Overlay.TV brings interactive video to online retail - New Overlay.TV for Retail...

Overlay.TV brings interactive video to online retail - New Overlay.TV for
Retail offering allows retailers to harness professional and user-generated
video for online sales

OTTAWA, June 15 /PRNewswire/ - Online video has become a staple of most web
users' media diet, yet very few online retailers have been able to harness the
opportunity provided by video e-commerce. Overlay.TV, a leader in
user-generated clickable video, is seeking to change that with the launch of
its new e-commerce product, Overlay.TV for Retail.
The enterprise platform allows a seamless integration of interactive video
into product pages, brand experience pages, face-to-face video chat and
user-generated video ratings and testimonials. This radically simplifies the
process of including user-generated content by allowing merchants to pair UGC
with professionally created video and moderate it with a built-in dashboard.
"There's no doubt that video can increase sales," says Rob Lane, CEO of
Overlay.TV. "Retailers have been slow to capitalize on this trend, largely
because of the technical issues that come along with video storing, streaming
and integration into existing product catalogs and inventory systems. We've
taken away the technical problems, and packaged it in a way that makes the
process easy to manage and entirely focused on sales."
Beyond simply offering a platform for product videos, the clickable technology
behind Overlay.TV allows merchants to easily repurpose brand-created video
content by adding links to product catalogues and inventory databases.
"Our view is that adding video is a half-step in the right direction, but you
need to have a plan for how it's going to be built into the sales process,"
says Lane. "The interactivity that our system builds allows customers to shop
within a video regardless of whether it's on the storefront or embedded on a
blog."
Video e-commerce also holds strong potential for the companies to build their
online community over the long term.
"The business of business today is increasingly about building communities,
which can drive sales and improve customer service. User-generated content
will become user-generated commerce," said James Governor, industry analyst
and co-founder of RedMonk. "Overlay.TV for Retail is designed to help manage
online commerce using interactive video."
Lane believes that the possibility for brand experiences combined with the
focus on personalized service and recommendations will bring video e-commerce
further into the mainstream.
"Once consumers begin to experience the social and personal aspects that
interactive video can bring to the shopping experience, they're going to begin
to demand it," says Lane. "As consumers, we're quick to adjust to a new
baseline, and I think this raises the bar significantly."
The company has just launched the product publicly, and has already signed a
major client that will be launching later in the summer. For more information,
a white paper on interactive video is available for download from the
Overlay.TV website.

About Overlay.TV

Overlay.TV is an interactive media company that provides a video commerce
platform that enables brands, online retailers and content owners to monetize
and customize their video through interactive widgets and tools that allow
everything from hyperlinks to video-in-video mashups. Overlay.TV is a private
company headquartered in Ottawa, Canada. For more information, please visit
www.overlay.tv.
SOURCE Overlay.TV

Ryan Anderson, Overlay.TV, (613) 266-9041, ryan.anderson@overlay.tv; Links:
Overlay.TV website: http://www.overlay.tv; Overlay.TV for Retail:
http://www.overlay.tv/retail; White Paper: Value Beyond Video - How
Interactive Video is Changing Online Retail:
http://www.overlay.tv/pdf/overlaytv_retail.pdf; Overlay.TV on Twitter:
http://www.twitter.com/overlaytv