Video Strategy: Evaluating the Online Video Platfoms
[Posted by Bobby Tulsiani]
In our first two reports in the Video Strategy series, we have detailed how online video has moved beyond the exclusive domain of media and entertainment companies. From travel to financial web sites, video is now ubiquitous across the internet.
Our latest report, The Forrester Wave: US Online Video Platforms, goes beyond market sizing and best practices to call for online video to be managed as a product. Like any web product, be it site-search or recommendations, a company has the choice to build an internal solution or to utilize a third party solution. In the Forrester Wave, we evaluate six vendors that offer product solutions for online video: Brightcove, Fliqz, Kaltura, Ooyala, Twistage, and VMIX.
While the number of companies in the space is certainly larger than six, we decided to focus on a set of vendors that serve a variety of clients, regardless of size or industry. For that reason, some vendors that primarily focus on high end media companies, such as Digitalsmiths, The Platform, or Move Networks were not included.
While the number of companies in the space is certainly larger than six, we decided to focus on a set of vendors that serve a variety of clients, regardless of size or industry. For that reason, some vendors that primarily focus on high end media companies, such as Digitalsmiths, The Platform, or Move Networks were not included.
The space proved to be highly competitive. Almost each of the six vendors had some strength that others could not fully match - while some led in monetization, others were stronger in distribution or user generated videos. Product managers evaluating the video platforms should carefully think about their goals and utilize our Wave tool to adapt the criteria weightings to select the right vendor for their needs.
The space is rapidly evolving with several of the vendors announcing new funding or partnerships just in the past few months. I expect online video to be even more of a focus for Forrester and myself as we move into 2010. I look forward to hearing your thoughts, comments, and feedback on the Wave.
What about the FeedRoom? I thought they were acquired by KIT Digital. I am interested why they were not in the six vendors.
Posted by: Ryan | November 06, 2009 at 01:26 PM
Ryan - We decided also to focus on vendors that help companies build video external experiences for their consumers or constituents.
It appeared that Feedroom was transitioning to focus more on internal/enterprise video: http://www.reuters.com/article/pressRelease/idUS120699+02-Sep-2009+PRN20090902
Though like I said this space moves so fast, that they may be again pushing in the consumer focus. We will have to look at them again for our next effort in the space.
Posted by: Bobby Tulsiani | November 06, 2009 at 01:56 PM
So I've been using Castfire for the better part of 3 years now, and I've got to say it's literally the most under appreciated video platform out there.
It can literally dynamically assemble videos on the fly that can be delivered to any platform. (iTunes as a podcast, flash as a web video, etc. etc. etc.)
You can serve video ads the same way you'd serve a banner.
I wish people would realize how revolutionary their platform is. It's better than Brightcove, in my experience.
http://castfire.com/
It's sort of odd that it wasn't included in the list, especially since they count big clients like CNET, NFL, NextNewNetworks and others. (And small ones like http://techvi.com :) )
Later,
RB
Posted by: Randall | November 06, 2009 at 02:53 PM