Innovative Spanish Virtual Cinema now on Magine Pro
Barcelona based and leading Spanish movie distributor A Contracorriente Films has signed with Magine Pro to put their TVOD service www.salavirtualdecine.com (SVdC) on the Magine Pro platform.
The concept of Virtual Cinemas has expanded in different countries during the 2020 lockdown. However, SVdC is taking this further. Being a joint effort together with movie theatres, SVdC is inviting all cinemas and distributors in Spain to participate. The main goal of SVdC is to collaborate with cinemas to complement their traditional businesses by offering the latest films online just after their release or sometimes even simultaneously with their presence in theatres.
These new solutions for parallel releases in cinemas and to audiences online is expected to remain even after the current pandemic has finally been dealt with. The service concept includes a unique revenue share with cinemas. In this sense, for SVdC it is a solidarity service with cinemas. It enables users to select their cinema during the registration process. This will generate incomes to the selected cinema indefinitely and is also able to limit the number of views on select films to emulate a film premiere or to give exclusive access to journalists and collectives (schools, academics, etc.)
“We are delighted to play a part in this innovative concept that we believe will play a significant role in creating new ways of viewing quality film in Spain”, says Matthew Wilkinson, CEO Magine. “It has been a pleasure to increase the capabilities of SVdC with the wonderful team of Magine Pro. They have understood what our needs are from the very first moment” says Eduardo Escudero, Business Manager of A Contracorriente Films who adds; “SVdC is an opportunity for cinemas to reach their audiences wherever they are, so fans of movies across all of Spain, when unable to have the best experience of the biggest screen, can still view the newest releases and their favourite films at their homes, thanks to SVdC. “With Magine Pro as a partner SVdC has expanded to a fully-fledged service with applications on multiple platforms including web, IOS, Android, LG, Samsung TV, and Amazon Fire.
About Magine Pro (www.maginepro.com/about)
Magine Pro is the platform for b2b managed services for OTT, which enables global content owners, broadcasters and telcos to build thriving OTT businesses with live TV and Video-On-Demand platforms. Magine Pro’s customers are located in Europe and the United States, as well as in emerging markets.
For more information please contact
Håkan Tranvik, Corporate communications, Magine, +46709383293 hakan.tranvik@magine.com
Matthew Wilkinson, CEO Magine matthew.wilkinson@magine.com
paus Collaborates with Magine Pro
paus, the streaming app for independent films, is collaborating with Magine Pro to expand paus in a secure and scalable way leveraging Magine Pro’s OTT platform. Working with Magine Pro will support the growth of paus, bringing a greater library of quality independent film to many more Android or iOS devices.
“Since we introduced the paus app earlier this year, the response has been both encouraging and exciting and our community is growing quickly, especially with the recent launch of our crowdfund campaign. As a result, we’re looking to accelerate our growth plans and bring paus to more users, as quickly as we can,” says Rishi Kapoor, CEO and founder of paus.
“Partnering with Magine Pro means we can focus on curating more incredible content and supporting filmmakers, in the knowledge that we have a proven OTT tech partner to help ramp up our platform. We look forward to working with the Magine Pro team to bring paus to a greater audience of people that share our passion for independent film.”The paus community will be able to watch more than 250 short films from comedy to documentaries to horror and SciFi on the mobile device and platform of their choice. Platform developments will maintain the familiar tipping feature on paus, which enables audiences to financially reward and support filmmakers.
“It’s great for Magine Pro to be working with paus to bring its streaming service to more film lovers across more devices,” explains Matthew Wilkinson, CEO of Magine. “The demand for streaming services has increased as a result of the pandemic and paus is a prime example of the innovative new services that are now available.”The upgraded paus streaming platform will launch within the next six months.
About Magine Pro (www.maginepro.com)
Magine Pro is the platform for b2b managed services for OTT, which enables global content owners, broadcasters and telcos to build thriving OTT businesses with live TV and Video-On-Demand platforms. Magine Pro’s customers are located in Europe and the United States, as well as in emerging markets.
About paus
paus (www.paus.tv) is a streaming platform where independent films can thrive. It’s ad-free and subscription-free. Once films are live on the paus app, audiences and supporters from around the world can show their appreciation and reward filmmakers by leaving a tip – any amount they want from 30p to £1000+, at any time. Best of all, the filmmaker keeps 80% of every tip. Follow paus on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.
For more information please contact
Håkan Tranvik, Corporate communications, Magine +46709383293 hakan.tranvik@magine.com
Matthew Wilkinson, CEO Magine matthew.wilkinson@magine.com
Cinewax partners with Magine Pro for African films service
Cinewax partners with Magine Pro for global African films service OAFF Cinewax has entered an agreement with the OTT platform Magine Pro for their Online African Film Festival OAFF .
Since 2015, Cinewax has been promoting African films through original programming, premieres, and festivals. With original media and event formats, they have promoted African cultures accessible through cinema. After a number of earlier online one-month festival events and a successful crowdfunding on Kickstarter to establish and launch an ongoing online service, Cinewax selected Magine Pro to expand the OAFF service further on a platform built for global scaling.
By entering a long-term partnership with Magine Pro, they are now ready to scale the service, addressing the large African diasporas in France and Europe, and also reach new audiences across the globe.
“We are proud to be the OTT partner for this great film service and to make African films easy accessible all over the world”, says Matthew Wilkinson, CEO of Magine The new service houses OAFF’s full VOD movie library and is available on web, iOS and Android platforms. It is built to be globally accessible, with the ability to be localized to suit international markets with multi-language, multi-currency and geoblock capabilities.
“Our agreement with Magine Pro means a big step forward for us in our aim to be the global focal point for African and diaspora films, and to maintain a high-level quality for our new streaming services” says Jean FALL, President of Cinewax.
About Cinewax and OAFF
Based in France, Cinewax is a cultural association that promotes African Cultures.OAFF (Online African Film Festival) is the new global online on-demand service for African and diaspora films launched by Cinewax. (https://oaff.cinewax.org, www.cinewax.org)
About Magine Pro (www.maginepro.com/about)
Magine Pro is the platform for b2b managed services for OTT, which enables global content owners, broadcasters and telcos to build thriving OTT businesses with live TV and Video-On-Demand platforms. Magine Pro’s customers are located in Europe and the United States, as well as in emerging markets.
For more information please contact
Hakan Tranvik, Corporate communications, Magine +46709383293 hakan.tranvik@magine.com
Matthew Wilkinson, CEO Magine matthew.wilkinson@magine.com
WEBINAR | OTT Video delivery: Industry experts share experience & best practices
In our latest webinar ‘OTT Video Delivery: Industry experts share experience & best practices’ we are joined by AWS and a number of Magine Pro partners to openly discuss the opportunities and challenges they face building and operating an OTT business. The webinar is available for free now, here.
What you’ll learn:
- AWS perspective on the OTT market
Chris Ticknor from AWS joins us to kick off the expert panel discussion with a presentation on the OTT industry’s direct-to-consumer business drivers from AWS’s perspective. - Hear from the experts
We’re joined by our partners at, Sappa, Draken Film and FlixOlé and learn more about the origin of their OTT services, the realities of operating an OTT business and their objectives. - Direct-to-consumer business drivers
Hear from the panellists on what it takes to delight and engage audiences, increase life-time value per user, drive engagement, reduce churn and accelerate outcomes. - Why partnerships can be imperative to sustainable growth
Panellists share their partnership experiences and discuss how they have the potential to positively impact OTT subscriber growth and market share. - Outsource vs In-house OTT development
Learn from the experts why outsourcing the build of an OTT service to a platform provider is preferable to developing one in-house and how doing so can enable subscriber growth and ensure a quicker return on investment.
Webinar speakers:
Watch OTT Video Delivery: Industry experts share experience & best practices
Run time: 33 minutes
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To find out more about Magine Pro’s partners, including FlixOlé, Sappa and Draken Film head to our experience page. You can find out more about our flexible OTT solutions and how we can help you build and launch a successful OTT business here.
Subscribe to the Magine Pro e-newsletter to stay up-to-date with our latest news, partners, products, and to find out which industry events we’ll be attending next and download our latest white paper, Thematic services: the future of OTT? here.
Renewed passion between Tosca Musk’s Passionflix and Magine Pro OTT
Tosca Musk’s OTT service Passionflix, the VOD bringing best-selling romance novels to life on screen, is renewing its long-term cooperation with platform partner Magine Pro by signing a new three-year contract. Passionflix has used Magine Pro’s platform since it first launched and is now prolonging the agreement for further expansion in the coming three years.
The story of Passionflix is about Tosca Musk taking her own route in Hollywood. The unique Passionflix concept is to produce and distribute romantic films as a fan service, attracting a female audience and readers of romance stories, and engaging the fans to be heavily involved in the filmmaking process, from casting to premieres. Passionflix was first launched at a romance novel conference in 2017, where fans signed up for crowdfunding. Later in 2017 after additional funding, Passionflix released their first own produced film, Hollywood Dirt, produced and directed by Tosca Musk herself. After three years the service has seen exceptional growth, with the support of the fan community.
Passionflix is, in fact, building its own “Romance Business Vertical” by taking control of everything from movie production to distribution of the service to the viewers in a cost-efficient and profitable way. This concept of profitable and cost-efficient thematic productions has parallels with the concept of Magine Pro. The OTT platform is serving thematic and Tier 2 linear and VOD services with cost-efficient end-to-end solutions, integrating the whole technical flow into one end-to-end solution.“Magine Pro has been our close partner since the early days,” says Tosca Musk, Founder and CEO of Passionflix. “I wanted an end-to-end solution that could scale in a reliable way for our future expansion. By placing Passionflix on the Magine Pro platform we could focus on content and marketing, leaving a large portion of the technical distribution in the hands of the Magine Pro team, and now, after three years, we are happy to prolong our relation further”. “We still share the same passion for Passionflix and are delighted that we now have gained the confidence to continue this partnership,” says Matthew Wilkinson, CEO of Magine.
About Magine Pro
Magine Pro is the platform for b2b managed services for OTT, which enables global content owners, broadcasters and telcos to build thriving OTT businesses with live TV and Video-On-Demand platforms. Magine Pro’s customers are located in Europe and the United States, as well as in emerging markets.
For more information
Håkan Tranvik, Corporate communications, Magine. +46709383293. hakan.tranvik@magine.com
Matthew Wilkinson, CEO Magine. matthew.wilkinson@magine.com
OTT Content strategy: the secret to streaming success
It’s no secret that content can make or break the success of an OTT service. Viewers have more choices than ever before, so you can’t expect subscribers to stick around if you don’t offer the content they want to watch (or enough of it). Putting an OTT content strategy in place is important for every video service that hopes to see positive subscriber growth.
What is a content strategy?
It’s essentially focusing on the planning, creation, and delivery of your content, whether it’s video content for your service or copy for your website and marketing channels. It boils down to asking yourself what content you should be producing or buying for your video streaming service and why?
The goal is to offer sustainable, high-quality content that engages your viewers. The content you provide should ultimately inspire them to act, whether that’s to subscribe/purchase or return regularly to watch more.
Content strategy starting points
Here are a few things to consider before you begin outlining your OTT content strategy:
- Define your end goal: How can an OTT content strategy improve your streaming service? Before you begin mapping out, figure out what you want to achieve. Do you want to see an increase in subscriber numbers, for example? Reduce churn? Or, have it help inform your decisions around content acquisition or production? Knowing your end goal will help you devise a strategy that can meet it.
- Audit your content: Before you begin making plans to produce or purchase more content, review what you already have. What are your viewers watching? How long are they watching for? Are they engaging with content through other channels such as social? Understanding what content is already working and why will help you decide what you need more of or what needs to change.
- Strategy & Planning: Your OTT content strategy should always align with your communications and marketing strategies. Planning for content production/purchases is important but your timeline for release should be carefully considered. For example, some content may be topical and worth waiting to release until relevant. Regardless, you should always align new content releases with your marketing plans to boost its chances of discovery online.
- Maintain & Track: Continually review your content strategy throughout the year and be ready to adapt and make changes. Most importantly, keep reviewing your library and track what content is working. Global services should also consider location – some content may show low viewing numbers overall but could be particularly popular in some parts of the world.
For more guidance, check out our Top 5 Content Strategy Tips. You can also find out more about Magine Pro video streaming services, and in particular how we can help you build your own successful OTT service, here.
Don’t forget to subscribe to the Magine Pro newsletter to stay up-to-date with our latest news, partners, products, and to find out which industry events we’ll be attending next. You can book in a meeting now on our events page; meet the team and demo our OTT services firsthand.
IBC2019: OTT has arrived!
September welcomes one of the busiest calendar events for us here at Magine Pro and the entire OTT industry, IBC. The annual event has long been considered the leading go-to exhibition and conference for media, entertainment, and technology and as such, attracts industry professionals from all over the world.
This year marked our fourth year exhibiting in Content Everywhere hall 14 and was arguably one of the busiest we’ve seen. Without doubt, there were more buyers present than years previous, with a noticeable increase in production houses, smaller ISP’s and Telco’s all looking to go OTT for the first time. Not too surprising. In our post-IBC 2018 blog, we reflected on how the OTT takeover was looming, and how telcos could move into the OTT market by either vertical integration or through partnerships. Check out our reflections on last year’s event here.
This year, the impact of OTT services dominated most discussions at IBC2019. There were panel sessions dedicated to monetization models, niche content, and how streaming is driving a golden era of content creation. It certainly raised some interesting questions around how new market entrants could compete against big brands with much bigger budgets. A popular opinion being that new entrants would need to offer services tailored to niche interests and content. On the Magine Pro stand, we demoed a few of our partners who offer just that. If you missed it, check our experience page to learn more about niche services such as PassionFlix Docsville and True Royalty.
User engagement has been a nascent trend in the OTT space this year. Likely driven by SVOD user fatigue and competition, we’ve seen more content owners looking for innovative ways to monetize and engage their users. Many now want to focus on customer loyalty, engagement, and differentiation in the user experience around content. This also explains why recommendation tools (although not new) were a popular talking point at IBC2019.
We also noticed more interest and focus on analytics and business tools, as operators look to move on from just having OTT, to now successfully monetizing. There was also an uplift in SVOD and live event offerings, alongside traditional AVOD, and subscription and advertising led linear.
But, more important things you might have missed from Magine Pro were our live product demo’s on the stand, including demos of the Magine Pro Console. If you didn’t get a chance to stop by, you can find out more about our products here or download our white paper. Get in touch if you would like to learn more or try a demo.
With OTT being a hot topic at IBC2019, it’s no surprise that hall 14 will be expanding at next year’s event as organisers increase capacity for more vendors by adding hall 5. It seems the OTT takeover is no longer looming, it has arrived!
We’re heading to the SportsPro OTT Summit next month. If you’re attending and would like to meet with a member of the Magine Pro team get in touch!
Top 5 OTT Content Strategy Tips
Planning to build your own OTT service now or in the new year? Check out our top 5 content strategy tips that can help you prepare for launch:
1. Get to know your target audience
Identifying your target audience may not be an obvious content strategy tip, but it’s important nonetheless. Before you should even begin to consider creating content or securing rights to some, get to know your audience. Understanding your key demographic’s interests and viewing habits will help you create a much stronger content strategy. It can inform decisions regarding the type of content you should invest in when and what time to release it and the best marketing channels to promote through.
2. Offer Unique content
Subscribers are signing up for more than just one OTT service these days as their appetite for high-quality and original content increases. In fact, Digital TV Europe’s 2018 annual survey revealed that 62.9% of respondents agreed original content that’s not available elsewhere is the most compelling reason to sign up for an OTT service in the first place.
To attract potential subscribers, offer content they won’t find as easily elsewhere. We’ve seen this work particularly well with our own partners, Passionflix which provides exclusive and original romantic content and True Royalty, an SVOD service dedicated to premium royalty-related content.
3. Be original
You don’t have to produce your own content for it to be original. Secure rights to original content with content owners instead. Try exploring markets that are often overlooked, such as local or regional content for expats and niche sports content that’s not being widely distributed. Don’t rule out purchasing the rights for older content that can be digitized either. Our partner FlixOlé is home to Spanish cinema and features new as well as classic movies that are particularly popular with their subscribers.
4. Promote your content
No matter how great your content offering, if it isn’t easy to discover, you won’t see the viewing figures you expect. To get a good return on your content investment, carefully consider how and where you promote it, both in and outside of your service.
Our partners are able to promote new and old content in their Magine Pro Pioneer and Premium services wherever and whenever they like. Our templated OTT solutions can be customized via the Console, enabling them to independently curate featured content on the start page and even content categories.
Promoting content outside of the service is equally as important. Create an engaging communication strategy that maximizes your marketing channels and don’t overlook SEO. Content metadata that is SEO optimized is a great way to boost awareness and traffic. Potential customers, for example, could find your service simply by searching online for a particular TV show or movie.
5. Keep things fresh
Even those that launch with a large library of content should refresh their service at regular intervals. Updating your service with new content not only encourages user engagement but also helps to reduce churn. Frequent changes give users a reason to return regularly. But that doesn’t necessarily mean you need to invest in new content. Promoting older content that has previously been overlooked is a great way to refresh the look and feel of your OTT service without incurring any additional costs. Magine Pro partners can do this independently using the Console, which gives them control over content positioning within their service.
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Want more advice and support on your OTT content strategy? Get in touch with the Magine Pro team and find out how we can help. You can also download our latest white paper – Turn your Content into Cash to learn more. Check out our branded OTT solutions and services here.
Converting Leads into Loyal Subscribers: Part Two
In part one we looked at optimizing the marketing conversion funnel and user journey to turn new leads into loyal subscribers. This week we dive deeper and take a closer look at the digital ecosystem and ideal channel mix for marketing a new OTT service.
The digital ecosystem gives an overview of the channels you should be utilizing pre, during and post launch. The channels outlined work together to build brand awareness, user interest, drive action and improve retention rates.
The Digital Ecosystem
Your website homepage and the OTT service itself are central to your digital ecosystem as all channels feed into them. They are the area on your funnel and user flow where potential customers take action – whether that’s submitting their email for future comms or subscribing to the service.
To break it down, there are two channel categories in your digital ecosystem that help drive leads and convert them into subscribers – the first being acquisition channels and the second, retention channels. Some channels, like social for example, can and do fall into both categories but play different roles depending on where the customer is in the user journey (as outlined in last week’s blog post).
Acquisition Channels
Your acquisition channels essentially help build customer awareness and interest. Acquisition channels for new OTT service entrants should include:
- PR
Work with an external agency or build your own PR strategy pre-launch. To get the word out, you’ll need to build relations with publications that your target audience is likely to relate to, solidify your key message and create an exciting press release for launch.
- Social (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram)
Identify which social channels are most commonly used by your target audience. You don’t need to be on all social networking sites. It’s better to have fewer pages on a handful of sites that are active and engaging than a lot of neglected pages everywhere.
- Paid SEM
Put a budget in place for online advertising and stick to it. Paid ads can help boost awareness and enable you to stand out in a crowded market. Research your competitors, identify your keywords and experiment with ad copy and A/B testing.
- Organic SEO
Search engine optimization is essential and will help drive organic traffic to your website and service. Identify your keywords and phrases and use them in the copy on your webpage and within the service. Content metadata that is SEO optimized is a great way to boost traffic – for example, potential customers could find you simply by searching online for a particular TV show or movie.
Retention Channels
Your retention channels keep customers interested and engaged before and most importantly after they have taken action and subscribed to your service.
Create an email comms strategy that includes, welcome emails, onboarding emails, and even weekly or monthly newsletters. It’s important to keep subscribers engaged, and emails are a great way to promote new content, offers and inform them on service updates or new features.
- Social
Your social channels are as important for retention as they are for acquisition. Build a trusted online community for your users where you can keep them up-to-date on new content releases and service features. Your customer service team can also play an active role here and use social channels to communicate directly with customers.
- Overlays and Push Messages
Overlays are a fantastic way to promote new content, offers, and discounts in your service, and even encourage visitors on your website to sign up to a newsletter. Push messages are useful if you want to send direct messages to users to remind them to open the app if you have new content available for example.
Check out last week’s post where we looked at the conversion funnel and ideal user journey here. You can also read more on reducing churn rates.
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Want more advice and support on converting your leads into loyal subscribers? Get in touch with the Magine Pro team and find out how we can help. You can also learn more about our branded OTT solutions and services here.
Converting Leads into Loyal Subscribers: Part One
Loyal subscribers don’t tend to form long virtual queues on the day a new OTT service is launched. A well-executed pre-launch marketing plan may drive a lot of traffic but there’s no guarantee those that show up will sign up and stick around.
Converting potential customers into paying subscribers requires pre-planning and a good marketing strategy. To be successful, you need to optimize your conversion funnel and user journey. Conversion funnels apply to all online sales-focused businesses and outline the journey a potential customer will take before they commit to purchase. In it’s simplest form, the conversion funnel has four main steps that we’ve outlined below.
Awareness
The first stage is all about building awareness around your brand and service. At this point, the funnel is broad because although a large volume of people may become aware of your service through marketing, they may not be interested in going further and finding out more.
In order to successfully build awareness that leads to subscribers, focus your digital marketing efforts on a defined target audience. Use social media to reach out and spread awareness, run targeted paid ads online and ensure you’re website and service is SEO optimized to improve organic reach.
Interest
At this stage, only those who are aware and interested will look for more information and effectively enter the funnel. This may be reflected in increased click-through rates on your paid ads or even a boost in organic SEO-lead traffic.
The trick here is to keep interested visitors engaged. You need to give them a better understanding of what your service includes and the value it provides. Offering promotions or discounts on your website in exchange for visitor emails is a great way to keep them moving through the funnel. Once you have their email address, you’ll be able to send more helpful info and reminders to them later.
Desire
The funnel will shrink further because not all those who showed interest will actually want the service after they learn more. This stage is predominantly influenced by the service itself and in particular what content is available and whether it appeals to them. It is here that you need to show potential customers why they need your service – what are you offering that others on the market aren’t? Or, what is it you do better?
Ramp up your marketing efforts here and retarget those who have visited your website or service but not committed to subscribe just yet.
Action
This is the smallest part of the funnel as only a small percentage of the original leads will want to take action and subscribe. It’s important at this stage that the process to do so is simple and straightforward to minimize bounce.
Even after customers have taken action you need to stay active to reduce churn. Automated onboarding emails are a great way to introduce customers to your service and remind them to come back regularly to watch new content. You can also use your social channels as a tool to keep them engaged and up-to-date on new features, content or promotions.
The funnel above gives a great overview but mapping out a detailed user flow will ensure your strategy is tight and easy to follow. It also gives you an opportunity to outline what channels you want to utilize, alongside customer comms that need to be in place pre, during and post launch. Here’s an overview of a typical user flow, which also includes the retention stage you’ll need to consider after action.
In part two we look more closely at the digital ecosystem and the ideal channel mix for marketing a new service. You can also check out our post on 5 ways to reduce your OTT subscription churn rate.
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Want more advice and support on converting leads into loyal subscribers? Get in touch with the Magine Pro team and find out how we can help. You can also learn more about our branded OTT solutions and services here.