• by Jack Loechner , Staff Writer @mp_research, February 22, 2018

According to Brett Sappington, Parks Associates senior director of research, and Hub Entertainment Research president Peter Fondulas at the  NCTC Winter Educational Conference, written by Mike Farrell, operators should embrace subscription video-on-demand services, making it easier for younger viewers to access their subscriptions.

Sappington noted that most users of SVOD services like Netflix, Amazon and Hulu are younger (aged 25-34) and have been in their homes less than 12 months, are the fastest growing segment among video consumers, from households that are taking two, three and four services, so they aren’t averse to paying for content, they just don’t want to pay for what they don’t want.

Fondulas pointed out that SVOD usage is growing, as well as the number of services they use. But according to Hub’s research, live TV is still the first thing that most viewers turn on when they want to watch content. According to Hub’s research, 47% of respondents went to live TV first, followed by Netflix (19%) and the DVR (13%).

Pay TV distributors can tap into the younger SVOD market in several ways, he added. Partnering with SVOD providers through promotions, offering six months of free Netflix, for example, is the easiest. Next is actively selling a service alongside of, or as a replacement for, existing service like Amazon is doing with Amazon Channels.

Fondulas went on to say that another plus would be making more episodes and seasons available for binge watching, as well as making it easier for customers to find shows they might like. “People worry that there are shows they will love that they’ve never heard about… this is creating opportunities for companies that can aggregate across sources…” he said.

The report suggests that adding other ways to attract the next generation of viewers is to offer slimmed down bundles of programming to address content proliferation, as well as considering incorporating other online platforms into the set-top to keep viewers in the ecosystem.

For additional information from Mike Farrell, Sr. Finance Editor, Multichannel News, please visit here.