-->
Save your seat for Streaming Media NYC this May. Register Now!

Edgecast: View from the Top 2021

Article Featured Image

"Content is king" is the often-repeated mantra in media & entertainment. There is much truth to this statement and great content definitely keeps consumers engaged—even when confronted with less than ideal user experiences. However, we are also in a golden age of content and the streaming landscape is filled with services that have compelling libraries. When so much great exclusive content is available in multiple places, service providers must also prioritize innovating the viewer experience to hold on to those eyeballs in a competitive and crowded marketplace.

Today's consumers are tech-savvy and accustomed to choice, control and personalization in nearly every aspect of modern life. Video publishers must respond to this expectation by using sophisticated platform features to deliver viewing experiences that reflect the interests and preferences of the viewer. Popular social platforms are especially good at this. In fact, it is a critical core element of maintaining engagement and delivering business success. Similarly, hyper-personalized viewing experiences, such as fully personalized streams or virtual linear playlists, will maximize a service's engagement rate and lead to higher subscriber retention. We are seeing engagement improvement with customers that utilize personalization capabilities of our platform to do exactly this.

The need for personalization also extends to advertising. Broadcasters can use the knowledge of individual viewers' habits to create highly targeted ads. Personalization in advertising is no longer restricted to how relevant an ad is to a viewer; it should also include the placement of an ad and its length. By taking this approach, service providers will deliver next-generation viewing experiences at scale that are much more engaging than anything we've seen before. 

Personalization has never been more critical, and in the coming years, it will play a pivotal role in the success or failure of a streaming service. Next-generation personalization tools and programming capabilities will underpin the success of a streaming service through its ability to drive the growth of video views and revenue. The service providers that commit to innovating the viewing experience will keep subscribers engaged and avoid the possibility of them switching to a rival's service.

edgecast.com

@edgecast

Edgecast logo

This article is Sponsored Content

Streaming Covers
Free
for qualified subscribers
Subscribe Now Current Issue Past Issues
Related Articles

The 2022 Streaming Media 50: The 50 Tech Companies That Matter Most in Online Video

Welcome to the 2022 Streaming Media 50, our annual list that foregrounds the industry's most innovative and influential technology suppliers, service providers, and platforms, as acclaimed by our editorial team. Some are large and established industry standard-bearers, while others are comparably small and relatively new arrivals that are just beginning to make a splash. All set themselves apart from the crowd with their innovative approach and their commitment to serve the customer and advance the industry. It's the fifth year we've capped the list at 50 companies.

AWS for Media & Entertainment: View from the Top 2021

Five solution areas are key for media and entertainment companies: content production, media supply chain & archive, broadcast, D2C & streaming, and data science and analytics

TAG Video Systems: View from the Top 2021

Elevating the consumer experience to the highest-level possible requires deep insight into quality, metrics and issues; data that was previously beyond the reach of operators. Thanks to TAG's Realtime Media Platform, however, that data is now accessible.

Dacast: View from the Top 2021

Dacast is expanding its highly scalable infrastructure to provide multi-CDN delivery to help deliver high-quality content to viewers worldwide, including in China.

Qwilt: View from the Top 2021

Qwilt is scaling fast, well on the way to reaching 200Tbps global capacity with its Open Edge Cloud, based on Open Caching, and customers like BT, Verizon, TIM Brazil, and Telecom Argentina are embracing the new content delivery model

SSIMWAVE: View from the Top 2021

Viewers have shown that they have huge appetites for content diversity. Success in delivery in the direct-to-consumer environment means being able to consistently meet viewer experience targets so that viewers keep tuning in and your business runs profitably.

Zixi: View from the Top 2021

Software-defined and virtualized workflows provide a degree of responsiveness that is impossible to replicate in any other manner. For that reason, we are seeing more and more large-scale media enterprises pivot towards increasingly end-to-end cloud-based workflows.

Amagi: View from the Top 2021

Free ad-supported streaming TV (FAST) is the cure for subscription fatigue, and Amagi is just what the doctor ordered

EZDRM: View from the Top 2021

Security is becoming multi-dimensional. The gold standard of DRM is now frequently used in conjunction with watermarking, geo-fencing, etc. to offer a fuller envelope of glass-to-glass protection, a trend that likely will accelerate as integration standards become normalized and costs are driven down by robust, cloud-based service options.

Mux: View from the Top 2021

This last year, video became a crucial component of every major business across the world, and even as things return to normal, development teams need to find easy, scalable, and rapidly deployable solutions.

Phenix: View from the Top 2021

The chatter around whether or not WebRTC can scale should now be less about "can" it scale, but rather can "your" company make it scale? At Phenix the answer is a resounding yes.

Tulix: View from the Top 2021

Live linear channels have grown in number, as has the video quality they are delivering. And advances in hardware and software have reduced the cost of launching channels significantly.

Verimatrix: View from the Top 2021

Due to the growth in scope, frequency, and severity of cyberthreats, today's media and entertainment industry needs more security, not less. This can present a difficult choice for some companies—compromise your creative vision, or lower your security standards? We believe you don't need to sacrifice innovation for security—you can have both.

View from the Top 2021: Innovating to Make a Difference

When the pandemic shut down schools, doctor's offices, retail, and concert and sports venues, video stepped in to keep teaching, patient care, business, and entertainment going. These solutions providers rose to the challenge, and in this year's View from the Top, they share their visions for the future.

The Streaming Media 50: The Most Important Companies in Online Video Tech

Our annual Streaming Media 50 rounds up the most important, most interesting, and most innovative solutions providers in online video. You'll find names both familiar and unfamiliar here, as newer entrants join market veterans. So who made the list? Read on ...