What Makes Streaming Businesses Opt for a Multi-CDN Strategy?

Learn More About Video CDN

The video streaming industry is growing bigger and better every passing day, paving the way for the speedy delivery of high-quality videos. 

Especially now that there is a rapid increase in the rise of newer OTT platforms, only a service provider who can satiate a positive viewer experience make it big in the content distribution realm. 

This is where the adoption of multi-CDN strategy comes into play.  

Keeping enhanced QoE (Quality of Experience) in mind, incorporating a multi-CDN setup has become the newest way to achieve increased viewership, engagement, and revenue in the OTT landscape. 

What is a Multi-CDN Infrastructure & How Does it Work?

To begin with, it is CDN we ought to brief about. 

As a quick recap, CDN (Content Delivery Network) is a series of geographically distributed servers or PoPs (Point of Presence) to seamlessly distribute content to the end-user with the lowest latency possible. 

In order to further increase the efficacy of this low-latency video delivery is the need for a multi-cdn strategy. 

Relying on a set of different video CDN providers rather than 1 particular vendor is called the multi-CDN infrastructure. There are several benefits tied to adopting this type of caching and here we discuss the same.

On technical terms, this eases network congestion and the load off a single cluster of servers, or in short, optimizes the traffic by bringing the content as close to the viewer as possible. 

How a Multi-CDN Setup Acts as a Load-Balancing Strategy in Video Streaming?

– Managing the network traffic forms the basis of an efficient streaming platform that positions viewer experience at the core of its business model. 

– And, via a multi-CDN environment, the video content from the streaming server is cached across different PoPs that span a wide geographical area.

– The client requests are distributed across the various CDN vendors via modern load-balancing algorithms. 

– The server closest to the end-user (for eg: in the USA) is employed for delivering the requested content. 

– This is how the entire setup works and the number of CDN providers a streaming service should join hands with depends on the business requirements and the level of QoE that is aimed at. 

– Especially, with OTT platforms that deal with heavy traffic, 2 or 3 more CDN providers are collaborated with for optimal performance. 

The Varied Benefits of Incorporating Multiple CDN Providers

Practically speaking, routing content via a CDN itself is a highly commendable approach. Here’s how multiple CDN vendors can ramp up the performance on a larger scale. 

Safe from Outage

Streaming services should always have a backup strategy at hand for an uninterrupted viewing experience. Having multiple CDNs helps these platforms stay resilient, thus mitigating the risks of downtime even if one provider fails unexpectedly.

Highly Scalable

With a large influx of users, there are chances that the platform might act unstable. To effectively handle the traffic comes a reliable multi-CDN strategy. The load is balanced and scalability is ensured alongside a positive viewer experience despite the high volume of audiences, especially in cases like a live event. 

Greater Geographical Coverage

The streaming platforms of today are keener on expanding their territory beyond regional audiences. The need to broadcast content beyond geographical barriers calls for a multi-CDN setup. Hence, instead of relying on one particular CDN, a multiple CDN approach optimizes the traffic over a wide range of cities/ countries and routes the content to the most optimal server that is closest to the end-user. 

Focal Reasons Why Modern Streaming Services Opt for a Multi-CDN Strategy

Considering how fuming the competition with OTT platforms is, one ought to be highly competent and resilient to make its customer stay. One bad experience and the subscriber is lost forever. 

• Breaks Single Vendor Dependency

As mentioned above, relying wholly on a single provider is sometimes not the most ideal thing to do because of fear of failure. Hence, in a multi-CDN infrastructure, the CDN which is up and active takes up the job of content delivery even if its peer drops in performance, ensuring continuous uptime.  

• Assures Low Latency Delivery

With more PoPs distributed over a wide area, latency issues are managed well by rerouting content requests to the most nearby server. In short, lagging and buffering issues are taken care of with a multi-CDN strategy. 

• Improves Security

Content theft is a recurring issue that costs streaming platforms millions of dollars every year. And in several cases, there are chances a content delivery network gets bombarded with DDoS attacks. In unpredictable situations like these, a secondary CDN comes handy, safely routing content to the end-user. 

• Remote Area Coverage

Internet penetration is on the rise and the demand to reach audiences in every corner of the world has amplified more than ever. With multiple CDNs that are spread across different geographies, there is a wider coverage in reaching audiences even in remote areas of the continent. 

• Lower Costs

With high-quality videos, there comes bigger bandwidth costs. But, with a multi-CDN setup, the most optimal and cost-effective network is chosen for content delivery, thus helping streaming platforms enhance their cost-effectiveness. 

To summarize,

A satisfied viewer experience is what will make a streaming platform rise above the rest. 

Quick load times, stutter-free playback, quality video delivery, and seamless relay even in the remotest regions are what will help streaming services secure their spot in the highly competitive OTT market. 

And by joining hands with multiple CDN vendors, the modern-day video businesses can not only assure a flawless viewer experience but also achieve scalability without compromising on security. 

With the right set of CDN providers, a video platform no longer ought to worry about distributing large high-graphic videos, be it on-demand or live, to audiences across the globe on any of their gadgets (mobile, web, tablet, smart TV, gaming console). This helps streaming services be available at all times, ultimately boosting engagement and revenue while reducing churn.