Finally real iTunes metrics, free via Google Analytics

I founded VoloMedia in 2005 to bring Analytics and Advertising technology to episodic media delivery, “Podcasting”.  As the years have rolled by,  Podcasting has grown from user generated audio to professionally produced video, from mainly an audio iPod  media, to consumption on a variety of screens – increasingly the iPhone. VoloMedia has had tremendous success signing up many of the major TV shows as customers – ABC, NBC, G4TV, How Stuff Works, etc. Today we manage over 45 million monthly media requests, 75% of which is video and the volumes are growing, we had nearly 2 million media requests yesterday. With all of these downloads over all of these years, one fact has remained stubborn -a vast majority of the traffic originates from Apple’s iTunes Media player. This should not be very surprising given that the iTunes store hosts 140,000 podcast feeds – and this is where most consumers are discovering podcast shows.

I helped ADM standardize the measurement specs around downloads, and the process was contentious around the metrics question, “download requests” or “completed downloads”?  The most final of all metrics , “plays”, was not considered because it simply was not feasible. During the current economic downturn, the need for the best metrics has become even more important for publishers and advertisers.

Over a year ago our engineers decided to resolve this issue in the most practical way we could – connecting iTunes to Google Analytics. We are announcing this product today. Before I go into the specifics, I would like to emphasize one important point – this free service does not require any relationship, contractual or otherwise, with VoloMedia.

VoloMedia’s Bridge-to-Google Analytics is a plug-in to the iTunes Media player, now installed with over 100 thousand iTunes consumers in the US – precisely 94,296 iTunes plug-ins were active over the last 5 days. Publishers are free to use this free service if it meets their needs, i.e. collect annonymous usage statistics regarding usage of their content on iTunes and to analyze them using Google Analyics: a free and robust industry-standard platform. If you have ever used Google Analytics, then you are familiar with “GA_ID – Google Analytics ID”. With a simple modification of the RSS feed to incorporate the GA-ID the publisher can start flowing aggregated play and download data to their Google Analytics account.  More information is on our website: http://www.volomedia.com

How to Speak Downloadable Media

As a result of the work done by Kiptronic’s Dave Rowley and his Terminology Standardization committee, the ADM invites you to provide input on downloadable media’s ever changing terminology.

Based on the committee’s charter “To collect, refine, propose, correlate, and present standard terms used in our industry for the benefit of publishers, advertisers and consumers of downloadable media.” the ADM has a established a Terminology Wiki to allow you to add to or comment on the terms that have been established to date.

As I noted at the outset, our taxonomy tends to be evolving. Hence the wiki. If you note new terminology emeging, whether it be to describe something new or existing, please take time to note it on the wiki. We will then inlcude it as part of our information provided to those offering potential revenue sources the industry we serve. Buyers of ADM member services and products will be better able to participate if they know, understand and use the language that is unique to them.

It should be noted that, just as an organization is strong because of it’s members, a wiki is only as strong as those who provide and edit content. Please take a moment to visit and share your knowledge!

Streaming? Downloading? Why RSS?

I have been struck by the continuing confusion in the marketplace in defining a download. The overly simplified convention holds all video within a web browser is streamed and all without is downloaded. I wrote a recent article on Downloading on the Internet and how at VoloMedia we define the three different types of downloads – RSS, Progressive and Direct. One of the challenges for ADM will be to concisely define our medium and explain why RSS matters to publishers. With the existence of suitable metrics and advertising solutions, there is no justification to keeping any media locked just within the confines of a web browser.

I’m a New Media Producer not a Podcaster!

I recently attended the “Podcast and New Media Expo” in California and the issue of using the name “Podcasting” was up for discussion again, however, this year some speakers went to the length of declaring “Podcasting is Dead”. Perhaps supported by the fact that for next years Expo, the term “Podcast” has been dropped from the show title – it’s just the “New Media Expo”.

Now this is nothing new as the topic of “Podcasting” terminology was actually brought up in Leo Laporte’s keynote from last year, when he suggested that the name “Podcasting” was bad for the industry.

Since then, negative connotations with “user generated content”, the detrimental effect of not having Microsoft fully supporting podcasts (although this seems now to be resolved at least for the Zune 2) and the general misunderstanding that podcasting was only available on iPods, all seem to have validated Leos suggestion on calling for a terminology change.

However, last year his voice was a solitary one and despite him re-branding his shows “NetCasts”, the rest of us were happy to soldier on under the banner of podcasting.

With this years Expo however, the tide seems to be turning.