AccuStream Research: Pro and UGV Views Up 36% in '09; Competition Impact Seen in Category Share Shifts

SEASIDE, Calif., March 2 /PRNewswire/ -- UGV and professionally produced, distributed and syndicated video combined rose 35.9% in 2009, generating 93.2 and 49.1 billion views respectively. UGV views grew by 47.8%, while the growth figure for pro video was 18.1%.

UGV views surpassed professional counterparts in mid 2007, driven in part by longer viewer engagement resulting in more views per site per month.

In 2009, for example, UGV sites averaged 27.1 views per unique user per month per site, compared to a 4.1 comparable on professional sites, according to a report published by AccuStream Research.

The report, Pro and UGV Category Share Analytics 2005 – 2009, analyzes viewing share--and shifts--for each content category on both professional sites and UGV destinations, providing detailed comparative analytics.

The report's findings reveal, for example, that while music video peaked on professional sites in 2005 with 45% total market share, a steep decline began with the emergence of UGV outlets in 2006.

Over the period 2007 – 2009 music videos available through YouTube increased in cumulative library share from 28% to over 31%. Music videos captured 6% share in the professional category in 2009.

Entertainment video (including competing Kids programming on Nickelodeon and Disney sites, animation and comedy) captured a 30.4% share on the professional side in 2008, but stalled at 30.3% share in 2009, and currently trending slightly down.

Entertainment is highly competitive in UGV, with comedy, funny and entertainment categories owning double-digital library share across sites such as Break.com, YouTube, Megavideo, Funnyordie.com and Metacafe.

"The strength of UGV libraries is derived from a community of editorial contributors creating multi-dimensional programming for a nation of channel surfers," noted research director Paul A. Palumbo.

"These radial or non-linear libraries more closely align with TV scrolling behavior than linear offerings, weaving enough relevancies into the initial video choice to stimulate increased search, discovery, sharing and enjoyment," he added.

"Pro content online is primarily linear, but delivers against a core weakness of UGV: entertainment consistency. There appears to be compelling incentives for each publishing segment to further integrate with one another."

AccuStream Research (http://www.accustreamresearch.com) is a publishing, research and consulting firm specializing in online audio, video, CDN, advertising, subscription and video CMS platforms.

SOURCE AccuStream Research