You can debate how effective recency may be as a media strategy, that business of running your ads timed to when people are most likely to make purchases.
   But there can be little debate on the effectiveness of getting your messages closer and closer to where people make those purchases. 
   The growing realization of the power of proximity is driving much of the out-of-home ad boom.
    One of the latest arenas in which out-of-home is gaining is in shopping malls, and it's no wonder. That's where 70 percent of all consumer purchases take place, yet only 1 percent of advertising takes place there.
    That's changing quickly, and those changes are increasingly evident to the 185 million people browsing America’s malls each month. 
   They’re encountering backlit panels, interactive video and kiosks that spew a product’s fragrance as they browse the corridors. Corporate reps, or hawkers, are working the cosmetics and electronic departments inside individual stores.
   Media Life has chosen two new venues to profile.
   This week we’ll take a look at giant, three-sided video screens displaying ads and related programs in mall food courts.
    Next week we’ll profile mall retailers who are using technology to let consumers preview products from home videos to vitamins.
   This is one in a Media Life series on buying the new out-of-home venues. They appear weekly.

Fast Facts:

What: 
    Giant screen advertising in the public areas of malls, featuring merchandise and services available from retailers both in and beyond the mall walls.

Who:
     Skytron Mall Network in Irvine, Calif.

How it works:
   Advertisements are interspersed with programming and shown on three 28 sq. ft. interconnected screens suspended above shoppers in mall food courts. 
   "One of our distinct advantages is that our audience is seated. It’s not like other out-of-home. It’s not video to a standing audience. We’re trained to watch while sitting," says Joseph Salesky, Skytron’s CEO.
   Satellite and internet technologies are used to deliver content to the in-mall screens.
    Programming runs an average of 10 times daily. Blocks can be customized to fit local demographics. The screens display video continuously during the mall’s operating hours.
    Program segments run 2 1/2 minutes to 3 1/2 minutes and are presented in a magazine format for the mall shopping audience. Music, movie stars, fashion and beauty, food, sports, travel and lifestyles are some of the program categories, and they may include behind-the-scenes interviews, movie trailers and concerts not shown on broadcast television.
    "The segments are topical," Salesky says. "An interview with a movie actress from a current release or a trailer not seen anywhere else. A fashion segment might be Jennifer Lopez behind the scenes at an Elle cover shoot."
    Local news and weather can also be programmed.
    Advertisements run 30 seconds and are grouped in three commercials per pod and interspersed with programming in a 60/40 mix.
     "Rotation varies with the time of day," Salesky says. "We bring in more music and entertainment in teen hours. It’s more skewed toward seniors and mothers in the morning, and cooking works for almost everyone."
   Exclusivity is achieved by grouping competitors in different ad pods, Salesky says. "Short pods eliminate clutter. It’s not hard to keep [competitors] apart."
    "This is a dynamic medium for testing promotional approaches," Salesky says. "We can pick selected malls in certain demographics and run a variety of campaigns and see what happens in terms of sales."
   Advertisers can define their flight. "If you’re doing a one-day white sale, we can show it in that window only," Salesky says.
    Creative is supplied by advertisers and is often a standard 30-second spot developed for television. 
   "We have capacity to expand to 35 or 42 seconds or whatever. We’re not locked into 30 seconds," says Ralph Dauria, Skytron vice president of sales.
   A static ad can appear alongside the video, Salesky says. 
    "But we try not to look like a race car" by cluttering the display area with diverse images, he says.
    Visual is high-resolution with "intelligent" audio that in some cases can be adjusted as mall noise increases and decreases. The same video and audio are playing on all three adjoining screens.
    "We tested it both ways, and today we run the same video on all three sides so we’re not competing with ourselves," Salesky says.
   Large-screen in-mall video can be used in stand-alone or multi-platform campaigns.
   Skytron is currently in 20 malls with 105 million annual viewers.

Markets:
    Current markets include Alabama, Tennessee, Georgia, Mississippi, Texas, North Carolina, South Carolina, Colorado, Pennsylvania, Maryland and California.
    Skytron is coming soon to malls in Michigan, Florida, Ohio, Minnesota, Illinois, Wisconsin, Wyoming, Kentucky, New York, Delaware, Maine, Virginia, Washington, Connecticut, Utah, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Indiana, Nevada, Hawaii, Nebraska, Iowa, Oregon, Missouri, New Jersey and North Dakota.
     "We are now on pace to deliver 70 new malls this quarter," Salesky says. "Our goal is 280 sites in 2001."

Research:
   What products and categories do well? 
   "It varies market to market, in terms of how much is point-of-purchase and how much is other local advertisers like car dealerships," Salesky says.
    Some categories that do well are automotive, entertainment, cosmetics, consumer electronics, fashion, home video, music retailers and suppliers, travel, hospitals, insurance and other financial services, communications, sporting goods and restaurants.
    No tobacco or alcohol ads are sold.  "And it’s not a great space for e-commerce," Salesky says.
   Skytron avoids taking ads for companies outside the mall that are in direct competition with in-mall retailers.
    The average number of mall visits per shopper is 3.3 per month. The average percent of female shoppers is 64 percent. The average time spent in the mall per visit is 77.7 minutes with an average expenditure of $69.50.
   Currently 70 percent of consumer purchases are made in malls, with just 1 percent of consumer advertising actually delivered in malls, according to the International Council of Shopping Centers.
    Forty-three percent of all mall visitors spend 20 minutes in the food area, Salesky says.
    Research conducted through exit interviews by Nielsen on first-stage video in food courts found that 9 percent of consumers were more likely to buy an advertised product after seeing the ad. There was a 7 percent increase in brand awareness and an 11 percent increase in aided brand awareness. That is, when the consumers were asked if they saw an ad say for a credit card, they could recall the exact brand.

Demographics:
    Most mall shoppers fall into the 18 to 44 age range with 7 percent age 14 to 17, 19.2 percent 18 to 24, 20.4 percent 25 to 34, 19.7 percent 35 to 44, 14.2 percent 45 to 54, 9.2 percent 55 to 64 and 10.3 percent 65 and older.
   Household income for the majority of mall shoppers is between $25,000 to $75,000, with 9.3 percent of shoppers having income under $15,000, 16.5 percent at $15,000 to $24,999, 17.9 percent at $25,000 to $34,999, 19.9 percent at $35,000 to $49,000, 19.5 percent at $50,000 to $74,999 and 17 percent at $75,000 and up.
    "This is an audience that’s hard to reach by television," Salesky says. "There are working women typically on their way home, buyers in motion, not wed to a chair."

Making the buy:
    Lead time, with creative in hand, is a week. However, ads can go up in as little as two days.
   Factors affecting pricing include seasonality, locations, and length and frequency of advertisement.
    "The best pricing comes when buying a region or the network," Salesky says.
   Sales offices are in New York, Los Angeles, Nashville and Atlanta. Advertisers can also contact Hachette Filipacchi, the magazine publishing house.

What’s unique: 
    Skytron recently partnered with Hachette Filipacchi Magazines. HFM is supplying original programming seen on Skytron screens.

Who’s already on Skytron:
    Jenny Craig, Honda, Ford, Camelot Records, RCA, Panasonic, U.S. Army, CBS, NBC, Cellular One, Memorial Hospital in Chattanooga and Silver Star Resort and Casino in Meridian, Miss.

What they’re saying:
     "It adds a sense of excitement to the food court. When you’re standing in line you turn around and watch the screen, and as people are eating they’re able to enjoy news or a cooking program or soap opera or football game. It gives us a tremendous advantage over our competition." – Tom Funari, general manager of Cool Springs Galleria in Franklin, Tenn.
    "We have a soft play area in our food court, and the Skytron is almost directly above the play area, so parents bring their kids to play and watch what’s going on on the screen." -- Bob Jenkins, regional marketing director for CBL & Associates Properties, headquartered in Chattanooga.

Web site info: 
www.skytron.com

-Kathy Prentice writes about outdoor advertising for Media Life, penning her stories from the resort town of Traverse City, in the upper reaches of Michigan.

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