News & Opinion

As the M&E industry advances rapidly, exhibitors gearing up for the innovative world of NAB 2024 are poised at the edge of unparalleled opportunity. With the right approach, this event can be much more than a showcase—it can be a pivotal moment in your brand's journey. But how do you cut through the noise and ensure your message resonates? Having guided 50+ companies through the NAB maze, here are five strategic PR moves designed not just to make an impact at the show, but to echo long after. Craft a Compelling Narrative Your technology isn't just a product; it's a story waiting to be told. Before you step onto the show floor, define what makes your solution unique and why it matters. This narrative should weave through all your communications, from press releases to social media posts, creating a cohesive and memorable brand identity. Do you have someone on your team that can distill complex tech jargon into engaging stories that capture media attention and resonate with your target audience? Leverage Media Relationships The media landscape at NAB is as vast as it is varied. Securing coverage in this crowded space requires more than just sending out press releases. It's about nurturing relationships with journalists and influencers who specialize in your niche. How are you identifying and engaging with targeted media to amplify your message? You want to be sure that your news not only lands but makes a splash. Engage with Influencers and Thought Leaders In today's digital world, influencers and thought leaders can be your most powerful allies. Collaborating with these individuals for panel discussions, interviews, and live demos can significantly extend your reach and credibility. Are you making the most of your strategic partnerships? NAB is the perfect opportunity for your executives to share the stage with industry luminaries and put your company’s innovations in the spotlight. Optimize Digital Presence NAB is not just a physical event; it's a digital phenomenon. An optimized online presence ensures that your brand captures attention both on and off the show floor. From live-tweeting key announcements to hosting virtual tours of your booth, consider crafting a digital engagement strategy that keeps your client’s and prospects connected and interacting, no matter where they are in the world. Post-Show Momentum The end of NAB doesn't mean your PR efforts should wind down. In fact, it's just the beginning. Post-show follow-ups, content marketing and leveraging the buzz created during the event can keep the momentum going strong. What’s your plan for converting post-show enthusiasm into long-term engagement, helping you nurture leads and build lasting relationships with your audience?   The BG&A Difference At Bob Gold & Associates, we understand that NAB 2024 is more than a trade show—it's the perfect chance to elevate your brand in the tech world. Our tailored PR strategies are designed to make every moment count, ensuring you not only shine at the show but continue to glow long afterward.   For tech exhibitors looking to turn opportunities into outcomes, BG&A is your partner in creating buzz, building relationships and driving success. Let’s connect and craft a PR strategy that puts your innovations on the map.

The NAB Show 2023 marked another significant milestone for innovation and excellence in broadcast and media technology. Among the many participants, two companies, represented by Bob Gold & Associates (BG&A), emerged as notable award winners, highlighting their contributions to the industry's advancement.   Yuvod stood out, securing the TV Tech NAB Best of Show award, a recognition that shines a spotlight on products with the potential to redefine the industry. This award emphasizes innovation, design, and utility. Yuvod’s Platform-as-a-Service Streaming Solution was recognized as a pivotal new technology in media and entertainment technology, offering a unique, turnkey OTT solution that empowers any streamer, broadcaster or communication service provider (CSP) to rapidly deploy, scale and customize their content.   Varnish Software, another BG&A client, achieved remarkable success by winning not one, but two significant awards. Alongside the TV Tech NAB Best of Show award, Varnish Software was also honored with the IABM BaM award. This latter accolade is reserved for products that demonstrate real impact on the industry, offering solutions that address current challenges while paving the way for future advancements. Varnish Software's work with its partners Intel and Supermicro set a new industry record for content delivery performance. The massive breakthrough unlocks entirely new possibilities for video service providers and the live event industry to deliver flawless live streamed events to massive audiences worldwide, in a more economical and sustainable way.   These achievements at NAB 2023 not only underscore the innovative spirit and technological leadership of Yuvod and Varnish Software but also subtly reflect the strategic guidance and industry expertise provided by Bob Gold & Associates. Through targeted PR efforts and a deep understanding of the broadcast and media technology landscape, BG&A has proven adept at positioning its clients for recognition at the highest levels.   The awards won at NAB 2023 serve as a testament to the collaborative efforts between BG&A and its clients, showcasing a joint commitment to excellence and innovation. As the industry continues to evolve, these recognitions will become even more vital to highlight highly impactful innovations and truly stand out.

Alliance Powers New One-Stop Solution to Get Content onto Netflix, Amazon, iTunes, YouTube and Other Platforms Easily, Meeting All Regional Requirements ODMedia Signs up for Ooyala Flex Media Platform to Streamline Operations Ooyala has collaborated with the ODMedia Group on a new strategic partnership, integrating ODMedia’s video localization and delivery capabilities with Ooyala’s video production, management, distribution and monetization services. The strategic partnership is a major step in helping content owners reach global audiences and markets realizing new revenues more quickly. The combination of Ooyala’s Flex Media Platform and ODMedia Group’s established position as preferred delivery partner with most global platforms, including the likes of Netflix, Google Play, iTunes and YouTube, will enable broadcasters and content owners to deliver content to any platform, any time, in any format, cost effectively. In addition, the partnership will address scale and complexity in producing different local versions of content by streamlining the processes for content companies seeking to deliver local experiences across traditional and new media platforms. “Increasingly, content owners and distributors are targeting global audiences, but there are significant costs involved in ensuring the right format requirements are met,” said Jonathan Huberman, CEO, Ooyala. “Through this new partnership, we’re able to provide a best-of-breed solution for delivering content to today’s top platforms, everywhere in the world. This means getting content to market faster, and at a lower cost – unlocking opportunities for content owners in every region.” ODMedia also has deployed the Ooyala Flex Media Platform to streamline time and resource consuming workflow processes. The Ooyala Flex Media Platform, the world’s fastest growing media asset management and workflow automation solution being used by the world’s most innovative content owners to simplify millions of video workflows, will help ODMedia automate and better manage internal media workflow tasks that are multiplying along with ODMedia’s rapid growth. Netherlands-based ODMedia Group is a leading video-on-demand (VOD) company, offering content management, encoding and extensive distribution services to enable VOD, linear TV and catch-up TV offerings. ODMedia processes hundreds of hours of content every day and distributes content to over 120 countries and 1000 platforms, including most IPTV/ cable operators, VOD platforms and OTT providers such as XBOX, Netflix, iTunes, Google Play and Amazon. “Delivering video to a global audience is often easier said than done. It can add a lot of manual processes, time and costs to a project,” said Sjef Pijnenburg, ODMedia Group. “Partnering with Ooyala – and leveraging their expertise – has significantly added to our capabilities, allowing us to better serve the demands of media companies seeking to grow and improve their operations.” Ooyala, a leading provider of software and services that simplify the complexity of producing, streaming and monetizing video, developed the Ooyala Flex Media Platform to connect the entire video content supply chain for broadcasters and content owners, from production to profit. The platform provides central workflows, shared metadata infrastructure and open APIs to integrate with existing systems and to provide a single source of truth for media companies.

Networks need to focus on the consumer experience and not use B2B language says Bob Gold, CEO of Bob Gold & Associates. This is one of the pearls of wisdom from Gold's recent survey of industry professionals about streaming media services like Netflix, Hulu and start-up video brands.   [embed]https://youtu.be/7vpAE8UHwaw[/embed]   Gold points out that, with so many choices, a strong brand becomes more important than ever to gaining consumer eyeballs. To that point, in an OTT world with a seemingly infinite number of video choices, a strong brand will be more important than ever. This should be to the local operators’ advantage, as they have a recognizable brand in the communities they serve and can provide value by making these services easily accessible with payments integrated into a common billing mechanism.   He likens today’s environment to the early days of cable when people who had “free” broadcast television, asked why they needed cable and its additional channels.   His survey indicates that people are frustrated with the bundle and the seeming chokehold of the traditional set-top box and associated DVR fees. Integrating streaming services into more traditional offerings, as many providers are just beginning to do, could reduce churn and cord cutting and satisfy consumers.   As in the early days of cable when operators would provide free premium service weekend previews, this HBO veteran says that free service trials are critical to showing prospective customers the value proposition of any given service. It goes beyond a free offering, however, as the ease of signing up for and, as importantly, cancelling a service is important. Gold stresses the importance of having a trusted brand in this process.   In the interview, Gold indicates that online and streaming video is at an inflection point, and now is the time to really put the consumer first because they are no longer limited to the traditional linear video bundle.   Join the conversation on Twitter here: https://twitter.com/viodi?lang=en    

M&E Daily- HITS Spring Kicks Off with a Message for Hollywood: Embrace Risk By Chris Tribbey M&E Daily May 17, 2018 UNIVERSAL CITY, Calif. — To kick off the annual HITS Spring: The Hollywood Innovation & Technology Summit, a collection of technology experts and studio reps looked at the state of productions embracing — or shunning — new, advanced technologies. And the panelists all agreed: the deployment of digital technologies for productions has been slow, despite the obvious benefits. “Risk is the 900-pound gorilla in our industry,” said Yves Bergquist, director of the Project on AI and Neuroscience in Media, at the Entertainment Technology Center at USC (ETC@USC). He shared how ETC@USC is working on using AI to build a map of the “emotional journeys” of thousands of characters in TV shows and films, and then cross-referencing that data with social media reactions from viewers. The endeavor — and others like it — has the potential of opening up an amazing avenue of new storytelling, Bergquist said. “The spectrum of possible stories is very, very narrow,” he said. “We’re sitting on the cusp of creativity in Hollywood.” Still, Bob Gold, founder and CEO of Bob Gold & Associates, said he sees the embracement of new technologies in the century-old business of making movies as a slow drip, with those dictating how things are done from the top continuously cautious. “[It’s] risk averse people taking more risk by way of technology,” he noted. But the benefits are showing: Computer-aided script writing. More direct digital marketing to consumers. Cloud and workflow technologies that allow for instant, worldwide collaboration on productions. All are recent — and game-changing — introductions into how productions are done. In a way, the key to embracing any new technology into productions revolves around one question, according to Patrick Baca, CTO of Entertainment Partners: “Not only does it work, [does] it provides value to the people using it?” “You have to be comfortable with change,” he added. “It’s here and it’s not going away. If you’re not comfortable with it, you risk being stagnant.” And on a larger scale, Bergquist sees things turning a corner when it comes to traditionalists in the entertainment industry changing their minds: “The studios are tired of saying no all the time.” HITS Spring was produced by the Media & Entertainment Services Alliance (MESA) and the Hollywood IT Society (HITS), in association with Women in Technology: Hollywood (WiTH); the Content Delivery & Security Association (CDSA) and the Smart Content Council. The event is being presented by Entertainment Partners, with sponsorship by Expert System, LiveTiles, Microsoft Azure, Ooyala, Veritone, Amazon Web Services, Avanade, Avid, IBM Security, MarkLogic, Aspera, Light Point Security, MicroStrategy, SAS, Scaeva Technologies, Western Digital, Brainstorm, Zaszou IT Consulting and Bob Gold & Associates. See the original posting here: http://www.mesalliance.org/2018/05/17/hits-spring-kicks-off-with-a-message-for-hollywood-embrace-risk/