Using Digital Lobby Signs to Make Waiting More Exciting

When patients enter the lobby of your clinic, they’re likely experiencing a range of emotions — apprehension, anxiety or even fear. Waiting rooms are made up of the many emotions that are tied to the many outcomes your patients may be facing, both good and bad.

The waiting room is an important place for practitioners to pay attention to when considering their patients’ comfort, especially when taking long patient wait times into account. In fact, research tells us that the average clinic visit clocks in at 85 minutes, and with every ten minutes they wait over that point, patient satisfaction drops by 3%.

Using the digital lobby signs in your practice that inform, entertain and engage your patients can counteract that decline and help put patients’ minds at ease. To put patient satisfaction back on the upswing, you’ll need the best digital signage solution to help you do it, stat.

Adding digital lobby signs to your clinic

Think of your lobby area as an opportunity to connect with your patients before their appointment begins. Digital lobby signs can create a welcoming space that centers around patient comfort and engagement.

Outfit your reception area with lobby screens

Your lobby area likely has TVs hanging on the wall or nested away in entertainment units. Investing in a digital signage software solution allows you to use the screens you already have to engage your patients.

The placement of your lobby screens is critical when it comes to visibility, readability and also for encouraging interaction. In short, you want to position your screens at key touchpoints so patients experience more than a passing glance.

Some of the most effective areas to position digital lobby signs include:

A centralized point of the waiting room that ensures equal access by all patients
The point of departure/check-out desk (for reminders, critical announcements about hours of operation, or to encourage patient feedback)
Corners or walls surrounded by patient seating

Pick a lobby display software that’s right for your clinic’s goals

Spend five minutes searching for lobby TV display software, and you’ll see a wide range of solutions with various features and capabilities. To narrow the playing field to find the best digital signage software for your practice, start by taking into account the following factors:

Clinic initiatives and goals you plan to tackle with digital signage (i.e., promote your healthcare retail storefront, drive sales for new services, etc.).
Universal and demographic-specific content you can display that will engage all patients (i.e., kid-friendly content for young patients, at-home remedies and care plans for common illnesses, etc.).
Your comfort level with content creation and the tools you’ll need to make the process as easy as possible.
The number of screens you plan to leverage with digital signage and the software’s ability to allow for remote, multi-user access and management.
An easy-to-use content management system (CMS) with diverse content creation capabilities (i.e., photos, spotlights, videos and more).
Access to insights and analytics, allowing you to visualize, track and measure patient engagement.

Create content for your digital waiting room displays

The content you show in the lobby displays will likely be as diverse as your patient population. To showcase the type of content your patients need (and want), you’ll want to consider the following criteria:

The age, interests and other key factors of your patient demographic.
The time of year and which services are most relevant (school immunizations and flu vaccinations, for example, have specific seasons of popularity).
Any issues your patients experience that digital signage could resolve (i.e., anxiety about new, innovative treatments, questions about lifestyle, wellness and preventative care, etc.).
The type of atmosphere you want to create (i.e., calming yet education-focused).

Once you have a clear sense of the type of content that would benefit your patients the most, zeroing in on the right digital signage solution, complete with user-friendly content creation tools and features, is your next goal.

UPshow’s in-app Canva integration simplifies the content creation process, making it as easy as dragging and dropping the content you want to see into a premade template. With hundreds of preloaded, health-related and other industry-specific templates to choose from, generating and changing over your content will be a painless process.

Other ways to maximize your digital lobby signage

Digital signage is anything but a one-trick pony. You can also modernize and prioritize patient education to drive positive health outcomes, and that’s just the beginning when it comes to digital lobby signs.

Share entertaining content on digital signage in your lobby

Whether your patients are waiting for five minutes or fifty minutes, the content you share should be entertaining to some degree. Entertaining content doesn’t mean it needs to lack educational value, either. To outfit your displays with the appropriate content, consider the age and interests of your patients. Showcasing entertaining content in your lobby might include the following:

Fun medical facts or trivia
Kid-led Q & A sessions with the medical staff
Interviews with doctors and other medical staff to familiarize patients with your team and ease their pre-appointment nerves

You can use UPshow’s fixed panel and multipanel displays to keep critical announcements and other content on the screen for a specific duration while simultaneously showing otherwise entertaining content.

Create interactive signs for patients in waiting room

Patient engagement doesn’t have to end when your patients are no longer in the same vicinity as your screens. You can interact with them while they’re on their own devices with the help of QR-code technology.

With UPshow’s QR Code campaign creator, you can link your patients to countless websites, resources and more to engage them and drive positive health outcomes. Many practices are using QR code technology in the following ways:

Link patients to the patient portal
Solicit pre and post-appointment feedback to enhance staff operations and quality of care
Use nature displays and sounds to reduce patient anxiety
Provide access to relevant, patient-tailored resources

Create an immersive entertainment experience with music

Some patients may not want to watch a video or read about medical topics, especially if they’re feeling anxious about their appointment. Research shows that music is an effective way to reduce symptoms of stress and anxiety. By playing music through your digital lobby signs, you may be able to take the edge off so patients can later focus on their treatment and care during their appointment.

UPshow’s Premium Audio solution comes with over 50 ad-free audio stations that will put your patients at ease. For an immersive waiting-room experience, you can pair music with your content displays, heightening their appeal to a level that inspires engagement.

UPshow can help you transform your lobby with digital lobby signs

While most patients will have a specific appointment time with their clinical team, their initial encounter with your practice begins in the lobby. Strategically placing digital lobby signs in high-traffic areas can help you tailor your patients’ experiences from the get-go.

UPshow’s digital signage software solution can engage patients the moment they enter your lobby. With extensive education and entertainment options, you can relay vital information on a screen-by-screen basis, giving your patients what they need when needed.