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HOW YOUNG HOLLYWOOD DELIVERS 150M MONTHLY VIDEO VIEWS

bsp-admin-1 on December 7, 2024

BRIGHTCOVE’S CONTEXT AWARE ENCODING REDUCES STORAGE AND BANDWIDTH WHILE IMPROVING VIEWER EXPERIENCE

As one of the leading producers and distributors of celebrity-driven digital media, Young Hollywood has solidified itself as the go-to entertainment source among millennial and Generation Z audiences. The company’s collection of nearly 5,000 hours of exclusive programming, reaches more than 150 million viewers each month in over 130 countries across the globe.

Since Young Hollywood’s debut in 2007, its entire digital video ecosystem has been supported by Brightcove technology, particularly its video platform and accompanying APIs. The publisher streams its content using the Brightcove player, and syndicates its video to partners via MRSS feed. Young Hollywood also relies on Brightcove analytics to review video performance data at a granular level, tracking how it has expanded its reach and increased engagement with audiences all across the globe.

In December 2017, Young Hollywood implemented two additional Brightcove Video Cloud features — Dynamic Delivery and Context Aware Encoding (CAE). These two features have enabled Young Hollywood to make more efficient use of bandwidth while saving costs on storage and video operations. Most importantly, these Brightcove technologies have helped Young Hollywood maintain an exceptional end user experience for its massive viewership. During the company’s first few weeks of use, its namesake brand, Young Hollywood, saw a 20% savings in storage and a 17% savings in bandwidth, while its OTT channel, Young Hollywood TV, realized a 23% savings in storage and a 35% savings in bandwidth.

YOUNG HOLLYWOOD BUILDS ROBUST DISTRIBUTION NETWORK

Young Hollywood boasts ten different media brands, including Young Hollywood, Younger Hollywood, Beyond the Athlete, Food Feed, The Code Word, The FanGirl Life, Inside the Look, Ampd Up, The Social Stream, and an OTT channel, Young Hollywood TV. Video content across the company’s entire media portfolio is original, produced in-house, and entirely void of libelous gossip, which, according to CEO R.J. Williams, makes videos highly shareable, resulting in increased views and audience engagement. While some celebrity-driven content is sensationalized hearsay, Young Hollywood focuses its efforts on producing only positive stories. Celebrities like Lady Gaga often share the publisher’s content to their own distribution channels and web pages, since it’s the type of press they actually want fans to see. By positioning itself as a trusted, respectful media source and building strong relationships with celebrity talent, Young Hollywood has successfully created a robust distribution network with incredible visibility.

Through Brightcove, we know exactly how many people watched a video and for how long they watched it—to a T.

R.J. WILLIAMS

CEO

“It’s content that celebrity talent is really proud of, which helps us in a big way because it gets them to actually share it,” says Williams. “It’s happening more now with social media. On a daily basis, talent is tweeting about us, putting us in their Instagram story, and putting us on their Facebook fan pages,” says Williams.

And because of the company’s distinctly curated brands, each targeting specific age groups and demographics per vertical, Young Hollywood ensures consumer retention, or “stickiness,” with its audience. Williams explains:

“We’ve expanded the verticals, and our expectation is that our audience is going to transition from Younger Hollywood to Young Hollywood, and then maybe to Beyond the Athlete or Inside the Look. People will be able to transition from one brand to the next depending on what their interests are and where they go in the future.”

YOUNG HOLLYWOOD SYNDICATES VIDEO CONTENT WITH BRIGHTCOVE APIS

Young Hollywood also syndicates video to distribution partners through an MRSS feed using Brightcove’s CMS API. Currently, Young Hollywood syndicates OTT video content to a handful of platforms such as Vewd (formerly Opera TV) and Xumo TV. Barry Cohen, post production supervisor for Young Hollywood, explains the specifics:

“We set up a custom secured feed allowing us to create specific delivery targets that are both private and secure. So if we need to deliver to somebody who’s in Argentina, for example, we can set up a feed that’s specifically for them, and it’s secured, private, and controlled. They can get the delivery assets they need. At the same time, we control whether they turn it on or off.”

By syndicating video content and providing viewers access beyond their owned and operated properties, Young Hollywood is driving brand expansion, visibility, and increased viewership.

“We’ve had it [the syndication feed] in place for a few months now, and we’ve had great success with it,” says David Bell, system operations director for Young Hollywood. “It’s opened up an opportunity for another distribution channel for our product…And it could open up different geographic areas to us in the future.”

BRAND-TARGETED AD INVENTORY HELPS INCREASE CPM

Young Hollywood leverages its own collection of niche media brands and respective audiences to boost overall value of ad inventory. The company manages individual private marketplaces (PMPs) per brand and demographic; it also partners with different advertisers specific to each brand. Because of this, Young Hollywood is able to create customized ad inventory ensuring advertising partners’ content performs well among consumers.

“We look closely at the advertising brands and who they’re trying to reach,” says Williams. “Then we put them on the platform where they’ll reach the audience that makes the most sense for them.”

As the publisher continues to add more editorial content, therefore broadening reach and viewership, Young Hollywood’s PMPs attract premium advertisers competing for the highest quality ad inventory. Combining the company’s highly attentive consumers and valuable collection of ad space, Young Hollywood manages to increase its CPM price tag.

BRIGHTCOVE ANALYTICS DRIVE AD REVENUE SUCCESS

Brightcove’s integrated analytics play an important role in the success of Young Hollywood’s ad monetization strategy. Analytics not only provide data critical to determining video best practices; they also offer the company’s production staff a consolidated collection of performance data across third-party sites and platforms. With Brightcove’s analytics tools, Young Hollywood saves both time and money, eliminating the need to subscribe to additional third-party analytics services. Hence, the company is able to track extremely detailed engagement metrics across all of their brands and various distribution points. “Through Brightcove, we know exactly how many people watched a video and for how long they watched it—to a T,” says Williams. “We have accurate analytics that are actually better than those we’d receive from Nielsen or comScore, which both rely on a panel of users as opposed to specific viewers. It’s a good predictor of success for our programming and what remains in the general interest.”

YOUNG HOLLYWOOD REDUCES BANDWIDTH USE, FORECASTS FUTURE SAVINGS

For Young Hollywood, with its incredible distribution network and extensive viewership, delivering top-quality content in the most efficient way possible is a top priority. The company enabled Brightcove’s Dynamic Delivery and Context Aware Encoding features to accelerate internal cost savings while improving playback quality.

Dynamic Delivery allows users to distribute media more rapidly by processing different quality levels of media formats in real time. Files are packaged in the correct format for each device requesting content at the time of the request, removing the need to pre-create and store multiple combinations of bitrates, streaming formats and DRM . Context Aware Encoding uses machine learning to optimize encoding settings on a per-video and delivery context basis. The technology is proven to reduce storage and bandwidth costs associated with video delivery, all without compromising visual quality.

Young Hollywood initially configured the technologies for two of its brands—Young Hollywood and Young Hollywood TV. In the early innings of using CAE the brands have seen reductions of up to 35% in bandwidth and 23% in storage. Says Williams, “Based on historical viewing patterns of content across Young Hollywood and Young Hollywood TV, these innovations at the platform level are allowing us to forecast a much more efficient use of bandwidth that won’t compromise the end user viewing experience.”

HOW WATCH IT! ENGAGED 400 MILLION PEOPLE

bsp-admin-1 on December 7, 2024

400 MILLION AND COUNTING

As the world’s largest Arabic streaming network, WATCH iT! offers premium video-on-demand and live streaming to 400 million people across the Arab world.

6 million downloads of the WATCH iT! app

5.2 million paid subscription accounts registered with WATCH iT!

650,000 hours of current and reformatted content on the WATCH iT! platform

90% of subscribers visited the WATCH iT! site each day during Ramadan

Want to reach an audience of 400 million people? Then keep an eye on WATCH iT!. As the world’s largest Arabic streaming service, its blend of legacy programs, sports and original content are designed to engage more than 400 million people of Arab descent across the globe. But more than just an OTT (over-the-top) viewing experience, WATCH iT! is deeply committed to honoring Egyptian culture while providing opportunities for Arab content providers. With the innovations and technology of Brightcove at its side, WATCH iT! will see its purpose and potential achieve new heights.

OLD STORIES, NEW AUDIENCES

One of the key drivers defining the mission of WATCH iT! is its commitment to bring back original Egyptian dramas, TV shows and movies from the 1960s and beyond. More than just entertainment, these shows and movies have great cultural value, enabling WATCH iT! to play a major role in educating Egypt’s next generation. “There’s great interest in this content,” said Moustapha Behkeet, VP and Managing Director WATCH iT!. “We’ve had lots of international stars emerge from Egypt, Nobel prize winners, and so much other history represented in this older material. When you restore the quality of the audio and the video, and then digitize it, the next generation is eager to enjoy it.” This legacy content provides a perfect balance to the contemporary programming of WATCH iT!, which includes original dramas and action content, top-rated tv shows and movies, blockbuster series, live- streamed concerts, documentaries, Egyptian Premiere football matches, and much more. Powered by Brightcove, it’s viewed across all devices in full HD quality, and Behkeet believes this will continue to position WATCH iT! as the “biggest Arabic streaming service, offering the biggest library of all times.”

VIDEO, A CREATIVE FORCE

We count on Brightcove to always give us the edge in technology, the edge in security, and the edge in distribution while remaining economical and efficient.

MOUSTAPHA BEHKEET

VP AND MANAGING DIRECTOR, WATCHIT

“We believe in the power of creativity we have here in Egypt,” said Moustapha Behkeet. “As we find the right forum for creators from the Arab region, and help them monetize that content, we’ll be on solid ground.” From the very beginning, WATCH iT! has been focused on supporting its local creative and production industry, which had been severely impacted by digital piracy. With its subscription-based platform, it will establish a precedent for the way that content is viewed and paid for in the Arab region. The key to making that happen is security–protecting the content they acquire, and the content they produce. This is where Brightcove plays a significant role. “There’s a huge effort being done by Brightcove engineers–and more to come–for content protection,” said Behkeet. “We are always looking at staying a step ahead of illegal distribution, and Brightcove is a main part of that.” With this relentless focus on content protection, digital rights management and more, WATCH iT! can provide vital support to Egyptian content providers while continuing to fuel its expansion to a growing worldwide audience.

KEEP WATCHING WATCH IT!

WATCH iT! is meeting the future head-on with a bold growth plan focused on acquiring more content, creating more original content, and increasing distribution. This includes new scripted series, additional international content, and reaching audiences with innovative approaches such as being available on leading game consoles. With the technology and expertise of Brightcove helping it achieve untold potential, WATCH iT! can stay firmly rooted with its Egyptian heritage as it competes at a world-class level in delivering content for 400 million across the Arab world.

HOW ROGERS MEDIA LEADS CANADA’S MEDIA MARKET

bsp-admin-1 on December 7, 2024

FREE, TARGETED CONTENT DELIVERED ACROSS MULTIPLE PLATFORMS BOOSTS VIEWERSHIP AND REVENUE

For over a century, technology advances have driven changes in user behavior, forcing publishers and broadcasters to evolve their businesses. This trend has accelerated in the past few years as streaming services, social video and other alternatives to traditional media outlets have surged in popularity. To stay relevant—and profitable—in this new environment, conventional broadcasters are continuously looking for new models to grow and monetize their audiences.

One company that is successfully evolving is Rogers Media, a leading Canadian media company. Under the Rogers Media umbrella are over one hundred brands delivering news, sports, and lifestyle entertainment to over 13 million digital visitors. Known for its long history of innovation, Rogers Media is putting digital video at the center of its new business model.

FREE, HIGHLY-TAILORED VIDEO PROGRAMMING DRIVES AUDIENCE GROWTH

Rogers Media content includes a wide variety of national, local, and regional current season programs addressing topics ranging from politics to health to arts, as well as US-acquired primetime shows. The company also owns rights to air professional and amateur sporting events, showcasing teams Canadians care about most. Through this type of focused programming, Rogers Media ensures there’s something for everyone.

One of the main differentiators for Rogers Media’s local City™ brand is offering primetime shows for free. “We’re the only major broadcast channel that puts in-season shows out for free,” says Kasra Zokaei, Director of Digital Product Development at Rogers. “Our content is ad-supported, whereas most other platforms are subscription-based and feature only past season content. Our viewers aren’t limited to past season catch-up.”

There’s a very important connection between sports fans who follow multiple sports at different times of the day, and the availability of various content—video, traditional stories, scores, data—all on digital devices.

DALE FALLON

DIRECTOR OF DIGITAL PRODUCT MANAGEMENT AT ROGERS

The instant gratification of up-to-date programming for those who don’t have a cable subscription is helping Rogers Media attract new viewers. This is supported by the company’s decision to not require authentication to access Rogers Media’s videos, which allows viewers to catch up on current season shows with zero hassle. This convenience has helped make City a major destination for primetime shows in Canada.

VIDEO VIA APPS DRAW MOBILE-SAVVY AUDIENCES

Rogers Media’s live and custom programming is accessible through multiple digital platforms—desktop, mobile, tablet and connected devices. As part of its strategy to reach audiences everywhere, Rogers Media pairs brand channels with a free app, allowing viewers to consume video content on-demand while on the go. This way, Rogers Media maintains their current viewership and gains new audiences. “We’ve been a pioneer in terms of our hybrid approach. In addition to making some content available at no charge to consumers and without authentication, we also offer a special tier of subscription access to our linear channels,” says Zokaei. “As our linear audience is very tech-savvy and quick to adopt our digital products, there’s a lot of uptake on mobile, so we really strive to give them the best mobile experience when it comes to consuming video.”

SPORTSNET REIGNS: MULTI-PLATFORM STRATEGY DRIVES REVENUE AND AUDIENCE GROWTH

Sportsnet is a prime example of Rogers’ success delivering content on a variety of platforms and through multiple business models. As the country’s number one sports brand, Sportsnet® delivers 24×7 access to regional and national coverage, in-depth analysis, and live events for a variety of professional leagues, including NHL, MLB, NBA, Curling and WWE—perfect for the all-around sports fan. Viewers can access this content free with advertising on the Sportsnet website or the Sportsnet app. In addition, Rogers Media also offers fans a subscription-based OTT product—Sportsnet NOW—for those who want live streaming of six Sportsnet linear channels, anytime, anywhere on a variety of different devices. The first mainstream sports TV channel in North America to be offered directly to consumers, Sportsnet NOW is available on desktop, through the Sportsnet App on mobile devices, Apple TV, and other connected TV platforms including Xbox.

“The Sportsnet mobile app is key to our success; it is heavily focused on distributing video. Our demographic is very mobile savvy, so we extend the brand to all major mobile devices,” says Dale Fallon, Director of Digital Product Management.

The Sportsnet App has helped Sportsnet grow a substantial audience and has become a revenue driver within the Rogers Media sports portfolio. Available on iOS and Android, the Sportsnet app won top prize for Best Mobile Utilities at the nextMEDIA Digi Awards and Best Apple Watch app at the Apple Best of Awards. The app has become a fan favorite, and is a regular fixture in the top downloaded sports mobile apps.

“There’s a very important connection between sports fans who follow multiple sports at different times of the day, and the availability of various content—video, traditional stories, scores, data—all on digital devices,” Fallon explains. “With our portfolio of products, we have all bases covered.”

BRIGHTCOVE PLATFORM PROVIDES EASY TRANSITION TO DIGITAL VIDEO SUCCESS

Rogers Media’s aim is simple: distribute video wherever people are consuming it. Using Brightcove’s technology, Rogers Media is able deliver on that goal.

Fallon explains: “In general, we’ve found Brightcove’s product plans and roadmaps align nicely with our needs, whether it’s SSAI, Brightcove Social, mobile SDKs, or integration with different ad servers. Brightcove is really a partner to us. There is a strong fit between the needs of our business and what Brightcove recognizes as trends in the media industry and priorities for media companies.”

Zokaei praises Brightcove’s Video Cloud solution for its high-functioning adaptability and superior technology.

“Brightcove has the fastest player on the market, and that’s very important for our audiences who want fast, uninterrupted viewing. We also have a lot of flexibility in how we customize and modify our players based on our brands. Each of our brands has its own unique needs, so customization is key.”

Overall, the collaboration between Rogers Media and Brightcove has delivered strong results. In expanding localized video content to digital platforms, Rogers Media has found a way to reframe its value potential for advertisers.

INNOVATION CONTINUES FOR ROGERS MEDIA

With Brightcove handling the heavy lifting on the technical side, Rogers Media is able to focus its efforts on finding innovative ways to expand. The company hopes to incorporate new discoverability methods to introduce viewers to alternative content. It’s also exploring digital live-feed capabilities for those who want to consume content in real time.

To increase monetization opportunities, Rogers Media plans to use Brightcove’s SSAI tools, which mitigate the impact of ad blockers and deliver an improved TV-like viewing experience across multiple platforms. The company has implemented Brightcove Social for its major brands, allowing streamlined publishing and aggregated performance data across both social networks and owned and operated sites.

In the end, Rogers Media doesn’t want to just grow as a company. It wants to continue building brands that offer relevant, reliable content to its audience where they want it. Zokaei explains: “We want to make it easy for our audience to get to the content they care about by bringing that content to the platforms they want to consume it on.”

“We are leveraging our content to turn viewers into local superfans. We want to win our viewers’ time so they’ll continue watching our channels, using our digital products, and interacting with our brands,” concludes Fallon.

HOW JUKIN MEDIA GENERATED BIG REVENUES WITH UGC

bsp-admin-1 on December 7, 2024

40,000 LICENSED VIDEO ASSETS GENERATE BILLIONS OF VIEWS, MILLIONS IN REVENUE

Jukin Media predicts user-generated video is the future of storytelling, and they are leading the way by licensing videos that capture authentic, spur-of-the-moment stories. If you’ve seen a funny, inspirational, entertaining, or newsworthy video that’s gone viral, chances are it is one of Jukin Media’s 40,000 video assets.

Over the past six years the company has become the go-to source for advertising agencies, digital publishers, and TV producers looking for original video stories that resonate with consumers. “We provide high-quality, hand-selected videos that transcend geography and language,” states Mike Skogmo, Vice President of Communications and Marketing. “There are videos we licensed five years ago that are still being used by partners, and they’re still generating revenue for the people who filmed them. That’s the power of really compelling video; it’s universal and timeless.”

In addition to its licensing revenue, the company monetizes its video assets through branded social video properties on YouTube and Facebook and original programming for television and OTT channels. Jukin Media’s brands currently have 55+ million fans and record more than 1.5 billion video views per month. The company’s original TV programs air in 200 markets around the world.

AUTHENTIC, “CAUGHT ON CAMERA” USER-GENERATED VIDEOS ARE THE FUTURE OF STORYTELLING

Jukin credits advances in technology with the burgeoning availability of compelling user-generated video. “Ten years ago the cost of creating original video footage or broadcasting live was prohibitive for the average person,” notes Skogmo. “Today, everyone has a personal television studio in their pocket. Anyone can capture beautiful HD 4K footage with their cell phone and upload it to social media sites with a touch of a button. As a result, the amount of video people are generating has gone through the roof. This has opened the door for our business and enabled us to grow exponentially.”

Brightcove is the video player for our online business-to-business ecommerce platform.

MIKE SKOGMO

VICE PRESIDENT OF COMMUNICATIONS AND MARKETING

Although it receives thousands of user-generated video submissions each week, Jukin Media relies on its internal research staff to identify the bulk of the videos they license. They scour the Internet 24 hours a day, seven days a week to identify videos with the right content to go viral.

“Our focus is video that captures compelling, everyday life moments,” explains Skogmo. “Ninety-nine percent of our videos are filmed by amateurs—not professional videographers, not entertainers, not people trying to make a career on YouTube. The videos are organic life moments from everyday people who happened to catch something remarkable on video.” To date, Jukin has paid over $10 million in royalties for user-generated videos.

BRIGHTCOVE POWERS JUKIN MEDIA’S EXPANSION

Jukin Media hosts its library of 40,000 videos on the Brightcove Video Cloud platform. “Brightcove is the video player for our online business-to-business ecommerce platform,” declares Skogmo. “We needed a reliable and flexible platform to support the volume of videos we host and the large number of people who view them on a daily basis. We integrated the Brightcove player with our back-end system and website, and that’s been great from our perspective.”

Before transitioning to Brightcove, Jukin Media tried other video players to solve the challenge of reliability. “Our business depends on people being able to watch videos when they want to watch them, on whatever device they choose. We can’t afford to have any issues with the video playback,” explains Skogmo. “We needed a reliable solution that would ensure our videos loaded quickly and displayed well. And that is why Brightcove is so important to our business. It just works as it’s intended to work.”

Brightcove’s search and preview functionality are also critical. “If you’re a TV producer and you need to fill 50 clips for a show, you don’t want to look through hundreds of irrelevant clips to find the 50 that meet your needs,” explains Skogmo. “The videos need to load, present well, and play quickly. Brightcove’s video preview feature is a huge time saver for our clients. The convenience to search and preview is extremely important to our customers.”

“Our website plays a critical role in our expanding business,” concludes Skogmo. “With Brightcove, our website delivers the reliability and performance our business demands.”

ORIGINAL PROGRAMMING FOR SOCIAL MEDIA, TELEVISION, AND OTT CHANNELS DRIVES NEW REVENUE

Jukin is breaking fresh ground and establishing new revenue opportunities by using its diverse video assets as the foundation for branded YouTube channels and original productions for television and OTT channels.

The company’s dedicated YouTube channels, which focus on specific verticals, have attracted large and engaged fan bases. The largest of its collection is the “FailArmy” channel, a global comedy brand that blends blooper videos with graphics and on-air hosts. “FailArmy” has 25+ million global fans and garners more than 500 million views a month. Similarly, Jukin’s “The Pet Collective” channel has 6 million fans between YouTube and Facebook combined, and it receives more than 200 million views a month. Another channel—“People are Awesome”—features videos of ordinary people doing unusual and extraordinary things. It has attracted 12 million fans and draws three hundred million views per month.

Jukin has created additional monetization opportunities for its videos by producing its own original television shows. One of the shows, based on the “FailArmy” brand, airs in 200 markets around the world. The show is in its fifth season and has aired 80 episodes to date, with an additional 20 episodes currently in production. The company also develops original shows for OTT and streaming platforms, including Verizon’s mobile video service, go90, and Comcast’s Watchable.

“We’re finding new creative ways to package our video assets,” explains Skogmo. “Jukin is the only licensing company that produces our own TV shows. We use only videos from the Jukin library in our shows, and we pay users a license fee if we feature their video in one of our shows.”

USER-GENERATED CONTENT OPENS NEW OPPORTUNITIES

“As online video continues to grow and become a bigger part of people’s lives, you’ll see that our brands also grow right along with people’s consumption habits from traditional to digital media,” states Skogmo.

User-generated content is creating a new age of entertainment, and Jukin Media sees its next big opportunities coming from international expansion. Jukin expects an increase in UGC coming from international markets, a result of device proliferation combined with better, more accessible global internet access. Advertisers in new markets will be able to seamlessly play back authentic, organic content that resonates more with a digital audience. “Our content is so visual that it works just as well in non-English speaking countries as it does here in the states,” concludes Skogmo.

HOW SAS USED VIDEO TO SHOW THEIR PRODUCTS’ IMPACT

bsp-admin-1 on December 7, 2024

Since its inception in 1976, SAS has understood that in order to convey the value and power of its analytics software, the company’s marketing needed to be as innovative as the software it engineered. Recognizing the unique ability of video to make SAS software tangible, senior managers embraced it early. Today, video permeates the business. Internally and externally, video is an essential tool to inform, educate, and persuade prospects and customers, and to bring the value of SAS software into sharp focus.

BACKGROUND

“Software is an intangible product,” explains Bill Marriott, Sr. Director of Video Communications and New Media for SAS, “but the benefits are very real. Video dramatizes how advanced data management and analysis impact people’s lives.”

Based in Cary, North Carolina, SAS is the global leader in analytics. Its innovative analytics, business intelligence and data management software and services are helping customers at more than 80,000 sites around the world make better decisions, and make them faster.

The company uses video to communicate with a range of audiences, from prospects and customers to employees and analysts. In the beginning, video was primarily a tool for customer training. But SAS quickly realized the potential of video to elevate marketing and sales campaigns. Last year alone, the 40-person in-house video production group produced more than 1,200 videos ranging in length from 10 seconds to an hour. Video is now a ubiquitous component of SAS’ business operations.

SAS TYPICALLY CREATES THREE CATEGORIES OF VIDEOS FOR A SOFTWARE SOLUTION

The value of our software comes from the great things customers do with it. Video’s value is in helping us tell their stories.

BILL MARRIOTT

SR. DIRECTOR OF VIDEO COMMUNICATIONS AND NEW MEDIA, SAS

Overview video – a short video describing what the software enables customers to do and why it is different than other software.
Reference videos – stories illustrating how customers are successfully using SAS software and the results they are achieving.
Demos – videos that show the software in action.

“The exciting thing about video is that it is not just evolving technologically, but the content is moving forward as well,” states Marriott.

For example, video is bridging geographic distances by enabling sales teams to bring the CEO into key sales encounters. In pivotal situations, a customized message from the CEO assures the prospect their business matters at the highest level. Such videos have helped SAS close deals around the world.

Recently, SAS Middle East had a significant sale on the line and wanted to include a personal message from the CEO in their sales presentation. Although the request arrived in Cary over the weekend, the team jumped into action: they wrote the script on Monday, shot the video on Tuesday, and delivered it to the Middle East sales office on the same day. SAS won the sale. “The video registered with the customer,” explains Marriott. “They were impressed our CEO wanted his voice heard.”

USING VIDEO TO COMMUNICATE THE BRAND

SAS is expanding its use of video to support the company’s brand, building awareness of the company, its culture and its values. “When viewers develop an emotional attachment to our company and our brand, they want to do business with us,” says Marriott.

How do you create an emotional attachment to data and analytics? One recent video documents how data analysis supported relief efforts after the devastating earthquake in Nepal. The powerful and visually compelling story describes how the International Organization for Migration (IOM) used SAS® to identify, source, and distribute much needed resources to 45,000 families living in 200 tent camps.

Racing against time to build shelters ahead of the monsoon season, IOM needed to locate unprecedented quantities of sheet metal. Using SAS analytics, IOM not only determined how much sheet metal they needed, but also which countries produced it, had quantities on hand, and could deliver it quickly.

“The Nepal example shows where video is going for SAS. The value of our software comes from the great things customers do with it,” states Marriott. “Video’s value is in helping us tell their stories.”

ANTICIPATING PROSPECTS’ BEHAVIOR

Marriott notes that today, all content is going to the web. “On any given day, people at different stages of the buy cycle are visiting our website – people of all ages, in different industries. We don’t know what path they’ll take, so we need video at every point in the cycle to encourage them to engage.”

Marriott adds that video is rapidly becoming more immersive. People want to access it everywhere, on their own terms. “As producers, we need to craft a wide variety of video assets and anticipate where they will be consumed and by whom,” states Marriott.

That is a key reason SAS moved to the Brightcove Video Cloud platform. Brightcove helps SAS deploy video through the cloud, when and where it is most convenient, via the preferred device for its audience. And it is also enabling SAS to keep abreast of emerging technology. “With Brightcove, we can focus on developing high-value, meaningful content. We upload one high-quality encode. Brightcove figures out all the devices it has to play on and the encoding algorithms for each. Brightcove is looking to the future with us, giving us the confidence that we’ll be well positioned as new technology evolves.”

HOW AVANADE’S VIDEO PERFORMANCE SKYROCKETED

bsp-admin-1 on December 7, 2024

Established in 2000, Avanade is the leading provider of innovative digital and cloud-based services, business solutions, and customer experiences, all delivered through the Microsoft ecosystem. The company has 80 office locations in 20 countries across the globe, generating $2 billion annual revenues, and employs more than 30,000 employees. To date, Avanade has delivered over 10,000 projects to approximately 4,000 clients worldwide, 43 percent of which are Fortune Global 500 companies.

PAGE VIEWS DOUBLE, VIEWERS ENGAGEMENT INCREASE FOURFOLD WITH MARTECH INTEGRATION

While Avanade was using video as a digital marketing tool, the company’s digital strategy wasn’t primarily focused on or tied to any sales objectives. Instead, Avanade concentrated solely on content. “Video was giving us bare-bones metrics, like how many people watched or played our videos,” says Matt Stegen, Senior Director of Digital Marketing. Unfortunately, this same data couldn’t show how videos were impacting sales goals, or how they might be affecting conversion and retention.

After recognizing how limited Avanade’s content-centric marketing approach really was, Stegen and his team reformulated the company’s digital plan, creating a user-focused video marketing strategy capable of targeting all parts of the customer journey. They decided to look at video in a new way, focusing less on impressions and views, and more on how videos convert and impact sales. The company also changed its approach to evaluating video content. Instead of measuring performance, Stegen and his team would now study which distribution channels see the most engagement, which videos reach the most target clients, and which videos have the most impact on the sales life cycle.

With a new video strategy, martech data stack, and content evaluation process in place, the company is now able to keep an accurate measure of video’s impact on sales and deliver personalized video experiences to viewers. Since implementing the new system, Avanade has seen its page views double, and viewers now engage with Avanade’s content four times more than before. And as audiences remain on site to consume video content, they also lend to Avanade’s decreasing bounce rate.

With the help of Brightcove Audience talking to our marketing automation solution, we’re able to see more, understand more, and deliver more power with data through the video we’re providing to a client.

MATT STEGEN

SENIOR DIRECTOR OF DIGITAL MARKETING

“They click, they’re downloading, they’re engaging with more content,” says Stegen. “They stay with us longer—four times longer, in fact. And they’re taking the next click action with us.”

BRIGHTCOVE INTEGRATION, AUDIENCE MODULE HELP PROPEL DIGITAL FRAMEWORK

To complement Avanade’s newly refined video strategy, the company also developed a comprehensive digital ecosystem to track and consolidate video-based data across the entire customer journey. Within this ecosystem, consolidated data provides Avanade a more thorough analysis of where prospects are within the sales cycle. By integrating Brightcove Video Cloud with Avanade’s web delivery and asset management solution (Sitecore), marketing automation platform (Marketo), CRM (Microsoft Dynamics), and its company website, and then combining data from social media and paid display ads, Stegen could now show the correlated impact of video on conversion.

He then developed a strategic scorecard system to track video data captured through Avanade’s new marketing tech stack. These scorecards identified which specific elements of video resonated most among viewers, including style, length, format, page location, and distribution channel. From this information, Stegen and his digital team would be able to pinpoint ideal types of video content and distribution channels for attracting prospects and closing sales.

“It’s not a matter of how many KPIs populate your scorecard,” says Stegen. “It’s about how much meaning they carry.”

Stegen attributes Brightcove’s Audience module as one of the driving forces behind Avanade’s new marketing tech ecosystem. By plugging the Audience module into the Brightcove platform, Stegen and his digital team are able to see detailed viewership data across all video distribution channels, which is then transferred and attributed to contacts within the company’s sales database. Avanade’s sales team can then craft tailored messages to qualified prospects and begin the lead nurturing phase of the customer journey.

“Having those three systems [Brightcove, Sitecore, and Marketo] speak to one another and having a vascular system in between them—specifically with the help of the Brightcove Audience module talking to our marketing automation solution—we’re able to see more, understand more, and be able to deliver more power with data through the video we’re providing to a client,” he says.

HOW MILBON CLAIMED MORE MARKET SHARE WITH VIEWER ENGAGEMENT

bsp-admin-1 on December 6, 2024

JAPAN’S NO. 1 HAIR CARE BRAND USES BRIGHTCOVE TO SURGE VIDEO ENGAGEMENT

Since 1965, Milbon has been supplying beauty salons with professional, high-quality products for healthy, beautiful hair. In Japan alone, over 500,000 stylists use Milbon brand hair care, including 2,000 signature products and 500 color treatments, to smooth, moisturize, and repair clients’ locks.

Nationwide, more than 230,000 salons carry its exclusive collections. In order to maintain consistent use and best practices across all locations, Milbon provides salon professionals the education necessary to master product application, technical skills, and innovative hair trends, ensuring customers receive the best hair treatments possible. Subsequently, stylists offer critical insight and feedback for Milbon’s beauty experts, which helps them to continually improve its products and hair care initiatives. This collaboration has proven successful—since 2000, Milbon has held the highest domestic market share of professional hair care products in Japan.

With such a massive customer base, Milbon realized digital video would be the best way to educate stylists and communicate product information effectively and efficiently. Following a period of trial and error, Milbon’s Educational Planning team decided to implement Brightcove’s Video Marketing Suite, which offered the perfect solution for superior video management, workflow efficiency, and customer engagement. The partnership was so rewarding, it resulted in a huge surge in viewership and brand visibility, highlighting Milbon as an inspiring leader within the beauty industry.

VIDEO PROVES THE BEST SOLUTION FOR COMMUNICATING WITH CUSTOMERS ACROSS JAPAN

Because of Milbon’s geographically dispersed customer network, one that includes independent stylists, salons, and company-branded studios across Japan, it had to find a way to deliver easily accessible educational content in the most efficient way possible. After reviewing possible solutions, Milbon found that digital video was the answer to providing product expertise, technical guidance, and skills training to 500,000+ customers nationwide. Beyond accessibility, video also gave Milbon a multidimensional approach to teaching; it allowed customers to study precise technical instruction beyond static resources like pictures or text.

Right from the start, Brightcove’s platform was easy to work with and videos were easy to manage.

ATSUSHI MASUKO

HEAD OF MILBON’S EDUCATIONAL PLANNING DEPARTMENT

“If we want to communicate an application technique using our own coloring agent, one would need a considerable number of textbooks and photographs to tell how to divide the hair and apply it correctly,” says Atsushi Masuko, Head of Milbon’s Educational Planning Department. “It’s important to know the tools, like scissors and hands, and delicate movements of the hair to acquire beauty skills. The movement is important to accurately convey technical know-how. It’s not an overstatement to say it’s impossible to communicate this by photographs.”

In 2011, Milbon launched its free video channel, an ad-supported digital resource providing a visually dynamic educational environment for customers. With the channel, Milbon stylists could learn application and product use via video demonstrations and explanations. Accessible on desktop, mobile, and tablet devices, the channel not only served as a convenient teaching tool for those far away or on the go; it also gave Milbon a chance to communicate with repeat customers in search of follow-up instruction. One viewer even noted, “Since I can simulate the styling experience by video, I can learn skills more clearly, and I can better understand the product.”

MILBON TURNS TO BRIGHTCOVE FOR KEY VIDEO CONCERNS

As the video channel popularized, Milbon’s digital marketing team raised several key concerns. For one, the video platform proved less than practical in terms of data management. It was difficult to organize its numerous video assets, and as a result, viewers were having a hard time searching for specific videos. Also, the ad-supported channel featured irrelevant commercial content—advertisements were in no way applicable to the Milbon brand or its products. Third, in terms of technical prowess, the platform fell flat. Uploads were time-consuming, playback speeds were slow, and video performances were inconsistent at best. Finally, the platform offered zero analytical data, and Milbon’s video marketing team had no way to test creative output. Plus, adding an analytics function to the existing platform would be an expensive investment.

After five years and much consideration, Milbon refocused its video marketing efforts and adopted Brightcove Video Marketing Suite as its platform of choice, which provided an extremely manageable environment for video distribution. With the new technology, Milbon re-released its video channel on its own website and debuted the “Biyoushi Doga” app, a convenient, highly-efficient video platform for the company’s customers and digital marketers.

The impact was almost immediate. Masuko notes, “Right from the start, Brightcove’s platform was easy to work with and videos were easy to manage.” The user-friendly data management system allowed Milbon to dramatically increase its video production, subsequently driving viewership and overall engagement. Plus, the platform gave Milbon a radically enhanced player solution, boosting video upload times and playback speeds. But the most salient improvement overall was the access to Brightcove’s analytics. By studying the number of video views, completion rates, and other various metrics, Milbon’s digital marketers could use this information to better understand a video’s impact, thus leading to more relevant content creation.

BRIGHTCOVE-POWERED VIDEO RESULTS IN INCREASED MARKET SHARE, 90% COMPLETION RATES, AND DOUBLE THE PLAYBACKS

In terms of investment return, Brightcove’s all-in-one video solution has proven a real game changer. No longer does Milbon worry about irrelevant ad-content; with Brightcove, Milbon hosts its channel on the company’s own website, therefore eliminating ads from competing businesses. As a result, Milbon has amplified its brand presence across various distribution points, including Milbon’s YouTube channel, web channel, and app. According to Masuko, the enhanced visibility has helped drive Milbon’s overall marketing penetration rate.

And because Brightcove’s platform provides a spectacular viewing experience for its videos, stylists and salon owners have really taken to the content. Since implementing Video Marketing Suite, the company has experienced a tremendous uptick in engagement—video playbacks have nearly doubled, and completion rates have steadied at 90%. That’s even the case with lengthier, three-minute videos.

Milbon’s digital strategists have also been able to measure viewer frequency rates, indicating which types of videos receive the most attention. In this case, “how-to” pieces have shown to be the most appealing. Masuko says, “The numbers we’ve received [from customers] and data analysis have been so useful for a variety of improvements.”

MILBON SETS ITS SIGHT ON AUDIENCE TO ENHANCE DIGITAL MARKETING

With the overwhelming success of Brightcove’s Video Marketing Suite, Milbon continues to implement extra features, like Brightcove Audience to help drive marketing efforts even further. The Audience module will allow Milbon to sync its Brightcove video analytics with its marketing automation platform, resulting in detailed viewership data from contacts within its own customer database. Also, Milbon is planning to leverage the Brightcove platform again, making use of its multilingual captioning to reach overseas audiences.

“It’s now possible to display multilingual compatible subtitles in videos and distribute globally,” says Masuko. “We’d like to explore the possibility of delivering our educational services, products, and brand images to the world.”

WHY LIXIL BUILT ITS OWN MEDIA PLATFORM

bsp-admin-1 on December 6, 2024

Launched media platform centralizing all marketing videos

2,300 videos at launch of LIXIL-X

Over 30,000 views per month

Before the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, Japanese manufacturer LIXIL Corporation had an active traveling salesforce. At in-person events, sellers would showcase products like plumbing materials for restrooms, bathrooms, and kitchens, as well as windows, doors, and other interior and exterior furnishings.

But once lockdowns prevented these live demos, LIXIL started creating product description videos and other video content that sales and marketing could use on its digital channels.

Although the videos initially filled the gap for in-person opportunities, LIXIL soon found they needed a holistic video marketing strategy. Decentralized content creation and management had led to over 2,300 videos spread across several internal departments. In order to maximize the investment in video, thousands of videos needed to be organized into a single library.

In 2022, the company partnered with Brightcove to launch its online video platform, LIXIL-X.

USING THE BRIGHTCOVE PLATFORM TO INCREASE CUSTOMER ENGAGEMENT

No matter how much you increase customer engagement using platforms like YouTube, it’s never easy to link this to improved engagement for your company. If you want to improve engagement for your company, it is vital to utilize owned media.

MIKE TAKAHASHI

CHIEF PRODUCT OFFICER, LIXIL CORPORATION

LIXIL selected Brightcove because it was a “stable video platform,” said Mike Takahashi, the Chief Product Officer of Product Content Management. “Many competitors offer features that can only be achieved through complex integrations with services from other companies. But the Brightcove platform has its own APIs, so we thought that would give us more options for possible marketing initiatives.”

To increase customer engagement, LIXIL originally planned to upload videos to YouTube—but ran into a common headache.

“There is no guarantee the ‘next video’ on YouTube is going to be a LIXIL video. And it’s likely the viewer will see related videos from influencers, competitors, and comparison videos between our products and those of our competitors,” said Takahashi. “We needed to develop owned media that directed viewers to the most relevant video in our own sphere. The Brightcove platform was the best fit for building this.”

BRIGHTCOVE APIS HELPED ENSURE MORE RAPID PROTOTYPING

The LIXIL-X prototype was completed in six months—an impressive undertaking that was only possible for a few reasons. First, LIXIL was using Brightcove technology before it started work on LIXIL-X.

“We had already built a video search program from scratch using the Brightcove platform as a file server. So when we began development on this new project, we assumed it would simply be a modification of our first build. However, as we started to select contractors and define the requirements, we realized it would take close to a year to launch. We couldn’t wait that long.”

“We wanted to release a prototype that was about 40% complete as quickly as possible, and then make improvements over time to bring it closer to 100%. Thanks to Brightcove’s excellent APIs, we achieved this with just a small group of front-end engineers.”

MAKING MEDIA THAT CAN BE USED IN SALES

Showroom managers and the sales department were the internal customers who would use the platform the most, so getting their buy-in and support was critical. “We got a lot of positive feedback from them. They believed that LIXIL-X was something people wanted to use and were pleased with the mechanics, video classifications, user experience, and how it looked.”

When the LIXIL-X prototype was released, Takahashi’s developers received a lot of feedback from departments within the company. “We interviewed all of the stakeholders and worked with our engineers to fix any problems with the system and incorporate all of the feedback into LIXIL-X.”

One of the key issues LIXIL-X was poised to solve was how to demonstrate a faucet’s water pressure in the showroom. As Takahashi explained, “Clients visiting our showrooms often ask, ‘How long does the bath take to fill up?’ ‘How powerful is the shower?’ Until now, we haven’t been able to answer those questions particularly well. Getting water to the showrooms is one of the biggest problems facing the showroom staff.”

“So we started immediately compiling videos of water flowing and made them easy to bring up and view on LIXIL-X. These videos to clients enabled showroom staff to answer questions from clients then and there, something which previously wasn’t easy to do.”

FUTURE ITERATIONS WILL ENSURE BETTER MARKETING READINESS

LIXIL aims to build LIXIL-X’s viewership as part of their efforts to build a strong external marketing strategy.

The platform currently receives 30,000 views a month, but increasing the number of video views is a key performance metric for the LIXIL team. “We want to ensure a large number of viewers for all the media on the system, with unique points of entry tailored to the niche needs of users.”

In the future, says Takahashi, there will be a login experience so that user behavior can be analyzed to provide a more personalized journey. “When users are logged in, we can notify them by email when a video is published to promote particular products. It will also connect with marketing automation tools used by our sales department.”

HOW CFA INSTITUTE MORE THAN TRIPLED ENGAGEMENT

bsp-admin-1 on December 6, 2024

SOCIAL AND LIVE STREAM VIDEO BOOST MEMBERSHIP, BRAND AWARENESS

CFA Institute is the world’s premier association of investment management professionals. This non-profit, membership organization is the official administrator of the Chartered Financial Analyst® Program. In order to be awarded the CFA charter, one of the most recognized and respected financial designations, candidates must pass a series of three exams, complete a work experience requirement, and annually attest to adherence to professional conduct guidelines. It’s also one of the hardest financial designations to receive—typically, only about one-fifth of program candidates earn the CFA designation.

Historically, CFA Institute dedicated its marketing resources toward current and future members, deriving its revenue primarily from membership and exam fees. Past CFA Institute marketing communications, such as emails, direct mailings, and printed flyers, focused on providing educational content for members. However, a shift in marketing strategy led the organization to develop a broader approach to increase awareness of its overall mission: to promote the highest standards of ethics, education, and professional excellence in the investment industry for the betterment of society.

CFA Institute turned to Brightcove to help achieve these new marketing goals. Using video as a core marketing tool, the organization hoped to target not just existing CFA Institute members and candidates, but also institutional and individual investors, all in the pursuit of establishing higher standards within the investment industry.

“The idea was to build awareness of the organization’s high standards and promote how CFA Institute and its members both embody these values and help deliver improved outcomes for membership and the broader society,” says Mitchell Forst, CFA Institute global video production manager. “By calling on the investment industry as a whole to measure up to these same high standards, we can build greater trust and market integrity, which will benefit everyone.”

LOCALIZED VIDEO MARKETING CAMPAIGN BOOSTS GLOBAL AWARENESS

We’ve learned a lot about engagement. It’s definitely higher than it was five years ago, and we attribute that to the better content we’ve been able to create using Brightcove. Brightcove has all the tools we need, and it’s a great choice for any size organization, large or small.

MITCHELL FORST

CFA INSTITUTE GLOBAL VIDEO PRODUCTION MANAGER

To transform its overall marketing strategy, CFA Institute collaborated with Brightcove to deliver better, more broadly-targeted brand awareness video campaigns. And while the organization continued producing educational video content for its membership base, the organization decided to allocate a majority of its video spend toward worldwide thought leadership efforts.

CFA Institute debuted its most extensive video awareness campaign, “Let’s Measure Up,” a multi-million dollar, multi-year initiative to raise awareness among financial services audiences. Hosted on, and distributed through, Brightcove’s Video Marketing Suite, the global campaign profiled some of the organization’s charterholders who have “measured up” by going above and beyond. The campaign ran in all 73 CFA Institute markets in which charterholders reside, including Europe, Africa, the Middle East, Asia Pacific, and the Americas. Through Brightcove’s global delivery platform, campaign producers were able to track engagement and web traffic from around the world. After seeing upticks in viewership in the Asia-Pacific and Latin American regions, the CFA Institute video team coordinated with those local offices to produce location-specific campaigns, complete with subtitles and culturally relevant content.

“One of the things we really appreciate about Brightcove is its ability to let us see who’s watching, where people are dropping off, and what works better in certain markets,” says Forst.

Since the organization’s introduction of localized video marketing, there’s been a tremendous growth in interest from the Asia-Pacific and Latin American regions. One of the reasons, Forst says, is video: “Video has played a big part of the growing interest in these local communities, especially among the younger, more tech-savvy demographic. They’re more inclined to be on social media and watch videos. And this new marketing effort has benefited the organization in many ways, including record-setting exam registrations and rapidly growing levels of top of mind awareness.” Currently, CFA Institute is working to create more localized video content for each of its regional markets, using Brightcove to support distribution.

CFA INSTITUTE TRIPLES ENGAGEMENT SCORE USING BRIGHTCOVE ANALYTICS

Among Brightcove’s capabilities, its analytics functionality and analytics API have proven most significant for CFA Institute. With analytics providing Forst and his video team precise data to measure video marketing efforts, they’ve developed a far better understanding of what aspects of video drive results. For instance, they’ve learned to keep a close eye on drop-off rates to determine ideal video lengths. And they’ve been able to identify key engagement-driving factors.

“We’ve learned to target our email and video campaigns toward different audiences at specific times of the day,” says Forst. “We’ve also been able to make much more informed decisions about the types of video our audience will be receptive to, with respect to content, length, and format. That was a big learning for us.”

One example that showcases Brightcove analytics’ tremendous value is in the video, “What to Expect on Exam Day.” Part of the organization’s exam preparation series, the video explains what candidates need to bring and what they shouldn’t forget on the day of their exam. It was the first opportunity for CFA Institute to put the full extent of Brightcove analytics to work and, according to Forst, results proved just how critical the analytical data was to the video production process.

“Our first attempt at the video was disappointing. The analytics showed it was way too long, and people dropped off because it wasn’t engaging.”

But the analytics also uncovered that the video attracted increased views and engagement in the run up to exams. Considering these factors, Forst and his team went back to the drawing board and recreated a far more effective version of the same video. They reshot it with a professional actress and shortened it. They also decided to release it twice a year, close to exam days, to maximize peak watching periods. “It turned out a lot better,” Forst says. “And it’s now one of our most popular videos.”

In 2017, “What To Expect on Exam Day” drew 53,000 views and a 71 engagement score—that’s more than three times its previous score of 20. And out of 4,000+ CFA Institute video assets, it’s one of the highest ranked videos for engagement.

ANNUAL CONFERENCE DRAWS 20K LIVE STREAM AND SOCIAL MEDIA VIEWS

CFA Institute also employs live stream video and social media marketing to increase views and engagement. For large-scale events, such as internal meetings, conferences, and outreach programs, the organization delivers live stream footage to its Brightcove Gallery Live page, giving off-site participants the chance to watch from their personal computers and mobile devices. Using Brightcove Social, CFA Institute posts the live content simultaneously to its Twitter, Weibo, and LinkedIn accounts. And after any live event, footage is cut down to smaller VOD clips, which are then posted to the group’s very active social network. Among its growing number of live stream video events, the organization’s annual conference and Research Challenge rank as most popular. Last year’s Research Challenge attracted over 10,000 live views across all distribution channels, while 2017’s annual conference drew over 20,000 views from live and VOD content combined.

Thanks to Brightcove Social, Forst says video distribution has become much more efficient, which he believes has impacted audience reach: “Through the social tool, we’re able to make clips rapidly. It also allows people in the organization to self-serve and find clips themselves, which saves us a lot of time and expense. I think we’re reaching new viewers just by being able to make those clips available faster to audiences on social media.”

He continues: “We’ve learned a lot about engagement. It’s definitely higher than it was five years ago, and we attribute that to the better content we’ve been able to create using Brightcove. Brightcove has all the tools we need, and it’s a great choice for any size organization, large or small.”

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