Forum Moderators: phranque
They're claiming a 5 fold improvement in CTR in comparison to banners. The question is, who is the target audience and what's the quality like?
They're not a Content Delivery Network themselves (they're an Akamai agent), so more of a feed than a platform. But they're claiming 15m videos are served daily...
The Eggnetwork was created to connect advertisers with the top social networks and vertical communities and delivers on four critical promises.Users first: give viewers a choice about which ads they want to watch.
Reach: advertisers should reach the largest social networks with a single call.
Targeting & accountability: leverage profile data to target video ads in powerful new ways.
Safety: make user content safe for advertisers. Have real people review each video.
[theeggnetwork.com...]
"This second round of funding will help us to establish VideoEgg as the premier user-generated video enabler while we execute our advertising revenue model and expand our platform into additional social networking and vertical interest communities," said Matt Sanchez, co-founder and CEO of VideoEgg, Inc.
Newspaper websites should jump on this ASAP.
We paid someone to gather friends on myspace with special tools. A month ago we sent out a promotion to our myspace friends. Got 0 sales.
That's because they aren't your friends. In fact, they aren't even your online friends. They're just people gathered with "special tools", whatever that means. They're most likely people who have zero interest in your product, but are easily-suckered...
I think targeted advertising on Myspace, YouTube, etc. CAN be effective. But it doesn't require "special tools" to "gather friends", nor does it require paying anybody to put your video on these sites. It just requires a good video that shows off your product.
I've noticed a number of companies using YouTube and/or MySpace to host their product demos for free. They include links to the product demo in their advertising. So, YouTube/Myspace may not necessarily bring in a lot of new eyeballs, but it is a useful part of a broader advertising campaign. Why PAY for bandwidth for a product-demo video when YouTube/Myspace will host it for free?
There is also a viral aspect. I think people are more likely to pass it on to a friend if it is on a website such as MySpace/Youtube than if it is on your own website. Being on MySpace/YouTube automatically makes it "entertainment". (Assuming, of course, that it IS entertaining to begin with...) Plus these videos DO get tagged and put on people's "favorites" lists.
Here's a couple of good examples:
- I recentely purchased a "knock box" online. For those unfamiliar, a "knock box" is a little container with a padded metal bar that you "knock" the grounds from your espresso machine into. Not a terribly exciting product. Yet, somebody came up with a new knockbox design that is head and shoulders above all knockbox designs. (Really!) Now, I found out about this product from a coffee-enthusiast website, and ordered one from the manufacturer in Australia (who sells ONLY on-line). They sent me a link to their video with my order acknowledgement. It was a well-made humorous "commercial" on why one may need a knock-box. In fact, I sent the link to a friend who had given me a puzzled look ("what's a knockbox and why would I need one - I knock them into the wastebasket...") when I mentioned that I got this cool knockbox. Next think, he's asking me "where did you buy that - I think I want one"...
- I have a device that allows you to "stick" any video camera on the outside of a car, boat, airplane, etc. - basically any smooth, relatively-flat surface - by suction. Some guy makes these in his garage in Colorado, and they've really proven quite a phenemona. For <$100 you can film some pretty slick video, should you happen to want to film the driver or the road from a moving car, etc. They have numerous product-demo videos (both showing how to use the product and sample videos shot using the product) up on YouTube.
