Right now, you can hop on the net and purchase soft-ware for as little as $49. This will give you access to global television programming over the Internet connection you already have. So why would anyone pay for cable or satellite TV which averages about $800 per year when you can watch the same programs that you currently watch for a one time payment of $49? Well there are many reasons at this point in time.
First off this programming is only accessible on your computer. So for many people they won't get the HD picture quality that they do on their $3,000 flat panel television set. This is true unless you have a television that is Internet ready. Most television manufacturers already offer this functionality or are planning to in the near future. Or you can do this through the use of a Slingbox, Xbox 360, or some other intermediary device that handles resolution configuration automatically. TV's are not monitors but technology is linking the two quickly. Vizio Internet Apps allows you to easily connect to the Internet and stream TV. Zenith plans to offer a family of Internet products and there are many more on the horizon.
Second, people are very comfortable with their current television situation. We have all been watching TV in pretty much the same manner for fifty years. To all of a sudden take that away, I believe, people fear that they will be missing something. Like there is some connection to the rest of the world that will all of a sudden be disrupted. Once we make a switch like this, we are now responsible for catching all that is important for our pop-culture needs, while under our current situation it is forced down our throats.
Finally, the model simply does not work. I mean, someone has to pay for these super expensive television productions, they are not donated to the past time needs of Americans. So, the networks have to be able to sell their programming to advertisers. The current Internet model gives away the farm for free. However, I think this will change. We are already seeing it work. There is ad-serving in the middle of video content and many other ways to sell production (pay per view, banners, etc.). Go to any of the major network web-sites and you can watch their shows but you are forced to sit through commercials.
So what is the point of all this? As we move farther away from cable/satellite TV and closer to Internet TV we will see more and more ad spend on the Internet. Plus, bigger and bigger prime time targeted demographics on the net. It's much easier to drive someone to your site from a commercial on their favorite TV show when they are already on the net. Well I am a strong proponent that web-marketers better get their act together when it comes to adding video to their web-site as the two mediums evolve and become one.
ReelSnap
Thursday, February 11, 2010
Tuesday, February 2, 2010
You Scared?
Is adding video to your site difficult? Or maybe tracking the effectiveness of adding video to your site is daunting? Oh, I know, actually going out and producing a video worthy of your marketing, message is scary? Or maybe just expensive!!!!!
Sure, anyone can go to YouTube, post some little hokey video, grab the embed code and then post it to their site. But what does this say about you and your company? It says, “Hey, it’s free!” Is this the message you want to send visitors to your site? Well it shouldn’t be. Your message should be succinct, compelling, and professional. It should be displayed within your site with the same care that you have put into designing your sites look and feel. It should have purpose. It should grab your audience and push them to your conversion event in one way or another. It should be manageable. When it is no longer relevent, it should come off the site and be replaced with something fresh.
"Well that’s all great and dandy Eli but to do what you are talking about is expensive. It costs money to build a player that fits with our look and feel. And video production is crazy expensive, we don’t have budget for that. Not to mention the technical time involved with formatting, managing, and hosting. After I have managed all of that... how am I suppose to track the effectiveness of my video content? I am sure that requires some custom analytics system.", you might say.
Yes it’s true, in the past companies that do this (ESPN, CNN) spent millions building custom systems to be able to do all of this. Not anymore! You can do it all! You can do it all and you can do it within your budget. Step in to 2010! Get signed up with someone like ReelSnap. They can do everything for you from one easy to use interface or VCMS (Video Content Management System). They will produce the video. Build you a player that matches the look and feel of your site. Distribute the video to relevant sites. And to top it all of they will track the effectiveness of your video distribution. Plus they will do it all for next to nothing. Get with the program and get your message out to the world with ReelSanp!
www.reelsnap.com
Sure, anyone can go to YouTube, post some little hokey video, grab the embed code and then post it to their site. But what does this say about you and your company? It says, “Hey, it’s free!” Is this the message you want to send visitors to your site? Well it shouldn’t be. Your message should be succinct, compelling, and professional. It should be displayed within your site with the same care that you have put into designing your sites look and feel. It should have purpose. It should grab your audience and push them to your conversion event in one way or another. It should be manageable. When it is no longer relevent, it should come off the site and be replaced with something fresh.
"Well that’s all great and dandy Eli but to do what you are talking about is expensive. It costs money to build a player that fits with our look and feel. And video production is crazy expensive, we don’t have budget for that. Not to mention the technical time involved with formatting, managing, and hosting. After I have managed all of that... how am I suppose to track the effectiveness of my video content? I am sure that requires some custom analytics system.", you might say.
Yes it’s true, in the past companies that do this (ESPN, CNN) spent millions building custom systems to be able to do all of this. Not anymore! You can do it all! You can do it all and you can do it within your budget. Step in to 2010! Get signed up with someone like ReelSnap. They can do everything for you from one easy to use interface or VCMS (Video Content Management System). They will produce the video. Build you a player that matches the look and feel of your site. Distribute the video to relevant sites. And to top it all of they will track the effectiveness of your video distribution. Plus they will do it all for next to nothing. Get with the program and get your message out to the world with ReelSanp!
www.reelsnap.com
Monday, February 1, 2010
Why Video?
Because it works.
If you watched the Grammy awards last night, you saw how the music industry is preparing for the transition to IPTV. All the display and imaging across the screen as they introduced nominees were framed in an Internet video player. And throughout the entire show, there were plugs driving people to web-sites. Sending people to sites to donate to Haiti, sending people to a web-site to vote for the song you wanted Bon Jovi to play, and many other web-sites. Just one more step in the evolution of IPTV.
By the way, marketers love this! It is easier to capture the success of your marketing efforts on the net. Through the use of sophisticated analytics tools and tracking software you can get much more accurate statistics than you can through the use of random sampling. Which is how TV has monitored it's reach for the past fifty years. Now that video technology has evolved to the point where it can be easily pushed across the net, marketers can combine their TV commercial knowledge with their Internet marketing capture knowledge. If you are a marketer, you must have a plan to incorporate video to your web marketing efforts.
We all know very well that the longer a visitor browses your site, the chances of them completing your conversion event increase. It seems like keeping the attention of visitors to your site is like herding cats. If they have to read more than a couple sentences, they click away. Recent studies show that visitors to sites with video stay on twice as long as they do on sites without video.
VIDEO IS EXPECTED!
If you watched the Grammy awards last night, you saw how the music industry is preparing for the transition to IPTV. All the display and imaging across the screen as they introduced nominees were framed in an Internet video player. And throughout the entire show, there were plugs driving people to web-sites. Sending people to sites to donate to Haiti, sending people to a web-site to vote for the song you wanted Bon Jovi to play, and many other web-sites. Just one more step in the evolution of IPTV.
By the way, marketers love this! It is easier to capture the success of your marketing efforts on the net. Through the use of sophisticated analytics tools and tracking software you can get much more accurate statistics than you can through the use of random sampling. Which is how TV has monitored it's reach for the past fifty years. Now that video technology has evolved to the point where it can be easily pushed across the net, marketers can combine their TV commercial knowledge with their Internet marketing capture knowledge. If you are a marketer, you must have a plan to incorporate video to your web marketing efforts.
We all know very well that the longer a visitor browses your site, the chances of them completing your conversion event increase. It seems like keeping the attention of visitors to your site is like herding cats. If they have to read more than a couple sentences, they click away. Recent studies show that visitors to sites with video stay on twice as long as they do on sites without video.
VIDEO IS EXPECTED!
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