Frequently Asked Questions
A list of the questions we see the most. Hence the name.
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What payment methods do you support?
For customers purchasing videos, we support Paypal payments as well as major credit cards: Visa, MasterCard, American Express, and Discover. We do not support Bitcoin payments, or any other proprietary monetary system at this time.
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How much does Pivotshare take out of my channel earnings?
There are no monthly fees, no starting fees, and no hidden fees. With Pivotshare, the Publisher (you) keeps 70% of all earned revenues.
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How and when do I get paid by Pivotshare?
Once a publisher’s channel has earned enough income (at least $25, or higher if set by the publisher) we mail out a check at the beginning of every month. Alternatively, Publishers can elect to get paid via Paypal or by ACH (direct deposit). These options are in the My Account area of your Publisher Console.
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What currencies does Pivotshare support?
Currently, all payments accepted and sent by Pivotshare are in United States Dollars (USD$).
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Can I change my pricing once I’ve tested out my channel?
Pivotshare is self-service, so 24 hours a day you can log into the Publisher Console and change prices, upload new media, disable out of date material or promote your new favorites, all with a few clicks of the keyboard.
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How much will I get paid?
The amount of money you earn from your media depends on a number of factors including the popularity of your content, how effectively the content is marketed, the price of your content, and the quantity of your content. We cannot make any guarantees about minimum earnings through Pivotshare, but we have found that many Publishing partners have reported earning more money with Pivotshare than they have using other platforms/methods.
Your Money
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How can my customers access my videos?
Selling with Pivotshare means your videos are automatically purchasable and/or watchable on a myriad of technology platforms. In some cases, only playback is supported if the video file itself (non-streaming) has been downloaded by the user. The following list clarifies which technology has been tested and is known to be compatible with Pivotshare’s video services, and in what ways:
- Desktop/Laptop (secure streaming & purchasing)
- iPhone/iPod Touch (secure streaming & purchasing)
- iPad (secure streaming & purchasing)
- Android Smartphones (secure in-browser streaming supported on version 4.3 and up, otherwise streaming supported through Pivotshare apps, & purchasing supported on all versions)
- Android Tablets (secure in-browser streaming supported on version 4.3 and up, otherwise streaming supported through Pivotshare apps, & purchasing supported on all versions)
- Apple TV (secure streaming via AirPlay from a networked iOS/compatible device)
- ChromeCast (secure streaming from a networked computer using the Chromecast browser extension)
- Amazon Kindle (purchasing only, otherwise buying and transferring downloaded files onto the Kindle from another device works)
- Blackberry (if you still use one, in-browser purchasing is supported but playback is not)
- Xbox 360/Xbox One (file download and transfer)
- Playstation 3/Playstation 4 (file download and transfer)
- SmartTV Systems (secure streaming and playback supported by some SmartTV web browsers)
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What Codecs and Filetypes can I upload?
The list of filetypes and codecs we can accept is pretty long, so we put together this handy PDF document for your reference. Click to download the supported codecs document.
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Can I integrate Pivotshare into my Wordpress site?
The Pivotshare Embed Player works on just about any site, including Wordpress.
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Can I embed my whole Pivotshare Channel into an iFrame on my own site?
For security reasons, only the Pivotshare Embed Player is capable of being embedded into a website. Putting an entire Pivotshare Channel into an iframe and putting that on your website opens up a lot of problems with security and playback quality. If you’d like to use a custom domain with your Pivotshare Channel, talk to us and we’ll help you out.
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How do I embed a video in my own site?
If you have a pre-existing website and just want to pop a monetized video into it, Pivotshare’s Embed Player is the perfect solution. All you have to do is visit your Publisher Console, find the video you’d like to embed and click the “Embed Code” button underneath the corresponding preview image. Copy the resulting code and Paste it into your site wherever you see fit. Voila, the embed is live.
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How much customization is available to me?
Both Pivotshare Channels and the Pivotshare Embed Player offer customization, and in fact we encourage every publisher to make use of it. Our product designs are simple enough to allow a publisher to simply make use of images (thumbnails, poster images, logos, and background images) to transform their Pivotshare products into unique, self-branded experiences for their customers. For even richer customization, Pivotshare offers a White Label package that includes implementation of a custom URL (purchased by the Publisher), as well as custom Roku App capabilities. Get in touch to discuss.
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Do you support 1080p video?
You can send us video at 1080p, our system will then store multiple versions at different bit rates, ensuring that we deliver the perfect experience depending on bandwidth availability and processor speeds.
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Can I upload as much video as I want?
There is a 300 minute quota placed on all video uploads for new channels. Because we are a self-service platform, Pivotshare uses this quota to protect our company from streaming and encoding fees for media that may never be purchased (eg videos which have been uploaded just to test out the system). This barrier can indeed be lifted through your Publisher Console.
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Is Pivotshare’s streaming technology secure?
We take our publishers’ content very seriously. Any video streamed to a customer is done so securely, much in the same manner we collect payments. Our videos are protected by industry-standard DRM encryption schemes and delivered over SSL to ensure your content is protected both at rest and in transit.
Video & Technology
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Where is Pivotshare located?
Pivotshare HQ is located in Southern California, just a short drive from Hollywood and the beautiful California coastline. Our proximity to the world’s leading source of video entertainment (Hollywood) gives us the ability to stay on top of changes and advances in our industry, and to respond to the needs of video creators.
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Does Pivotshare allow Adult content?
Pivotshare strongly believes that artists should be free to create and share their vision as they see fit, but for legal reasons Pivotshare does not permit video content that is of a sexually explicit/pornographic nature. To see more about our content policies, please click here: Content Policies
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Does Pivotshare allow the upload of copyrighted material?
Any content created or licensed by a publisher can, of course, be uploaded. However, Pivotshare will promptly take down any material deemed to have been uploaded/sold/shared illegally and, in some circumstances, may ban the uploader of said illegal content.
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How is Pivotshare different from other video services?
Pivotshare’s primary goal is not to just help you sell your video content, but to help you sell more of it. We not only enable fully-branded libraries of video content that can be rented, purchased & downloaded, subscribed to, or paid for with tips, but we continue to build new, innovative technologies that help publishers measure their success and market their content more effectively. All of this conspires to give publishers and creators more power to earn more revenue from their work.
The Company
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How can I get people to see my channel?
At a basic level, it’s important to recognize that simply existing online isn’t enough to generate viewership. What you need are links and interest, and that comes from marketing. Marketing comes in a lot of different varieties, and Pivotshare can help with many of them. YouTube is a great place to start with marketing, and you can even expand your campaign to using AdWords or similar online advertising. Of course, nothing beats word of mouth, so ask your friends, family, and acquaintances to share your work.
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I’m experiencing errors/issues with Pivotshare.
If you’re having a problem with Pivotshare, any problem whatsoever, please use our Contact Form to let us know what’s going on.
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I’ve uploaded videos via the Publisher Console, but they aren’t appearing on my Channel.
When you upload a video to your Publisher Console, it is disabled by default. This is done because simply uploading a video doesn’t mean it’s ready for selling. We don’t want to make decisions for you, so we rely on you to enable videos as you see fit. To do this, find the video(s) in question in the Publisher Console under the “Video” section. Toggle them “on” and they should appear on your Channel, ready for purchase. If for some reason this doesn’t work, feel free to contact our support team.
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How do I disable the subscription setting on my Channel?
If you don’t want to offer a subscription service to your customers, this can be disabled in your Publisher Console under the Channel Setup area. Please note that if any customers have purchased a subscription, you will not be able to turn the subscription setting off until your active subscriber count is zero.
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I am unable to upload images using the Publisher Console. What gives?
If you are trying to upload images to your Channel, be they a new logo, a video thumbnail, etc, check to make sure the image you are uploading meets the minimum size requirements mentioned in the upload window. Also please be sure that any images you upload are in either JPG/JPEG or PNG format. If you’re certain that you’re doing everything properly but we messed something up, please contact us and let us know.
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How can I use a different URL/Website Address for my Pivotshare Channel?
By default, all Pivotshare channels are given a subdomain address, such as yoursubdomain.pivotshare.com. Many publishers are happy with this solution, but if you would like to have a custom domain name enabled for your account, please contact us and we’ll help you out.
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Why are my customers unable to access my channel?
Because people’s computer setups tend to differ greatly, there could be a number of reasons why a given customer might not be able to access your channel, but the most common issue we’ve seen is related to how you may be sharing your Pivotshare Channel’s url. Please make sure that any time you create a link to your channel you DO NOT place a “www” in front of the URL. In other words, www.yoursubdomain.pivotshare.com is WRONG, while yoursubdomain.pivotshare.com is RIGHT.
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What browsers do you support?
Our products work with most modern web browsers, but if we’re talking about Internet Explorer (IE), we only officially support IE9 and up.