Growth in online food delivery platforms such as Uber Eats and Mr D Food has led to a boom in the number of delivery scooters on South Africa’s roads, especially in urban centres.
Digital outdoor advertising specialist Polygon has taken advantage of this by adding “programmatic” smart boxes on delivery bikes that show ads based on location and time of day. Polygon MD Remi du Preez said the company developed a solution that “sits on the plastic box on the back of a bike”.
“You can think of it as a mini billboard. You can program the screen to do what you want it to do,” Du Preez told TechCentral in an interview.
The digitised cargo boxes weigh about 20kg and have three digital displays on each side, except the one facing the driver’s back. The displays are synced to play the same advertising content.
Polygon’s clients are given access to the company’s content management system, through which they can load ads remotely and track real-time campaign performance. Once the ads are approved, they can be pushed onto the bike screens programmatically based on a number of parameters such as the bike’s location and the time of day.
Polygon has partnered with Street Swift Media to be its programmatic advertising partner. Street Swift Media developed the Smart Box solution and partners with fleet owners and delivery drivers, who own their own bikes that they use for deliveries. The digital signage provides drivers with additional income by paying them a monthly fee for agreeing to show ads on their bikes. Any damage to the screens is covered by Street Swift Media.
“These are digital screens, so the luminosity is obviously better at nighttime, but you can still see them during the day like digital billboards you see on the side of the highway,” said Du Preez.
Massive potential
Polygon offers programmatic advertising on delivery bikes as part of a consolidated digital screen package consisting of some 3 000 screens found on roadside billboards, in malls and even in shopping aisles in some stores. It does this in six countries: South Africa, Namibia, Botswana, Zambia, Nigeria and Kenya. The delivery bike solution has only been rolled out in Johannesburg so far.
The smart digital boxes are fitted with smart audience technology, which provides real-time and verifiable audience measurement. This is to give advertisers an idea of their reach, frequency and impact of every smart delivery box.
Read: Mr D Food is profitable for the first time
“The data is anonymised; we never know who the individual is. I have never seen a name, surname or ID number coming through in the data we collect. We just look at the herd and try serve ads based on what people are doing,” said Du Preez.
He downplayed a question about the safety of the smart boxes from criminals. The boxes can be tracked and, according to Du Preez, in the only instance of a bike theft in the past year, the tracking device helped recover the bike quickly and it was returned to its owner.
Polygon sees massive growth potential in advertising on delivery bikes, with the aim being to recover at least 1% of the advertising spend currently being directed to offshore companies like Google and have that circulate in the local economy instead.
“Research shows that receiving a delivery inspires feelings of anticipation among consumers, meaning that these audiences are often in a receptive and positive frame of mind, making them amenable to brand messages,” Du Preez said. – © 2024 NewsCentral Media
