It Sure Seems Pricing is Important to Video Streaming Subscribers

May 10, 2022

This article is included in these additional categories:

Advertising Trends | Creative & Formats | Digital | Video

With Netflix recently announcing its intention to add a lower-cost service option that includes advertising, it’s interesting to see just how appealing this could be to subscribers. Recent data from Morning Consult suggests that this option will find a willing audience, as more than twice as many adults in the US would prefer a low-cost streaming service with ads (57%) to a high-cost one without ads (27%).

This sentiment is largely shared in numerous countries around the world, with more respondents in each of the 15 countries surveyed preferring the low-cost ad-supported option to the higher-priced ad-free one. (It should be noted that opinions are almost split in both Spain and Germany.)

The popularity of ad-supported streaming options is reflected by recent data from Hub Entertainment Research, which has tracked a rise in TV viewers’ use of AVOD platforms and free-with-ad platforms.

Moreover, pricing options are considered the most important feature when considering subscribing to a streaming service, according to separately-announced survey data from Morning Consult. Within the US, for example, 83% of respondents said that pricing options are an important element for them when considering a new subscription. This was tied with a large content library (83%) as the top response, just ahead of a user-friendly interface (82%), which has also been found critical in other research. Other content-specific factors such as original content (71%), critically acclaimed content (65%), and global content (56%), trailed in importance for US respondents.

It’s interesting to see that a large content library is important to more respondents than original content. A recent study from Hub Entertainment Research found that interest in original or exclusive content has led 4 in 10 respondents to sign up for a streaming service in order to watch a specific show.

Nonetheless, Netflix’s decision to include a service option with commercials will surely shake up the advertising landscape, given that (notwithstanding its recent subscriber loss) the platform is forecast to reach three-quarters of a billion people around the world by 2025.

About the Data: The Morning Consult results are based on a March survey of 999-2,211 adults in each of 15 countries around the world.

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