry—the software adjusts based on the space, the content to display, and the communication goals.
When selecting your solution, it’s essential to consider future needs beyond immediate requirements. Evaluate the software’s evolution roadmap and the frequency of new feature rollouts. Are user requests taken into account when planning updates?
The ability to grow alongside your digital signage software is critical, especially in a constantly changing industry. Real-time monitoring and control systems are also essential to ensure all screens and players function properly. This capability allows for remote actions such as software updates, equipment reboots, or addressing other technical aspects of your screen network.
Dedicated customer support
Another crucial factor when choosing digital signage software is customer support. With SaaS solutions like Disign, you benefit from personalized assistance and responsive support to ensure your project’s success. Technical support is a determining factor in the success of a digital signage project. A solution free from technical debt—that is, one that doesn’t require complex updates or heavy maintenance—lets your business focus on its core activities while relying on a reliable and scalable system.
The Disign support team is passionate about digital signage and committed to providing quick responses and tailored solutions. Their expertise will help you fully harness the potential of your digital signage solution while guiding you throughout your journey.
conclusion
Digital signage is a powerful asset for modernizing your company’s external and internal communication. With interactive screens, personalized content, and centralized management via SaaS software, you can optimize both customer and employee experiences. Whether it’s energizing your storefronts, informing visitors in waiting areas, or strengthening your company culture, digital signage allows you to address diverse needs while remaining flexible and scalable.
With Disign, enjoy a simple and intuitive interface that lets you manage your content from the cloud, along with personalized support to guide you through every step of your project.
Discover today how Disign can revolutionize your communication! Try our solution for free and easily begin your transition to modern and dynamic signage management.