Yearly Archive
for: ‘2010’

BrightCove and TubeMogul Release Third Quarter Research Report for 2010

Posted Dec 27 2010 by in Current Affairs, Internet Delivered Video, Online Video with 1 Comment

Last week BrightCove and TubeMogul released their third quarter research report titled “Online Video and the Media Industry”. This report focused on “Peak Video Engagement by Days of the Week and Times of Day”, which offers invaluable insight into current internet video trends, as BrightCove and TubeMoguls’ quarterly reports are considered to yield some of the most significant data in the Online Video world.

One of the most noteworthy findings shows that player loads for online media properties saw a substantial increase In Q3 of 2010. A player load is a measure of graphics, data, and other components that are necessary to be rendered on a web page for a user to watch a video stream; all while monetizing this content with in-page or in-player ads. Player loads can be thought of as video metrics’ version of what a “page view” is for web page analytics across the web, and they’re vital means of obtaining data on the amount of video content that’s embedded across web properties.

Online media properties saw a 127% increase in views reaching about 1.8 billion player loads, which is second only to newspapers with 2.1 billion player loads. What’s even more fascinating about this statistic is that the online media properties was the only category that saw a steady increase in video uploads each quarter, affirming that the rise in online video and media is indeed a trend, and not a fad. This means that each consecutive quarter more and more people are using internet video to strengthen their online voice, and the rise of popularity doesn’t look to be slowing down any time soon.

Other significant data from the report show that, for the first time ever, Facebook now refers more video streams than Yahoo! and accounted for 9.6% of all referrals, making it second only to Google. Check out the BrightCove and Tube Mogul Q3 2010 Report to find out more.

Happy Holidays from everyone at Varvid!

Posted Dec 23 2010 by with 3 Comments

The Varvid team gathers for some holiday festivities – this year we’ve been blessed with many great partnerships and additions to the staff. We’re happy to have had a chance this Christmas to thank some of the key people who have made it all possible. A special thanks to Varvid’s interns, Dingus & Mingus…we’re not quite sure who’s who, but that hasn’t seemed to dampen their holiday spirit.

Varvid helps support the Arthritis Foundation and their annual Jingle Bell Run

Posted Dec 22 2010 by in Varvid Team with 0 Comments

Varvid helps support the Arthritis Foundation and their sponsor, Wellesse Premium Liquid Supplements at this year’s Jingle Bell Run in Bellingham, WA – 2010.

http://www.arthritis.org

http://www.varvid.com

30-60-30: Stuart Crawford’s Social Media Strategy That Works

Posted Dec 10 2010 by in Social Media with 2 Comments

Social media is still a major buzzword in today’s business environment. It can make or break a business’ reputation in the span of a single tweet. But it seems like many businesses is are still struggling to find the best way of utilizing it. As Stuart Crawford of Ulistic says: “Consider Your Tools.”

30: Spend 30 Minutes per day READING

  • Read blogs, read local newspapers, read medical journals – anything that is current, and relates in some way to your chosen vertical of specialization. Read

60: Spend 60 Minutes per day ENGAGING

  • This is, in Stuart’s words, the Secret Sauce in the social media sandwich. Doing this, above all else, will help your social media success skyrocket. GET KNOWN, BE VISIBLE. Get on forums and answer questions from the communities you serve. Know your community, and make sure they know that you’re there, you’re knowledgable, and you’re ready to help them.

30: Spend 30 Minutes per day CREATING CONTENT

  • This could be as small as a blog post or product review, or as big as an article for your business community’s newsletter. Publishing your own content which brings value to your community will increase your positive visibility.

Interested in more from Ulistic, visit:  www.ulistic.com

Google Democratizes the eBook: How Village Books and the Bellingham Community Benefits

Posted Dec 10 2010 by in Village Books with 1 Comment

Earlier this week, Google launched Google eBooks, which has prompted a paradigm shift in both the literary and IT communities alike. Google’s eBooks, alongside Amazon and Apple, is now the third major e-books retailer on the market. However, Google’s eBooks diverges from other eBook distributors because its business model has essentially removed the corporate advantage from the eBook market and has allowed independent bookstores and publishing companies the opportunity to invest in eBook technologies without risking their livelihood.

Prior to Google’s eBooks, the business was dominated by large stores like Amazon and Barnes & Noble, who sold eBooks that couldn’t be accessed by users, unless they also purchased an eBook reading device from the same company. This is where Google’s eBooks is unlike major competitors, because Google is not selling a reading device that’s required for their eBooks to operate. Instead, Google’s eBooks are platform agnostic, which means they do not require any particular device to be read and can be run on smart phones, desktops, tablets, the Barnes & Noble nook and the Sony eReader (pretty much everything except the Kindle).

Google is in cohorts with major publishing companies such as Penguin, Simon and Schuster, Random House and Macmillian, as well as thousands of smaller publishers, which enables them to offer more than 250,000 in-print books for sale. Google is also planning to launch 2.7 million public domain books, all which can be accessed for free. All the eBooks are stored in “the cloud” (a metaphor for data storage on the internet) which creates a personal online bookshelf connected to a user’s Google account.  Google executives have described the e-bookstore as an “open ecosystem” that will offer more than three million books, including hundreds of thousands for sale and millions for free. With Google’s new e-bookstore “open-ecosystem”, users can buy eBooks wherever they want, rather than directly from the distributor or national outlets. With their technological innovations, Google has essentially democratized the eBook industry.

Bellingham, WA’s Village Books, a major voice in the local literary community, is now selling eBooks via Google’s eBooks service. I had an opportunity to speak with Chuck Robinson, co-owner of Village Books, and he’s very enthusiastic about their new found partnership with Google and views it as an auspicious addition to his business. Chuck had this to say:

Chuck Robinson of Village Books

“This partnership allows our customers to buy their eBooks from Village Books, something many of them have asked about for some time.  The announcement elicited a significant response from folks who either own or plan to buy eReaders, iPads, iPhones, or Androids.  They’re excited to be able to buy locally from the same bookstore they’ve patronized for years.  And the fact that the eBooks exist in “the cloud” allows them to read on multiple devices, including their laptop or any web browser.  This levels the playing field quite a bit.”

Being a Bellingham resident, it is great to see a local business like Village Books benefiting from Google’s new eBook service and equally exciting to consider the positive effects this service will have on local literary distributors and communities across the nation.

Here at Varvid, we can’t help but see the similarities between Google’s influence on the literary community and the effect of next generation HD video capturing devices on the IT community. In both cases, technological innovations have democratized creative and intellectual properties and products that were formerly unfeasible options for the average person. Now,  more people can gain access to almost any book they wish by the press of a button on a hand-held device, just as they are able to capture professional quality HD footage with cameras the size of a cell phone. It is this very principle, that innovative technologies should be accessible to anyone, that Varvid is founded upon.

For more about Village Books and their partnership with Google, visit their Google eBooks page. You can check their blog to keep updated on the great literary events they provide for the Bellingham community, and their official website can be found here: http://www.villagebooks.com/.

Varvid Partners UnicomIT, CW Dash, Forza, Proactive Networks all Benefit From Video

Posted Dec 9 2010 by in Varvid Partners, Video Delivery with 1 Comment

Check out these Varvid partners: Unicom is IT,CW Dash, Forza Technology Solutions, Proactive Networks and see how they’re using Internet Delivered Video to boost their SEO, generate more leads and gain customers. We’d also like to give a shout out to our friends at Pronto Marketing an awesome MSP Marketing company that helps people boost their online presence, website, newsletter, SEO, AdWords Campaign Management, and create press releases.

4 Life Lessons the IT Industry has Taught Me

Posted Nov 15 2010 by in Drew Thoughts, Family, Uncategorized with 6 Comments

As the newest member of team Varvid, I have had the pleasure of meeting all kinds of folks in the MSP/VAR industry over the last 8 months. From one-on-one meetings to panel discussions to multi-day conferences,  these folks have taught me dozens of lessons.  I’d like to share with you four I have learned thus far that stand out:

4.  Whether or not folks on the other side are going to like the answer, tell the truth. This is not to say I’ve cried wolf my entire life, just reiterating what we all know can be a tough conversation, especially if it’s not a positive answer, response or dialogue.  Remember that productivity comes from both sides of the isle. Be it clients, customers, family members, co-workers or law enforcement, be honest. Like my father once said, “Son, the truth is not only the right thing to share, it’s the easiest to remember.”  Took me years to realize how right on the money that statement is.

3.  When it comes to a conversation, listen twice as much as you talk. We all know (or are) people who struggle with this. There’s the no eye contact gazer… the one-upper … the interrupter… the sentence finisher… the argument maker… and the list goes on and on.  When it comes to listening, I’ll be honest… it’s difficult for me. I am a talker and love to share stories, thoughts or insight with anybody who wants to engage with me.  But in an effort to listen, I have found the connections I am making in this industry are more real and more meaningful than those I have made in the past. Not because I’m hearing you, but because I’m listening to you.

2. It’s OK to ask for help.  I still have a hard time with this part of my business life because I don’t want to come across as a poser or fraud. My biggest fear is that somebody is going to call me out. In this industry especially, if you pretend you do know and you don’t, you will be eaten alive.  When that happens, there goes your credibility and any business you may have hoped you’d earn. Recently I have put my ego on the back burner and started to ask people to slow down or explain it again.  Do some folks get a little bent out of shape?  Sure they do, but more often than not they understand and want to help me.  It’s in our nature to help, so don’t be afraid to ask for it. Like our school teachers always said, the only dumb question is the question not asked.

1. To fully appreciate all in life, creating priorities is a must. While work is not life, it plays an integral role in who we are, allows us to be creative, productive and utilize our education and experience to better those we come in contact with. I speak for the majority of us when I say what we do is not brain surgery. Lives are not in the balance every time we go to work. As a people pleaser, learning to check out at 5:00 (most days) and not bringing home my work has proven to be a difficult task. But doing so has done wonders for my marriage and my relationship with my son.  These are the most important thing in my life and to remember my work helps me provide a roof and food for those people, it does not replace them.

Again, these are only 4 lessons of the dozens I have learned since I started with this organization nearly a year ago.  The education continues with each new person I have the privilege of meeting.

The Rise of Video in the Workplace

Posted Nov 8 2010 by in Cisco, Social Media with 0 Comments

Cisco’s Connected World Report is an international study that shows how and why workers in the IT industry access their online information. While the main focus of the study was on the disconnect between corporate IT company policies in relation to the behavior change in IT workers due to developments in social media, the  results also reveal that most IT workers see video as a rising technology.

The study shows that, globally, more than two-thirds of IT professionals (68%) believe that video communication will play an important role in their company’s future. This opinion was most popular among workers in China (85%), Mexico (85%) and Spain (82%), suggesting that video is considered to be on the rise as a means of enterprise and consumer communication.

While two-thirds of IT employees are aware of the capabilities of video, not all employees who wish to use video communications while at work are able to do so. The study shows that about two in five employees globally (41%) said they cannot use video at work. Even more astonishing is the fact that more than half of employees in Germany (55%), the United Kingdom (55%), the United States (53%) and France (60%) claim they either do not have access to, or are not permitted to use video as a communications tool.

Interested in the full scope of the study? Check out the MarketWatch article here.

Aaron Booker Featured in INC Magazine

Posted Nov 2 2010 by in Aaron Booker with 0 Comments

Varvid’s one and only Aaron Booker is featured in INC Magazine where he talks about using the online itinerary organizer TripIt to schedule his travels.  In the article, Aaron describes the different ways he uses TripIt and explains the impact it has on his business.

Check out the article here.

B2B vs B2C Social Media and Video’s Rise to the Social Media Forefront

Posted Oct 28 2010 by in B2B, B2C, Social Media with 3 Comments

A recent study by business.com titled the 2009 Business Social Media Benchmarking Study reveals that in North America, more B2B companies are incorporating social media tools into their marketing model than B2C companies.

The results show that:

- 74% of B2B hosted a blog compared to 55% for B2C, 75% of B2B companies use Twitter while only 49% of B2C get their tweet on, and 66% of B2B participated in online discussions,  much higher than the 43% of B2C companies that have an engaging online presence.

-81% of B2B companies were more likely to be integrating company-related profiles on social networks into their strategy, in comparison to 67% of B2C companies.

What’s the explanation for the higher social media use by B2B’s compared to B2C? This informative E Marketer study says that a substantial 60% of B2B marketers claimed they use social media to create a “thought leadership” for their brand, while 49% said they participate in order to generate leads, 46% to monitor and maintain customer feedback, 35% to satisfy their advertising needs and 29% to collect social data about their particular market. All this data points to one thing: that Social Media use in the B2B world is extremely popular now, but what does this mean for the future?

Because of the huge buzz around social media, it’s easy to forget that social media marketing is only a few years old. The truth is, companies are still getting a feel for these technologies and few, if any, have completely harnessed the full potential of these nascent social media tools.

In an interview referenced in the Mashable article titled What the Future Holds for B2B Social Media Marketing, Autumn Truong, the manager of social media and corporate communications at Cisco believes that B2B marketing is about to see a few shifts in essential strategy, with video, mobile and engagement models at the forefront of this new movement. It’s quoted that “she seemed especially excited by video’s potential to tell a story and spur new engagement.” Which isn’t news to the Varvid Crew, as we’re including Cisco’s HD Flip cameras in our new VENUE Packages. So, whatever the future holds, it’s all going to be captured on video.

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