Point of Sale Advertising: Everything You Need to Know

Running a business is no easy feat. You probably have a million and one problems to deal with daily—from marketing to logistics and operations. To make matters worse, each sale gives you the mammoth task of managing printed receipts, overnight inventory checks, and endless pricing calculations.

This takes up a massive chunk of time and energy, so you can’t focus on the more high-value aspects of your business. Frustrating, isn’t it?

Enter PoS (point of sale) systems, a sure-fire solution to tackling this problem. PoS display software empowers retailers to capture a buyer’s attention with eye-catching visuals, thus boosting sales and top-of-mind recall.

It has evolved from a basic cash register and shelf display into a power-packed dashboard of business solutions. In fact, retail businesses have been able to scale in the blink of an eye with PoS, boosting sales by almost 200%.

PoS vs. PoP Advertising

Some people use Point of Sale and Point of Purchase interchangeably, but they aren’t the same. PoS is where a customer pays for products (think cash registers). On the other hand, PoP is where customers make their purchasing decisions. You would have probably noticed PoS displays laden with discounted products in certain parts of your local grocery store. Coca-Cola is one brand known for its innovative PoS displays.

But how do you hit the mark with PoS advertising? It’s easy—embrace the digital revolution.

A wide array of digital PoS solutions allow you to display and promote your products. These are great at driving conversions for quicker business growth. This blog will discuss some innovative ways digital screens can boost your point of sale gains.

Types of Point of Sale Marketing

80% of grocers who have used digital signage in their stores have seen a boost in sales by nearly 33%. Additionally, it increases brand awareness by 47.7%. So, if you’re planning to upgrade your PoS systems, don’t forget to pair them with digital signage.

Here are four types of Point of Sale marketing that can add to your top-of-funnel strategies:

1.PoS advertisement displays

You can use digital signage software for advertising your products through checkout counter screens. This results in what marketers call a “problem recognition response” that leads to impulsive buying.

Let’s say you’re standing at the checkout counter when an ad for a tub of ice cream pops up on the PoS display. This triggers a problem recognition response—do I need to get dessert for after dinner? Your mind will impulsively say yes, and the next thing you know, you’re taking the tub of ice cream back home.

Since PoS ad displays help consumers recognize a problem or need, they work wonders at selling products when consumers have no primary buyer intent. Think about it. Would you impulsively buy a phone worth $500 if you saw it on a PoS display? Probably not.

But what if it’s an accessory for your phone that costs just $2? It’ll be in your cart in the blink of an eye. Pencil sharpeners, chocolates, lozenges, and buttons are a few other add-on items you can advertise for a similar result.

2. Product catalogs

Reading through a long list of product names and descriptions isn’t fun. And your customers will think so too. So, present your products in images and brief descriptions to back them up. You can also digitize these PDF catalogs and display them on your website. In fact, McDonald’s is known for their user-friendly point of sale systems that double up as product catalogs.

3. Discounted products

Have you ever read a sign in the store that said “X product, now 80% off,” and considered buying the product even though you didn’t need it? That’s the power of a great deal because everyone loves discounts.

89% of customers named price as a primary factor influencing their purchasing decisions. Trigger your consumer’s desire to purchase using PoS systems that display messages like “Hurry, only 2 items left!”. This will create a sense of urgency and FOMO among buyers.

4. Membership plans Membership plans are always priced sneakily, and customers spend much time weighing the pros and cons of each plan and making the right decision. With digital signage, you can interactively highlight the perks and offerings of all your subscriptions, so your buyers can make decisions on the go.

6 Brilliant PoS Advertising and Marketing Ideas

If you’re running into a brick wall every time you try to think of engaging PoS advertising and marketing strategies, you can use these four ideas as inspiration:

1. Gamify discounts to improve engagement

There are many ways you can use digital signage to play games. Say a new Marvel movie has come out, and you have Marvel-themed products. Hold a contest for buyers through quizzes and reveal a prize like a discount or a freebie. Offer instant rewards like a 25% discount on specific items, or a “Buy 2 get 1 Free deal” with the games.

Digital discounts are exciting ways to gamify promotional campaigns; they allow you to add QR codes to your digital displays. Customers can scan these QR codes to avail of a discount. These can be limited deals, randomized surprise discounts, or even fixed rebates.

2. Display complementary products

Upsell your best-selling products by promoting complementary items on your PoS display. Take a yoga mat, for example. People who buy a yoga mat from you will probably be hunting for other fitness equipment.

Anticipate their needs and promote products they’re likely to buy—resistance bands, weights, track pants, and fitness trackers. This will help you sell more while marketing your store as a one-stop destination for your customer’s needs.

3. Make your PoS ads multilingual

When you create multilingual POS ads, you can appeal to a wider consumer base and invoke a positive emotion in them. 68% of consumers would switch to a different brand that offers support in their native language.

While English is a standard mode of communication, most of us are more comfortable with our native language. Take advantage of this and create PoS solutions that can build long-lasting connections with your customers.

4. Deploy a social wall at the point of sale

With a social wall, you’ll be able to collate various posts from your social media feeds and display them on digital screens. These are easily monetizable, too, as many brands will want to buy space on the wall to increase their visibility.

Another concept would be to include a selfie theme. Ask customers to take selfies of themselves and upload them on their social media accounts with your brand’s hashtag. You can then display these pictures on your social wall. This is a great way to build engagement in the store.

5. Entice customers with product testing booths Set up a product testing booth in various parts of your store. This will improve brand awareness and lead to more conversions. To make your booth stand out, use digital signage solutions to draw attention to your selling products. Make sure the visuals have a clear call to action, so customers know they can avail free samples and discounts on certain products.

When they enter the booth, ask them to try the product and give feedback. If they provide constructive criticism, note it down for later, so you can re-evaluate your business strategy when the time comes.

6. Get in-depth insights with artificial intelligence

Retailers often use facial recognition technology to recognize shoppers by learning their profile, recent order history, buying traits, and more. AI-based PoS systems combined with facial recognition can allow retailers to identify a customer’s age, gender, and emotions.

The AI algorithms then assess these factors to display highly-targeted advertisements in point-of-sale areas. This helps personalize the user’s shopping experience and boosts the retailer’s sales.

The Role Of Digital Signage in Point of Sale Advertising

70% of purchasing decisions are made at the PoS. As a retailer, your job is to capitalize on this by revamping your creative displays with modern digital signage displays. This can help you boost sales through a variety of ways:

• Attract customers: Digital signage attracts the most attention from consumers. After all, a brightly coloured animation is definitely more engaging than a static image with text. By pairing digital signage with your PoS ads, you draw buyer attention to your products at the moment it matters most—just before they make a purchase.

• Display dynamic content: Dynamic content refers to media that can be sourced without much prior planning― these may include user-generated content, syndicated content or information that can update automatically whenever there is new data available. With PoS advertising, you’re aiming to display promotional messages in the most engaging manner. Your priority is the buyer experience. Nothing else.

• Multipurpose solution: No matter how creative your Point of Sale advertising displays are, they are ultimately serving you for one purpose: marketing and promotion. On the contrast, digital displays can serve you in more than one way. PoS digital signs can show marketing content, billing details, queue information, estimated wait time, entertainment content and whatnot.

• Situation-based content update: Updating content with a digital signage software is easy; it doesn’t require the store staff to wait for a whole week or even a whole day to change the content. For instance, if you’re seeing a significant boost in coffee sales, your employees can take a situation-based call and instantly update your store’s PoS advertising displays with content that promotes offers on sugar, milk, coffee mugs, and cookies. This leads them to buy more than what they came for.

Point of Sale Advertising― Beyond Retail

Although PoS advertising is most common in the retail industry, we see a host of other sectors adopting such solutions to increase engagement and top-of-mind awareness. These include:

1. Restaurants After retail, restaurants are hotspots for point of sale displays. You can find all sorts of PoS marketing and advertisements touchpoints such as self-service kiosks, interactive feedback and also interactive digital menu boards.

2. Hotels In a hotel, the point of sale is generally the check-in and check-out area for guests, that is the hotel reception and the hotel lobby. It can also be the hotel restaurant, spas, golf-course, or the gaming lounge. As a hotelier, you could digital reader boards and lobby boards to upsell premium suites, luxury services, and high-end meal courses.

3. Spas Using digital signage for your spas can deliver immersive experiences while advertising the treatments you provide to customers clients. You can display customer testimonials, beauty tips, latest news, HD images and introduce your experienced stylists. Many PoS solutions used by spas can also play soothing music with a built-in media player for better customer experience.

Wrapping it Up

Evidently, Point of Sale advertising and marketing has taken various industries by storm with its uncanny ability to make customers buy more. But in the age of the internet, it’s important to remember traditional PoS systems aren’t enough—you need to upgrade them with digital signage solutions.

Not sure how to get started? Our team at Pickel will be happy to help you draw up your PoS marketing strategy. Reach out to us here.