A recent study by Kinetic Panel highlighted that 18-24 year old consumers found one element of digital signage more appealing than any other: media services. They were more willing to download video clips from digital signage to their phone than they were an app or a game. This highlights the usefulness of digital signage for movie theaters.

Utilizing Social Sharing

Go to any movie theater and you’re almost certain to see those same, old static movie poster frames that have been used for decades. Movie posters work all right for advertising. They’re often great pieces of art. Yet a movie poster or even life size cutouts only have so much appeal. No one’s leaving the theater with a movie poster or a cardboard cutout under their arm. They’re not showing those things to their friends.

What does carry appeal is video clips on digital signage. This can be teasers, trailers, scenes, behind-the-scenes footage, the list goes on. With prompts to download a video to their phone, young adults will quickly share that footage with each other. This encourages what really makes your theater money outside of opening weekends: repeat business and word of mouth. It will also increase advance ticket sales for opening weekends. When the video’s shared on social media, you can maintain a link to your theater in those shares.

Expanding Sales

You can even use this to encourage coupons for snacks or vouchers for movies. Download a trailer, get a coupon attached. You can link the download directly to advanced ticket sales. This encourages buying tickets for upcoming movies when the excitement is highest: right after they’ve watched the trailer or shared it with a friend.

Digital signage for movie theaters is the kind of step forward that the industry has needed for a long time now. Yet very few theaters have meaningfully embraced it. You don’t need to pepper your theater with digital video screens. You don’t want it to get over-busy or distracting to the eye. Video clips on digital signage that’s selectively placed can fill in the gaps where movie theaters have struggled to maintain business for a long time now. The technology’s there, it just needs to be utilized.