Chris Pfaff moderated an all-star session – ‘Successful Strategies for Growing and Monetizing Your Streaming Service’ – on the virtual Streaming Media Connect conference, produced by Streaming Media Magazine, on February 22, 2024 that discussed strategies for curating content, maintaining audiences, and growing new channels.

Joining Chris were panelists Rene Santaella, Chief Digital & Streaming Officer, Estrella Media; Matt Farina, Senior Vice President, Content Distribution, NBCUniversal; Eric Sorensen, Director, Streaming Video Research, Parks Associates; Smriti Sharma, Head, Consumer Insights, Publishers Clearing House, and Julia Moonves, SVP, Advertising Sales & Brand Partnerships, pocket.watch.

You can view the entire panel session at:

Chris Pfaff moderated the scintillating ‘SVOD: It’s Not Dead Yet’ virtual session at Streaming Media Connect 2022 on August 23, 2022 with Evan Shapiro, from ESHAP; Jennifer Kent, from Parks Associates, and Paul Pastor, from Struum.

The session discussed the slowdown in subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) services, which has led some pundits to declare that the first act of the “streaming wars” is now over. SVOD, though, is in the middle of creative and licensing challenges, and customer retention – in the wake of advertising video-on-demand (AVOD) services – remains challenging. The panel discussed the way forward for SVOD providers, both large and small.

You can watch the full ‘SVOD: Is It Dead Yet?’ session at:

Chris Pfaff moderated the Streaming Media Connect virtual panel – ‘From Small Things: How Niche Services Can Find Mainstream Success’ – on Thursday, February 17, 2022, a discussion on the growth in niche OTT services, with the followingexpert group of panelists:

• Igor Oreper, vice president, solutions, Bitmovin
• Paul Erickson, Director of Research, Parks Associates 
• DeShuna Spencer, CEO/founder, Kweli
• Marc DiLorenzo, CEO/founder, 2GTHR
• Ajit Thakur, CEO, aha 
• Damian Pelliccione, CEO/co-founder,Revry

You can watch the full panel on ‘From Small Things: How Niche Services Can Find Mainstream Success’ at:

ABOUT ‘FROM SMALL THINGS: HOW NICHE SERVICES CAN FIND MAINSTREAM SUCCESS’  

Whether they’re defined by the type of content—science fiction, horror, romance—or the type of audience, niche services are the long tail of the OTT universe. But just because their audiences are limited doesn’t mean their revenue opportunities are. Partnerships with aggregators and “mainstream” services offer pathways to bigger viewership numbers, and innovative marketing approaches can turn small services into big successes.