Junk Research: When Planning A Digital Signage Network, Remember To Consider The Breastfeeding Implications

June 24, 2019 by Dave Haynes

I get an email from Google each morning that is a summary of the news headlines it scrapes on the search term “digital signage” and I’d say 95% of what it finds is useless.

It does not return stuff from Sixteen:Nine because this deemed “just a blog” and carries opinions. Instead, you get an endless stream of press releases from Indian research factories that try to find people dumb enough to buy their garbage reports.

This has been written about many times, but I note this now because I saw a particularly amazing version of these press releases this morning. These companies pull numbers out of thin air and often refer to forecasts for years that have already been completed, or reference companies that have little or nothing to do with signage. But this one … oh my …

The headline:

Global Digital Signage Software  Market Overview, Growth Analysis, Drivers and Top Company Profiles | roadSign International, LLC; Omnivex Corporation; Panasonic Corporation; VXL Software Solutions Private Limited; Planar Systems

So, Omnivex is a well-established CMS company, and VXL is a Mumbai company that also markets CMS software. But Panasonic and Planar are by far display companies, and I can’t even find roadSign online.

The summary then goes into a description of Cloud Telephony services, and makes no reference to signage.

Then, the truly great part, the PR issues a cautionary note … about breastfeeding.

GOVERNMENT REGULATIONS REGARDING USE OF ENVIRONMENT FRIENDLY PRODUCTS

There are various problems associated with breastfeeding such as sore nipples, engorged breasts, mastitis, leaking milk, pain, and failure to latch on by the infant. In these issues women require professional assistance to continue to breastfeed.

Anyone who reads 16:9 has seen posts, going back many years, about garbage research from factory/boiler rooms in India that issue pricy, always positive and rarely worthwhile reports on anything that could be dubbed an industry. Google Alerts must feed me 8-10 press releases a day about the state of the signage market.

I continue to note this for two reasons:

1 – Some publishers STILL re-purpose these releases without bothering to scrutinize the content. Or they simply don’t know enough about the industry they cover to recognize crap, so it gets posted and is seen as credible by that publisher’s readers;

2 – I get many presentation decks and see many web pages from companies touting the projections, saying “The Global Digital Signage Market size is expected to reach $29.8 billion by 2024, rising at a market growth of 8.6% CAGR during the forecast period.”

Maybe it will, but there’s almost zero chance the “market analysts” have even the vaguest notion of why that might happen. A few companies like IHS Markit, Futuresource and DSCC have people who actually study this industry and can generate real forecasts and insight. Your best “tell” on whether the research you are considering buying, if you don’t yet know the signage industry, is the press release section,

If the research company issues many reports a week, or even a day, on everything from o-rings to cough medicines, they’re just whipping air and inventing numbers to create something that looks like a real report, invariably with a rosy outlook that encourages purchase.

Reader beware, and if you are planning a digital signage project, please do factor in the implications of cloud telephony and breastfeeding.