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I am launching a beta version of a new video product today...
This is a Flash video player which allows anyone to charge for information conveyed by video, allowing viewers to watch for a set period of time free, then the video is paused and the viewer is required to pay for unlimited access if they wish to continue!
I would like to demonstrate the concept to you by given you an example of its usage and for this case I would like to introduce a method to help protect a companies online brand from being tarnished.
The Example:
Online brand reputation management is generally very expensive to accomplish and the technique I am revealing in this video could save a company thousands of pounds.
There is a fee of £49 GBP to watch the full video, but the first six minutes are free. It will then pause at 6 minutes and ask for a payment to be made, thereafter I will explain the procedure technically.
You can see the product in action here:
http://www.brandcurrency.co.uk/
It's the large video with the £49 price!
SOME BACKGROUND:
We are all pioneers in our own fields and each of us often have unique insights to problems and hold information which could have a high value to others, which can also be easily explained in a video.
There are many successful entrepreneurs selling informational ebooks, typically they use a company called Clickbank (http://www.clickbank.com/index.html) who manage the online payments of sales.
These ebook offers' normally make use of very long and somewhat spammy looking sales pages which for some strange reason seem to convert well...
A typical example of such a sales page would be as follows: http://www.get-better-grades.com/index-pass-exam.php
Clickbank claims to have paid out over 1 billion euros in earnings over the last 10 years so clearly there is money to be made from selling information!
One problem with those traditional ebook offers is that ebooks actually take a long time to write and develop.
Another problem is that in many cases video is better suited to explaining techniques visually, take the example of a plasterer demonstrating the art of plastering! Which would you prefer an ebook or a video demonstration?
In my new concept, information can be produced and packaged much quicker than traditional ebooks. Videos can be shoot and edited very quickly (in a few hours) in comparison to ebooks which can take several months to develop.
Also by using video it opens up entirely new avenues which can be explained easily and quickly, giving both the producers and consumers of the content added efficiency.
The concept is known and the Flash PAYer and can be found here: http://www.karsa.co.uk
At some point in the next 6 months (according to its adoption) I will probably incorporate a payment plan to this application and most likely have a tiered pricing plan with low monthly fees from £29GBP etc. however, its use is currently free and it will likely stay free for at least 6 months.
All payments go straight into the video producers own Paypal account so they make all the profits, no margins are siphoned off.
This concept is currently a 'minimum viable product' with just the most essential features incorporated, nevertheless it achieves the goals I set out for this product and I hope you find the concept interesting.
It could be used for any archive of online video information and all the variables can be adjusted.
I would love your feedback....
The idea is like Megavideo for anyone.
This app and widget allows publishers to input a few details about where their content is and their paypal email and the widget then cuts off viewers after a set time (which they can adjust per video), it sends them to Paypal, which pays directly into their own accounts then back to the video where they can continue watching for the duration they sign up for (so they have 4 choices, 1 day, 1 week, 3 months, 1 year).
I'm not interested in design related points, like the site looks naff etc. I'm interested in what you think of the general idea and if you think it could be successful.
Here's the problem. Since announcing the idea to a few people and sending it some traffic love from my highly popular documentary site, it has had very little interest. I have some potential customers who have asked I develop extra features which I have about half completed but the problem I get is it just hasn't gotten the reception or enough feedback to tell me this is a real pain and there are enough end users out there for it.
The main problem I foresee is that publishers would have a fair bit of set up time to implement it, they would have to change all the Flash player widgets they currently use (though I don't think this should be a big deal?).
So I need to do another month or so development to get it finished and I'm asking for your input on the idea to tell me if you think it's a worthy project and if you think it can be successful.