VideoNuze Posts

Nielsen's new Q4 '12 Cross-Platform Report has identified just over 5 million "zero-TV" homes in the U.S., as Nielsen calls them, an increase from 2 million in 2007. Not to be confused, these aren't homes without TVs (75% of them still have at least one); rather they are homes that don't receive programming over traditional platforms (i.e. pay-TV and broadcast). Instead, almost half of them (48%) opt for OTT services like Netflix, Hulu Plus and others for content.

The growth in "zero-TV" homes should come as zero surprise. In fact, if there's anything surprising, it's that the number isn't already higher. But who these zero-TV homes are is less clear: are they cord-cutters or cord-nevers? The fact that almost half of them are under 35 suggests many are cord-nevers. Yet, the 2 main reasons for not subscribing to pay-TV (36% due to cost and 31% due to lack of interest) suggests many cord-cutters. Either way, with only 18% of them considering subscribing to pay-TV, most may well be "permanently cordless" and beyond the industry's promotional efforts.

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Multiplatform video services provider Avail-TVN has rebranded itself as Vubiquity. Chief Marketing Officer Laurie Lawrence told me last week that the new branding is meant to convey that "no other company does more to make video available ubiquitously."

Vubiquity works with both content providers and service providers to prepare, deliver and monetize video across devices. It manages more than 28K hours of content/month from 340 different content providers that reaches over 75 million homes through 270 different service providers. Among the services Vubiquity provides are encoding, metadata management, dynamic ad insertion, linear channel delivery, TV Everywhere authentication, cloud-based delivery, data analytics and marketing.

For more on Vubiquity, see this video interview I did with CEO Ramu Potarazu at last year's Cable Show:

Watch the interview

Several weeks ago, after watching Intel Media chief Erik Huggers interviewed at the D: Dive Into Media Conference, I expressed skepticism that the company's marketing plan for its forthcoming pay-TV service would work. Huggers explained that Intel would emphasize a breakthrough, high-quality video experience, rather than a "value approach" where consumers could possibly save money by switching to Intel.

While I agree with Huggers that there's a lot left to be desired in today's pay-TV experience, the reality is that the industry's big players have set the tone for how consumers make their decisions to switch providers: price first, features second. The latest evidence of this was another Verizon mailer that arrived at my house last week (see below), offering a 2-year, $89.99/month bundle of video/broadband/voice and a $250 Visa card. Verizon will also bump the broadband speed to 50/25 mbps as a bonus.

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I'm delighted to announce that Brightcove Chairman & CEO Jeremy Allaire and I are going to present a complimentary video webinar, "Sizing Up the Apple TV Opportunity," on Tuesday, April 2nd at 1:30pm ET.

The prospect of Apple launching its own television or "television-like" device (beyond the current Apple TV) has been one of the hottest rumors in the video industry. But while there has been lots of hype around it, there's been little strategic discussion of why Apple might launch this type of product, what features and benefits it might actually have, how it would differentiate from competitors' products, how it might affect the ecosystem, or what challenges Apple would face trying to make it successful. Our one-hour webinar will focus on exactly these types of questions.

Jeremy and I have both written extensively about the prospects for an Apple television/device and (examples here, here, here) and we believe that like so many previous Apple products, if the device is properly conceived, it could well represent a game-changer with profound industry impact. That said, the webinar will be a "hype-free" zone where we'll rationally delve into the details, while also providing ample time for Q&A. There are no agendas at work; Jeremy and I merely thought it would be timely to try shedding some light on this topic. For anyone in the ecosystem who would be impacted by an Apple television/device, it promises to be an engaging, worthwhile session.

Complimentary registration here

Follow the discussion and submit questions via Twitter at #SizingUpAppleTV

I'm pleased to present the 170th edition of the VideoNuze podcast with my weekly partner Colin Dixon of nScreenMedia. First up today, Colin does a little trash talking of Time Warner CEO Jeff Bewkes. At a Deutsche Bank conference earlier this week, Bewkes said “We don’t think the multichannel bundle is becoming less of a good deal, we think it’s getting to be a better deal and we think it’s getting to be a better deal in the opinion of consumers,” Colin thinks this statement is complete baloney and cites specific research refuting Bewkes' assertions (more detail here).

We then shift gears to talk about online and mobile video advertising. It was a busy week on that front (more of what VideoNuze wrote is here). One that really caught my eye and I wrote about was from Extreme Reach. The company announced an innovative cross-media reporting suite that maps actual TV and online video ad impressions along with conversions. To my knowledge it's the first time such reporting has been possible, enabling buyers to have unprecedented insight into campaign ROI.

Listen in to learn more!

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Another milestone today in advertisers' ongoing quest for clearer insights into how their TV and online video ads perform together: Extreme Reach, a company that until now has mainly focused on distributing TV ad creative to local TV stations, is announcing a suite of cross-media reports that integrate performance metrics from actual TV and online video campaigns. As a result, agencies and advertisers are able to optimize spending in each media and can understand how different permutations of spending and creative drive different results.

As viewers fragment their behavior over connected and mobile devices, the ability to measure ad performance across screens is becoming an increasingly urgent problem for advertisers. Because metrics for online video campaigns are silo'd from TV ad reporting, it is virtually impossible for media buyers to truly understand how the two sets of campaigns worked together.

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TubeMogul announced today that it will be offering real-time buying for mobile video ads on smartphones and tablets across public and private exchanges that generated over 94 million daily streams in February. TubeMogul believes this is the greatest reach of mobile video streams assembled to date, enabling buyers to centrally tap into the exploding world of mobile video usage. Top sites are routinely citing mobile usage as now accounting for between 25-50% of their video streams.

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Innovid has raised an $11 million series C round from existing investors Sequioa Capital, Genesis Partners and T-Ventures, along with new investor Vintage Investment Partners. With the new round, the company has raised $27.6 million to date. Innovid CEO and co-founder Zvika Netter told me the company experienced a very strong Q3 and Q4 in 2012, contributing to 450% year-over-year growth. The new financing will help the company expand its ad platform beyond online, mobile and tablet to also reach connected TVs, game consoles, VOD and broadcast.

Innovid's technology platform allows advertisers to integrate interactive elements into their pre-roll video ads, increasingly the likelihood of engagement and improving ROI. As Innovid's iRoll gallery shows, these can include social sharing, links to mini-sites, special offers/commerce, supplementary content, etc. Interactivity is added to the ads easily through the iRoll Studio. Innovid also offers ad serving and advanced analytics that track exactly how users engage with the interactive elements.

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