Here’s another winning stop-motion film on youtube directed by Bang-yao Liu…but this time with Post-it notes! It took 3 months of planning, 4 days of shooting and over 6000 Post-it notes to create. If you’re curious to find out more about how the film was made, check out the great behind the scenes video here:
Posts Tagged ‘youtube’
24
Mar
Let’s Ask Google and Youtube a few questions : Marissa (Mayer), Matt (Cutts) if you are around, please talk to us… (Part 2)
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by Videoagency
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No Comments |
Now moving on to my second discussion topic:
2/ What about indexing videos into Google Universal ? Are you going to give preference to the people who upload onto your platform?
Most of us who are interested in videos and/or SEO have noticed in these last few weeks a big move in video integration into search queries…Particularily new SERPs with video thumbnails situated before text links.
I have seen many examples of this:
- Some videos come from Youtube and you can play them directly in the SERP
- Others come from Youtube, but you cannot play them in the SERP
- A few come from others sites with thumbnails and some even without
- More impressively, some of them even come from video websites that are not big platforms
I would be curious to know what kind of results you guys are getting on this? Do people clicking on the videos? How, when you’re a video website, can you be indexed by Google?
Last but not least THE big questions concerning Video market on Internet is:
1. Are you going to prioritize SERPs videos uploaded on Youtube in your Algorythm?
If Yes: (bearing in mind your ToS – mentioned above) that would mean that you will be giving more exposure to content producers who accept to license their content to you for free?
If No: What type of commitment can you offer to content producers? A Chinese wall? That could prove to be difficult!!!!
In terms of text content the situation is clear, you were not hosting it and thus got a free license. Now, with video it has become more ambiguous…
So to sum up briefly!
Google is moving towards Universal which strongly impacts SERPs.
This also impacts all online video market as videos uploaded on Youtube or Google could be better indexed thus forcing producers to upload their content on Youtube…
In the meantime, uploading videos on Youtube does not allow producers to make money out of it and more over gives Youtube a free license the producer’s video content…
So in the future, if you are a producer and you want exposure, you will probably have to produce without the intention of making money…Fame is probably the future 
But one thing is true, since its beginnings, the SEO game has been very closed and now with the development of Google Universal we are finally starting to open up the game and create new, exciting opportunities…
To Google : “Don’t be evil”. Don’t repeat the mistakes that MSFT did. Be transparent and share your vision even if you’re not sure about it but give directions to the market. Don’t try to dominate every single market.
13
Mar
Youtube broadens its APIs
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by Videoagency
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1 Comment |
Yesterday Youtube announced that it has broadened its APIs thus making it even easier for third parties to integrate YouTube content and community into other websites, desktop applications, video games, mobile devices, televisions, cameras, as well as a bunch of other applications… In essence, Youtube has become an open video services platform.
According to Jim Patterson (Product Manager at Youtube) the new API services include :
- Upload videos and video responses to YouTube
- Add/Edit user and video metadata (titles, descriptions, ratings, comments, favorites, contacts, etc)
- Fetch localized standard feeds (most viewed, top rated, etc.) for 18 international locales
- Perform custom queries optimized for 18 international locales
- Customize player UI and control video playback (pause, play, stop, etc.) through software”
Check out the video that Youtube has made in order to explain the new API changes:
This is an exciting step forward for online videos, however it will also have some brutal consequences. As Techcrunch (Erick Schonfeld) correctly points out, other video-hosting platforms such as Brightcove, Maven Networks and Move Networks will probably have a hard time keeping up with these changes.
Another question in everyone’s minds at the moment is how the ad revenue split will be defined. Here is what Jim Patterson had to say on the matter:
“We are not introducing any fundamentally new way to monetize. Any video that is uploaded through our API is treated exactly as on YouTube.com. In general if a video is uploaded to YouTube, in some cases we serve ads into that on YouTube.com. When people embed those we reserve rights to serve ads in the future.
It is not a white-label service. We do offer a hosting service, but it is not a direct alternative to the companies that you mention. There are some big differences. It is a YouTube-branded experience. It is free. The price you pay for using it is you must participate in the YouTube community. ”
Lets see what happens next! In the meantime take a look at these interesting case studies to see how various partners have integrated Youtube into their sites.
8
Mar
Is Google dancing for videos?
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by Videoagency
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No Comments |
I have talked to many specialists in the SEO field over the last few days and we have all noticed that there is a real increase in the number of videos and images appearing in Google’s SERPs.
For most of the experts this is a sure sign that there is a big dance at Google. A dance which could change a lot of things for SEO as we know it. Some even argue that SEO is dead and DAO (Digital Asset Optimization) will take its place.
Is the promise of Universal Search coming true? Just search for “How to tie a tie” in Google and take a good look at the SERP.
SCREENSHOT:
So let’s analyze this page:
There are a total of 11 results with the following:
- 1 image results (3 images aligned next to each other)
- 3 video results with thumbnails (two of which do not originate from YouTube, something very new indeed!) and none with a “+” to expand the player within the SERP.
- 11 text results
This is great news for those who produced the videos that land on Page 1, but bad news for everyone else. The SEO game, which has been pretty much closed for the past few years is now wide open again. What a boom for the SEO market!
I’d really like to know more about the traffic that Google sends directly to Videojug as a result of their videos appearing directly in the SERP (as seen in the “how to tie a tie” example9.
Video SEO (VSEO) is becoming a real area of expertise and its going to be a major challenge for those who do not catch on to this revolution early on.
All you SEO gurus: get ready to tell your clients that they need to produce videos as it will have to become a key component of their e-marketing over the coming months and years. Video will become the tool for getting free traffic to your website in 2008 and beyond. Furthermore it will be a tool that, if used properly, can get you on the first page of Google (the dream of any marketer out there!!!).
Your customers expect video, and Google wants you to deliver it to them, so start producing videos now!
Users clearly LOVE video:
I’d like to hear what you all have to say about this… Comments please 
14
Feb
Interview with David Burch, TubeMogul’s Marketing Manager
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by Videoagency
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No Comments |
Thomas Owadenko: When did your company launch?
David Burch: TubeMogul was founded in February of 2006 and we launched our free beta product in March of 2007, which had great reception. Through our users’ feedback, we developed more and more features, adding more sites and tools like distribution. We also started getting feedback from larger media companies willing to pay for other features, so we launched our new Premium Products at DEMO 08.
TO: Where is the company located?
DB: The company was founded in Berkeley, California by UC Berkeley graduate students and was housed in a new business incubator there. The company recently moved into larger offices in nearby Emeryville, California.
TO: Why did you launch?
DB: We recognized that video creators were posting videos across the internet and had no easy way to measure the performance of those videos, nor a good way of effectively distributing them.
TO: What are the strengths of your products?
DB: Because we partner with video sharing sites and have APIs to both distribute content and bring back viewership information, we have a very rich data set and a scalable product.
TO: How many people work for the company?
DB: We have 12 employees, and are growing quickly.
TO: Who are your clients?
DB: Our clients vary from larger media companies, agencies and marketers managing large brands on down to smaller film-makers, journalists and politicians–in short, the panoply of people who want to gain large audiences online and need to know information about their viewership.
TO: Why did they choose you?
DB: Our intuitive interface, our free distribution and reporting tools and our more-advanced Premium Products are all raved about by customers. We give the small guy free tools to maximize and measure his reach online, and larger media and marketers the tools they need for their sponsors and clients.
TO: What are your thoughts on the Google Universal and video SEO frontier?
DB: Video SEO is a reality that a lot of people are just starting to figure out. If you distribute across video sharing sites and are intelligent with your meta data, you are very likely to be in top organic search results. This is largely made possible by Google Universal (and the equivalent at Ask, Yahoo, and MSN), which integrates relevant video results into search pages, boosting video’s relevance. The highest results at Google are not necessarily videos from YouTube or Google Video, either.
We are providing the tools to empower the foremost experts in video SEO and the new media marketing agencies that are involved in video SEO. Together we are at the beginning of the learning curve of what can be done.
TO: Did you raise money?
DB: The company recently announced $1.5 million in Series A funding from Knight’s Bridge Capital Partners. Prior to that, seed financing was provided by investors such as David Toth, the founder of Net Ratings, the first internet metrics company.
TO: What are your priorities for the coming year?
DB: This year, we are focused on growing our user base and continuing to improve upon our valuable products.
13
Feb
Interview with Eric Fontaine, Hey!Spread’s chief business officer.
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by Videoagency
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No Comments |
Hey!Spread helps any producer to publish and track videos on different platforms. I invite you to read the interview I had with him. Hey!spread is evolving in the same space as Tubemogul, Divinitymetrics and Visible measures.
Thomas Owadenko: Hello, in a few lines, please introduce yourself (name, age…) and your track record?
Eric Fontaine: My name is Eric Fontaine. I am 30 years old. I did all my studies in Marketing and Strategy. Before launching my own company, I worked at Universal Music Group International and the mobile phone department for 5 years.
TO: When was your company launched and where is it located?
EF: Hey!Spread was launched in July 07. We are in located in Marseille, in the South of France.
TO: Why did you launch it and what is its mission?
EF: Actually, we always try to develop tools that can help people do everything video-realted as easily as possible. And we do it pretty well through our two services Hey!Watch, our video encoding web service, and of course Hey!Spread. On the one hand, video is the trendiest medium on the web and online video platforms pop up like mushrooms. And on the other hand, people are becoming video web producers and want to create the buzz around their video content. Unfortunately, spreading their content over all the platforms is something very boring and time consuming. That’s how Hey!Spread was born. From now on, promoting your video content over the best video portals can be done in one shot. Easy, efficient and quick.
TO: What are the strengths of your products?
EF: Actually, we do not only distribute content. We promote it and allow our client to highlight their video creations. We propose many innovative options like watermarking, encoding, real time monitoring, cross-posting, credentials-checking, job-restarting… All thees features optimize the distribution. It’s not a closed or blind service. The user is almighty. Besides, as we do for all our products, we propose an API. That way, companies can integrate Hey!Spread as a white label and offer it as a new feature. They can spread from one platform to another. It’s very successful.
TO: How many people work in your company?
EF: We are two founders. I, Chief Business Officer and Bruno Celeste, Chief Technical Officer. When there is a peak of activity, we hire external people.
TO: Who are your clients?
EF: We have many different clients. Live streaming video platforms, online video portals, User Generated Content websites, Web agencies and individuals. Actually, most of our clients combine our two services to have a global and powerful video tool.
TO: Why did they choose you?
EF: The main words that we heard are Flexibility, Reliability and Reactivity. Even if we are a small team, we do not need to sleep a lot. We want to be available for our clients at any time. We do not only want to provide tools. We also want to work closely with them to make their project successful. Proposing a good tool is not sufficient, people need human relationships too.
TO: What is your turnover?
EF: We have not closed our first year of activity, so we can’t provide that information.
TO: Who are your competitors?
EF: Actually, we do not have “real” competitors. I mean our tool was thought out for integration as a white label. Both Hey!Spread and Hey!Watch are technical and business enabler tools. Some other services propose the distribution of content, but only through their interface. We want to free our clients from any technical prison.
TO: SEO and Video ? Myth or reality?
EF: As video content is like text or images, we need to find it. But the way it is right now things are still a little confusing. You can use many methods to find videos, like classic search engines or directly on a well-known video portal like YouTube. The main problem is the same with the text 10 years ago: Relevance.
TO: What do you think about Google universal and how it should be?
EF: Google is a company that impresses. How can one not be impressed by two men building an empire based on free tools and Ads. Actually, they invented the current most used business model. The only problem is what is great for Google is not the same for all. Free is not a business model at all. I am sure that too many small companies suffer from this philosophy that everything must be free on the Web. So, each time the same story, you raise funds, propose a free service hoping you will have huge traffic and wait to be bought. I hate this idea.
TO: Did you raise money? How much and who invested or do you plan to raise?
EF: We are self-funded and very proud of it. We are often approached by VC’s but we want to be independent. We make money, we like our clients and they trust us. We keep the good work.
TO: What are the “top 3″ priorities for your company in the coming year?
EF: We are working a new version of Hey!Watch. We will develop 2 new services this year. We are currently negotiating some nice partnerships.
7
Feb
MegaVideo tells YouTube users: “we love you more”
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by Videoagency
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No Comments |
MegaVideo, one of the newest video sites, has challenged YouTube users to switch to their service. This is a bold statement that is giving them a lot of media attention. Even if YouTube users decide not to switch to them in masses, the PR storm will surely increase awareness.
To back up their ambitions, they have released a video that gives YouTube users 10 reasons to start using MegaVideo. You can see this video below.
The top reason for switching to MegaVideo, according to them, is that you earn money on your video with their rewards program. With an AdBrite publisher account, you can earn ALL the revenue generated by advertising in your video. Also, there is no maximum playtime for uploaded videos.
All in all the offering doesn’t seem bad at all. Who knows if it will help filmmakers and videoagraphers make money. We’ll see what YouTube users make of it over the coming months.
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