12 Must Have Features for Enterprise Digital Signage

Enterprise environments are notoriously challenging when it comes to deploying employee-facing communications. And when it comes to organizations with deskless or mobile workforces, sprawling physical spaces and geographically distributed fleets of devices, this can present many additional hurdles. 

Digital signage is increasingly been accepted as one of the most effective methods of managing a cohesive and visible communications solution. Especially for organizations that have multiple, disparate and non-desk based workers.

But how can you choose an enterprise digital signage solution from the many options on the market? With everything from free digital signage software up to done for your signage, it can be a mine field choosing the right software for your digital displays.

Why use digital signage for communications?

The return-on-investment with digital signage can be significant. Whether it's improving productivity, saving time and money, improving your digital employee experience, or enabling your organization to reap the benefits of an engaged workforce - digital signage is used by the world's largest companies to manage their workforce communication.

A good digital signage system can be a multi-functional solution too. For example, connecting your back office and logistics centers, while also communicating with front of house or offering a customer facing experience.

Enterprise digital signage solutions should offer easy functionality and the ability to scale the usage as needed. In addition to this, you want to be sure that you can get the support you need when you need it, and that the tool also offers the highest level of security.

With all that in mind, these are the features to watch out for when choosing enterprise digital signage software.

Must-have features for enterprise digital signage

1. Cloud-based

With on-premise or self-hosted digital signage, you purchase individual licences and run the solution on your own equipment (usually the backend and database servers, plus media player hardware). 

Cloud-based digital signage is software delivered as a service and billed monthly or annually. 

92% of IT leaders prefer the Cloud to on-prem. Apptio.

The benefits are many and varied: organizations save money and reduce CAPEX by avoiding the cost of buying and maintaining servers.

There’s no need to worry about downtime because your data always gets backed up.

You’re able to scale up and down as required – fast. And finally, teams can access and manage content from any device at any time. 

While you still may need to purchase the actual screens or TVs, your digital signage network is managed, monitored and updated remotely, via a cloud-based content management system. 

ScreenCloud Studio is an example of a cloud-based CMS, giving you the flexibility, scalability and configurability most on-prem solutions do not. 

2. Hardware support

You'll need to choose a digital signage software that supports a broad range of hardware, and to carefully consider what your hardware requirements may be.

While some organizations might need specialist signage equipment, others might find that consumer grade TVs and monitors are more than adequate for their needs.

Factors to consider when choosing your hardware for digital signage include:

• Will you be displaying content outside or in all weathers? You may need hard-wearing digital signage screens designed for external displays.
• For displays running less than 8 hours within a covered setting or building, a consumer-grade display may be suitable.
• Need 24/7 content broadcasting? You might need a specialist screen with low power consumption.
• Which media players are you using to connect your digital displays?

Do you need to offer interactive features such as a touch-screen kiosk?ScreenCloud Touch can integrate with tablets, kiosks and TVs too.

Read more: ScreenCloud buyers’ guide to digital signage hardware.               

For enterprise IT teams wanting a performant, high-specification option at an affordable price; we recommend ScreenCloud OS. ScreenCloud’s proprietary operating system and media player is a custom Linux-based platform purpose-built for digital signage.  

3. Remote control

Enterprise digital signage usually consists of a large, dispersed network of digital signage displays broadcasting an even larger amount of dynamic content. 

It’s a lot to keep track of, and can demand plenty of administrative and IT hours. That’s why the ability to manage your network of screens and content in one centralized place – from the top down – is business-critical. 

Being able to take actions remotely, like rebooting a device, changing your network settings, launching emergency alerts or viewing a device’s status is particularly important when things go wrong. It can prevent organizations from having to send a technician to troubleshoot devices in the field, which is expensive, time consuming and very inefficient. 

The average technician field visit costs an IT team $800 USD. Forbes. 

ScreenCloud OS offers excellent ‘remote control’ opportunities via its Remote Device Management Dashboard. The dashboard makes it quick and easy to remotely manage your fleet of devices, and is especially valuable for organizations with geographically distributed fleets. 

4. Single Sign-On (SSO)

SSO is an authentication process that allows employees to securely access a variety of applications and websites using the same log-in credentials every time.

This feature can be a game changer because it eliminates the need for large organizations to store huge amounts of passwords, cuts down on the time IT teams need to spend on login troubleshooting requests, minimizes the damage a hack or phishing scam can cause, and boosts worker productivity by streamlining the log-in process.

Plus, logging into a system via SSO is on average 5-15 seconds faster than using a traditional log-in strategy. 

Password resets cost organizations upwards of $70 USD per fix. Forrester. 

Enterprise digital signage is usually managed by multiple business units and teams (IT, Operations, HR, Marketing) and a large group of administrators and content creators. Simple and secure log-in procedures are key. 

ScreenCloud’s SSO and SAML support enables you to access the CMS and manage user-level access via your existing user directory.

5. Advanced user permissions

Any decent digital signage software will give your business the ability to control account permissions with a high level of granularity. 

This means you’ll be able to create custom user groups and give them access to control certain displays throughout your digital signage network. That way, teams in your building or on your site can focus on launching content that is relevant and useful for only the screens they’re responsible for.

ScreenCloud Studio enables organizations to create different teams and manage permissions remotely. Users can belong to multiple ‘spaces’,  with their own set of features, controls and access. 

Admins may also enable certain users to have privileged access to data or information and create custom roles with granular controls.

6. Security by design 

Needless to say, security is top-of-mind for every business, particularly enterprise IT professionals. Even if your systems and processes are watertight, it’s important to not create vulnerabilities within your organization via third-party cybersecurity risks. 

The average cost of a data breach was $4.24 million USD in 2021. The financial harm of these events is amplified in third-party data breaches, reaching an average cost of $4.33 million USD. IBM. 

If security is a major focus for your organization (and let's be honest, it probably is - and if it isn't it definitely should be), choose a digital signage vendor that takes security, privacy and compliance as seriously as you do. 

ScreenCloud understands how fundamental a requirement security is for today’s businesses, which is why we’re SOC 2, Type 2 accredited. 

All your content is encrypted and any sensitive information is stored safely – with endpoint security in place and granular content roles to allow you to practice ‘least privilege’. We automate patches, and conduct regular pen tests, threat modelling and security training. 

IT teams can confidently approve ScreenCloud for multiple business units knowing their data is secure, user data is private, and our internal processes meet rigorous, proven standards.

ScreenCloud OS also presents minimal security risks, due to its enterprise network options and an interface that is locked down by design. Less  ‘OS surface area’ exposed means there is no possibility of unauthorized personnel accessing your device.  

Check out Security at ScreenCloud to learn more.

7. User-friendly CMS

IT teams typically inherit hours and hours of extra work as they become content proxies, or often unwilling owners of content publishing systems.

For the use case of employee-facing screens, digital signage should ‘belong’ to marketing, HR, Internal Communications, or even Operations functions – the teams who create and execute your organization’s digital signage content strategy. 

ScreenCloud Studio is designed to ensure content owners are empowered to create and share impactful, visually appealing content without going through design or technical teams. 

Studio includes an easy-to-use design editor, Canvas, with 150+ editable templates that can be customized to your brand, and 80+ free apps that automatically optimize content for screen performance and aesthetic. 

On software comparison site G2, 96% of ScreenCloud users recommend Studio for its ‘ease of use’ – translating to fewer requests and tickets for IT!

8. Limitless integrations 

Digital signage that integrates with your tech stack and workflows is not only easier to set up, but more likely to be adopted across the business and deliver ROI. 

Choosing a vendor which fits into your digital ecosystem is key. For starters, ScreenCloud integrates with thousands of tools and apps enterprise teams use every day – including Microsoft Power BI, Tableau, Google Suite, Salesforce, and many more.

Many businesses start with our 80+ app integrations, meaning popular tools such as Slack, Zendesk and various review platforms plug and play easily with your digital signage. This allows for zero-effort content as content can be pulled from these apps easily. But enterprise clients also want the opportunity to connect data and dashboards according to their specific needs.

Playgrounds is our onboard code editor which enables users to create their own app in ScreenCloud by working in a familiar HTML, CSS and Javascript editor environment.  

Stepping up from Playgrounds, the ScreenCloud SDK enables IT teams to build ScreenCloud apps using Firebase and React, while the ScreenCloud API, organized around GraphQL, enables programmatic access to ScreenCloud functionality. 

9. Scalability

Any enterprise software tool needs to be able to scale easily as a company requires. Whether this is easily adding more users or screens, through to the ease of integrating new software tools.

Any enterprise digital signage solution should offer the ability to quickly adapt to business demands - as ScreenCloud does.

If you're looking for a digital signage system that will grow with your business, schedule a demo to find out more about how ScreenCloud can grow with you.

10. Round the clock support

Your digital signage partner should offer technical and user support in your timezone, so help is on hand when you need it. 

ScreenCloud provides 24/5 professional support, with trained teams strategically located around the world, from North America to Europe and Asia. Enterprise customers are also paired with a dedicated Customer Success Manager from day one. 

Our Professional Services team – digital signage users and veterans – provides higher-touch support, useful for complex deployments or when your teams need some extra help with onboarding, training, creative services, and more. 

In addition, our support and product teams are committed to making ScreenCloud work for you, and very receptive to feedback and ideas – both technical and non-technical. 

“We've thoroughly enjoyed working with ScreenCloud. Our combined development has been a breeze; from the initial conversation to the ongoing development, ScreenCloud has been able to adapt and always deliver on our ever-moving goalposts.” Nathan Thomas, Digital Product & Software Engineering Lead, Ricoh UK Products Limited.

11. Flexible and comprehensive onboarding

Investing in a software tool means mastering the skills to make it do what you need, or want, it to do. And getting the most from any software packed means access to good onboarding and after-sales support.

Here at ScreenCloud we offer full training and support to your team as part of your enterprise digital signage onboarding. Your support representative is available to ensure you get the best results from your signage as quickly as possible.

In addition to personalized onboarding, at ScreenCloud we also offer an extensive documentation library as well as handy video guides for those quick jobs or troubleshooting.

Whatever you need to get started with your digital displays, you'll be able to contact our support team and be ready to go.

12. Done-for-you content management

While easy content creation might be fine for some, it might not be an option for some enterprise companies. Having the option of handing over management of your digital signage system to someone who can create and manage content for you can be priceless.

That's why we offer Company TV: Your custom-managed digital signage solution.

With Company TV, our digital signage experts can offer a fully bespoke service by creating, scheduling, and managing your enterprise digital signage for you.

Read more: Company TV

Getting set up with enterprise digital signage

Big organizations demand the best in class solutions to ensure they are as efficient and productive as they can be. And while digital signs present an opportunity to improve factors from your customer experience to communication with employees, managers expect technology to just work and to improve their workload, not add to it.

ScreenCloud digital signage software is designed to integrate easily with existing software and systems and be up and running quickly. And, perhaps most importantly, it's also designed to work for you and with you, rather than present another challenge to your operations.

If you need to manage the complexities of securely scaling a large screen network across multiple locations, find out more about enterprise digital signage software from ScreenCloud

Book a demo, or sign up for a free trial today.