Watchfire and Blip Announce Seamless Integration for OOH Demand Generation

Push-button activation through Ignite OA provides access to hyper-local advertising


DANVILLE, Ill., Nov. 05, 2019 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Watchfire Signs, a leading manufacturer of digital billboards and LED displays, today announced a partnership with Blip that will allow users of Watchfire’s Ignite software to enable Blip with a single click. Blip is the highest performing self-serve marketplace for small business advertisers in the United States to buy airtime on digital billboards with any budget. The integration enables Watchfire customers to use Ignite OA as usual, but now maximize revenue by seamlessly enabling sales through the Blip marketplace. Click to Tweet.

Watchfire’s VP, Digital Billboard Division, Darrin Friskney, comments on the partnership: “This is a release our customers have been asking for. Billboard operators love our software, Ignite OA, and they love the revenue Blip delivers; but they wanted them both in one easy-to-use platform. This is it. The day-to-day use of Ignite remains, and to enable Blip, our customers flip a switch to make their inventory part of the program. It’s easy and will increase revenue.”

Vince Miller, President of DDI Media, one of the largest independent billboard advertising companies in the United States, shares his experience working with Blip: “We’re now connecting with smaller businesses who wouldn’t normally have the budget or scale to buy OOH advertising. Blip has brought us incremental revenue from new customers, without competing against our sales team or targeting our existing client base. There have even been months where Blip has been my number one or number two salesperson for their allocated inventory.”

Blip President and Co-founder James Munnerlyn enthusiastically explains that “it requires technology and intelligent automation to service small and medium sized businesses in a profitable manner. By integrating Blip into Ignite, Watchfire users get a pushbutton solution to profitably gain access to Blip revenue from net-new audiences.”

On the technology, which is driving fresh new revenue for DDI, Miller contemplates: “How the billboard industry harnesses and embraces technology that makes buying easier will determine how we grow as an industry.”

Watchfire customers should contact their Watchfire representative for a demo and onboarding processes. A dedicated team from Blip and Watchfire will help make sure that everything is setup correctly, so that customers can expect to begin receiving new advertising demand without delay.

A short video explaining the partnership can be viewed at https://www.watchfiresigns.com/seamless.

About Watchfire
Watchfire Signs designs, engineers and manufactures the best looking, most durable outdoor LED signs and digital billboards to help businesses and organizations increase visibility and drive growth. Headquartered in Danville, Ill., Watchfire has manufactured outdoor electric signs since 1932 and LED signs since 1998. The company has more than 60,000 Watchfire LED signs in operation worldwide and has more digital billboard customers in the U.S. than any other manufacturer. For information, go to http://www.watchfiresigns.com.

About DDI Media
DDI Media is a full-service billboard and outdoor advertising company servicing the greater St. Louis area for over 35 years. DDI offers more than 1,100 billboard faces including 28 digital billboards. 

About Blip
Blip optimizes OOH media revenue by making billboard advertising accessible to the masses. As the first self-serve, pay-per-blip digital billboard marketplace, Blip brings incremental new small business advertising customers to digital Out-of-Home media companies at scale. By democratizing access for a whole new segment of buyers, Blip is on track to make out-of-home a part of the standard canon of advertising for companies of all sizes. For more information about Blip, visit www.blipbillboards.com.

Contact:
Linda Muskin, 847-432-7300
lmuskin@teamclarus.com 

Mara Conklin, 847-816-9411
mconklin@teamclarus.com