As I mentioned in my last post, we've had an extremely successful year client-wise and thought it would be nice to share some of the work we have done for various client campaigns.

JCPenney

When JCPenney exclusively launched MNG by Mango in the U.S., they were given product videos to help promote the new line. Rather than just play the videos as is, JCPenney employed our service to create a clickable shopping experience for their users. So far, we have run two very successful interactive video campaigns with JCPenney. Both campaigns featured a sleek player with a clickable product carousel, Overlayed with "invisible" clickable targets that link directly to the product page as well as updated fonts and colours for each.  You can check out the latest Fall/Winter campaign here.

MNG by Mango for JCPenney

Armani Exchange

Armani Exchange, or A|X as they are known, partnered with Overlay.TV to make their "How to Wear It" online section an interactive shopping experience. The videos feature stylists and celebrities discussing the latest trends with clickable hotspots on the clothes. They use a customized player, including a new product information panel, custom targets, and a complementary color scheme to match their site which is configurable for each new campaign. For their first interactive campaigns, we created the Overlays in-house, but as is the goal with our solution the team at A|X eventually decided to take on the creation process themselves, and with great success. After some personal training they were able to create their Holiday 2010 "How to Wear It" clickable video! Congrats to the A|X team for a job well done! 

Armani Exchange Custom Player

Boss Orange

For the Fall/Winter 2010 collection, Hugo Boss brand, Boss Orange, wanted to expand their online presence through video and social media. We created a shoppable video for them using a behind the scenes video that can be accessed through their main site as well as on the Hugo Boss Facebook page for their more 500,000 fans. We customized the player colors to match their brand, and like all our players, it can also be shared to the various social media sites, including Facebook and Twitter.

Boss Orange Player

For more detailed information on these and any of our clients, please check out http://www.overlay.tv/clients.html.

Happy Holidays from everyone at Overlay.TV!

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We have landed some pretty stellar clients this year, some by word-of mouth, others through good ol' fashioned pavement pounding and salesmanship. Part of our sales effort always includes sending the team out to the various trade shows throughout the year and demonstrating to the masses what we do best - interactive video. Trade shows are always a lot of fun, and one of the best ways to meet and greet potential new clients. And here, without further ado, are some highlights from the 2010 trade show circuit...

MarketLive Summit 2010 Conference - Sonoma California

This was our first time at the MarketLive Summit and what a terrific experience it was. What's great about this event is that MarketLive takes care of all the creative for your booth so the only thing you have worry about is getting there. It's a smaller affair with time to focus on each person, and because of this we were able to generate some extremely valuable leads. Plus our "taxi" ride to the airport didn't hurt either . Stepped out to hail a cab and this was waiting for us!

Taxi!

The 2010 Shop.org Online Merchandising Workshop - Huntington Beach, California 

The Shop.org annual merch event is great to attend for 2 reasons: 1. it's always in California; and, 2. it's always in California. Who doesn't love California?! Location aside, we enjoy this event because of its smaller size, which means we can spend more time with people and really gauge their needs and get to know their business. Our booth almost didn't make it to the event this year (U.S. customs you are on my list!) and I spent a few panicky hours going back and forth with a local Kinkos in hopes of procuring new signs, but at the 11th hour our booth finally arrived. *Phew* 

Tyler, Rob and Jim at the Shop.org Merchandising Workshop

Huntington Beach

The Shop.org Annual Summit 2010 - Dallas, Texas 

Rob, Jim, Siân, Nadav and Tyler at the Annual Summit 2010

The Shop.org Annual Summit is one of the biggest trade shows of the year and is probably the most stressful but also the most fun (no offence to the other trade shows). Thankfully our booth arrived in its entirety and we had a terrific spot right by one of the food courts, which meant a steady stream of traffic. We've come a long way since our first attendance at the Annual Summit in 2009 so it was great to come back and show off all that we have accomplished in the past year. I thought the 2009 event would be hard to top (Vegas, baby!) but the team from Shop.org certainly outdid themselves, the highlight being the networking event at the Dallas Cowboys Stadium right on the field.

Rob on the centre star at the Dallas Cowboys Stadium

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It's that time of year again, time for the Shop.org Annual Summit. Last year had us waking up in Vegas and this year it's going to be bigger and better in Dallas, Texas! We have been working hard since last year's Summit and have some amazing client projects to show off including Armani Exchange, Tory Burch (see below) and JCPenney to name but a few. Stop by our booth #223 for a product demonstration and the lowdown on how clickable video can change your video from a passive viewing experience into an interactive one.  At our booth you can also enter to win a Smart Car from friends at Demandware! See you in Texas!

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Just read an interesting article on AdAge today, which talks about a sharp decline in percentage of users who click on online display ads. Couple this with recent numbers of online ad spend decline and you’ve got yourself a pretty scary picture of the state of content monetization. But is it really?

Semi, or unrelated display ads, are not like other links on the page. They usually bring no utility or immediate value to users; more like “content high jacking” than “content monetization”. It’s no surprise then that people are fed up with this noise. We do still click on things  - to get to more relevant content - so click-through is not dead, just getting smarter.

I think it’s got something to do with the packaging. When we visit web pages we very easily separate between “content” and “noise”.  The former is what we came in for, while the latter is what we have to put up with because we are not willing to pay for the real content. We’re obviously less likely to click on the “noise” which drives its price down, making it even more difficult for good content providers to survive. It’s not the underlying content though, it’s the ineffective way of associating the message with a call-for-action.

One of the main reasons for this, I believe, is the lack of relevance due to weak contextual association. In order to have an effective “participation” from viewers, one has to bring closer the enabler (primary content) and the CFA or ad (secondary content). There are two dimensions to this. The first one is space: if it’s relevant to the content then couple it with the content, don’t just throw it into the same container (page) and expect the two messages to stick. The second is time: most content is fundamentally linear (text you read through, video you watch though, or audio you listen to) and comprises of lots of smaller pieces of information (a sentence, a frame in a video or segment of audio). It is those pieces, rather than the big piece, that could be monetized, just like hypertext links to relevant/contextual content are being followed.

The ultimate goal is to personalize this, to get the right message delivered to the right person at the right time in the right context. Lots of progress is being made towards these goals by my company (Overlay.TV) and others.

Click-through is not dead, it’s just getting smarter.

[Orginally posted at  http://kishkush.com/2009/10/01/is-click-through-really-dead/]

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Welcome to the new and improved Overlay.TV. Over the past couple of weeks our team has been diligently working away to give our site a new facelift. Our goal for the re-design, based in part on community feedback, was to make information more accessible for people with business and development interests, while still maintaining the UGC aspects of our site.

The hompage now has three options to choose from: Creators, Business and Developers with each of these sections providing more information specific to your needs, including features and benefits, demos, downloadable PDFs and contact info.  There is also a promo video explaining what we do and showcases how clickable video can enhance your audience's viewing pleasure.  As always we welcome your thoughts and feedback regarding our site changes and encourage you to leave them here or on our official Twitter page @OverlayTV.

Ahhhh ... now that's refreshing!

Special Thanks to The Anybody for graciously allowing Overlay.TV to use their music for our promo video.

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Backbone Magazine, a Canadian IT magazine that itself has had remarkable growth and staying power, establishing itself as a trusted source of IT information in the frosty nether regions has recently published its second annual Top 25 Up and Comers, a list that recognizes the leaders of tomorrow within the Canadian ICT industry. To make the list, companies had to be established no earlier than 2005 and were selected for their innovation, uniqueness and long-term potential.

The list is from Canadian ICT companies appearing on the 2009 Branham300 Edition and their combined force surpassed $70 billion in revenue for the first time in Branham300 history! Overcoming increasing economic pressures, these Canadian companies experienced a whopping 18 per cent growth - collectively generating $75.97 billion in revenue.

The envelope(s) please...(in alphabetical order, not ranked): (more...)

backbone · branham 300 · canada · ict · new technology · revenue · top 25 · up and comers

Today we are taking the wraps off what promises to be our most widely adopted technology to date - Overlay.TV for Interaction.  This breakthrough technology has been in the works for some time now and we are proud to be delivering it as a first-time extension for interactive overlays that transcend online video.  Already this morning we have seen thousands of examples of it in use.

The premise is very similar to the Overlay.TV technology we have been working with in the past with one major difference - it does not require an online video and targets.  Instead real objects are placed in the path or line-of-sight for a user and they are able to fully interact with the objects.

To illustrate the difference, take a look at the two examples below, courtesy of our new user, charlesandmarie.com and their creation, Fab5TV.  In the first model, we see the person enabling interaction with the object through the use of an Overlay.TV product widget that allows viewers to get more information on, or even purchase, the product in hand.

In the second example this powerful technology takes over, and we see the person actually interacting with an object themselves - a fully tactile experience that perfectly replicates how we interact with objects in real life.

We expect to see massive adoption for this in a short time, and are already working on cases such as:

• being able to actually drive the car you see in an advertisement or movie
• shopping in physical stores for objects you see online, or interacting with them after shipping from e-commerce
• meeting people in person and shaking their hand or hugging them

This also opens up new possibilities in word-of-mouth or viral marketing, wherein people will describe the experience they have with these objects to other people.
Overlay.TV for Interaction will continue development over the course of the year, and we will keep you informed as we uncover new and exciting use cases for everyday interaction with objects new and old.

(please bear in mind that this was originally posted on April 1st)

fab5 · interaction · objects · overlay · Overlay.TV · technology

As Shannon had posted last week, the gang here at Overlay.TV is headed off to SXSW in Austin, Texas today. Shannon also encouraged y'all (Texas style!) to drop by our Platinum Booth during Interactive for a visit, and that we'll have tons of freebies and give-aways and, on the final day, the best thing of all - FREE BEER! What Shannon forgot to mention was that if you do swing by our booth (located at station 317/416 by the way ) you'll also have the opportunity to get laid ... *ahem* I mean get Overlayed. What does this mean exactly? Well I think that y'all will just have to c'mon down to our booth and find out for yourselves We'll be posting more once were down Austin way, so stay tuned for updates. Soon you’ll be able to tell all your friends - I GOT OVERLAYED @ SXSW!
For now, please sit back and enjoy the Overlay below:

beer · I Got Overlayed @ SXSW · Interactive · overlays · SXSW

Just a quick note to say thank you to all our amazing, innovative users and customers for making 2008 a great year for everyone here at Overlay.TV.  We have had many successes this year including:

• Beta launch in February
• Building an amazing team
• GA launch in September
• Our weekly show with Amber Mac, The OverView
• First customers including Nettwerk Records, Transcontinental Media, Hollywood Records, KidzBop and more.
• Launch of several custom players
• First API users
• Second round financing in December

We have been working hard on the next generation products for Overlay.TV and we plan on making 2009 a banner year for interactive video.  We will be speaking and showing our stuff at several tradeshows including:

• ITVT - TV of Tomorrow
• Shop Online 2009
• SXSW - big presence here for both the music and interactive 
• AdTech

So be sure to catch up with us here or there and find out what's in store for interactive video in '09.  Happy New Year and best wishes in 2009! 

2008 · 2009 · customers · Interactive Video · new year · Overlay.TV

Contribution. Sharing. Interests. Passion. Talent

The new faces of social media are sharing their passion and talent in forums that make the seemingly impossible possible. How do you go beyond words to express your love of something? How do you connect your contributions to those from people in over 100 countries simultaneously? How do we obfuscate technology and deliver community experiences that create engagement levels never before seen and at the same time give people a reason to stay up late, practice their potential and ultimately share this with the world?

We do it by delivering an experience that resists the urge to describe itself, and instead offer a single point of entry and action (similar to the iPod 'wheel' or the Google Search button) that allows for a common and shared experience that is immediately accessible - in this case "Create Your Own".

I give you first exhibit A - the new faces of social media - and if you click on any one of them (below) you will see what they shared just minutes or hours ago at the Jonas Brothers Vocal Booth. Forget the technology for a minute and focus on what was going through the minds of these very passionate community members from all around the world as they sang along with their favorite boy band, crush in, and hearts out.

Consider a few things as you ponder this - this wall of faces represents a very small 1-2% of the actual tens of thousands of participants who engaged in the experience. Beyond the bravery to share their version of a song sung by their heroes with their heroes and thousands of fans who are tuning in to watch the versions (many visitors now watch as many as 20 or more of the videos) they also overcame network, technology, bandwidth and hardware issues that would daunt most of the leaders in this space that are more than twice the age of our contributors here. It is one thing to soapbox, but it is indeed quite another level of sharing to sing when you are up on it.

These days we too often focus on the why or the how and not the what of social media. And when we think about the who, it would be great to focus on who really benefits from all the work, theory, technology and effort that goes into building great experiences.

These are a few of the new faces of social media. As a parent we can be proud of our children safely sharing their talent and passion with the world at large, and in my very humbled opinion they are worthy of nothing less than a standing ovation of heartfelt applause for their considerable effort and passion.

(reposted from http://bitpakkit.com )

experiences · faces · Jonas Brothers · Overlay.TV · sing · social media · technology · Video · youth