It's All About Integration: Enterprise Year in Review

Historically, online multimedia has uniquely addressed the communications challenges that large companies face in distributing information to far-flung networks of employees. Web audio and video provide a forum for large company leaders to communicate directly with a global work force on a cost-effective basis. As a result, today’s enterprise multimedia sector is largely tuned to address the internal communications needs of these large corporate customers who have illustrated the most willingness to invest in online audio and video capabilities.

And while the emergence of video has attracted much attention in the deployment of these applications, it’s important to remember the continuing role being played by online audio in the enterprise multimedia story.

Currently, 43% of companies represented in IMS surveys report that at least half of the webcasts they produce integrate video. Given the industry’s increasing focus on promoting and marketing video-enriched solutions, this percentage underscores just how much room video deployment has yet to grow and the relative importance that audio sustains the current enterprise online multimedia market.

Indeed, only 9% of companies surveyed report that their complete schedule of webcast content is produced with integrated video. Put another way, this means that 91% of companies using online multimedia in 2007 are deploying "audio-only" webcasts—and that these audio webcasts can make up a significant portion of a firm’s webcasting activity.

Whether a company is developing online presentations incorporating audio or video, one common theme emerged across the board during the past year: Successful implementation of this technology requires more than just good content-creation tools.

Beyond Content Creation and Delivery
As the volume of webcasting activity in the corporate sector increases, leading users are recognizing the need for sophisticated tools to track viewership patterns and manage archives of online multimedia content, says Buinevicius of Sonic Foundry.

"Some executives are still a bit naïve about the complexity of technology that is required to make all of this work," Buinevicius says. "You have a lot of complexities that arise when you want to reach 100,000 employees with a rich media presentation."

And the complexities grow particularly large when companies develop large libraries of on-demand multimedia content that they want to make available to employees at the click of a computer mouse.

While many companies historically have linked the use of webcasting with the distribution of executive presentations and training on a live, real-time basis, the size of online libraries of prerecorded content that can be accessed online continues to grow.

Simply put, a growing number of organizations are creating too much multimedia content for their own good. Growing libraries of online multimedia content make it increasingly difficult for executives to find a specific piece of information—or even a relevant presentation—when they are looking for it. A disjointed multimedia archive is the equivalent of a library with books scattered on the floor and no system for cataloging information so that it can be traced quickly and efficiently.So consider the plight of companies accelerating the pace with which they are implementing online multimedia. Among organizations that are deploying online multimedia, 15% report that they have cumulative archives of more than 500 hours of multimedia content that are actively available on their corporate networks and readily accessible. Another 19% of companies surveyed say that they have created cumulative content archives of between 100 and 500 hours of corporate presentations and meetings.

The sprawl of business multimedia in the workplace will only worsen over time. The companies that create the largest archives of on-demand content are the firms that have spent the most money and the most time implementing the technology. As more companies pour substantial resources into fostering the adoption of this technology, the importance of effective content management systems will only grow over time.

The evolution in market needs is sparking a strategic evolution among key players in the enterprise online multimedia sector. Companies like Sonic Foundry and Accordent, which cut their teeth on developing content-creation platforms, continued to steadily expand their product lines to incorporate more sophisticated content-management and tracking tools.

And even as these companies were expanding the functionality of their comprehensive multimedia solutions, other vendors in 2007 were introducing new business models as "application service providers," selling the technology enabling business multimedia that could be accessed online for a monthly subscription fee. Firms such as Multicast Media, IVT, and NetBriefings all rolled out these "ASP" solutions in 2007 in which companies could pay monthly fees to access selected technology offerings via the web.

At Allete, the Duluth-based utility, the company launched its foray into rich media webcasting by buying a Mediasite appliance made by Sonic Foundry. The company has used the technology to produce nearly 50 online events incorporating online audio and video in its first year of webcasting.

Many of the webcasts are produced to supply training and benefits information for employees working in the company’s network of power plants. Allete IT executive Opien acknowledges that most of the workers in power plants don’t care which technology—whether its DVD, online presentations, or some other format—is used to deliver information to the field.

But for utility executives responsible for distributing information to the Allete workforce, the arrival of online rich media capabilities has made a significant difference. Opien explains that, for instance, single training sessions can be recorded and shared with workers whether they work during the day or through the graveyard shift. That eases the burden on trainers who are able to use online multimedia to deliver the same training message to all employee groups that need to hear it–no matter when they are on duty. "It’s convenience, actually," she says. "It gives the same message, the same way, any time they want."

As a result, count Opien and Allete among the believers in using online multimedia to improve communications.

"I would do it over in a minute," Opien says of her company’s foray into rich media. "I wouldn’t hesitate at all."