# Scheduled Premieres and Content Countdown | Vodlix **Source:** https://vodlix.com/features/countdown-premiere **Summary:** Schedule a title to the exact minute across web, mobile and TV, announce it with a deep linked push notification, and set an end date for when the licence runs out. **Publisher:** Vodlix --- ## Countdown / Premiere Set the exact minute a title goes live, announce it with a push that opens straight onto the title, and let the date do the work. - **Feature Plan:** 2 - core-platform - front-end ## A Release Is a Moment, Not an Upload Give a title the minute it should appear and it appears, on the website, in the apps and on television at the same instant. Nobody sits waiting to press a button, and nobody publishes an hour early by accident. ### The Difference Between Releasing Something and Just Putting It Up A film that quietly appears in a row on a Tuesday is a file you uploaded. A film that arrives at eight o'clock on Friday, that people knew was coming, is an event. The technical difference between those two is almost nothing. The commercial difference is enormous, because one of them gets watched by whoever happens to scroll past and the other gets watched by everybody who was waiting. Anticipation is the cheapest marketing there is, and the only thing it requires is that you know when the thing is going to happen and that the platform can be trusted to make it happen then. That is what scheduling is actually for. Not convenience for your team, though it is that too, but the ability to promise a time and keep it. #### To the minute, not the day The publish date carries a time as well as a date, so a premiere can land at eight in the evening rather than whenever somebody remembers. Leave it empty and nothing is scheduled at all. #### Announced, not discovered A push can go to every device with your app on it, carrying content details that open the app straight onto the title rather than dropping somebody on the home screen to go looking. #### Everywhere at the same instant Web, mobile and television read the same schedule, so there is no window where a title is live in one app and missing in another and your audience is telling you about it. ### What a Premiere Actually Looks Like The work happens well before the moment anybody notices. A title is loaded, encoded, given its rating and its territories, and left as a draft, which means it exists completely and is visible to nobody. Somewhere before the date you tell people it is coming. Then the minute arrives and the title is simply there, on every screen at once, without anybody logged in and watching a clock. Afterwards there is an optional second date, because rights run out and a title that should have gone last month is a licensing problem rather than an oversight. The whole point is that none of those four things depends on somebody being awake. A launch that requires a person to press a button at eight in the evening on a Friday is a launch that will eventually happen at nine. - mx-auto ### Telling People Before It Lands A premiere nobody knew about is not a premiere. Push notifications go to a single device or broadcast to everybody with your app installed, and the useful part is the content fields underneath the message. Attach the title and the notification stops being an advert and becomes a door. Somebody taps it and the app opens on that title, ready to play, rather than on a home screen where they now have to search for the thing you just told them about. That gap between the message and the content is where most of the audience for an announcement quietly disappears. Combine it with a row you have placed deliberately through [content lists](/features/content-lists) and the title is waiting in two places when the moment comes. - mx-auto ### Scheduling Is Part of Access Control, Not Separate From It The publish window sits on the same screen as the countries a title may be watched in and the age it is suitable for, which is not an accident of layout. They are all answers to the same question, which is who may watch this and when. A title with a start date, an end date and a list of territories is a licence expressed as settings, and that is exactly how it should be held, because the alternative is a spreadsheet somebody has to remember to read. The enforcement behind it is described under [conditional access](/features/cas-user-control-manager). The scheduling applies to a single film through [movies management](/features/movies-management) and to a whole run of episodes through [series management](/features/series-management), so a weekly drop is set once rather than every Thursday. What the launch achieved shows up in [reports and analytics](/features/reports-and-analytics). **Q: Can I schedule a title to publish at a specific time?** Yes. The publish date carries a time as well as a date, down to the minute, so a title can be set to appear at eight in the evening rather than at some point during the day. Leaving the field empty means nothing is scheduled and the title stays as you left it. **Q: Does the title appear on all platforms at the same moment?** It does. The website, the mobile apps and the television apps all read the same schedule from the same platform, so there is no period where something is live in one place and missing in another. That matters most for a premiere, because a staggered launch is the version your audience complains about. **Q: Can content be scheduled to come down as well as go up?** Yes. Alongside the start there is an end publish date, and leaving it empty means the title simply stays. Setting it is what you do when a licence has a fixed term, so the removal happens on the day rather than depending on somebody remembering months later. **Q: How do I tell viewers a premiere is coming?** Push notifications can go to one device or broadcast to everybody with your app installed, and they can carry content details so the app opens directly on the title. That last part matters more than the message itself, because an announcement somebody then has to go and search for loses most of its audience. **Q: Can I schedule a whole season rather than one film?** Yes, and episodes are where scheduling earns its keep. A weekly release is set up once, with each episode carrying its own date, rather than somebody publishing one every Thursday for three months and eventually forgetting. **Q: What state is a title in before its premiere?** It sits as a draft. Everything is in place, the media, the artwork, the rating, the territories and the pricing, and none of it is visible to viewers. That is deliberate, because the alternative is preparing a launch in something half configured and hoping nobody stumbles onto it early. **Q: Does scheduling work alongside country restrictions?** It does, and the two sit on the same screen. A title can go live at a set time only in the countries you have licensed it for, which is how most rights deals are actually written. Holding the window and the territory together is what keeps a licence from becoming a note in somebody's diary. **Q: What happens if I need to move a premiere?** You change the date. Because nothing is published until the moment arrives, moving a launch forwards or backwards is editing a field rather than unpicking something that has already gone out. That is the practical advantage of scheduling over publishing manually and hoping the plan holds.