If you’re a filmmaker looking for extra exposure and/or work, join us on Wednesday July 8th, 2009 for our first NYC Filmmaker Gathering. Learn how to make a living (or extra cash $$) shooting local video spots for small business and real estate in New York city and surrounding boroughs.

Location: WellcomeMat Soho Office
Address: 676 Broadway - 2nd Floor - New York, NY 10012
Date: Wednesday July 8th, 2009
Time: 6:30-7:30pm

Sign up here and join fellow filmmakers for an hour of conversation and networking.
NOTE: Space is limited to 20 filmmakers.

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It’s been a long time coming, but we are here to officially announce that video professionals can now manage all of their clients on WellcomeMat, and do it with style/efficiency. “Client Management” is the means by which video pros can do all of the following (and more):

Listen in below on our Friday (Feb 6th) Video Producer call as Co-Founders Christian and Phil discuss how to master Client Management and move up the ranks on WellcomeMat.

Some Bullet Points About Client Management:
* Add/Subtract Clients from Your Dashboard
* Upload and Assign Videos to Your Clients
* Provide Your Clients With Access to Their Own WellcomeMat Account, and Provide Them With The Most Powerful Tools Known to the Local Video Marketplace.
* Quickly and Easily Log Into Each Client’s Account and Manage Their Videos in Their Behalf.

Cheers to all of us sticking to our strengths and taking local video to the next level! Questions Wellcome.

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One of the things that [WellcomeMat] has always been known for is quality of video playback. You haven’t caught us jumping on the “HD” bandwagon because, well, the term/phrase “HD” is being used as marketing speak, without much substance behind it. Sure, playing a flash or H264 file in a 16:9 aspect ratio is cool, and making sure that the videos are quality is even cooler. We applause high quality, but let’s all take a deep breath and realize that true HD would a) not play without stuttering on the average end users’ machine and b) would be very difficult to transmit given the limited connection speeds that all Americans have.

Rest assured, WellcomeMat is still chugging along on the quality train, and we are doing so without forgetting that videos need to be watched for quality to be realized by the average internet user. Quality lovers, [WellcomeMat] has your back! Layne Freedle posted this video months ago, and I immediately was thinking that it could play a fitting role as a 007 scene. Check it out, and if you can’t watch it without seeing the video stutter, that’s because when the limits of quality are pushed, there is a cost:

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Stand Out with Video

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Yes it’s true! You can now publish your WellcomeMat videos and ‘Neighborhood’ posts to Twitter. Distribute links to your content and promote your videos online without any extra work!

To get started…
Step 1: Sign in on WellcomeMat.com
Step 2: Click the ‘Account Settings’ link (top of page)
Step 3: Add your Twitter account info (username and password).

That’s it! The next time you upload a video or post a question/comment to the Neighborhood, we’ll post a message to your Twitter account. You’re busy, let us do all of the heavy lifting.

Note: If you do NOT have a Twitter account, sign up here for an account (Don’t worry, It’s FREE!).

…

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Mark Robertson of ReelSEO cranked a ball out of the park today with his post about how to control the search bar within embedded YouTube videos.

I wasn’t aware of the fix for this when I put up our post on YouTube’s search function, so-as it turns out-there is control over this function (sorry YouTube).

Truth is that ad/entertainment based video sites have no place in the local scene. Yes, there are SEO benefits of sending content to specific sites (not all), but when videos ARE the advertisement (ie…local video), we are going to see the generalist sites become less and less applicable to the local cause. It’s a natural progression and one that we are actually very excited about (of course).

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We’ve always struggled with what our blog should be. Should it be a place where we objectively post news? Answer: whenever possible. Should we be promoting the product here and stop trying to even hide our passion for WellcomeMat? Answer: this is what we have to do.

We have tried the righteous path of objective news gathering. Truth told, it’s impossible for us to be objective on the video front. We in this to win it, in this to make money and can’t hold back our advocacy…we’re…ummm….hopeless. So, with that, we are making some changes around here in terms of the types of content you are going to see posted to our blog. Stick around to see what I am referring to.

Oh…one announcement. We’ve discontinued the WellcomeMat Top 5 Videos of the Week for now. We loved doing this, it made a lot of people happy when they were included, but MAN…it took a lot of resources to keep it up. Look for a leaner, meaner, and more democratic version of the Top 5 at a later date. Thanks.

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Here we go for a mini-post here. One thing that is very cool is how heavily Google is going after Microsoft: good things are coming fast and furious, from both companies, as a result. One thing that is not very cool is that all the people that continue to rely on free video platforms are finding out the hard way that they have no control. Look no further than YouTube’s new search-enabled video player for proof:

WellcomeMat will have a very valuable free level of service. But, in local video, control is everything. Entertainment/advertising based video platforms are not where you need to be.

Update: Google/YouTube have since removed the search bar from this particular video.

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It would be tough to count the number of times that a reporter or potential partner asked us “how many members do you have on WellcomeMat?” We did not talk about this number, partly because it’s better to keep competition guessing, and partly because the total number of WellcomeMat members wasn’t, in our mind, something to be vocally proud of…until now!

Few people (you know who you are) know as much as team WellcomeMat how much of a shlog local video has been. It’s been a lot like marching up a vertical, muddy slope, with a boulder strapped to your back, every single day for years on end. There hasn’t always been a lot of believers, there haven’t always been a ton of video success stories to point to and say “that’s why you use video,” and-quite simply-only people with a clear vision into the future adopt new ideas, tools and systems.

While we in no way believe that we have “arrived,” it is with great pleasure that we announce that WellcomeMat has exceeded the 10,000 member mark! We have a lot of people to thank for helping us early on and don’t forget where we come from (ever):

-First and foremost, thanks to all of our local production teams. Our common thread has always been the massive challenge that we collectively faced in making real estate and local video happen.

-Joel Burslem, publisher of FOREM (futureofrealestatemarketing.com) .
-Joseph Ferarra of Sellsius
-The Inman News team
-Rudy Bachratay of Trulia (and Sellsius past)
-Fred Light of Nashua Video Tours
-Doug Heddings of TrueGotham.com
-Erick Hersman of White African
-Dustin Luther - 4Realz.net
-Marc Davison of 1000WattConsulting
-The Active Rain Team. While they liked video enough to start a competing video platform, they are a great group of people and had our backs since way back.

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The last big run I made with a tech company was with Webroot Software, and the explosion occurred while there was very little going on in tech, very little funding available, and our economy was in shambles. While I hate to see people hurting, and companies failing, failure is just part of playing the startup game and a down market is a great thing for companies that have a strong plan, revenue and a lean cost structure. The future belongs to niche players…

Erick Schonfeld posted a solid rundown of the current state of the online video market yesterday. The things that made me proud to be taking part in WellcomeMat’s success became more evident while reading Erick’s post, which I read only shortly after I read Mark ‘Rizzn’ Hopkins’ post entitled “Online Video Publishers Should Look to Monetize Audience, Not Video”.

Check these two articles out: it’ll make you proud to be part of the local video niche!

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