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Your new TV has arrived – Is YouTube TV right for you?

By Paul B. Kaiser on April 6, 2017

That’s right – YouTube TV has launched it’s Live streaming TV service that could replace your cable service. Or can it? YouTube TV officially launched April 5th in 5 cities and surrounding areas. (I was able to sign up for the 30 Day Free Trial 25 miles outside New York City.) But since then they have opened it up to about 50 cities – see list here.

NY
LA
San Francisco Bay area
Philadelphia
Chicago

Do you think you can cut the cord? There’s more involved than you think when it comes to replacing your channels, but all in all I think we are being gien a good chance at cutting the cord with the cable industry.

Personally, I’m excited for this. It may not be perfect, and there my not be an abundant amount of channels, but moving forward, this is the model in which people will watch TV/movies/shows. YouTube TV has the potential to work well for all the cord cutters who don’t want an entire cable subscription. But it is one step and cost in the mix of media you will want – see article on media strategy.

Users will have access to over 40 channels by default, but they can also add a few others for a few extra bucks, like Showtime. Anyone who wants to simply record their TV programs can do so via digital DVR, which comes with unlimited storage, so that’s cool. However, the biggest advantage that YouTube TV has over its competitors like DirectTV appears to be the reliability of the streaming, which certainly adds to its appeal.

To get started with live streaming TV:

Check out tv.youtube.com today to start your free trial.
You can also sign up on the Google Play Store and Apple App Store.
If you’re not in one of the initial launch markets but want to find out when YouTube TV is coming to your area, you can sign up here.

Heres the stuff you get with a YouTube TV membership, you’ll get:

Live TV streaming from ABC, CBS, FOX, NBC, ESPN, Fox Sports Networks, Comcast SportsNet and dozens more. YouTube TV gives you the best of live TV, from must-see shows like “Empire,” “The Voice,” “The Big Bang Theory” and “Scandal,” to the live sports you want from the NBA, MLB, NFL, and NCAA. Based on where you live, you’ll get your local broadcast TV stations covering local sports and news. You’ll also get dozens of popular cable channels, including FX, USA, Disney Channel, Bravo, MSNBC, Fox News. And you can add Showtime or Fox Soccer Plus for an additional charge. In total, YouTube TV will give you more than 50 networks, listed below.
A cloud DVR, with no storage limits. With YouTube TV, your cloud DVR can record as many shows as you want, simultaneously, without ever running out of storage. You can keep each of your recordings for nine months.
TV when it matters, where it matters. You can watch YouTube TV on your phone, tablet or computer—and you can easily stream to your TV with a Google Chromecast or Chromecast built-in TV (we’ll be supporting even more connected TV devices later this year). And your cloud DVR goes with you, so you can stream your recordings on any device, whenever you want and wherever you go in the U.S.
YouTube Red Originals. With a YouTube TV membership, you can watch all of our YouTube Red Original series and movies right in the new YouTube TV app.
Six accounts included. You can share your YouTube TV membership with your family and roommates, and each account will receive its own unique recommendations and cloud DVR with no storage limits. Your household can watch up to three streams at a time.
More networks coming soon. We’re excited to announce that AMC, BBC America, IFC, Sundance TV, WE tv, and BBC World News will be included soon at no additional charge. These networks will join Telemundo and others listed below as networks coming to YouTube TV soon after launch. This means you’ll be able to watch shows like “The Walking Dead,” “Doctor Who,” and your favorite telenovelas. And you’ll also be able to add Sundance Now or Shudder for an additional charge.

YouTube TV is Coming – Can You Cut the Cord with Cable?

By Paul B. Kaiser on March 9, 2017

1 Billion hours of video consumed a day. Wow.

Competition in the streaming TV market is heating up. Google announced that it will launch a new service called YouTube TV in major cities in the United States over the next few months. “YES!” S ign up here to be notified by YouTube.

“1 Billion hours a day is how much video we consume in a day.”

With an option like this, could you really “cut the cable” with cable TV? I’m thinking yes. It’s the best attempt, and next step to unraveling the cable companies that have strangled us for years. There are many critics of the new YouTube service, but in my opinion, it’s a great start. And personally, I’m damn close to cutting that cord. It’s almost not about the money anymore, it’s about being free of their silly charges.

Here is a quick combination of online services you could subscribe to that will get you what you watch. And I should note that if you watch a lot of TV channels, a lot of specialty channels, then this may not be for you. This is for the folks that watch general TV stations and movies.

Purchase the following services:

YouTube service to get network stations and other notable stations (see list below)
Netflix or Amazon for movies
Google Play, or iTunes for newer top-rated movies
Optional media:
- Might be Hulu, or HBO
- AMC app: If you’re a walking dead fan for instance, you can get older episodes on Netflix and the new ones are available for free on the AMC app.

What does it cost?

The combination would cost $60 a month (optional items not included). And any missing channels like AMC or HGTV you can download their Apps and watch for free. Average monthly costs for FIOS or Comcast is about $75 per month. But then if you add Netflix and other premium movies you’re adding another $35, making the total $110 per month. One other perk with YouTube is that you get unlimited cloud storage (like DVR) for recording.

YouTube TV will cost customers only $35 a month, which gets them 6 accounts, 3 of which can be used to stream live TV concurrently, and access to 40 different networks, including “ABC, CBS, FOX, NBC, ESPN, regional sports networks, and dozens of popular cable networks,” according to a recent entry on the official YouTube blog.

$35 a month
includes Youtube red
6 accounts (only 3 streams at a time)
40 channels

Each of the accounts will be personalized and utilize searching algorithms, similar to Netflix’s profile system. Users also gain access to YouTube Red original shows and an unlimited cloud DVR (1 per account) to record live TV.

Currently, other options on the market include: Dish’s Sling TV, which offers 2 basic packages for $20 and currently has around 764,000 subscribers, and Sony’s PlayStation Vue, with a monthly cost of $40 for 60 channels. Hulu is expected to launch a similar web TV offering sometime this year.

Susan Wojicki

Susan Wojicki, the CEO of YouTube, declared that this was the evolution of television, aiming to “give the younger generation the content that they love with the flexibility they expect,” able to watch YouTube TV on their computers, smartphones, tablets, or any device with a Google Chromecast.

The habits and methods in which we consume TV/media is changing. And it’s changing rapidly. What’s changing in society is the fact that the younger generations care less and less about traditional TV. They would rather stream everything to their computer or phone. And, they are satisfied with what they get there, and less interested in network TV. Thus, a shift in the cable TV model. So it’s not just the generational gap but the way we consume – Mobile VS TV set.

YouTube TV Has Major Broadcasters On Board, But Still Lacks Selection

So here are the cons.

Plenty of cord-cutters or those who have never signed up for cable are likely to be satisfied. But there are some large gaps. For example, there’s nothing from Viacom, or Time Warner—no CNN or Discovery Channel, no TBS, and no TNT (YouTube is still in discussions with other partners). However, popular channels such as HBO and AMC will not be available at launch. Moreover, Google still needs to figure out deals with the network affiliate stations of major broadcasters in smaller cities, possibly implying that the service will only be launched in larger metropolitan areas to begin with. Overall, YouTube TV’s list of channels is significantly smaller than the 100+ channels AT&T offered under its $35 introductory pricing for DirecTV Now.

In addition to those gaps, the YouTube TV service is only available in markets where its existing cable partners have affiliates. So if you live in or near a number of major U.S. urban centers, you won’t be able to subscribe even if you want to. All of these caveats make YouTube’s service look a lot less like a cable-TV killer and a lot more like just a digital version of a not-so-great cable package. But like I said in the beginning, this is a start. And I believe a company the size of Google will wheel and deal and make it happen for most cord cutters. It will be interesting over the next couple years to see how watching TV changes.

Heres a little how to video for cord cutting. This doesn’t include the YouTube option because it wasn’t announced yet. But where they mention getting a antennal for local TV stations, that is where you insert YouTube as an option.

Wrapping up 2016 with YouTube Rewind

By Paul B. Kaiser on December 9, 2016

Well it’s that time of the year again when we look back at the events. In this case, it’s all about the YouTubers of 2016 as told in “YouTube Rewind 2016”. It highlights the videos, people, music and moves that made 2016. #YouTubeRewind

I have to say I don’t like this years as much as previous years, but always a great production from the folks at YouTube. Enjoy the video and some links below.

Additional links of interest:

A good behind the scenes with your favorite creators, videos and trends from 2016: http://yt.be/rewind2016
Watch all the trending videos from 2016: http://youtube.com/rewind
See trends as they happen: http://youtube.com/trending
Watch all the easter eggs: https://goo.gl/WihKvv

All the Tubers in the video:

The New YouTube Music App is Shaking Things Up

By Paul B. Kaiser on November 13, 2015

The new YouTube Music app is here. Have you downloaded it yet? This could be a game changer for Google, or it’s just going to confuse the heck out of everybody. The app is free, and you can use it in free, ad-supported mode, but it becomes a lot more powerful and interesting if you pay for a YouTube Red subscription. It looks like YouTube and feels a little like Google Play, but doesn’t quite feel like anything. It just plays videos/music in succession. I have to spend more time with it. They do have cool video for it though.

Check out this very cool video.

android-app-on-google-play — Download for Android

Social Media – Age and Gender Keep Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Pinterest at the Top

By Paul B. Kaiser on August 26, 2015

As more and more social media networks emerge, they don’t simply launch and hope for the most visitors. They need to be targeted and fill an unmet need with their audience. Ongoing engagement has never been more important in order to keep users coming back. The biggest differentiators are gender and age. Coupled with those 2 factors, is the technology behind the social tool. Is the Social App easy to use? Does it have a evident need to exist for that gender or age group? For example, Snapchat is popular with millennials because it is “instant,” and teens are instant. Also, because the App requires a little more tech savvy, a 50 yr old may not want to invest the time to learn – I’m the exception 🙂 .

According to BI Intelligence and PEW Internet, the gender and age differences breaks out as follows:

Pinterest has tremendous reach among women. Among US female internet users, 42% reported being on Pinterest in Pew’s late-2014 survey, compared to only 13% of men.
Instagram has become the most important and most-used social network for US teens. 32% of US teenagers cited it as their most important social network, compared to only 14% saying that of Facebook.
Snapchat, Vine, and Tumblr had by far the most youthful user bases of the social networks we looked at. 45% of Snapchat’s adult users are between 18 and 24, followed by Vine (28%) and Tumblr (28%), according to comScore.
LinkedIn enjoys high adoption among highly educated and high-income users. LinkedIn is used by 44% of Americans with income of $75,000 or more, according to Pew.
Messaging apps also have become more broadly popular, but still skew young: 7% of all people in the US aged 12 and older use WhatsApp, according to the Edison Research and Triton Digital survey.
The aging of Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and even Pinterest is more apparent than ever. That’s especially true of Facebook: Less than two-fifths of Facebook’s adult user base in the US is aged 18 to 34, according to comScore.

In the US, while gender, income, and education have little impact on whether or not someone uses social media, these factors do have a big impact on which social networks people opt to use. Many top social networks – including Facebook, Pinterest, and Instagram – have a strong skew toward female users. Women in the US are more likely to use Facebook than men by about 11%, Pinterest by 29%, and Instagram by 7%, according to Pew. But Twitter and LinkedIn continue to attract a mostly male audience.

There are more channels to compete with social media that would take males away from Facebook and Pinterest, like YouTube or Reddit. While this isn’t considered social media, at the end of the day, it’s the content that draws peoples attention, not necessarily the platform.

Some fun Facts – 2015

Top 10 Most Popular Social Networking Sites as derived from our eBizMBA Rank which is a continually updated average of each website’s Alexa Global Traffic Rank, and U.S. Traffic Rank from both Compete and Quantcast.

Facebook Statistics and Facts

Each day on Facebook, there are 350 million photos uploaded; 45 billion “Like” buttons clicked; and 10 billion messages sent. (The Wonder of Tech)
In an average month, 1.28 billion users are active on Facebook. (Convince & Convert)
In the United States, average click-through rate (CTR) for Facebook advertising increased by better than 50% last year, from .09% to .14%. But the average Facebook CTR in the U.K. is nearly twice that, at 0.27%. (Convince & Convert)

Twitter Facts

Twitter drives just over 1% of all website traffic. While that’s considerably less than Facebook or Pinterest, it’s more visits than are driven by StumbleUpon, Reddit, Google+, YouTube, and LinkedIn–combined. (Shareaholic)
There are 500 million tweets a day
Twitter is where millennials turn for business and financial information as well as sports. (Heidi Cohen)

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