A guide to making the case for deploying public WiFi to deliver digital strategies - for non technical readers

1.
TRIPLE A SQUARED
TECHNOLOGIES
Understand which technologies make
sense now and what is needed to
build for the future.
TEAM WO RK
Building a story to engage all
stakeholders, with facts and figures to
make the case.
P LA CE MAKING
Putting your destination on the map.
Help visitors find you and the
businesses in your local area.
GUIDE TO
DIGITAL
STRATEGIES
A guide to incorporating
technology and digital
thinking in planning for
Business Improvement
Districts throughout the
UK. With information and
reference material to build
compelling visions.
THE CASE FOR CHANGE
A tool kit to help convince stakeholders that investing in base level digital
connectivity will benefit the whole community…
2017 Christmas trading was dominated by the growth in online sales as the web continues to devour the
traditional retail landscape, with eCommerce spend continuing to grow by 17.8% in 2015-2016 and 82% of
Internet users shopping online. Attracted by 24x7 convenience, competitive pricing, a wider choice and more
engaging/personalised online experience from instantly available Internet shopfronts, all underpinned by faster
and mobile Internet connections and rapidly evolving logistics capabilities.
It is not surprising that consumers continue to embrace the virtual alternative to “going to the shops”.
1

2.
WHICH HAS SINCE SUNK
WITHOUT A TRACE
Search the web for any of these ideas today, any
follow up or follow through and the whole exercise
looks like a pet project from a coalition
government, which has sunk without a trace when
Parliament was dissolved.
“THE WORLD NEEDS NEW
LEADERSHIP, BUT THE
NEW LEADERSHIP IS
ABOUT WORKING
TOGETHER.”
Jack Ma
This document is intended to provide a high level
blueprint for anyone interested in leveraging the
opportunities of the online combined with the
offline so that they can understand what is needed
to engage and complement the online retail
experience. With ideas, data and case studies we
are looking to help you succeed.
As Amazon opens physical stores we look at
some of the reasons that businesses and places
across the country could approach taking
advantage of their physical attributes and how this
might be enabled a local level…
Specifically, we have been working with Business
Improvement Districts (BID) to make the strongest
possible case for digital development, helping
managers and stakeholders understand the nature
of the underlying infrastructure required and
consider some of the implications for users and
also for payers of BID levies. We operate from a
pragmatic commercial position and are confident
that every high street can successfully offer a
compelling vision of the future which includes an
integrated and coherent digital strategy.
The approach to BID governance and
management varies throughout the UK and we
aim to help decision makers and influencers better
understand the nature of the digital challenge
facing their area. Through understanding the
needs of your community and stakeholders and
building an articulate vision for complementing
existing efforts we hope you can be even more
successful.
In March 2015, with much fanfare “The
Digital High Street Report 2020” was
published. A solid piece of work
looking at how high streets could
respond to the threat of online
competition, seemingly the antithesis
of a physical high street. It made
some interesting suggestions based
on 4 broad areas:
IT ALL STARTED WITH
THE DIGITAL HIGH
STREET REPORT
• Infrastructure
• Digital Lab
• Training
• Monitoring Digital Health
2

3.
“WE ARE STUCK WITH
TECHNOLOGY WHEN WHAT
WE REALLY WANT IS JUST
STUFF THAT WORKS.”
Douglas Adams
Working with technology can be a frustrating game.
Some people love it while others can’t stand it.
Remember that everyone has a starting reference
point for their understanding of technology, at home.
What sort of technology do you have in your life
through choice? Most people have a secondary
reference point, either through work or education.
These may be complementary or sometimes
conflicting, but can be helpful when discussing
technology with friends and colleagues. Some
people also help decide what technology other
people use; MPs, policy makers, councillors,
executives and sometimes suppliers/vendors.
Often we have found that there can be a disconnect
between the people who understand the actual
technology (the engineers who can strip and rebuild
an engine) and the users of the technology (the
drivers). It is this gap that drives many failed IT
projects and leads to problems of ownership
especially when trying to deliver a competitive
outcome. Fear of the unknown and budgetary
constraints on both sides can hamper decision
making and often leads to unambitious goals and
bland or uninspiring outcomes.
WHO IS YOUR AUDIENCE?
WHAT IS THE “TARGET
MARKET”?
Who are you talking to? For the purpose of this
section, we will consider who is actually online.
Assuming that the whole UK population of 65.6m
people exist offline and 89% of adults have used the
Internet in the last 3 months, there are around 58.4m
people considered to be “online”. 70% of adults
access the internet via a mobile device. While there
remains a large number of adults that don’t use the
Internet, the majority of your target audience is online
and probably mobile.
THE DIGITALLY ENGAGED
HAVE ACCESS TO THE
GREATEST RANGE OF
RETAIL CHANNELS
Of the total 58.4m online, those that are considered to
be digitally engaged share a number of common
characteristics that make them attractive customers
and help inform the best ways to capture their
attention and build trust.
Affluence - the majority are in well-paid, full
employment and are more affluent than the average
shopper on the high street. While this is more
pronounced in major cities, weekday offers aimed at
the “digitally engaged” might be more successfully
targeted at working people; at various times during
the day - early morning, lunchtime and evening.
Preferences - digitally engaged users show more
interest in digital interactions including; restaurants,
health clubs, appointment booking (eg: doctors &
hairdressers) and transport. The vast majority are
active social media users.
Devices - 81% of UK adults own a smartphone and
this rises to 90% for 18-24 year olds with the majority
(54%) connecting over 4G, as opposed to 3G.
Smartphones are increasingly seen in social settings;
meeting friends, shopping, pubs and even eating in
restaurants. Any commuter journey on a train, tram
or bus during rush-hours will also reveal the extent to
smartphone penetration among those in full time
work.
Although smartphone penetration is starting to level
off between 80-90%, be under no illusions - ALL
digital experiences now demand mobile optimisation
and probably require a mobile first approach to the
user experience.
Age - It is safe to say that digital engagement is
skewed towards a younger age demographic, with
the under 30s consistently showing to be the most
connected group within the population. However, it is
easy to misinterpret this key fact. While younger
people rapidly adopt new technology, the largest
growth is now taking place among older groups. In
2016, Dutch social media use increased from 12% to
83% among the 45-64 year old users.
3

4.
.25
0.5
.75
1
18-29 30-49 50-64 65+
66%
71%
84%
92%
ALL MEDIA IS
SOCIAL
There is nothing that you can say that is more
interesting than what users already want to do right
now. Today, 92% of teenagers are online every day,
and 71% use more than one social network.
FACEBOOK IS COMPLETELY
DOMINANT.
Facebook's dominance of the social media landscape
is truly extraordinary. Not only does it take the top
spot, it owns Facebook Messenger and Instagram
which come second and third respectively for user
engagement. In the UK 78% of all adults use the site
and its related services, and 60% do so every day. It
is this persistent user attention that has propelled
Facebook to one of the largest and most profitable
(more than Google) businesses in the world.
Facebook presents an interesting challenge in
business circles as it can be seen as somewhat
frivolous and often frowned upon as a “waste of
[employee’s] time”. The user demographic is skewed
towards younger people and as a result a large
minority of “decision makers” are not active facebook
users. The facts however speak for themselves with
92% of the under 30s using Facebook.
Social media and Facebook specifically requires a
reasonable level of digital understanding to take
advantage of the business opportunities arising from
access to their highly engaged users. Facebook has a
dedicated business division focussed on helping
business make the most of their platform. Visit
https://www.facebook.com/business/ for some case
studies and overview of all the various ways a
business can use Facebook to reach their customers.
A number of other networks also offer social
engagement and advertising including; Twitter,
Pinterest, LinkedIn, Instagram, SnapChat & Google.
ALL B2C BUSINESS TODAY
WILL HAVE SOME
EXPERIENCE OF REACHING
CUSTOMERS VIA
FACEBOOK.
eMarketer estimates that
Facebook UK generated
£1.8bn in 2016. Mobile and
video advertising are set to
be the big stories with
almost 90% of the UK’s
under 50s engaged.
GET FOUND -
BUSINESS
ADVERTISING
The variety of content
available via YouTube makes
it the most popular online
community in the UK.
Registration and advertising
are developing to keep up
with growth.
YOUTUBE HAS
THE LARGEST
REACH
Cross platform messaging
app - Whatsapp has been
growing strongly in the UK,
likely to follow China’s
WeChat service towards
monetisation with
advertising and apps to
attract businesses.
WHATSAPP IS
GROWING
STRONGLY
0.25
0.5
0.75
1
18-29 30-49 50-64 65+
70%
83%
91%
96%
0.25
0.5
0.75
1
18-29 30-49 50-64 65+
24%
35%
57%
76%
4

5.
NOT ALL USERS CAN
ACCESS THE INTERNET
For this reason, the most fundamental (and first
point) that was made in the digital High Street
2020 Report was “Sufficient Access Through
Infrastructure”. While smartphone adoption
continues to rise, and operators bundle larger
amounts of data - per user data usage is also on
the increase. At the same time it is also true that
“smartphone users spend more time on Wi-Fi than
on 3G/4G”. For a variety of reasons, users prefer
Wi-Fi to paid-for mobile data plans. This is a vital
fact in building any plan for a digital vision and
should be fully considered. It may be more
difficult to attract users to your digital services if
they have to pay for the connectivity to access
them.
Although users might use the Internet in the same
way, data delivered via a mobile/cellular network is
considerably more expensive. Not only have
operators paid the government for spectrum, but
they have invested in a huge nationwide network
of masts, backhaul connections and data centres
to ensure that when someone dials your number,
your mobile phone rings. With call volumes in
decline, data is increasingly paying not just for the
maintenance of these networks but also their
expansion. Unsurprisingly, mobile network
operators are looking share much of the fixed
infrastructure costs while differentiating their
offerings on service and bundles (rather than
speed and coverage).
“High quality Internet and mobile access
(‘connectivity’) is now recognised as the
‘fifth utility’ alongside water, electricity,
transport and gas.”
source: Theo Blackwell, 2017
Camden is widely seen as the leading beacon of
London councils when it comes to digital strategy
and you can find out more about their approach
at: https://www.camden.gov.uk/digital_strategy.
Theo Blackwell the architect of much of the good
work has recently been appointed as London’s
Chief Digital Officer (@LDN_CDO).
“BUSINESS COMMUNITIES
ACROSS THE UK STILL
REPORT THAT OUR
DIGITAL INFRASTRUCTURE
IS NOT FIT FOR PURPOSE.
THROUGHOUT THE
COUNTRY, SIGNIFICANT
NUMBERS OF COMPANIES
OF EVERY SIZE AND
SECTOR LACK RELIABLE
INTERNET CONNECTIVITY –
A BASIC REQUIREMENT
FOR BUSINESSES TO
OPERATE EFFICIENTLY IN
TODAY’S WORLD.”
Dr Adam Marshall, Director
General of the British
Chambers of Commerce
QUARTER OF UK
BUSINESSES DON’T
HAVE RELIABLE
BROADBAND

6.
3
WHAT KIND OF
DIGITAL
OPPORTUNITIES?
While the provision of fast [free] Internet connectivity
is a great way to attract digitally engaged users to
physical places, the technology needed to provide
access to the Internet for people and their personal
devices is the foundation needed for a range of new
services. Sometimes called “Smart Cities”, or
referred to as Internet of Things (IoT) there are a
whole range of digital capabilities that require
underlying Internet infrastructure to work.
The digital high street 2020 report referred to a
centralised “lab” that would pilot technology and
showcase best practice. Often we have found that
there can be a disconnect between the people who
understand the actual technology (the engineers who
can strip and rebuild an engine) and the users of the
technology (the drivers). It is this gap that drives
many failed IT projects and leads to problems of
ownership especially when trying to deliver a
competitive outcome. Fear of the unknown and
budgetary constraints on both sides can hamper
decision making and often leads to unambitious goals
and bland or uninspiring outcomes.
SOME ANTICIPATED
TRENDS:
• Discoverability of High Street offer using digital
channels, driven by social media and proliferation
of mobile devices.
• Local online-mobile platforms (super-apps) are
needed now but are still in early stages of
development - with more recent research reports
coming to the same conclusion.
• Collective marketing: digital content from High
Street must be aggregated to form the overall offer
and inform the consumer.
• Consumer trust & data flow subject to a “value
vs intrusion” perception.
• Geo-location of mobile devices makes the High
Street into a real-time experience.
• Physical and virtual access - dependent in the
High Street context.
• Click-and-Collect - provides purchase time
choices
• New High Street occupiers will include online
businesses, pop-up shops and mobile street
trading. Leisure/health facilities and community
centres emerging as part of new High Street.
• Demographic shift and regional urban/rural
variation
• Contactless technology such as QR codes, NFC
and beacons are seen as a rapidly growing mobile
engagement channel.
• Digital investment incentives, both in soft
infrastructure (knowledge/skills and cloud based
services) as well as hard infrastructure (super/
ultrafast broadband, 3/4G cellular coverage &
WiFi).
• Sustaining High Street partnerships; growing
understanding of town centre management role in
meeting consumer expectations of High Street
visits.
These are all insightful and useful themes and we will
take a look at some of the ideas for services, consider
the prerequisites and also the possible benefits and
beneficiaries. For many, there aren’t any successful
examples that you can reference, most are supplier
lead initiatives and some are solutions looking for
problems. No-one is likely to embrace all of them,
but the intention is to provide you with an entry point
to start considering the art of your possible.
CAN YOU GIVE
ME AN EXAMPLE?
Stakeholders can be conservative and while some will
embrace change there are those that will require
proof. While there are hundreds of examples of
public WiFi deployments, there are very few that have
truly been successful. I could take you to a city with
fantastically fast WiFi that isn’t growing. Or a town
with a great local app that is hardly used by visitors or
residents. You could visit an internationally award
winning interactive visitor experience, with only a
handful of visitors. Certainty, in other words, is hard
to find. Motivations vary and change over time.
Embarking on the creation of a transformative local
digital vision requires some belief in the future of
technology.

7.
THE WORLD’S
MOST VALUABLE
RESOURCE IS
NO LONGER OIL,
BUT DATA
ECONOMIST 2017
Almost as fundamental to providing infrastructure is
the need to provide access to public/useful data.
1. OPEN DATA IS DATA THAT
ANYONE CAN ACCESS, USE
OR SHARE.
We’re not talking personal data, but all data in general
and a great starting point is the Open Data Institute.
“Whether it is data on local housing from government,
real-time train times from rail companies, organising
family events, or finding supermarket locations from
retailers, open data can help us all better understand,
and interact with, our cities.”
source: Open Data Institute
As you build out your ideas for delivering digital
services, it is important to consider how the data that
it will generate could be made available to other
people. Think less about why someone might be
interested in the historic [parking] data generated by
your [“free spaces”] app and more about how you
can make it available.
As a bus traveller, who does the [anonymous]
information about my travel patterns belong to? The
bus company? The council? The government? Me? In
truth it doesn’t really belong to anyone, it exists
because I choose to take a bus. I would like that fact
to be as widely useful as possible, so that the
information collected can be used to qualify and
inform future decisions about transport.
Building open data can be as simple as collecting the
data into a central repository or database and then
providing .csv files to organisations and partners or
as complex as writing APIs and letting developers
access information in real time.
2. COMMUNICATION HUBS,
USING STREET FURNITURE
To provide digital services. The best known example
is the LinkNYC that offers street based kiosks that:
• Provides superfast, free WiFi to anyone
• Has a built in tablet device with access to an
Internet browser and a predetermined list of
websites, local maps and services
• Allows users to make free national calls via an
app on the tablet
• Has a dedicated 999 emergency button
• Provides a power only USB port to charge
devices
• 2 x 55’ digital displays for public messaging &
advertising
The entire service is offered free and is entirely paid
for by digital advertising. BT are bringing a similar
service to the UK. However, the actual cost of the
service has attracted much debate from privacy
campaigners.
7

8.
PERSONALLY IDENTIFIABLE
INFORMATION HAS
INCREASED THE VALUE TO
ADVERTISERS:
“Ad space on the Links is so valuable because of the
user information (including IP addresses, GPS
location and browsing data) that allows advertisers to
deliver highly targeted content to passersby.”
source: govtech.com, 2016
Hubs may make good sense in areas that already
have fast broadband connections and high volumes
of footfall. Slow broadband and sporadic footfall
largely undermine the purely commercial model for
deploying kiosks. It is unlikely that BT will voluntarily
roll out the technology beyond major city centres
unless made to do so as part of their Universal
Service Commitment (USC).
It is however possible to make the case that kiosks
provide a plethora of advantages to the local
community; attracting digitally engaged shoppers,
showcasing local attractions, signposting and local
information, however making them “free” shouldn’t be
the objective. Free to the users certainly, but not free
to install, manage and maintain.
3. DIGITAL PLACE MAKING
Mobile apps have promised a whole range of benefits
for those investing in them. The pitch is “users/
visitors download your app and it immediately
becomes easier to talk directly to your chosen
audience”.
They offer the promise of easier digital discovery -
what’s on, where to find things as well as always on
communication and collective marketing.
However, they can be extremely problematic. In
general place apps tend to fall into 2 categories:
• Considered, useful and well executed
• Formulaic, templated and useless
The problem is that one is time consuming to setup
and expensive to maintain, whilst the other is cheap
and does not deliver a consistent, well planned user
experience to ensure frequent repeat usage and
loyalty.
There are a number of commoditised app providers
(eg: Townapps and Cityinformation) who scrape
information from a variety of sources; local news,
local council, hotel booking sites, voucher sites to
provide the semblance of a “local” offering. They
offer varying amounts of customisation and content
management, the lighter the human touch the less
costs involved.
The alternative is to build an app for your specific
audience. Similar in approach to building a web site -
using an app should add something extra from a
user’s perspective. If you were to build a website,
what information would it contain? Who would
publish it? How often? What does success look
like? Who’s interested in the information about site
traffic? Who owns the customer data?
Many places have built apps only to find that there
wasn’t sufficient value, to the users or the operators
to justify the continued expense of management and
maintenance. The Regent Street Partnership has a
vibrant and social web site but is not currently
offering an app. Canterbury has a integrated digital
offering around an app, a loyalty card and a website.
Of course, just developing your app overlooks the key
need to get users to download it.
COST-PER INSTALL IS EASY
TO CALCULATE: YOUR
TOTAL AD SPEND DIVIDED
BY NUMBER OF INSTALLS.
The ongoing promotion and marketing of your app
should be considered in any budgets and forecasts.
Making the case for a dedicated app, which clearly
identifies a need and positively addresses that need,
can be a useful way to engage digitally your target
demographic audience. Often however, a well
executed website designed with mobile users in
mind, can achieve the same results for a lower cost.
If you are looking for something a little more
customised and authentic digital placemaking is a
good label for the kind of app/experience that might
be more suitable. Committing to such an approach
will require time & resources as well as money and
while the return on investment remains to be seen, it
is certainly an “all in” way of taking your town online.
8

9.
4.PARKING AVAILABILITY &
PAYMENTS
Connectivity is also transforming the way in which
vehicles and places interact. With a robust
underlying connectivity platform, drivers should be
able to interact with parking information in real time
as well as receiving live traffic information.
People & Places paint a compelling view of the future
of town centre parking in which the connected
minority become the connected majority, and the
pace of innovation accelerates leading to reduced
travel times, congestion and pollution.
“They [motorists] will be able to call up the area in
which they want to park via their in-car displays and
click on the location that is the best value or most
convenient and then click through to book and pay for
parking”
source: people-places.co.uk
Spanish company Urbiotica is using sensors to
change cities' parking. Its wireless sensors provide
real-time data on traffic, which has helped reduce
congestion by ten per cent in Nice as part of the
MOV'Smart plan. Using Internet of Things
technology they are pioneering the “smart parking”
revolution.
5. ENVIRONMENTAL
SENSORS & LIGHTING
The future of Smart Cities demands that the
technology can lead to environmental benefits. The
first is to use sensors to report; temperature,
pollution, pollen count, water quality and more.
Information provided by connected “sensors” can be
used to change behaviours.
Smart lighting offers the ability to adapt to weather
and ambient light conditions. How often have you
seen street lights on when it’s light enough to see
well? The demonstrator in Glasgow (Futurecity) has
combined a number of these sensor elements into a
single trial. More at http://futurecity.glasgow.gov.uk/
intelligent-street-lighting/
Smart waste containers can monitor public bins for
garbage collection route optimisation.
In Oxford citizens created a sensor network Flood
Network to collect real-time data on river levels.
Many of these more “integrated” solutions require
service providers to manage the data and act upon it.
However, these technologies will define our
understanding and ability to react quickly to changes
in our urban surroundings.
6. LOCATION & WAY
FINDING WHEN WAS THE
LAST TIME YOU USED A
PHYSICAL MAP?
Knowing where you are and where you are going is
now a feature of your phone. Even stand alone
satellite navigation has followed the map, in perhaps
one of the shortest product lifecycles ever
experienced.
Smartphones now offer an unparalleled ability to
know where you are. With built in GPS in almost
every Smart device (not just phones), Google and
Apple have risen to dominate the world of digital
mapping. With an array of sensors, phones can also
“tell” the speed and direction you are moving, leading
to many turn by turn navigation apps.
This presents a unique opportunity to help visitors
find the things that you want to promote. Using these
public mapping tools, towns can easily add points of
interest and make sure that key places are easy to
find.
Going further, using sensors that improve accuracy
(most GPS solutions can only achieve accuracy to
within 8m and don’t work well indoors) it is possible
to provide very granular information on where people
should go and even the best route for them to travel.
Some examples of way finding solutions include
tourist trails, audio solutions for the vision impaired
(Wayfindr), and detailed mapping information for the
physically handicapped that ensures accessibility
(EnabledCity).
9

10.
LONDON IS THE
MOST SPIED-ON
CITY IN THE
WORLD.
WORLDATLAS.COM
The UK population is one of the most heavily
surveilled the planet. From critical infrastructure, to
policing, transport, security and protection, we are
happy to be caught on camera.
7. CCTV.
The UK embraced CCTV early, we are starting to
discover that hardware needs upgrading to the latest
HD standards and connecting back to central
locations that can process facial recognition in real
time to provide early warnings.
New uses for CCTV are emerging all the time, such as
suicide prevention on the rail network, Artificial
Intelligence for retail (eg: Amazon) and more. As the
technology has moved from analogue to digital,
connecting cameras has become increasingly
expensive. High bandwidth wireless networks can
make the deployment of CCTV in “trouble” or
strategically important areas considerably more cost
effective and in a clever twist, in Gloucester existing
IP cameras have been configured to “share” their
spare bandwidth with the public via WiFi.
When security and surveillance is an important
service, existing wireless networks can be used to
expedite the speed, reduce the complexity of a new
deployment and significantly reduce the infrastructure
costs compared to the inconvenience of digging a
copper or fibre optic cable to the street furniture .
8. FOOTFALL MONITORING,
KNOW HOW MANY PEOPLE?
Knowing the volume of people that travel past a
particular place has enormous planning benefit and
potentially commercial advantages as well. Without
capturing any personal data, sensors can monitor the
“number” of people passing the sensor. This number
can be accurately extrapolated to provide location
specific footfall information. There are a variety of
technical solutions but all need to be connected to a
central location via the Internet.
All these technologies provide “visualizations” of how
users actually move through spaces:
• Absolute volumes
• Time of day
• Entry & exit
• Special events
This allows improved planning and better preparation
for sporting events and seasonal peaks (eg:
Christmas). It can also provide insight into the most
densely trafficked areas as well as the least, which
may have implications for potential tenants.
9. OUT OF HOME (OOH)
ADVERTISING
Has been a feature the UK urban landscape since the
1970s. It adds welcome colour to streets around the
country, and Clear Channel Outdoor recently found
that 82% of people surveyed felt it had an overall
positive impact.
10

11.
DIGITAL
CONTENT &
CONNECTIVITY
As many billboards have over the last 10 years been
upgraded to “digital displays” the Digital Out Of
Home (DOOH) market has emerged as a the preferred
way for many brands to deliver their advertising
messages.
“Ultimately, the emerging digital-out-of-home market
is groundbreaking in its interactive technology, but it's
also a return to advertising's roots and the original
purpose around advertising: to provide an engaging
and useful service to the public.”
source: AdAge 2017
These new digital displays need not just power, but
also a way to update and change the content. Early
versions had slow connections that required
“overnight” updates, newer models are connected to
the Internet over fast [wired and wireless] connections
and are much more like televisions. In fact some
advertisers have used this capability to deliver
“timed” content such as product launches and
“interactive” content relative to the display’s location.
8. TRANSPORTATION
Perhaps one of the biggest opportunities is within the
transportation sector. Almost all transport operators
(particularly in the UK) tend to act in their own best
interests (from a commercial revenues perspective)
rather than helping passengers make informed
decisions by using a multi-modal journey, that might
include bus > train/tram > taxi.
Underpinning such an utopian vision of a “joined up
transport infrastructure” is the ubiquitous connectivity
that supports a large number of different telemetry
devices, footfall counting devices, ibeacons and other
real-time location and passenger usage data.
Traffic management - by combining traffic sensors
with traffic lights real time traffic information can
“inform” the network, allowing artificial intelligence to
predict traffic flows and co-ordinate the light
sequencing. In Pittsburgh it has lead to a 25%
reduction in travel time and 20% reduction in
pollution. The principle of smart traffic management
has already arrived on our motorways with a similar
25% reduction in journey times and it is likely that
environmental benefits will ensure that we see the
technology in urban settings in the near future.
Smarter public transport - in Manchester their
CityVerve project is enabling the bus network so
“people will be able to check-in and let the bus driver
know they are waiting”. Trains and busses are likely
to get much better at predicting (and sharing) their
real time schedules. Paperless or “smart” ticketing is
also gradually arriving in the UK.
Mobile access - In Porto, the city connected 600
buses and taxis with WiFi hotspots, providing vehicle
telemetry as well as public WiFi access and collecting
sensor data.
While transportation is an attractive area to focus as it
directly benefits residents, it is also extremely difficult
to directly influence due to the devolved nature of the
commercial and competitive landscape in most cities
and towns. Being aware of some of the benefits and
the need to ensure maximum interoperability of
solutions is likely to lead to the best short term
outcome and could inform and influence some of the
long term aspirations of Smart City planners, their
residents and the associated supply chains that
support them.
11

12.
ACCESS POINTS ALLOW
WIFI DEVICES TO
CONNECT TO A WIRED
NETWORK
“In a wireless local area network (WLAN), an
access point is a station that transmits and
receives data (sometimes referred to as a
transceiver). An access point connects
users to other users within the network and
also can serve as the point of
interconnection between the WLAN and a
fixed wire network. Each access point can
serve multiple users within a defined
network area; as people move beyond the
range of one access point, they are
automatically handed over to the next one.
A small WLAN may only require a single
access point; the number required
increases as a function of the number of
network users and the physical size of the
network.”
source: TechTarget
Access points contain radios, the type, number
and arrangement of the radios in an access point
determine their cost and define the theoretical
speed that each user can receive, number of users
that can be “connected” at the same time and the
amount of physical space that a single AP can
“cover”. Access points require power and a
network interface (usually wired but sometimes
configured as a mesh using a dedicated wireless
channel to connect to the network).
It should be noted that “carrier grade” access
points are technically different from home or
consumer grade access points. Containing much
more/higher performance components as well as
being suitable for outdoor deployment.
There are a huge number of access point vendors,
as they can be cheaply manufactured using
reference designs in the far east. When
considering building a public wireless network the
most common access point vendors to choose
are: Cisco, HP & Rukus, making brands including;
meraki, ubiquiti & aruba. There are some very
niche AP vendors that might be considered in
exceptional environments (eg: extremely high
density indoors).
While choosing a reliable partner
should ensure that you don’t have to
worry about the details, it is worth
being familiar with the key elements
needed for WiFi delivery and ultimately
what you are paying for. Of more
importance is the service that you
agree around support and
maintenance. How many times have
you tried to connect to a WiFi network
only to find that it doesn’t work? This
experience erodes user trust and
makes it very difficult to launch digital
services. Your WiFi must work as
intended ALL the time.
WHAT DO YOU NEED
FOR A WIFI SERVICE?
12

13.
WIRELESS CONTROLLERS
Some access points are sold as stand alone while
others user controllers. Controllers can be located
locally (requiring space and power) or located
centrally in a data centre. Managing APs centrally
allows you to change to your mind and more easily
experiment and test user experiences. Broadly
speaking stand alone APs are cheaper to deploy and
more expensive to manage. Some AP controllers can
be very expensive and vendors/suppliers often look
to aggressively increase costs using controllers.
CENTRALISED
INFRASTRUCTURE “THE
BRAINS”
Hidden deep in the background are the nuts and
bolts of the WiFi services. Often shared across a
wide number of networks/customers suppliers need
to manage who has access to the network, what they
are allowed to do and how this time/usage should be
counted (or billed). It is this part of the network that
generates the information that you want to report.
How many users, time of day, which access points,
how much data, what services, etc… At a network
level this data is not personally identifiable, however it
does rely on using a MAC address which is unique
and does ultimately identify a device (with a person).
This is the first point that General Data Protection
Regulation (GDPR) may impact your WiFi network.
The reporting that you can receive will depend on the
implementation and integration of the brains. Real
time information should be provided and you should
consider what types of things you might want to see.
If 80% of users are watching YouTube you might want
to advertise on YouTube. Peak times might drive
smoothing or extending activities to capitalise on
footfall, etc... Specifically you should consider who
needs to see what information and how. It is a
technical spreadsheet once a week or a visual
dashboard in real time?
• Just you
• Your team
• Your organisation
• Other stakeholder organisations & employees
• The public
Developing an integrated view of customer’s WiFi use
requires this data to be combined with registration
data. Network information (based on a MAC address)
needs to be associated with a user to provide an
additional level of insight, the utility of which needs to
be carefully considered. Capturing this information
and storing it safely (in a compliant fashion) creates a
considerable commercial overhead. We advocate
capturing as little data as possible (read more).
Keeping customers safe is also a significant
responsibility. When deploying WiFi it is important
that users aren’t able to cause offence to others and
while the responsibility for filtering necessary to
ensure that young users don’t access restricted
content may rest with the partner, the reputational risk
and damage sits firmly with the visible provider.
The user experience is the product. Sometimes
referred to as UX this is often the most overlooked
aspect of any WiFi network. All of the elements so far
have been [relatively] technical in nature, related
mainly to the cost and performance of the “network” -
IT considerations. The user experience however is
the part of the WiFi network that faces the end users.
As such, it the most important piece of any WiFi
network.
NO MATTER HOW FAST, OR SAF E
OR W IDELY AVAILAB LE YOUR
WIFI NETW ORK, IF USERS
DON’T F IND IT EASY TO
CONNECT, THEY WON’T USE I T.
4G is easy to connect to… you take your phone out
of your pocket and you open your app/browser.
That’s it. Although falling in price, it isn’t yet free and
it also doesn’t work well indoors or when there are a
lot of other people around. Public WiFi on the other
hand varies significantly, unnecessarily onerous
registration pages combined with long terms and
conditions [which people rarely read] create a
significant amount of friction upon first use. The
experience on subsequent visits also varies with
landing pages and captive portals preventing users
from reaching their content online.
Most integrated WiFi solutions include a Captive
Portal element designed to address the needs of
marketing. They usually provide a Content
Management System (CMS) that allows users to
create user registration forms, landing page/s,
managed payment & subscriptions, offers/coupons,
adverts/videos and surveys. Some may even offer to
manage email notifications within the same system.
13

14.
IT IS POSSIBLE
TO CREATE
MANY CUSTOM
EXPERIENCES
When planning the ongoing operation and
management of the WiFi network, it is important to
approach this from an end user perspective. Who
[what entity] will be offering the service? When/if a
user provides personal information who will store this
and how/who will it be shared with? How will
coupons be conceived, published, printed and
redeemed? Who will create emails, with what content
[from whom] and organise for them to be sent to [a
segmented set of users], how often?
Answers to some of these questions will help you
understand the importance of the CMS functionality
to your organization. It is possible/likely that you
already perform some of these activities and it may
be better to seek to “add” the WiFi data to your
existing tools, in which case the “openess” of the
data is of more interest than the publishing tools
themselves. When running a large estate of WiFi
access points, although it is possible to create many
custom user experiences, doing so may require the
creation and maintenance of a large number of
different “microsites”. It may be worth assessing why
WiFi users should be redirected anywhere other than
your homepage or existing website?
Properly building and maintaining a separate WiFi
experience is likely to take time and care, and will
require an ongoing commitment of resources to keep
it fresh and relevant for users. The digital skills
required are similar to those of building and running a
website.
UNDERSTAND MORE, GET A
MORE GRANULAR PICTURE
WITH IBEACONS
Beyond deploying access points bluetooth low
energy [LE] currently offers a viable technology to
provide lower level location information. To know
exactly how many people walked past a particular
place/object or to build interactive apps based on
precise location (in an art gallery) bluetooth offers a
passive opportunity to find out where someone is.
The users device obviously needs to have bluetooth
switched on, advances in power consumption (uses
less battery) and utility (bluetooth headphones) are
making the use of bluetooth more capable.
With Android and iOS delivering native solutions,
beacons are likely to become more common,
however much has been promised and very little
delivered to date. At this point most beacon based
solutions are experimental, however they will form an
operational backbone of the new crossrail project
when it opens. We expect to see more compelling
and useful use cases emerge
14

15. BE CLEAR, MAKE
YOUR POINT &
MEASURE THE
RIGHT THINGS
The best way to succeed with your WiFi project is to
be clear why you want/need it. Working within your
wider organisation to understand your motivation for
providing WiFi. We have come across literally
hundreds of reasons, and yours is likely to be a
combination of many. In clarifying your rationale you
will also discover what you need to measure, in order
to know if you have been successful. The best
projects combine many different motivations into a
single project and deliver value for a wide number of
stakeholders.
REASON MEASUREMENT
We want customer/visitors to stick around longer so
they can spend more money
• Revenues
• Dwell times
We want to sell WiFi access to users Revenues
We want to advertise local shops/attractions to
visitors so that they spend more money
• Number of WiFi users
• Number of adverts served
• Advertiser actual revenues
We want to make it easier for visitors to find parking
spaces
Surveys
We want to reduce the cost of adding CCTV cameras
to our network
CCTV camera deployment costs
We want to know the number of people visiting • WiFi network data
• Footfall analysis
We want to sell sponsorship of our WiFi Revenues
We want to remotely monitor assets (eg: lifts &
escalators. Temperature, etc...)
• Wireless connectivity capabilities
• Cost savings
We want guests to share our network User numbers
We want suppliers to be able to remotely deliver
“data” to assets in our estate (eg: Adverts to screens)
Reduced supplier costs
We want users to be confident that they can’t be
hacked when using our network.
Audit and security compliance
We want to digitally engage with visitors - create an
electronic relationship.
Interactions eg: Social Media
Measuring some of these items can be difficult
requiring a number of different stakeholders to share
possibly sensitive information to better understand
whether the underlying connectivity is meeting its
objectives. This should not be a reason to ignore the
outcomes.

16.
BUILD THE
BUSINESS CASE
TO SUPPORT
YOUR VISION
If you came straight to this section, it is worth have a
quick look at the some of the previous sections. WiFi
is either a key enabler for your vision of the future or it
is something that someone else has asked/
demanded that you provide. The distinction will be
key to meeting your financial expectations. Top down
or bottom up?
The components of ALL wireless networks are largely
similar, the attention to detail and underlying quality of
the access [and user experience] will be defined by
your budget. If you come from the point of view that
we have £XX to spend, then the procurement will be a
price lead activity based on your desire for the lowest
cost. If you have framed the need for WiFi in your
context, then careful expenditure while building the
infrastructure is likely to deliver considerable
efficiencies further down the line.
It should be noted that often the people responsible
for specifying and deploying a network, are not well
aligned with those that will manage and use it.
DO YOU PREFER CAPEX?
The hardware has a capital cost which can frequently
be combined with the installation of the hardware
[usually about 50% of the overall deployment cost].
The cost per access point is a measure that will allow
you to understand the relative benefits of deploying
larger numbers of APs [costs fall as economies in
deployment are achieved, up to a point].
Total Cost of Deployment / no of Access Points
= Cost per Access Point
Be aware that APs have an extremely short life-cycle
as they are based on the smartphone technology life-
cycle. Smartphones are replaced on average every 2
years, leading to very rapid shifts in technology. The
evolution of wireless standards from 802.11b (11
Mpbs) in 2000 to 802.11ac (433 Mbps) in 2013
requires that the underlying infrastructure be
upgraded to keep pace.
The overall capital deployment costs can be “offset”
in a number of ways, including standard financing
that would allow for the costs to be spread over 1, 2
or 3 years to more creative automatic upgrade deals,
where the equipment is never owned and partners
agree to upgrade the hardware every 2, 3 or 4 years.
Clarity over your ability or willingness to pay upfront is
likely to lead to a better overall financial package.
Additionally, from time to time the government [and
EU] offer loans and grants to help with capital costs
associated with public WiFi and other types of
connectivity.
OR WOULD YOU LIKE TO
PAY WITH OPEX?
The network itself has elements that require
management and maintenance on an ongoing basis.
Unless you have a team of IT staff, you should
expect to pay a % of the capital cost on an annual
recurring basis to ensure the smooth operation of the
network that you deploy. It can vary significantly and
will usually dictate the quality of the service you
deliver to your users. You will need staff to manage
this interface with your partner and ensure they are
delivering the service that you are paying for.
Perhaps more importantly, you should
CONSIDER THE R ESOURCES
THAT YOU MAY NEED T O
OPERATE YOUR W IFI SERVICE
from a user perspective. Are you collecting user
data? Do you plan to send them emails? What
content will these contain and who is going to
produce and send them, how often? Do different
locations have different “messages” for customers/
visitors? Who will create and publish these
messages? What sort of reporting will be generated?
Who will look at it, how often? What will they do
based upon it? What is the business justification?
Sometimes your resources [or willingness to pay for
resources] will dictate the type of service that you
eventually launch. Beyond the initial enthusiasm,
creating a consistent experience for end users will
create trust and ultimately ensure that your WiFi
meets the needs of all stakeholders. The currency
of digital relationships is trust, a network that doesn’t
work breaks this trust as does a newsletter without
any news, or special offers that aren’t special.
15

17.
TRIPLE A SQUARED
Oneustonsq, 40 Melton Street, London, NW1 2FD,
M +44 7984 613380, E toby@3a2.co.uk, www.3a2.co.uk
TECHNOLOGY IS
PART OF THE
RETAIL
LANDSCAPE AND
ALL RETAILERS
WANT MORE
CUSTOMERS
In this context, think carefully about how reporting
and content management can be handled by
stakeholders that do this already. Retailers and
business face these issues on a daily basis. Creating
a service that allows existing stakeholders to take
advantage of new insights may deliver better value
that creating a whole new process and/or
stakeholder. For example, most retailers already have
a way of getting coupons to their customers, rather
than creating a whole new coupon platform, find out
how you can use their existing solutions.
Many of the brands on today’s high street have head
offices and centralised ways of doing things. Does
the manager in your local supermarket decide what
products cost and which offers are available? At the
same time, much of the artisanal attraction of today’s
high street with small independent boutiques and
eateries, requires that these businesses also have
loyalty schemes and coupons. Technology is part of
the retail landscape and all retailers want more
customers.
AS YOU EMBARK ON YOUR
JOURNEY TO DELIVER THE
BENEFITS OF TECHNOLOGY
TO YOUR BUSINESS OR
VENTURE IT IS VITAL THAT
YOU HAVE A VISION.
A clear picture of what you are trying to achieve. A
story that other people can understand and then
share with others. A reason for wanting to invest in
digital.
It isn’t all about costs and revenues. When
eCommerce entered the world, it was a technical
problem. Using web pages to present customers
with lists of products to buy. Over 20 years later the
most successful online retailers combine technology
(and IT) with sales and very sophisticated marketing
to create personalised online experiences.
There are many reasons that people will continue to
visit physical locations, ironically convenience and
experience are top of the list. So the high street will
need to evolve to better meet the needs of a younger
demographic, who have grown up with technology.
Triple A Squared offers independent advise to private
a pubic sector clients to make the most of digital
technology deployments at scale. Correctly
specifying and rolling out foundational capabilities
ensures both the longest possible asset life cycle and
also offers a sound platform for future
experimentation and discovery.

18. INTERACTIVE APPENDIX:
17
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