VideoNuze Posts

Don't miss out on a chance to win a 55-inch TCL Roku TV by registering early for the 5th annual VideoNuze Online Video Ad Summit on Tuesday, June 16th in NYC.

Yesterday's Verizon-AOL deal was yet another reminder of how online video advertising and the ad tech that supports it have moved to center stage in the media industry. To learn more about why, our Video Ad Summit sessions will cover the convergence of TV and video advertising, programmatic from both the buyers' and publishers' sides, how video monetization is being modernized from both the buyers' and publishers' side, mobile video, connected TVs, the NewFronts/Upfronts, viewability and online video ad innovation.

The program features key industry thought-leaders like Kris Magel (Chief Investment Officer, Initiative), Adam Shlachter (Chief Investment Officer, Digitas), Julian Zilberbrand (EVP, Zenith Optimedia), Jackie Kulesza (EVP, Starcom), Neeraj Khemlani (Co-President, Hearst Entertainment & Syndication), Ron Amram (Sr. Media Director, Heineken), Mike Berkley (Head of Product, Viacom), plus many more.

If you need to understand what's really happening with online video advertising then the Ad Summit will be a must-attend day of learning and networking with executives from brands, agencies, content providers, technology companies and others in the ecosystem. Last year's Ad Summit drew over 420 attendees and featured 40+ speakers.

Learn more and register now!

Verizon's surprise $4.4 billion acquisition of AOL, looks like mostly a bet on video, mobile, and programmatic, with content likely the odd man out.

The deal gives Verizon a bigger play in 3 of the biggest trends in the media business - the explosion of personalized, on-demand video viewership, the massive adoption of mobile lifestyles via smartphones, and the shift to automated, data-driven ad buying through programmatic platforms. AOL has been pursuing all of these over the past few years through internal growth and acquisitions.

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U.S. pay-TV operators lost 31K video subscribers in Q1 '15, compared to a gain of 271K in Q1 '14, according to analysts MoffettNathanson. The loss was the first time the industry has ever lost subscribers in a first quarter, and signals an acceleration of cord-cutting (or cord-nevering, since it's hard to pull the two apart), contributing to a .5% industry contraction over the past 4 quarters (461K subscribers).

MoffettNathanson has always tried to put pay-TV results in context with both occupied housing net additions and new household net additions. In Q1, the former declined by 407K, but the latter increased by 1.3 million, suggesting around 900K households were added in the U.S. Despite the gain the industry still lost subscribers.

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I'm pleased to present the 272nd edition of the VideoNuze podcast with my weekly partner Colin Dixon of nScreenMedia.

At INTX (the re-branded Cable Show) in Chicago this week, Comcast announced a blizzard of innovation, showcasing how its heavy technology investments are resulting in new products and features (see here and here for roundup). In today's podcast, Colin and I discuss the range of announcements Comcast made, which impact its video, broadband and home services.

Importantly, Comcast also announced a new "customer experience transformation" plan, which includes the hiring of 5,500 new customer and technical service staff. The renewed emphasis on customer experience is ironic, because, as I asserted on Monday, had the company done this 5 years ago, and transformed itself into a "most admired" company, it may well have gotten approval for the Time Warner Cable deal. NCTA head Michael Powell seemed to agree with my assessment.

Colin attended INTX and also shares thoughts on his session and broader trends of how pay-TV operators are evolving into broadband service providers and how OTT services fit in. For example, Comcast revealed this week that it now has more broadband subscribers than video subscribers, an important milestone for the industry.

Listen in to learn more!

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Mobile video advertising is red-hot. According to Opera Mediaworks' new State of Mobile Advertising report, mobile video ad impressions in its network rose to 12.8% of all its impressions in Q1 '15, up from just 2.5% of all its impressions in Q1 '14. Mobile video advertising is also much more profitable than other formats, accounting for 55% of revenue delivered to publishers in Opera's ad network.

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Startup VHX has unveiled a turnkey SVOD platform with no upfront cost, no exclusivity and full branding/pricing/packaging control by content providers. The platform is intended both for both premium content providers and online original creators (e.g. YouTubers) seeking to diversify from free, ad-supported only models.

Jamie Wilkinson, co-founder and CEO of VHX sees the SVOD platform as allowing content providers to easily "roll their own" Netflix or HBO Now service. He distinguishes VHX's approach because the content provider is in control and retains all viewer data. Unlike a storefront like iTunes or Amazon, VHX's platform is meant for content providers that want to set up branded video businesses online, rather than just sell their content through third-party outlets.

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