VideoRetailer.org - Exploring the Intersection of Video and e-Commerce.

A closer look at SpotMixer

SpotMixer is a video advertising service for small to medium sized businesses. This service is offered by One True Media, a well funded Silicon Valley startup backed by Kleiner Perkins ($19M total in funding since 2006). Even though SpotMixer isn’t exactly playing in the video commerce space, there a couple of ideas worth meditating.

At a simple level, SpotMixer is a nice little service which allows small business to create and run video ads in just a few minutes.

Creating a first video ad with SpotMixer is rather easy. First users select a template, a business vertical and type in some text they want featured on the video, similar to Google Adwords.

The tool is 100% online and requires no software install. Yet, users can upload their own photos, and record a voice-over sound clip to be attached to the final video. SpotMixer also provides a wide range of themes including music which make the video rather fun to build.

The final step of the process consists in selecting where the video ad should be inserted, and assigning a budget. There are a few interesting options like Facebook or Google, which SpotMixer recently signed as a distribution partner. There is also an option to just get the ad and the embed code, to be inserted in HTML pages, for $49/mo.

When considering these separately, the pieces that make up the SpotMixer solution aren’t impressive. After all, putting together a video animation from different templates with some basic customization isn’t exactly rocket science. But SpotMixer goes the extra mile and offers a comprehensive solution for the lower end of the market, which does not want to deal with the complications of HTML code embeds, video hosting or even video production to get a video message out to prospects.

The integration with Google Adwords is also quite interesting. Google has been offering geo-targeting capabilities for some time now. When combined to the SpotMixer ad creation capabilities, it should be possible for a local business to create a nice promotional video and promote it locally to a targeted base of clients. Video is powerful for connecting people, and humanizing businesses. The potential for video is enormous for local shopping, where over approximately 75% of all shopping dollars are spent.

Back to eCommerce and retail in general, SpotMixer is an invitation for smaller merchants to think about video as a way to seduce prospective clients. Every day that goes by a new service or technology is introduce that lowers the video commerce bar for everybody.

vzaar adds video to your eBay listings

vzaar is a UK-based video startup focused on allowing eBay sellers to add video to their product listings. The company is doing a great job with tools that make it easy for the non-technical person to tap into the power of video for selling products. It has also partnered with video production services worldwide to offer an affordable, well-rounded solution for small to medium-sized eBay businesses.

vzaar is quite simply a video solution for eBay sellers. The tool has a simple purpose - it lets merchants upload their video content, and get a snippet for HTML code that can be inserted into any eBay listing. Not that revolutionary, you might think - but in reality eBay doesn’t allow any outside videos to be played on page unless it comes from a “certified vendor”. The reason? Some old school people at eBay still distrust outside code, fearing the players could carry some viruses, bugs, etc. Non sense Mr eBay, but I guess that’s besides the point: vzaar works for eBay and that’s good.

Perhaps the most interesting feature of vzaar is its simplicity. A prominent play button, no overlays, no product image distraction. Video in its purest form, delivered in a player that’s clean and simple.

What does it look like on an eBay page? Anything you’d expect: the video embedded in the actual listing.

Then scrolling down you see the video:

Now unlike other hosting services that provide the video streaming, the vzaar team really tries to solve the content creation problem by partnering with a few companies worldwide, like iSpeakVideo in the United States. We’ll make sure to cover this great little service as well in the future, but is short, iSpeakVideo allows you to get a professional spokesperson to pitch your product or brand.

If you’ve been in the video commerce space long enough, you probably know that production is one of the biggest problems for many small to medium sized businesses, and this type of integration (content creation + video service) is a winning combination for the unsophisticated user.

How this great little service priced? Very reasonably - there is a free package and a host of paying solutions ranging from $10/mo to $200/mo. Definitely worth a try!

PS: Here is a cool little video of the people behind vzaar.