During the rapidly evolving crisis with COVID-19 we were contacted by Kim Jones, Executive Director of the Optometric Physicians of Washington

Her organization had been planning their 55th Post Graduate Seminar scheduled to take place 8 days from the time she reached out to us. We were able to collaborate with Kim and her organization to quickly find a new venue, figure out safe and sanitary practices for crew and presenters (including one immunocompromised individual), and get a custom viewing page set up with tabbed videos, embedded chat function, email capture for each session and linked quizzes for participants to earn their continuing education credits.

Thanks to this joint effort between our teams, the conference took place on time and around 600 doctors were able to get their continuing education credit from the safety of their home. 

Participants delighted at having free parking, no crowded hallways and other such light-hearted benefits from their devices. Many shared photos of them practicing social distancing at home while holding their babies, sharing a desk with their school-aged kids who are all home from schools, and enjoying the company of their furry family members.  

Some of the safety measures we took during the production and streaming were frequent hand washing, minimal crew, who did morning temperature checks for fever before coming into the closed-off hotel conference room that had only production crew (3 people) the OPW Executive producer, 1 moderator and 1-3 speakers safely spaced throughout the room. 

Our techs kept a minimum of 6 feet apart at their work stations and microphones, the presentation computer and clicker were all disinfected between each person’s use. In addition, we changed foam covers on lavalier mics after each presenter. 

Finally, we had our audio person, who would switch mics and disinfecting gloved and masked when coming into contact with speakers. 

Right now we serve many areas who are being affected by “shelter in place” orders or similar precautions.

As media professionals, our crews are small and carry press passes. We have also applied to have Varvid listed as an essential business in Washington state. 

Our hope is to continue to help create ways to keep people in corporate, education and community organizations connected through bringing meetings, classes and conferences together safely online. 

We also are offering consultations for individuals, groups and businesses who are sheltering in place and in need of a live streaming solution to meet their individual needs using existing gear they have on hand, and or by assisting them in making buying decisions.

Please reach out to us for your streaming and consulting needs. 

If you were not already aware, marketing is a continuous activity successful businesses do really well. Nothing you didn’t already know, right? But did you know that great marketing organizations are able to show you how well your messages are resonating with your audience?

That’s right, today’s great marketing resources enable you to monitor the following after your videos are released. It’s not enough to just see if people are playing your videos, you need to learn:

1. Are people watching and re-watching your videos and where are they being played from?

It is important to not only know if people are viewing your videos, but if are they re-watching them. This could be an indication the message is important enough to watch twice!

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2. How are the videos being played and who is watching them?

As you look at which video is getting the most play, you will want to know which messages in each video is being focused on. For example, in this video the red indicates a part of the video that has been replayed over and over again. This is a strong indication that the message being viewed is resonating or confusing to viewers. In either case, this is an opportunity to put more focus on this particular message in your next video.

platform-metrics2

3. Where do people stop watching your videos?

Knowing where viewers stop watching or skip ahead to is just as important as knowing where they are being rewound to be watched again. This may indicate a video message that was too long or boring.

platform-metrics3

At the end of the day, your marketing (video or otherwise) should be teaching you about which message is playing well with viewers and readers.

Stay tuned for more details as we learn whether or not this email was valuable for you. Learn more about how Varvid Subscriptions can help your video content marketing efforts.

TAG_webcast-_2013-Slide-700

Webcasting — it’s one of the first services Varvid initially offered and it continues to be a cornerstone to our overall success.  While most of our projects have us traveling to wonderful locations across the globe, we are pleased to be planning, preparing and testing for one right here our own backyard.  On Friday, January 18th, we’ll produce and live stream Technology Alliance Group Northwest’s (TAGNW)  Annual Predictions Luncheon from Syre Hall on the campus of Whatcom Community College.  Living in Bellingham is wonderful and working in Bellingham is even better!  We are honored to be part of what we expect to be a long running tradition.

[pullquote_right] Living in Bellingham is wonderful and working in Bellingham is even better![/pullquote_right]

The event and webcast gets underway around 11:45am with some formal introductions and organizational announcements.  Once the formalities are out of the way, the program moves right into tech-savvy prognosticator Mark Anderson’s predictions and some Q&A until about 1:30 or so.  After a little research, his ability to forecast the IT future is pretty darn good…  he’s been right more than 90% of the time over the last 10 years!

There are a couple things that make this webcast really cool:

  1. You can participate via our live chat feature. So if you have questions, we’ll ask them on your behalf.
  2. This is a great way to save on travel costs and time away from the office.
  3. If you are not in Bellingham but would like to attend, no problem.
  4. We’ll be broadcasting in H.264. So, it’ll work on your mobile device.

If you’d like to be part of the audience, either live or virtually, contact the good folks at TAGNW and they’ll set you up.  We’ll see you there or “there.”

Mark Anderson

Mark Anderson

In a recent interview with NPR affiliate KPLU, tech guru Mark Anderson  of Strategic News Services (SNS) shared his top 10 tech predictions of 2013.  Published in his newsletter, these forecasts are aimed at providing cutting edge news for the computing and telecommunications industry – hey, that’s us!

Our Take On It. . .

First of all, Mark knows his stuff. . .  over a 10-year period his accuracy rating is over 90%.  Of his predictions for this year, one in particular will affect the way video and other digital media content is viewed on the web.  His number one prediction, “Surface and slates and iPads and Kindle Fire and Nexus 10 and everything else that’s got a 7-inch screen plus or minus an inch or so, will be the biggest category of computing device.”  That’s scary if your company isn’t doing anything to stay relevant in this growing digital atmosphere.

photo2It is important, for anyone publishing content on the web, to know these devices are integrated inside and out with Google and Bing search capabilities.  Why is this important?  Decision makers across the board are searching for advice and insight online.  As it turns out, more and more of this is taking place on tablets and mobile devices, increasing the importance of staying relevant and attractive on the web.  One powerful and effective way in doing so is through video.  In 2012, mobile video ads alone made up 33% of the average marketing budget – with 56% of consumer web traffic in 2012 being video, we can certainly see why!*

[pullquote_right]In the online landscape of uber-short attention spans, delivery is king![/pullquote_right]Most of us experience streaming video content on a daily basis – we get the concept and we see the value. The million dollar question we should be asking is not why video, but how?  Simply put, it’s not just about creating video content.  In the online landscape of uber-short attention spans, delivery is king!  Flash has been replaced by HTML5, standard 4:3 aspect ratio is now glorious 16:9 widescreen!  So we’ll ask again… how are YOU delivering your message?  Is your video and digital media optimized for today’s mobile audience?  It should be.

[fancy_box]If you’d like to know and hear more on this topic, join us Friday, January 18, 2013 in the Syre Auditorium at Whatcom Community College.  Varvid is honored to be a sponsor for the 2013 Predictions Luncheon featuring Mark Anderson.Visit the TAG website for more info: 

http://www.tagnw.org/events?eventId=568722&EventViewMode=EventDetails[/fancy_box]

 

*source  –  Social Times: http://socialtimes.com/infographic-2012-online-video_b112645