Kixi is a German-language video on demand app designed to offer educationally valuable content for children and families.
We talked to Sascha Stradtmann, head of acquisitions and programming at Kixi, to learn more about Kixi’s service and their reasons for publishing it on Amazon Fire tablets and Amazon Fire TV.
Please tell us more about Kixi and your service.
“Kixi was originally founded under the brand-name Kinderkino in 2011 at a time when video on demand (VoD) was far from mainstream in Germany. Ever since then, Kixi started offering educationally valuable movies, series, cartoons, instructive films and documentaries for children and families. Our licensors are small independent production companies as well as major studios. We offer our partners a turn-key solution for the publishing of their content on our platforms. Kixi is a convenient way for our partners to monetize their content in an economic and efficient way. We use the newest state-of-the-art technology for encoding and content management, so we are able to achieve a lot with a surprisingly small team.
"In addition to the Kixi apps for Fire TV and Fire tablet, we also have an app for our owned and operated VoD platform.”
Why did you choose to publish your app Kixi on the Amazon Appstore and for Fire tablets and Fire TV?
“Amazon offers customers various ways to watch their favorite content – whether at home or on the go. So for us, it’s been a no-brainer to develop for the Amazon Appstore.”
Why did you choose to implement the in-app purchasing API?
“By implementing the in-app purchasing API, we did not have to code a payment service or back-end by ourselves. Instead, we were able to use a reliable ready-made solution.”
How do Amazon customers fit into your target group? What is the value of Amazon customers compared to other audiences?
“With the Amazon Appstore, we reach a wide set of customers and users can choose from a rich app catalog, including a great selection for family and kids. Therefore, the Amazon Appstore is the perfect place for us to engage with our target audience.
How do you optimize the app and content for families?
“We optimize our content strategy two ways: First, which individual title is watched the most and which the least. We try to match the respective successful genre or content type when acquiring new content. Second, we align our content release to days and dates on which VoD is consumed the most.”
How does your app perform on Amazon Appstore?
“Our apps for Fire TV and Fire tablets perform very well! In fact, the Amazon Appstore currently generates the most turnover and revenue for Kixi.”
What is your experience developing and publishing your app for Amazon devices?
“It was pretty straightforward. Amazon offers a good environment and framework for developers. Our tips for other developers: Just go for it!”
Getting started with Amazon Appstore
Amazon offers several tools and documents to get you started. You can test your existing APK within minutes to help you understand potentially required adaptations (if any). The Developer Portal also offers a variety of extensive documents to help you implement Amazon specific services, such as Login with Amazon, Amazon Device Messaging or the In-App Purchasing API.
Source: Alexa