We asked streaming/webcasting vendors in the radio broadcasting biz to explain their latest offerings and revenue models. We want stations to know if they’re getting the best deal currently with their provider and if they’re not streaming, which service would be best for them. We also asked a about their other offerings.
The respondents:
Jason Vosburgh, Marketing Director, Abacast
Karen Fitzgerald, Marketing Supervisor, Triton Digital
David Palmer, VP Sales and Marketing, MainstreamNetwork
Brittany Bullock, Manager, Customer Relations, VOPED
What can you provide radio stations that want to stream and monetize their overall online presence?
Vosburgh: The Abacast Clarity™ Digital Radio System is a complete, cloud-based digital radio solution that enables profitable online radio streaming for both terrestrial broadcasters and Internet webcasters. Clarity™, currently in-use by hundreds of customers and over 1,000 stations, comes with the following components, which can be used as a whole or purchased separately:
-Ad Insertion and Management
-Audience Metrics
-Premier Player and Mobile Apps
-High-Capacity Streaming
-Royalty Reporting
-24×7 Technical Product Support and Audience Support
-Product Training for ad trafficking, sales, programming and management
-Digital Sales Training including brandable sales and marketing collateral, ad product development and pricing development.
-All Abacast customers get Technical Product Support, Product Training, and Digital Sales Training at no extra charge.
The key benefits of the Clarity™ Digital Radio System are:
Increased streaming revenue and profitability by receiving revenue from multiple ad types (in-stream audio with companion banners, pre-roll video, player sponsorships, and display banners for the player and station website) and getting more inventory value and CPMs through targeting and local ad sales.
Even more revenue through outsourced ad sales of unsold inventory via Abacast Ad Sales Partners. Broadcasters receive a significant share of the gross revenue, have multiple partners effectively competing for their inventory, and retain control by being able to opt out of any specific ad campaign.
Larger online audiences by reaching new listeners on new devices including iPhone, iPads, Android and desktops, and keeping them engaged with broadcaster brands through social media integration and listener interactivity.
Quick deployment with our modern, cloud-based service that lowers integration and support risk found in multi-vendor solutions. Clarity™ works with all major automation systems; station groups can be set up in as little as one day
Decreased risk when expanding online through reduced pricing, no overage charges, higher CPMs for inventory, digital sales training and brandable collateral, and a built-in conversion process to minimize resources when migrating from other vendor products.
Higher local ad sales with the Abacast Digital Sales Program. Outlined in our detailed case studies, this program is being used by radio broadcasters today to generate annual streaming profits in a short amount of time. This program is a free training and consulting program, and broadcasters keep all the revenue generated.
In short, Abacast has the engineering expertise for the largest radio station groups, a focus on broadcaster profitability that is unmatched in the industry, and pricing, training, and support to help lower broadcaster risk and provide more value.
Fitzgerald: The Triton Digital platform provides everything publishers need to build their offline brand online. Our infrastructure, applications and innovation are powering online audience and revenue growth for clients around the globe.
Palmer: Mainstream provides not only revenue generating ad space on the customer player that we design for our clients, but we also provide gateway ad insertion technology.
Bullock: VOPED offers an online video platform packed with features including Video On-Demand and Live Streaming, Pay Per View, ad platform, advanced analytics, a player design studio, hosted websites and more.
Tell us about your media player.
Vosburgh: Abacast provides both desktop and mobile players which are completely integrated into our ad management system and configuration tools, and that are designed to grow and engage listener audiences. Our players are compatible with all popular platforms and browsers including Windows, Mac, Apple iOS and Android devices.
The players feature social networking integration that enables listeners to easily share and promote the station brand via Twitter, Facebook, resulting in audience growth. The players create stickiness and longer listening times via popular features such as song ratings, previous playlist, top songs, request a song, contest entries, additional stations, podcasts, and listener club signups. The player is easy to setup and use via a back-end management console for complete control of the listener-facing features and customized station branding. Broadcasters have complete control to turn on or off any of these features and easily re-skin the player.
Fitzgerald: Our media players give the greatest functionality for content display, advertising distribution and display, and other helpful interactive services. You can incorporate your brand into your media players with custom-designed player layouts.
Palmer: MainstreamNetwork.com provides you with a customizable player box that is loaded with features to help you promote your station and branding, build your customer base, and provide a means of revenue for your stream.
Logo Display Area
Your station log is displayed in this area and it links listeners back to your web site. The logo size is 200×100 pixels.
Featured Links Area
Display up to 6 ‘Featured Links’. Use these links to link back to pages on your site such as Home, Morning Show, Contests, Our Staff, News, ect. Just send us your Text for the ‘Featured Links’ and the URL/web address that they link to.
Share Link
This feature will let your listener tell their friends about your station, providing growth to your listenership.
Listening Help Link
This will link your listener back to our listener support page in order to provide them with the most up to date and ever changing information.
Embedded Media Bar
The media bar displays the current status of your stream, provides player controls and audio volume controls.
Ad Space Windows
Two Ad Space Windows are available within the player box. You can display Banner Ads, images or Web content. Many stations use these areas to promote their own site or create revenue by selling and displaying your advertisers banners. The size of the Ad Space Window located on the right side of the player box is ‘300×250’ pixels (Medium Rectangle Banner). The Ad Space Window located on the bottom is ‘728×90’ pixels (Leader Banner). The content for these Ad Spaces can be located on our servers, your website, or from your Banner Ad Management provider. Just provide us the content or URL location of the content and we will link it to the player box.
Gateway Advertising
Gateway advertisement’s run when a listener first opens your player. As soon as the gateway is finished, the player automatically redirects to the live stream. The format type of the gateway ad can be a Windows Media Audio (.wma) file or a .MP3 file. Just send us the audio ad and we will upload it to the server and link it to your streaming player box.
Bullock: The VOPED system allows for the upload of all major video formats, and the VOPED players stream on-demand video, live streams, MP3s, image slideshows, and has numerous optional features like commenting, rating, sharing, link embed, full screen, auto play and more.
Tell us about your advertising platform. What ad types can you provide and how targeted are they?
Vosburgh: The flagship Abacast Clarity™ Ad Insertion System (AIS) automatically replaces live terrestrial audio ads with online audio ads and provides campaign management, targeting, and advertiser affidavits. Clarity™ AIS supports multiple ad units including in-stream audio with companion banners, pre-roll video, and rotating display banners that can be placed on the station player or website. All of these can be setup, managed, and reported on via Clarity™.
Clarity™ provides geo-targeting capabilities that increase inventory value. Advertising is targeted by listener DMA, the standard Arbitron metric to work with stations using the same advertising language they understand.
Clarity™ (AIS) integrates sales and trafficking with Abacast trusted third-party Ad Sales Partners for broadcasters that want to outsource all or par) of their in-stream audio or pre-roll video ad sales. Most advertisers are nationally recognized names and targeted by station DMA. The broadcaster can opt out of any specific ad campaign at any time while continuing to sell prime inventory locally to their best customers.
Fitzgerald: Our Advertising Platform provides the only campaign management and ad insertion technology designed and built specifically for the radio industry, helping to monetize streaming broadcasts by delivering highly contextual and appropriate ads to your audience.
Palmer: Mainstream was the first to successfully deploy an ad replacement technology and to enable our clients with the ability to monetize their internet broadcasts. With our proprietary software that was developed by our own developers, you are not limited to replacing only fixed length ads. Our solution is able to replace any advertisement that is between 5 and 72 seconds.
Bullock: The VOPED online video platform has a built in ad management system and can also deliver 3rd party ads for qualifying publishers. Graphic and flash banners, pre, and mid roll ads can be delivered.
In Parts II and III we ask:
-What mobile offerings/apps do you have?
-What social media options are there with your platform and service?
-What is the revenue model—how do stations pay and how do you make money?
-What reporting and analytics do you offer?
-How do you help stations in making it easier to produce and place web and streaming audio ads?
-How is your service better than your competitors?
-Can you tell us what clients you have/how many?
