How to prepare, and present, a winning sales strategy to replace lamp message technology with LED digital signage
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In my recent travels, I’ve noticed that quite a few lamp message displays are still standing throughout the country. Monochrome LED displays have been in widespread use for 15 or more years. Color LED systems for sign applications became popular roughly 10 years ago. How can lamp message technology still survive in the marketplace?
Nearly 10 years ago, I first wrote, in this column, about the cost savings associated with modern LED signs. I prescribed a formula that helped justify the upgrade cost. Since that time, the price of LED digital signage has plummeted while electrical-utility costs have inched higher. The resulting differential makes the cost of an upgrade to full-color LED a no-brainer.
In 1986, in my home town, I sold a double-faced, 32 x 96 lamp, wedge-base message center that still stands. The lamps have 1.5-in., center-to-center spacing and use 7.2-watt xenon lamps. The display is in a separate cabinet affixed to the bottom of a beautiful, shopping-center sign, mounted squarely between two poles.
The center is fully occupied with upscale shops and stores that befit the area’s demographics. Two, very high-profile enclosed malls closely bracket the center. One of the malls utilizes a large, full-color, LED sign with extensive, paid, tenant advertising. From my vantage point, the old, wedge-base lamp display is not only useless, but embarrassing and an insult to its tenants.
Because I don’t work for the sign company that maintains the display, and because I do manage a salesforce of people who represent a display manufacturer, I haven’t contacted the retail center owner. Frankly, it's not my place to compete with the sign trade to whom my company sells products. However, given that I sold that particular sign in my youth, I feel entitled to use it as an example for an LED upgrade. Here’s how I would prepare for the sales call.
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