Ivideon Counter 3D: whom, how and why count visitors

Counting visitors began, probably, with the advent of the first stores. The main question that a store owner had after the start of sales demanded an answer: how many of the people who arrived managed to turn into buyers? Over time, other complex issues that have affected conversion rates have been added to this task.

Today, automated systems help to determine business performance, on the basis of which data you can choose the date of sales, find out the best opening and closing times, and find problems in the work of personnel. It seems that it’s enough to put a few sensors and watch how charts grow favorably or tragically fall, but life makes adjustments: in some cases, the system generates more problems than money.

Why count

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Practice shows that in business they often follow the principle of “doing like everyone else”, forgetting that each point of sale is unique.

Guided only by previous experience or mirroring the behavior of successful competitors, it is impossible to optimally plan the work of your particular store, which means that costs and lost profits are inevitable.

We need objective data to make management decisions in the areas of marketing, development and HR. Such data will help to collect visitors counters.

The key objectives of the area of ​​calculation include:

1. Determining the ratio of the number of visitors to the number of purchasers.
2. Calculation of traffic growth for visitors on weekends and holidays to hire the optimal number of sellers. The solution to the eternal problem, when on some days the sellers are bored and do not know what to do, but are overloaded on others.
3. Detailed evaluation of the effectiveness of advertising campaigns. Did the promotion really bring in new buyers?
4. Assessment of the attractiveness of a display case or stand. It always seems to have done a little better or a little worse than it should be. With the counter it is easy to find out about possible problems with the arrangement of goods.
5. Testing hypotheses about seasonal workload of employees. Do you prepare for the New Year influx of buyers or sales growth will affect only the online store?

In our practice, there was a case when, according to the data of the counter, the number of visitors in the store dropped over the week. A good reason to spend time and resources on checking the quality of sellers' work. However, the owner had a second counter installed, which measured patency in a common corridor in front of the display case. The counter in front of the entrance also showed a drop in traffic - fewer people began to go to the shopping center, and sellers began to work even harder amid the general drop in human traffic.

It is easy to imagine the opposite situation: if employees report low store traffic, they will automatically increase the conversion and the sales bonus. Accurate attendance data will ensure that premiums are correctly calculated to motivate employees. Thus, the error of the visitor counting system has an impact on retail sales.

Overview of visitor counting systems

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In the digital era, people were considered a special employee in front of the store. In the 70s, with the development of household video recorders in the USA, video recording became available to private individuals, and cameras began to be used to count visitors. The disadvantage of these systems was that visitors to the recordings had to be considered exactly the same “analog method” - manually.

Already from the 90s, infrared sensors and counters for opening and closing doors on reed switches began to be used for counting. Then, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth technologies were connected to the task, and modern turnstiles with thermal and video sensors were added.

A big plus of the first decisions was cheapness - the cost of one sensor started from several thousand rubles. Cons - high error, lack of protection against data falsification and the need to purchase additional equipment (most often a computer).

Today on the market there are many different counting systems: from the simplest IR sensor to the analysis of the video stream using neural networks. The quality of work of almost all solutions is highly dependent on the conditions in which they are used at the object of observation.

The accuracy of the calculation is adversely affected by changes in the light background, shadow and glare. Frames can count as a person a loaded cart with dimensional things, and with a very large influx of visitors, often two people are taken for one.

Among all the tested devices, the most effective was a 3D video counter that tracks the position, height of objects in the coverage area, the direction of movement of objects, their shape and size. One device includes all the necessary functions - collects, stores, alerts, transfers information without installing a registrar or PC.

The operation of the 3D counter does not depend on the number of visitors, lighting, temperature and other factors. The counter can monitor the passage width of up to three meters, so one device is enough for most objects. Today it is the most professional solution for counting visitors, characterized by high accuracy, stability and low error rates.

3D counter uses digital signal processor ( DSP), which in real time receives data from two graphic sensors, calculates a three-dimensional picture, converts it into a mathematical 3D model, finds the heads of passing visitors using the built-in algorithm, excluding any false objects (shadows, sun glare, food carts, baby carriages, bags).

Ivideon Counter 3D: universal counter

Now we are releasing a counter integrated with the Ivideon service, which connects via Ethernet to the Internet, is configured in 5 minutes in the Ivideon dashboard and starts transmitting statistics to the cloud.

Main characteristics:

• Built-in analytics for counting visitors with an accuracy of 95%;
• coverage of the passage width up to 3 meters;
• built-in microphone;
• Power over twisted pair (PoE) or DC 12V;
• motion detection in the input / output directions;
• remote setup and maintenance;
• flexible adjustment of detection zones;
• statistics storage in the Ivideon cloud archive, video storage in NAS, locally on a PC or microSD card up to 128 GB.

Installation and setup

The device is located at a height of 250 to 380 cm and controls the passage width of up to 3 meters. The meter is easy to install without the involvement of an installer and additional costs.

The fastening technique allows installation on any surface, including suspended ceilings, drywall, concrete, remote brackets.

The operating temperature is from -10 ° C to + 45 ° C, but it is recommended to use the meter only indoors. The design of the device (white metal case), small dimensions (162.1 x 76 x 37.8 mm) and light weight (300 g) make it possible to place the meter so that it does not attract attention.

In Ivideon's personal account, the counter is added like any camera with our firmware. In addition, it is possible to add any number of counters - this is necessary if several remote points are controlled. In this case, it’s convenient to look at all the statistics in one office.

Opportunities

• High accuracy

Pass statistics are collected with an accuracy of 95%. Counting algorithms exclude the influence of clothing color, lighting, temperature, humidity, crowds, shadows, bags, prams, food carts and other factors.

• Large area of ​​calculation

When placed at a height of 320 cm, wide-angle lenses provide a counting area over an area of ​​290 * 180 cm, which allows you to block all standard input openings with one sensor.

• Easy to set up and use

We made the counter as easy to connect as all cameras integrated with Ivideon.

• Saving

The counter does not require a high-speed communication channel with the server.

• Cloud service

The counter stores the received data in a cloud archive. You will receive an accurate counter and video surveillance in one personal account.

• Price

Until recently, the main limiting factor in introducing such devices was price. The cost of Ivideon Counter 3D is 26 thousand rubles.

On the minuses, it’s also worth mentioning - you need a permanent Internet channel for transmitting statistics. Recording can be done locally, and in this case, save traffic, but without access to the Internet, the counter does nothing better than a conventional camera. The counter is still more expensive than conventional sensors - we expect that the efficiency of use and the accuracy of the data completely compensate for the difference in price.

The counter can be ordered here .