As part of an on-going campaign to engage and inform residents and visitors to the city centre, Manchester City Council commissioned “CityLive”. This project saw giant touchscreen kiosks erected in key areas of the city last year, allowing people to interact with content about the city in a fun and engaging way.

As with most of these experiential marketing tools, it’s the code behind the screen and how the screen’s content is managed that makes the magic happen out front. FTP Concepts is proud to be a part of that behind the scenes team.

CityLive touchscreens are installed with the Quividi software. This innovative software means that people in the vicinity of the CityLive screens are scanned and then appropriate messages and adverts are displayed according to the make-up of the audience. Behind the scenes, it was essential that different creatives and a range of campaigns could be brought together seamlessly to ensure a smooth experience for users, based on the Quividi analysis.

CityLive also has a number of engaging apps to attract users, including the hugely popular Christmas campaign. Both the content management system and FTP Concepts’ network management were put to the test before Christmas, when there was an upload of one picture every 90 seconds on each screen in the network, as people took festive “selfies” on the screens, which were then uploaded to a Facebook page. With queues of people waiting to use this function, FTP Concepts’ content management system and network management ensured it ran smoothly.

As well as the advertising content, displayed according to the Quividi analysis, and the interactive apps, Manchester City Council also wanted the content management system to be flexible so they could offer advertisers targeted packages.

Therefore, FTP Concepts ensured that the content management system enabled advertisers to book slots on as many or as few CityLive screens as they wished, with the Council maintaining overall control of the system and being able to make changes to booking in real time. This ensured content could be delivered based on consumer behaviour and react to external events, such as the weather.

Furthermore, FTP Concepts was also asked to manage the network, ensuring that it was working to full capacity.

Richard Blackburn, Managing Director of MediaCo, who FTP Concepts worked with on CityLive, said: “FTP are doing a great job of managing the network and looking after the content management.”