Improvements You Requested for IP Video Market

Published Oct 24, 2009 00:00 AM
PUBLIC - This article does not require an IPVM subscription. Feel free to share.

This report lists over 20 improvements recommended by subscribers of the Video Surveillance Professional Service in a recent survey. Each request is addressed with explanation on plans for improvement. 

Not a Subscriber?

If you are not a subscriber and would like to share what improvements you would like to see, please answer a short 2 question survey. I'd like to know what your needs are and see if I can meet them.

New Content/Reports Requested

The most common requests were for adding new content and reports. Here is a fairly long list and my thoughts on meeting those requests:

  • User Case Studies - I definitely am going to start doing case studies. My idea is to do in-depth, critical examinations of deployments to provide insights into product selection, logistical issues, ROI, value etc. I'd like to do them anonymously so end users can speak frankly about the issues involved.
  • PoV of Integrator/End Users - I think the case studies will help with end user perspective. In addition to that, I will start doing interviews with integrators, consultants and A&Es.
  • Consumer Market / low cost systems - Will expand here as I frequently receive requests for this segment. Let me know what companies are of most interest. I will likely start with D-Link.
  • Deeper Technical - I plan to expand this in Q1 2010. Technical analysis takes more time and is an interest of a smaller segment of users. I think it's important though and as our organization grows, this will be an important element to improve on.
  • Innovative uses of surveillance - Good point. As I do case studies, I will look for innovative uses.
  • Standards - In the last few months, I have had little coverage on standards. This week, I added a post on timetable for ONVIF/PSIA adoption. Next Monday, I will release an analysis on standards for VMS/DVRs.
  • More on Europe - I would like to do more on Europe. Suggestions for companies or topics would be appreciated.
  • Application/Market/Vertical Reporting - I plan to do a series of case studies for each vertical and use them as a basis for building vertical/application specific reports.
  • Company Information (Management/Revenue/Structure) - How much of an interest is there in this? It would be straightforward to do and I could add it to the section page for each company.
  • ROI of video surveillance systems - Good point. As I do case studies I will examine this.
  • Central Stations - Video integration with central stations including remote monitoring and managed video is growing. I expect to publish more on this topic.
  • Comparing VMS systems - In Q1 2010, I will publish an update on VMS system comparison. This will include our testing of VMS systems this year.
  • Wireless - Next month, we will release a comparison report on wireless. See the November/December schedule.
  • Screenshots of camera tests - Good suggestion. I will include images (jpgs) as well as videos for each future camera test.
  • Video Walls / Monitors - I do not know much about video walls and monitors. Please let me know if this is important.
  • Value of IMS / Forester / Frost - A survey response asked about the market research firms. Forester does not really cover video surveillance (to the best of my knowledge). The problems with Frost's lack of analysis are well covered on the site. For those wanting detailed video surveillance market statistics, I recommend IMS (not sponsored, no financial connection with them - they are simply the most respected of the market sizing firms by industry insiders I speak with).
  • Comparing camera quality - I agree that comparing camera quality is important and valuable. My concern is that my testing process is not sophisticated enough yet to do this reliably (given that small variances or errors in testing can impact results). I would expect to be capable of doing this Q2 2010.

Suggestions/Problems with the Site
  • Too few companies covered - We have done tests, company or product reviews on more than 60 manufacturers. That being said, there are hundreds of manufacturers around the world and we aim to cover more.
  • Too Axis driven - The multitude of Axis articles is based on reader demand. Axis articles have 2-3x the readership of almost any other company. Many of the articles are clearly critical of Axis and in-depth so I think this serves the interest of a broad portion of the community.
  • Spelling and grammar mistakes - Agreed. As we expand, we will place more emphasis on fixing them. Thanks to Ray Bernard for his extensive help over the last year in finding many.
  • Too much analysis based on past events rather than future possibilities - Good point. I will keep this in mind.
  • More disciplines in security - Until our coverage of video surveillance is both globally broad and technically deep, I will be reluctant to expand. I think it's more important to maximize quality than breadth.
  • Single paragraph story summaries - I am happy to add these. I am not sure what's the best way to do this.
  • Need reference table of acronyms - Good point. Readers with less industry background can definitely make use of this. We will put this as a definite future addition.
  • More community features, meeting before shows - I am open to doing this though I am not sure how broad the interest is here.

Questions on the Subscription Service
  • All premium subscribers should get PDF downloads - Only corporate subscribers may download PDFs of reports. I want to keep the pricing as low as possible ($99 USD per year) to allow any end user or integrator to easily justify purchasing the service. At the same time, people who want to share content should be able to pay moderately higher prices ($299 USD per year). Given that any traditional individual analyst report costs thousands, I think this is reasonable.
  • Corporate should have content not available to personal subscribers - I could do this and motivate more people to upgrade to corporate. However, I'd like for as many people to access the content as possible now. At some point in the future, perhaps market statistics/finance will become corporate only. However, it's not an issue now.
  • Charge more for manufacturers, less for other - I definitely do not want to do this. I purposely want to keep financial relationship with manufacturers as minimal as possible. Given that no company can spend more than a few hundred per year, it essentially eliminates financial alignment with manufacturers. The traditional analyst model is to get tens or hundreds of thousands from the companies they cover. I think that creates a conflict of interest and want to avoid that.

Additionally, a number of requests have already been met:

Improved Search

New options and new content are included in search:

  • You can now filter out so only results from IP Video Market are shown. Previously, results always showed content from this site and across the web.
  • You can now sort results by most recent date. Previously, results ranked only by relevancy of match to search term.
  • All premium content (including updates) are now searched providing many more relevant results. Previously, only non-premium IP Video Market content was searched.

Improved Usability

Based on your feedback, links that you have already visited now turn grey. Previously, they stayed blue - the same color as prior to clicking on the link. This should make it easier to determine what reports one has previously read.

When logged in, in larger type, a message "Welcome' and your name is displayed to make it clear that you are signed in. A subscriber mentioned that the previous design did not clearly show when they were logged in or out.

Provide More Feedback