Eight Reasons Enterprise Social Software Makes Sense: #4 Embedded High-Definition Video

The evolution of tools like YouTube has freed companies to market and communicate directly with their target audiences opening a whole new avenue for video communication in the business world. A challenge for businesses is how to integrate video communication into their internal systems in a way that augments communication among colleagues.

Part 4 of our blog series counting down the “8 Ways Social Enterprise Software Makes Sense” for your business focuses on embedding high-definition (HD) video and how you can leverage video directly within NewsGator Social Sites activity streams for enhanced communication, training opportunities, and other social sharing where visual collaboration elevates inter-office communication.

Why video integration?

How often are you on a website or your Intranet and you need to launch a separate viewer to watch a video? Is it actually able to play the video file? Once you launch the viewer, do you have to wait through annoying pauses as it progressively loads? Integrating HD video within NewsGator Social Sites 2010 takes care of all of these issues so that you can just get down to business. Video uploading and viewing are seamless within the activity stream. Users can easily upload all major video codecs, including Windows Media (WMV, WMA), AVI, QuickTime (MOV), DirectShow Filters, MPEG-2, AVCHD, Dolby Digital, Silverlight 4.0, and Smooth Streaming output. Users can simply paste a link in a post from sources like YouTube, Vimeo or Kaltura – or even add a piece of video content to a content library. Upon upload, a thumbnail is automatically created. Just click to view it real-time in the activity stream. No worrying about file size. No progressive loading pauses. No resizing to fit the monitor. No separate viewer.

What does this mean for business?

Collaboration and content are linked, regardless of the file format. Users can comment on, like, hashtag, and search for videos as they would for any other piece of content. Onboarding and training become more efficient and can be self-paced to fit into busy work schedules. Consistent, enterprise education (e.g., on new product features) can happen at the click of a button. You don’t need to reserve a conference room, set up a conference call, write special documentation, or worry about time zones or training schedules. Viewers get the face-to-face communication they desire and the company culture benefits from the personalization.

Personal social learning for the enterprise

With NewsGator Social Sites, businesses can easily deliver personal social learning for the enterprise. Users can browse videos by community, filter their activity streams to show videos, and sort videos by most liked, most recent, and most viewed. Video collateral becomes a reusable resource to be accessed by anyone, anywhere. Whether a user is sitting behind a desk or traveling with an iPad or smartphone, videos are a dynamic and personal form of communication. Learn more about how the video stream module for Social Sites can make video communication a reality for your business.

Don’t miss the rest of the Social Enterprise Software blog series including:

• #8 Fluid Conversations & Problem Solving
• #7 Intelligent Activity Streams
• #6 Configurable Scoring Engines & Expertise
• #5 Configurable Scoring Engines & Recognition