Mumbai: Media Distillery, a provider of AI-powered video analysis solutions to optimize the user experience (UX) of video entertainment platforms, has released a new solution: Ad Break Distillery. The solution identifies the exact start and stop times of ad breaks in broadcast video, enabling video platform operators, service providers and broadcasters to enhance monetization opportunities for on-demand viewing while also improving user engagement.
With a gradual shift of viewership from linear viewing towards on-demand streaming services, and ever-intensifying competition for audience attention, providers of live TV and/or on-demand content need to differentiate and engender loyalty by personalizing experiences according to viewers’ preferences.
Ad Break Distillery gives video service providers novel ways to improve and monetize catch-up and replay, while providing a more consistent and innovative UX
The explosion of OTT and VOD has raised the bar for video services, with advertisers expecting to be able to target and create personalized ad experiences, as well as setting consumers’ UX expectations regarding the presence and duration of ad breaks.
Many broadcast channels have ad breaks that can last up to five to eight minutes. These long periods of advertising have several drawbacks, however.
Research undertaken in Switzerland by TV marketing specialist Admeira shows that the length of the ad break influences the recall of ads. Shorter ad breaks generate more attention, with recall decreasing almost linearly as ad break length increases. When the ad break is too long, viewers may even tune out completely.
Furthermore, these linear ad breaks often don’t translate well, and/or are less effective, in the context of catch-up and replay. One reason is because viewers have grown accustomed to the shorter ad break formats typical of today’s popular OTT services.
The main technical cause preventing a good UX for linear TV ads in replay lies in the general lack of time markers, a prominent issue in the video industry. This not only hinders service provider's and broadcaster's ability to generate additional revenue from advertisements, it also limits their ability to personalize and otherwise enhance the viewing experience.
Guided by these needs, Media Distillery has launched Ad Break Distillery. This solution automatically detects the beginning and end of ad breaks in live broadcast video and delivers time markers as actionable metadata.
With Ad Break Distillery, broadcasters and operators of video entertainment platforms can:
● Create new ad inventory: Replace existing linear ad breaks with dynamically inserted and personalized ads for catch-up and replay.
● Enforce trick-play restrictions: Apply restrictions during ad breaks but allow viewers to freely navigate through the content: no more complete limitation due to not knowing where the ad breaks are.
● Repurpose broadcast content for FAST and AVOD: Extremely useful for content archives where existing ads no longer hold value – for instance, ads for campaigns that have ended, promotions that have expired, ads for products that no longer exist, or ads on foreign channels, all cases where the ads offer no current value to the advertiser or the viewer.
● Bring the OTT experience to Replay: Elevate catch-up and replay viewing experiences to be in line with OTT UX with shorter and personalized ads.
● Ad skipping subscription model: Offer a premium subscription that allows ad-skipping.
Every use case depends on the agreements between content owners and distributors, which may vary in different markets, regions and/or per content type.
Ad Break Distillery builds on the same core technology as Media Distillery’s market product EPG Correction Distillery that detects a program’s true start and stop times, so that viewers have a VOD-like experience for catch-up and replay. EPG Correction Distillery catch-up and replay experiences for over 1,000 channels across the globe.
"In today’s competitive media landscape every video platform can benefit from granular metadata to enhance the user experience and the potential for monetization. However, our research shows that creating good metadata can be an expensive and lengthy process especially for super-aggregators attempting to create a more immersive and visual user experience,” said Caretta Research Director Ed Barton.
“We're seeing operators adopting Media Distillery's technology to ensure catch-up and replay time markers are correct, the right key frame images are extracted and time markers for ad breaks are accurate, creating ad replacement revenue potential for video distributors and improving the viewing experience for audiences,” Barton added.
Video service providers that carry many channels from different broadcasters and content owners face a particular challenge in delivering a consistent UX across all content when some broadcasters provide ad markers but others do not. Media Distillery invented Ad Break Distillery to enable providers to overcome this challenge, and give them the ability to provide a harmonious experience across all content.
“With the ad break markers we provide, video service providers are now enabled to do dynamic ad replacement, enforce trick play restrictions during ad breaks only, and deliver novel viewing experiences,” commented Media Distillery CEO Roland Sars.
