I think it’s pretty clear that we here at bub.blicio.us like online video, but TurnHere is proving that video can do more for you (and your business) than you may know. Although, it is useful for covering topics like office style.
In just a year and a half, TurnHere has produced a whopping 20,000 videos for businesses in a range of industries including travel, publishing, local, and real estate. The company leverages its growing network of more than 8,000 professional filmmakers across more than 70 countries to create affordable Internet videos.
Many small businesses are turning to online video to stand out with customers. With its measurable ability to build trust and create consumer action, video is one of the best (and most affordable) ways to meaningfully engage with potential and current customers.
In fact, Kelsey Group research shows of people who viewed a video online: •55% visited the company’s web site •30% visited the physical store •24% made a purchase
So, to celebrate their milestone, TurnHere has launched the “Fall in Love With Video” sweepstakes. If you have a small business – pay attention!
Here’s how it works:
The campaign started August 31 and runs until September 25. Each week, TurnHere randomly selects 100 winners to receive a free custom video profile of their business shot onsite and produced by one of TurnHere’s professional filmmakers.
Additionally, one winner each week will receive a $1,000 “Stimulus Package” giftcard to a leading retailer such as Costco, Best Buy, Staples, and Walmart.
Disclosure: In addition to being a contributor to bub.blicio.us, I also work at FutureWorks where one of my clients is TurnHere, but that doesn’t make this contest any less cool.
Taking a page from Google’s playbook, Hulu today launched Hulu Labs. According to Hulu, the Labs are “a place to try out experimental projects … and share your feedback while they’re still in development.”
It’s a great idea, and they started big.
Hulu Desktop: Hulu has taken video viewing out of the browser and onto the desktop. With native applications built for Mac and for PC, you can now use Windows Media Center remote controls or Apple remote controls, allowing you to navigate Hulu’s entire library with just six buttons. It’s also handy without the remote controls. I’ve had various episodes of Kitchen Confidential playing in the background on my machine all day. Download
Video Panel Designer: Now when you embed a Hulu clip into your site, you can customize its appearance.
Recommendations: Hulu has now added recommendations based on shows you’ve watched and rated. You need to have a Hulu account to have recommendations, but they’re pretty accurate. Based on my love of quirky sitcoms, Hulu recommended 30 Rock.
Time-Based Browsing: I think this is the best of the new experimental features. You can now quickly scan videos grouped by original air date. As Hulu puts it, “whether you’re a TV junkie who remembers shows by the day of week they air, a budding media anthropologist curious to study TV’s evolution across the decades, or just a user in search of timely news clips, time-based browsing is another way to easily find more videos on Hulu.”
Hulu, home of NBC and Fox shows, has a new partner. Disney has joined the online video service, and brought ABC along with it. The Big 3 now each own 27% of Hulu, according to TechCrunch.
While I’m thrilled that Hannah Montana and Kim Possible will soon find their way to Hulu, I have to wonder – where is CBS? When I want to watch two of my favorite shows online – CSI and How I met Your Mother – I still have to do it through the limited and annoying CBS.com site. I have to wonder what is keeping them? After all, everyone is finding a way to put their content online in an easily accessible manner. Last week, Sony announced a partnership with YouTube to distribute limited, ad-supported content. So, come on CBS!
Hulu is the #3 video site right now, although it is quickly gaining on #2 Fox Video and #1 YouTube. Many writers are calling for YouTube to either get some real content or get out of the way. Meanwhile, I’d rather speculate on the future of Hulu. With its star rising fast and content seeking out the site, I have to wonder if a premium or subscription model isn’t in the future. What about pay-cable shows? Would you pay a fee to see premium content from channels like HBO or Showtime? You can take that further and ask, what would that do to cable TV?
I don’t how far in the future we’ll be using our laptops for televised entertainment all the time instead of the behemoth monitors in our living rooms. I do know that the time people spent watching TV online jumped 40% in one year and stands to grow even faster as more content becomes available. What do you think?
At last week’s Web 2.0 Expo we caught up with ooVoo, a company that enables people to connect, collaborate and communicate in real-time through online video. Bubblicious Reporter Jolie O’Dell spoke with Tom Herman, VP of product marketing at ooVoo, about their core products and their new open API that allows developers to build customized applications and widgets for use within the ooVoo platform.
ooVoo enables people to have video chats with up to six people on camera and another six people by audio, as well as screen-sharing capabilities. ooVoo competes against more established players such as Logitech’s SightSpeed, and is an alternative for businesses who cannot afford the higher end solutions such as Cisco’s TelePresence.
Developers interested in building a video app on the ooVoo platform should participate in ooVoo’s developer contest where he or she can win $2,500 by building a creative video widget and embedding it on their personal or company site. Video is a powerful medium and it’s one more way to communicate with readers, viewers, customers, partners, colleagues, etc. Check out our interview with ooVoo:
In addition to ooVoo, the Bubblicious team talked with a few other companies offering social computing applications and services. If you missed yesterday’s video, watch our highlight reel and stay tuned all week for the full interviews with each company. Tomorrow’s video interview is with MindTouch.
Bubblicious Reporter Alison McNeill recently presented Bubby awards to five winners at Twiistup 5, which was held at Hangar:8 at the Santa Monica airport. On Friday, we posted our highlight reel of the Bubby Award winners and this week we’re posting one interview a day from each of the five winners.
Yesterday’s interview was with Causecast, our “Favorite Do-Gooder” Bubby award winner. Today’s post features Viewdle, our ‘Favorite Showoff’ Bubby award winner.
Viewdle is a video platform that provides powerful facial recognition and audio content identification in Web videos for indexing, searching and monetizing video assets.
In our interview with Laurent Gill, president and COO of Viewdle, he shares how Viewdle’s video search technology works and how its able to recognize who is in a video and identify what’s being said within the video. To date, they have indexed more than 44,000 people in online videos with a high degree of accuracy. Viewdle can even find your mother, provided she’s in a Web video.
Watch our interview of Gill to learn more about Viewdle’s innovative digital media platform and how it all started with three guys in a room with a whiteboard in the Ukraine. The company is now based in Los Angeles with R&D in the Ukraine.
And come back tomorrow and watch our interview with Patricia Handschiegel, winner of “Kick Ass Female & Best Laugh” Bubby award.
