StreamGuys has launched its second-generation SGreports solution, a log processing and content analytics toolset for live streams and podcasts. The updated solution, part of StreamGuys’ growing SaaS suite of analytics and monitoring services, offers a much-improved user experience through improved data aggregation and presentation and quicker access to streaming analytics. StreamGuys has initially made the updated solution available for small-to-mid-sized clients and will soon expand availability to larger enterprise accounts requiring higher customization levels.
SGreports helps broadcasters and media companies access metrics to understand how audiences interact with streaming content and then leverage the resulting data to make intelligent business and programming decisions. The software presents visualizations on user dashboards to help them quickly filter and compare data on program streams and podcast episodes. In its previous iteration, users manually parsed data through SGreports’ expansive filter options to build reports. While the process of exporting data was straightforward, the data aggregation process could grow time-consuming as the number of sources of metrics grew.
Broadcasters with varied streaming portfolios often have specific reporting needs that weren’t easily serviced by the prior iteration of SGreports
Robert Minnix, head of product at StreamGuys
“Broadcasters with varied streaming portfolios often have specific reporting needs that weren’t easily serviced by the prior iteration of SGreports,” said Robert Minnix, head of product at StreamGuys. “SGreports now offers a more cohesive environment to aggregate data from different subsets to achieve a singular view instead of managing data across many dashboards. The simple explanation is that users have a more consumable view of everything in one place, which is especially useful for larger media networks and market-based streamers with much ground to cover. We have now centralized all this data to a single pane of glass.”
The latest iteration of SGreports still allows users to drill down for greater detail and customize their views for maximum efficiency. However, it also offers what StreamGuys calls a “snappier, more responsive user interface,” offering more visually distinctive metrics with greater speed, including more insightful charts and graphics versus columns of numerical information. “Some of the SGreports metrics that our users value most, such as geolocation information from users in different cities and countries, are now presented in ways that are simply more appealing to view and quicker to digest.”
A different software architecture
StreamGuys has migrated SGreports to a Kappa software architecture that it claims better supports real-time processing for analytics. This allows SGreports to aggregate data quicker, with event metrics often available within minutes of completion. “We’ve integrated the analytics stack into our infrastructure so that the host and client servers are processing data in real-time,” said Minnix. “There is no more waiting until tomorrow to access metrics on user traffic, as there is no more batch processing data across different intervals. The information populates as viewers and listeners disconnect.”
SGreports’ advanced reporting capabilities now include enhanced user agent and device-level analysis based on the Open Podcast Analytics Working Group — a cross-platform initiative to standardize podcast download tracking and measurement. Support for OPAWG bolsters IP and user agent blacklisting, bot identification and filtering to provide higher-quality podcast reporting through community-based specifications. SGreports also now directly integrates with StreamGuys’ flagship SGrecast podcast management platform and will soon support the SGrewind time-shifting service to help users spot trends in traffic and consumption of rewindable content.
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