Washington Post and Newsweek plan to partner to produce seven hours of video, covering the upcoming democratic and republican conventions. The publishers plan to equip reporters with cell phones and digital cameras to record the necessary video interviews. Online readers will be encouraged to participate by adding comments to videos without moderation.
Gannett is taking its relationship with video company Mogulus one-step further and has decided to partially finance the start-up. Mogulus has received 2.7 million in financing to date and now Gannett’s 10 million dollar investment will give the start-up the flexibility it needs, to compete in the ever crowded world of video vendors.
Mogulus and Gannett have already had a relationship spanning the past three months, but Gannett’s announcement of funding for the start up further ferments the relationship and in my mind could very well lead to an acquisition. It is important to note that up until this point, Gannett has termed the relationship as one formed out of a product need only, but I strongly question the truth of that. “Now, with Mogulus, all our journalists–including print and Web reporters–can deliver live, multi-camera broadcasts of news events to our customers,” said Craig A. Dubow, chairman, president and CEO of Gannett, in a statement.
Mogulus provides a browser-based Studio application to create LIVE, scheduled and on-demand internet television to broadcast anywhere on the web, through a single player widget. Their service comes in two types Free (ad-supported) and Pro (white-label, no-ads, pay for usage). To date Mogulus has gained 100,000 users and more than 3,000,000 unique viewers.
Gannett backed Captivate Networks announced that in addition to continuing to broadcast news in thousands of office tower elevators across North America, they too now would start to deliver video news clips online, via their own branded Internet news site.
Mike DiFranza, founder and President of Captivate Networks, states that this upcoming online video news venture will “take engagement to the next level…” DiFranza plans to give viewers a deeper scope of the 15-second news bits they see in elevators with this new platform.
In addition to the online news site, the company also alluded to the fact that they were working on a widget that would allow bloggers and publishers to import Captivates video based news to their own sites.
Captivate Networks was purchased by Gannett in 2004 and today the company delivers 54.5 million impressions per month and is in 23 of North Americas top designated market areas.
The Interactive Advertising Bureau of Canada released its annual online advertising report and the numbers show that 2007 was a banner year.
Online advertising revenues in Canada grew by 38% in 2007, to reach 1.2 billion and according to the IAB, this means that online ad revenues in Canada have more than quadrupled in only five years. Of the growth in Canada, Paula Gignac (President of IAB Canada) said “The sky’s really the limit for Online, as new developments in targeting technology, creative (it’s great to have our first Video advertising revenue number), and integrated strategies are happening on an almost daily basis — all with the goal of helping marketers capitalize on online’s ever-growing and engaged audience. Online advertising is no longer below the line in any way — it’s now an essential component of any marketing mix.”
According to the IAB, the 2007 online ad revenue breakdown was as follows:
From a geographical perspective, approximately $260 million (21%) of the $1.2 billion, came from French Canadian Online properties.
The IAB breakdown of 2007 online ad revenues, by advertiser category was as follows:
You can download a summary of the report here: IAB Canada 2007 Online Ad Revenues
Monetizing video has always been a daunting task for traditional print publishers building their online properties and the equation gets even harder when you look at trying to monetize user-generated video. And although I recognize that there are many models one can study and take things from to build your own, I would strongly suggest that publishers reviewing their video models take a look at the Metacafe model.
Metacafe is a UGV site, which has been in existence since 2003. Knowing that amassing content was their primary objective; Metacafe decided not to bill the content providers (the marketplace) and instead created a revenue model that complimented the user and user activity. What Metacafe does is sell inventory through video networks, charge for prominent placement of promotional videos and offer overlay units within videos. The site also uses the Google’s AdWords program for running display ads. Certain content providers are paid out of the AdWords revenue and it’s all based on video performance and popularity - See the Kip Kedersha story for more details.
The model seems to be working for Metacafe as they manage to increase their market reach in not only North America, but world wide, on a daily basis. Today Metacafe celebrates 30 million visitors per month, 500 million page views and 200% year over year growth! Traditional print publishers will also be happy to know that Metacafe moderates their content before it is published to the web - don’t know if I quite agree with that operating process however.
Another clever newspaper promotional ad in the format of video:
SND Buenos Aires — The First Commercial from Society for News Design on Vimeo.
A white paper released by ABIresearch confirms that viewer expectations for online video is much different than what they would expect from television. Confirmed from the quality of UGV content that makes it to the top of sites such as Vidmeter, ABIresearch concludes that online video is perceived as ”free, low-resolution, snackable content,”.
This report was very worthy of blogging in this forum, because it speaks volumes for folks in the publishing business. As you will see below, the most popular video content types viewed online, either already relate to newspapers (news clips) or have the ability to easily be adapted to a publishers online business model (UGV). Moreover, the fact that the average Internet users expectation for online video content doesn’t marry that of professional film or television quality, makes entering into this realm far more affordable for newspapers - both the dailies and community weeklies alike.
Interesting Online Video Stats from ABIresearch
- 86% of those surveyed are viewing online video content
- The most popular type of content viewed online is news clips
- User Generated Video and Movie Trailers tied for second place!
- Only 5% of those surveyed said they currently pay to watch video content online
- 20% of respondents said they would be willing to watch advertisements in exchange for viewing content for free
In a recent report published by AccuStream iMedia Research, it is said that User Generated Video (UGV) is expected to yield 34 billion views in 2008. The report further goes on to quantify that the average views per video in 2007 was an impressive 10,695 views.
Source: AccuStream iMedia Research, January 2008
This is a great example of an European newspaper using video in fabulous way to self promote. You will enjoy this!
http://www.amazon.ca/Pillars-Earth-Ken-Follett/dp/0451166892%3FSubscriptionId%3D1YNZ339ZCHHAKYFSY702%26tag%3Dsubversionfor-20%26linkCode%3Dxm2%26camp%3D2025%26creative%3D165953%26creativeASIN%3D0451166892
http://www.amazon.ca/Polished-Hoe-Austin-Clarke/dp/0887621341%3FSubscriptionId%3D1YNZ339ZCHHAKYFSY702%26tag%3Dsubversionfor-20%26linkCode%3Dxm2%26camp%3D2025%26creative%3D165953%26creativeASIN%3D0887621341
http://www.amazon.ca/Using-Political-Ideas-Barbara-Goodwin/dp/0470025522%3FSubscriptionId%3D1YNZ339ZCHHAKYFSY702%26tag%3Dsubversionfor-20%26linkCode%3Dxm2%26camp%3D2025%26creative%3D165953%26creativeASIN%3D0470025522
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