Advertising is at the heart of the concerns of streaming giants. Over the past two years, all platforms (or almost all) have changed their approach to living room entertainment to form partnerships with international advertisers. If a premium experience devoid of advertising pages has long been the main argument of Netflix and others, things have changed as everyone had to consolidate their financial support. SVoD companies could no longer rely primarily on revenues generated by subscriptions, they had to diversify their sources of income. Netflix was among the first adherents to this model, well on its way to becoming the norm.
If the operation was crowned with success, the red N claims 23 million users of its offer supported by advertising, it is still very little compared to its competitors. According to Bloomberg, Netflix is on the lowest step of the companies most invested in the advertising sector. While YouTube remains the number 1 platform when it comes to selling ad breaks, Netflix is in tenth place behind Roku and Amazon. Disney is second, the company was already well established in the sector thanks to its television channels. To correct the situation, the first SVoD offer would consider reducing the bill further.
According to sources close to the matter, discussions have taken place to launch an offer entirely financed by advertising in Europe and Asia. The American media explains: “Senior executives have discussed whether to create a free version of the service in much larger markets, particularly those with popular free TV networks where the company also sells ads.”
It’s not that stupid
When the launch of advertising-supported subscriptions in France was announced, many voices were raised among French users. In France, access to television is mainly free, financed by advertising on the TNT networks. The introduction of denominations, at a price not so far removed from that of its launch in 2014, went badly. The company finally seems to have understood that American culture – all access to television is paid and with interruptions – was undoubtedly not adapted to certain European markets.
Several French companies have also relied on free access to make their mark in the sector, we can cite M6+ and TF1+, launched a few months ago and free for users who agree to support a few advertising pages. Elsewhere in the world, Tubi has just overtaken Disney+ by attracting 969,000 viewers in the United States. Completely free, the platform recorded a 46% increase in its audiences over one year, confirming that users are increasingly attentive to their portfolios.
Netflix has a card to play, it remains to be seen whether the company will choose to include free access in its range of offers. Finally, YouTube remains the most watched platform in the world, with 100 million paying subscribers, according to the latest figures shared by the Google subsidiary (distributed across YouTube and YouTube Music). The platform claims 2.4 billion active users every month.
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