What is Brightcove Beacon?
Brightcove Beacon is a platform which enables you to create and configure a single media streaming experience which is then used across multiple devices. With Brightcove Beacon you can curate your content, implement monetization strategies, and design viewer experiences. In doing so, you can:
- Greatly reduce overall costs. The costs of developing apps for each platform are considerable, anywhere from $50K-$250K for a custom app targeted at just ONE platform. Brightcove Beacon allows creation of multiple apps from a single configured experience.
- Provide a consistent experience for viewers across all platforms.
- Allow monetization of video content via options like AVOD and SVOD.
Apps can be generated to run on the following four device types (some specific examples included):
- Mobile (Phone / Tablets)
- Android*
- iOS
- Connected TVs
- Android TV**
- Apple TV
- Fire TV
- Roku
- Smart TVs
- LG
- Samsung
- Sony
- Toshiba
- Web
Not only do you get multiple device apps from a single source, but Brightcove Beacon also allows you to control the content and layout for each device app from your single Brightcove Beacon Experience.
The following is a visual representation of Brightcove Beacon:
How is Brightcove Beacon implemented?
The phases listed in this table are detailed in the Implementation Phases document.
| Implementation Phase | Description |
|---|---|
| Prepare for Brightcove Beacon Experience Creation* | Gather design artifacts, create your application design and plan strategies for advertising and monetization. |
| Establish Relationships with 3rd Party Vendors* | Create accounts for: Stores to which you wish to submit device apps, advertising server, online payment vendor, etc. |
| Create Your Application Design | Determine you information architecture around which videos will be available for viewing, as well as how they are grouped and ordered. |
| Ingest or Add Content and Configure Your Brightcove Beacon Experience | Configuration of, and media assets added to, your Brightcove Beacon Experience. |
| Create Device Application(s) from Your Brightcove Beacon Experience | Work with a Brightcove representative to finalize the configuration of your Brightcove Beacon Experience, from which the device apps are then generated. |
| Submit Your Device Applications to Corresponding Stores | Submit the newly generated device app(s) to corresponding store(s) for approval, and then your apps are ready for customers’ use. |
How are the device apps updated?
Your specific device apps are submitted initially to vendors for approval, and only need to be resubmitted in very rare instances like an OS update. Of course, you will want to change the media that is offered for viewing, alter the app layout, or change your monetization for advertising strategy. This is done by altering the experience, which does NOT require a resubmission to a vendor store. The key to updating the app, but not having to resubmit to the vendor store, lies in the architecture of Brightcove Beacon as shown here:
This architecture provides the functionality to only alter the single Brightcove Beacon Experience to update the layout or configuration of all your device apps.