In our first two reports in the Video Strategy series, we have detailed how online video has moved beyond the exclusive domain of media and entertainment companies. From travel to financial web sites, video is now ubiquitous across the internet. 

Our latest report, The Forrester Wave: US Online Video Platforms, goes beyond market sizing and best practices to call for online video to be managed as a product. Like any web product, be it site-search or recommendations, a company has the choice to build an internal solution or to utilize a third party solution.  In the Forrester Wave, we evaluate six vendors that offer product solutions for online video: Brightcove, Fliqz, Kaltura, Ooyala, Twistage, and VMIX. 

While the number of companies in the space is certainly larger than six, we decided to focus on a set of vendors that serve a variety of clients, regardless of size or industry.  For that reason, some vendors that primarily focus on high end media companies, such as Digitalsmiths, The Platform, or Move Networks were not included.
 

The space proved to be highly competitive.  Almost each of the six vendors had some strength that others could not fully match – while some led in monetization, others were stronger in distribution or user generated videos. Product managers evaluating the video platforms should carefully think about their goals and utilize our Wave tool to adapt the criteria weightings to select the right vendor for their needs.
 

The space is rapidly evolving with several of the vendors announcing new funding or partnerships just in the past few months. I expect online video to be even more of a focus for Forrester and myself as we move into 2010.  I look forward to hearing your thoughts, comments, and feedback on the Wave.