Welcome to the MyAdTV Digital Signage Application User Guide. To start, scroll down to the 'Introduction' section. You can also skip to the section you want to view by clicking on the links under the Table of Contents.
After that, you can view other User Guides listed below to learn other important utilities provided by MyAdTV. You can access these user guides by clicking on the links under ‘Available Documents’.
Available Documents:
- MyAdPlayer User Guide – how to create and playback ad content
- Image Preparation User Guide – how to crop images to fit template frames
- MyAdTV User Guide – how to edit account profile and view payment history
- Account Structure User Guide – how to build multiple user and player accounts with an hierarchical structure that fits your business
- MyAdXchange User Guide – how to exchange ads with third party businesses for cross promotion
MyAdPlayer User Guide
Table of Contents:
1. Introduction
2. Logging In
3. Creating Ads
5. Creating Two More Ads to Complete an Ad Campaign
6. Editing and Viewing to Fine Tune Ads
9. MyAdTV Menu Tabs and Menu Bars
11. Editing Display Location Profile
12. Designing a Real Estate Ad Campaign
12.1 Select a Template
12.2 Downloading Sample Images
12.3 Left Side Frame
12.4 Right Side Frame
12.5 Main Frame Ad
12.6 Display Your Real Estate Ads
12.7 Display Your Real Estate Ads (Alternate ‘Delegated’ Version)
13. Conclusion
1. Introduction
Welcome to the MyAdTV Quick Start User Guide. Following these quick easy steps you will be
able to display your own ads in 30 minutes or less! You will quickly find yourself intuitively
creating and refining advertisement content and schedules.
Here we will show you how to use MyAdPlayer to create
content and display them on your own internet PC. In addition we will show you how to instantly
update ad displays at any location!
We provide you access to free sample ad images but you can
always use your own digital camera to create quick low cost images. Alternatively, you can purchase stock
professional quality photos for as little as a dollar each from web sites like
dreamstime.com and istockphoto.com.
For more dynamic ads, we enable you to upload flash animations
or digital movies (Microsoft Media or MPEG).
Please ensure that your animation files fit your subscription
level. The Professional package allows
much larger file sizes than the Standard subscription package.
After completing the exercise on content creation and
playback, we will come back and review other software applications such as
managing your account in MyAdTV and exchanging ads with third parties in
MyAdXchange.
2. Logging In
With your initial subscription you receive one User account
and one Player account (Please note: Player account is also referred to as
Display Location account on the MyAdTV tabs).
The User account allows you to manage your digital signage postings and
account profile. The Player account
allows you to playback the digital signage content at a screen location. This enables you to create content from one
computer (with your User account) while you play your digital signage content
at another computer (with your Player account).
Please ensure that your internet browser is Internet Explorer, version
6.0 or higher.
To logon to your User account, open up an Internet Explorer
and go to myadtv.com; select the ‘MyAdTV login’ button on the left hand side or
directly type in http://myadtv.com/login.php
in the browser. You will arrive at the logon screen
Let’s review the links available on the MyAdTV login
screen. From the upper right hand link (Click Here To Tell A
Friend) you can send an email to your friend
telling them about MyAdTV’s free digital signage service; MyAdTV does not retain the email address or
other information you enter. From the link below that (Reactivate Your Account) you can
reactivate your cancelled account . If
you forget your password, the ‘Forgot Password?’ link, on the bottom right,
sends your password to you via email; click the link, enter your user account
logon name, an email is sent to the account’s registered email address.
At the MyAdTV login screen type in your user account logon
name and password and then click the ‘Login’ button at the bottom. The first screen you see after logging in is
the Account Summary as shown below.
From Account Summary you can: change your password, list
accounts, list display locations and more.
From other tabs you can: edit account profiles and view your billing
history.
The general appearance of your ads is set by the template
assigned to your Player account. MyAdTV
provides nine different templates for you to choose from. Click here to view the template choices.
You can change templates at anytime. However, please remember that existing
content is deleted when you change. So
plan your changes carefully. Below you
will learn how to change templates.
You can also access this document, Quick Start User Guide,
from the Account Summary page by clicking on the ‘User Guide’ button. There is
an ‘Online Help’ button on every page to give you a brief description of the
current page you are viewing.
3. Creating Ads
There are 4 tabs you can select from at the top of the page,
MyAdTV, MyAdPlayer, MyAdXchange and Logout.
Let’s click on the MyAdPlayer tab and go to the content
creation page. The first screen you see
is the Content Summary page, the table lists the content that you have created
for this account.
On the upper left of the screen above the table is the
Location drop down menu. This allows you to choose the location you want to
post your ads to if you have multiple display locations (Player Accounts). At this point, you will only have one
location.
NOTE: If you click on the arrow of the Location
drop own menu, you will see there is another entry called MyAdXchange besides
your location name. MyAdXchange location
contains all the ads created for the purpose of ad exchange. We will come back to this topic. For now, just leave the selection to your
location name.
On the upper right hand side, there is the Frame drop down
menu. Frames divide your screen into
different display areas where you post various media (i.e., text, images, or
movies). Your new account defaults to
Template1 which has one frame named ‘Main Frame’. Click the frame drop down arrow and you will
see only that one entry.
NOTE: In the second part of this user guide, we
will show you how to select a different template. Each different template uses different frame
layout. A template can have 1 to 3
different frames.
Click here to see
a guide to a list of templates and samples.
Since you haven’t yet created ad content, the content table
is empty. We have some sample images that you can use for this exercise. Please
note that these images are courtesy of dreamstime.com and can only be used for testing
purpose, do not use them for any other purpose. Click here to download sample images.
Find the ‘Insert New Ad Here’ button at the bottom of the
‘Content Summary’ screen and click it.
Below the main menu tabs are the tab selections for the
different types of ads you can create:
* Image –ad with image you upload
and transition effect you choose
* Text – ad with the text message,
font attribute, and background color you specify
* iText – Text ad with a background
image that you upload
* Flash – create an ad with the
flash file you upload
* Movie – create an ad with a movie
file you upload in wmv and mpg file formats.
* HTML – an upcoming feature
Let’s create an ad now!
Please click on the iText sub-tab. Most of the information is pre-filled
for you but you can change the values.
In the Ad Title field enter a short descriptive phrase with
no more than 255 characters. In this example, we use demo1-1 as the title of
the ad.
The Ad Start Date is pre-filled to today’s date. If you want
the ad to start playing at a later date, click on the calendar icon and use the
outer arrow buttons to select the year and the inner arrow buttons to select
the month. Remember, the format is the
4-digit year, then the 2-digit month and then the 2-digit date (YYYYMMDD).
The ‘Ad End Date’ is pre-filled to year 2008. If you have a
specific date that you want to stop playing the ad, just enter that in from the
calendar.
‘From Hour’ and ‘To Hour’ specify the time that you want
your ad to run. The default is set to 24 hours a day. Say, if you want to run
your ad from 5:30 PM to 9:00 PM, set the ‘From Hour’ to 17:30 and ‘To Hour’ to
21:00. During playback, the Player software will create a play list with ads
that are scheduled to play at that time. After the entire list is being played,
the Player software will access the server again to check if additional ads are
scheduled to play. So if you scheduled an ad to be played at 5:30, it is not
necessary to start exactly at 5:30, it will start playing after 5:30 when the
previous list is done playing.
‘Ad Posting Duration’ determines how many seconds your ad
plays each time. The default duration is
30 seconds. To play your ad for two
minutes enter 120 for the Ad Posting Duration.
NOTE: If you are using flash or movie, you need to
determine the full playtime of the media files and set the ‘Ad Posting
Duration’ to suit. You also have to know the size of your media file and the
allowable limit of your account base on subscription level. If you are
currently subscribed to the ‘Starter Package’, your file size limit is 2M. If
you have a media file that is larger than 2M and under 5M, you can upgrade your
display location account (not your user account) to the ‘Standard’ level. If
you have a media file that is larger than 5M, you need to upgrade your display
location account to the ‘Professional’ level.
‘Ad Posting Day’ determines what days of the week the ad
will play. You can set any combination
of days you want by selecting or deselecting the Weekday check boxes.
In ‘Text Message’, copy and paste and the following into the
text area including the blank lines:
The New Fall Collection Has Arrived
Ultra-Comtemporary Fashion
Take A Peek Inside
When entering text message, you can use all alphanumeric
characters including ! @ # $ % ^ & * (
) _ + and line feed.
Hint: Avoid using any control characters or
symbols. Do not use angle brackets; angle brackets confuse web browsers and may
disable your ad.
Below ‘Text Message’ is the ‘Text Display Area’ as shown
above. The ‘Text Display Area’ specifies the exact location that text will
display. It uses two coordinates: the ‘Upper Left Corner’ and ‘Lower Right
Corner’ of the intended display area. In
this example, we want the text to show up on the left 1/3 of the screen. So in
‘Upper Left Corner’, enter 1 in X and 3 in Y, in ‘Lower Right Corner’, enter 35
in X and 100 in Y.
Figure-1 “Text Display Area”
The display
screen coordinate system shown above in Figure-1 has (0,0) for the upper left
of the full screen and (100,100) for the lower right of the full screen. In this system of (X, Y) coordinates, X
increases horizontally from left to right, and Y increases vertically from top
to bottom.
To display
your ad text message over the entire screen, type in Upper Left Corner X = 0%
and Y = 0% and Lower Right Corner X = 100% and Y = 100% (see Entire Screen in
Figure-1 above).
To display
your ad text message exclusively on the upper half of your screen, use Upper
Left Corner X=0%, Y=0%; Lower Right Corner X=100%, Y=50% (see Upper Half Screen
in Figure-1 above).
To display
your ad text message exclusively on the half screen size at the center, Upper
Lower Corner X=25%, Y=25%; Lower Right Corner X=75%, Y=75% (see Half Screen Center in Figure-1 above).
Next, set values for Text Alignment, Text Shadow, Font Name,
Font Style, and Font Weight.
Text
Alignment allows you to align your text to the left, right, or center. In this
example, we use ‘Center’.
Text Shadow
provides you a better contrast if you are displaying the text against an image
with lots of different colors. In this example, we will turn it ‘On’.
In ‘Font
Name’, select ‘Monotype Corsica’ or any other font type you prefer.
In ‘Font
Style’, select ‘Normal’.
In ‘Font Weight’,
select ‘Bold’.
Next, set ‘Font Size’ to 55.
This is a very important choice.
The default is 30 but we recommend a value from 50 to 80 and
occasionally as high as 100. However, if the content is more of an informational
type and is meant to view up close, it is not bad to use fonts that are much
smaller, but it shouldn’t be smaller than 20.
When
displaying ads on the screen, you want to make sure the viewers are able to
read the text from a distance. In general,
the bigger the text, the more impact you can make on the viewers. Of course, you also have to consider the
available screen space and the amount of information you want to display. In
general, you want to use a font size from 50 to 80. Occasionally, you may want to use 100 to
accent the statement you are making.
We
recommend the ‘two seconds rule’ when comes to creating effective ads. In most cases, digital signage is being used
in retail environment, hotels, restaurants and public areas. People walk by the digital signage screen
without consciously reading into the ads.
The amount of time that a shopper or customer really sees the screen is
about two seconds. If you can make a
connection with the shopper or customers during that time, your ad has made an
impact; otherwise it is a missed opportunity.
The rule of thumb is to display a static ad with an image that tells the
story and just enough text for them to read in two seconds.
Next, set the ‘Font Color’ to #5f444b. This is a hexadecimal
number, so make sure you include the # sign. Hexadecimal color number is used
whenever you want to use a very precise color. In general, you just click on
the color patch and the color chart will appear (see Figure-2 below).
The chart
consists of a larger color selection area, one vertical side bar and 2
horizontal size bars. To change the
general color scheme of the color selection area, click on a color on the
vertical side bar, and then click on the color on the color selection area. The
first horizontal side bar allows you to select different shade of gray; the
second horizontal size bar allows you to select black or white. Once you
selected a color, the color chart will disappear.
Figure-2 “Font Color Selection”
In ‘Text Transition Style’, select ‘Wipe Down’ and enter 7
in ‘Duration’. Text Transition Style and Duration control how the text will
appear. The default is 4 seconds; but
you can increase or decrease the time and the limit is from 2 to 10 seconds.
In ‘Upload File’, select the file you have downloaded from
the sample image page named demo1-1.jpg.
If you haven’t downloaded the file, click
here. Next, you need to choose the Image Transition Style, select
‘BlendTrans’.
This
provides a special effect when the image is being brought in. You can choose
any one from the drop down menu. The software is designed for you to easily go
back and forth between edit and view to test out the setting until you are
satisfied with the result.
‘Assign Edit Right’ allows you to reserve the edit right to
yourself or to delegate the edit right to users underneath you after you have
constructed an account structure. If you are a new user, you will not have an
account structure. You will just leave this alone.
Now, click the submit button; this uploads your ad image and
related choices to the MyAdTV server.
The software will prompt you if you forget to fill in any information.
You will be prompted when the upload is completed, just press the ‘OK’ button
to continue.
After pressing OK, you are returned to the ‘Content Summary’
tab where your posted ad appears.
Important! Please click
here to continue with the next section.