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A digital sign helps a tourist information centre show visitors what is worth seeing, answer the same questions all day and send people out to explore the area. Photos, video, drone footage, maps, QR codes and opening hours can all go on screen, and you can change them in a few clicks or set them to change on their own.
Why screens work for tourism
People notice bright light, colour and movement, which is why a screen gets looked at when a poster on the wall doesn’t. Words still matter, and a well-written description can make someone want to see a place for themselves. Pictures just do it faster.
Take the Pinnacles in Nambung National Park, with thousands of limestone pillars rising out of the sand. You can describe them, but a slideshow does it better: shadows moving across the pillars as the sun climbs, the Milky Way overhead on a clear night, kangaroos and emus along the way. That is hard to walk past.
What should a visitor centre put on screen?
- events and festivals coming up
- local attractions, with photos, video and drone footage
- tour times, parades and exhibition timetables
- transport timetables and travel times
- large, easy-to-read maps
- opening hours, closed days and park fees
- weather warnings and unexpected closures
- a QR code or web address for bookings and more information
Add whatever your visitors ask about most. That might be a daily list of wildlife sightings, the weather forecast or a reminder to take plenty of water. Live footage works too, such as surf conditions or a parade, if you have a camera feed to show.
Keep each screen simple
A digital sign can carry more than a printed one, because you can spread the information over several screens that play one after another. Even so, keep each screen simple. Let the photos and video do most of the talking, and save the words for the essentials.
Urgent notices
When something changes, a digital sign can say so in seconds: a transport delay, a road closure, extreme heat, a fire or storm warning, or a tour that has filled up. Change it from your phone, so visitors get the news before they head out. Read more about safety messages in digital signs for workplace safety.
Should the sign go inside or outside?
That depends on the centre. In a town or city, a sign outside catches people walking past on their way somewhere else, and people on a hop-on hop-off bus if the centre is on the route. A sign in the window keeps working when the centre is closed.
Smaller centres often have a captive audience, because every visitor starts their trip there. An indoor sign may suit them better. Put it somewhere obvious that everyone walks past.
Larger centres often do well with one sign inside and another outside, and a double-sided sign outside catches traffic from both directions. Our guide to where to put a digital sign has more on choosing a spot, and the short version is simple: put it where the most people will see it, and don’t be afraid to try a few spots.
Which screen suits a visitor centre?
Tourism is about pictures, so most visitor centres are best served by a full colour screen. Outdoors, it has to be bright enough for the midday sun, and our FA2 outdoor range reaches more than 10,000 nits. A free-standing digital poster is another option: our AP1 outdoor poster screens are made for busy places like shopping centres, stations and airports, and the AP2 is a slim 88 mm indoor poster screen.
Ideas through the year
Plan your screens around the local calendar: wildflower season, whale season, school holidays, festivals and long weekends. Set the content up ahead of time and schedule it to start when the season does, so the screen always matches what visitors can do this week.
Less repetition for staff
A good sign answers many of the questions staff hear all day, so they can spend more time with the visitors who need real help. When a busload of visitors turns up looking for something to do, you can change the screen in seconds to suit them.
Signs for visitor centres
We design and build outdoor LED signs, indoor LED displays and full colour LED screens at our workshop in Welshpool. If your centre is run by a council or shire, see LED signs for councils and shires.
Get in touch for a free quote, or call Aaron on 0416 053 335 or the office on (08) 9335 7944.
