Have you cut the cord when it comes to your cable or satellite TV subscription? If not, you may be surprised at how little you will actually miss traditional cable television if you were to say goodbye to the extremely expensive monthly bills.
According to Bloomberg, 2013 was the first year that cable and satellite subscriptions had a full year decline. This decline is largely due to the large amount of content available from streaming providers such as Amazon, Netflix and Hulu Plus as well as a whole host of independent streaming providers that are harnessing the power of technology to create compelling content for their user bases.
Roku Devices Continuing to Introduce More Users to Live Streaming
Whether you are extremely technical or not you likely have heard of a company by the name of Roku. This company has done an incredible job of marketing themselves as an organization that can easily allow you to watch streaming content from a wide variety of online providers.
If you’re not familiar with Roku, they sell a variety of set top boxes which connect to your wireless network as well as your television and allow you to stream content from providers like Hulu, Netflix, Amazon and other independent providers. These set top boxes allow users to watch streaming content from the comforts of their living rooms as opposed to their computer chairs.
As the Roku platform has matured and gained in popularity, more and more independent providers have begun to use the platform to disseminate their content because of the large user base. Roku has been very inclusive, allowing a variety of providers to interface with their technology to truly give the end user a rich media experience.
TikiLIVE Offers Full Support for Roku Devices
At TikiLIVE, we are excited about what Roku has been able to do in terms of upending the traditional cable and satellite market and allowing independent streaming providers as well as large media conglomerates to be able to easily distribute content to a large number of end users.
Our TikiLIVE suite of products offer full support for Roku which allows you to stream your content right alongside the big players. Through TikiLIVE’s easy to use online interface, you can quickly create live streaming channels that can then be shared to Roku users around the world.
How to Publish Your Content to Roku Devices
If you’ve been streaming your content through TikiLIVE’s servers for some time you may be interested in how to expand your audience by publishing your content to Roku set top boxes. The process to stream your content to Roku is easy and can be accomplished with the following steps:
- Navigate to the channel that you wish to share on Roku by going to your “Live Channels” page in your TikiLIVE control panel.
- Click on the “Edit” button located alongside the channel that you wish to stream to your Roku users.
- Ensure that “Available on ROKU” is selected under “Publishing Options.”
- Click “Save Details.
- Now your content should be available to millions of Roku users.
Now that your content is shareable on Roku devices, you also must alert your users as to how to add your TikiLIVE channel to their Roku box.
How to Create Your Own Roku Channel
We’ve integrated the Roku application with the new version of TikiLIVE (V.6) and made it even easier for you to create your own private Roku channels. Easily customizable, you can brand the channel with your logo by accessing the “Build Roku Application” page on your TikiLIVE account dashboard.
Simply upload your branded images and our server will create the application for your private Roku channel. All you’ll need to do is download the application package and upload it to your Roku developer account.
With just a few clicks, you can publish a private channel and share your content with millions of people using Roku connected TVs. Using the rest of TikiLIVE’s features, you can live broadcast multiple applications and video playlists.
Once published, your channel will be displayed on Roku’s channel lineup next to major names like Netflix, Amazon and HuluPlus.
How to Add a TikiLIVE Channel to a Roku Box
Pass along the following instructions to allow your users to easily access your video content from their Roku boxes.
- Navigate to https://my.roku.com/signin and login with your correct Roku account credentials.
- You will now be asked to insert a channel access code, which should be given to you by the channel owner.
- Click “Add Channel”
- You now should see the new channel added under “My Channels” on your Roku device.
- Should you have any questions adding a TikiLIVE channel to your Roku box contact the channel owner or TikiLIVE directly.
As you can see, the instructions for your users to add your content to their Roku boxes are fairly straightforward. It may be a good idea for you to test out the Roku interface on your own to ensure that you can help any of your users that may be having trouble adding your channel to their Roku account.
Other Benefits of TikiLIVE Outside of Roku Support
While having support for Roku offers a large opportunity for those looking to stream content to a large number of users across multiple platforms, TikiLIVE offers much more in terms of a robust feature set. Below are just a few of the most popular features that our users continue to rave about:
- Powerful Desktop Applications: One of the hurdles for many trying to enter the video streaming arena is finding high quality software for streaming their content. TikiLIVE has solved this common problem with their robust and easy to use HD Wave software. HD Wave allows you to easily stream content to your computer with nothing more than a simple video camera or if you’re really pressed for time, you can even stream using your computer’s video camera or your smartphone.
- Robust Mobile Apps: Sometimes the best live video happens at random times. For this reason, TikiLIVE offers an iOS app as well as an Android app that allows you to quickly and easily stream live video content from your mobile phone or tablet. This way you can catch those once in a lifetime moments when you may not have time to run back home or to the office to fetch your video camera. With most smartphones and tablets supporting HD video, the quality of these mobile streams is often more than sufficient for your needs.
- Analytics: TikiLIVE offers a whole host of analytics tools showing viewer habits and statistics for all of your channels to help you understand which content is working well and which content needs to be tweaked.
Ready to Broadcast Your Content to Roku Devices?
Whether you’re a seasoned video pro or just a beginner, the pros at TIkiLIVE would be more than happy to help you stream your content to Roku devices. Don’t be hamstrung by relying only on online users when you can stream your content to the millions of users with Roku set top boxes. To learn more give us a call today at 305-743-6722.
