News from media, comms, and business – it’s the latest edition of the BHC Bulletin.
This month’s highlights for less reported stories in media-ville include what the audience voted as essential viewing, how a crowded marketplace is confusing consumers plus ITV to close Kids linear channel in favour of streaming.
Regular readers of the BHC Bulletin will know I am both a fan and dumbfounded by Netflix – a fan as a disruptor, dumbfounded at the level of debt and the level of investment in a content led product.
This month – research firm Aluma Insights have found two-thirds of US Netflix buyers view the service as indispensable. Indispensable? That’s big claim.
More than half of subscribers considered the service essential instead of just nice to have. Hulu and Disney+ were the only other services to get more than 50% approvals.
An interesting point was that the (almost) equally hugely spending Apple TV+, and Peacock were found to be the least essential for households..
The full article is here:
and still with SVoD – it’s a crowded marketplace. Differentiation of service is needed as audience confusion is high.
The streaming wars have of course created a crowded marketplace,
In their Evolution of Video Branding survey from Hub Entertainment Research shows what many of us knew for a long time – viewers find it tough differentiating the brands in the SVoD world and instead turn to “known” content or brands to help
41 percent of viewers say they have signed up for a platform just to watch one specific show (up from 35 percent two years ago).
Advanced Television described this simply, “When lost in a sea of content, viewers look for what’s familiar: New shows based on familiar characters or histories have a leg up in the discovery process.”
David Tice, senior consultant to Hub and co-author of the study states: “Viewers have not lacked in choice of services and content over the past few years. But this can be a two-edged sword for content providers, as the immense volume just makes it hard for viewers to remember what is different about each service.”
To read more:
In the UK, ITV is to close its CITV broadcast channel this autumn.
Instead – the broadcaster announced a new streaming hub for kids programming, ITVX Kids, which will be aimed at 6-12s and launches in July.
(ITV will maintain the LittleBe pre-school segment on ITVBe and will offer some children’s content in the early mornings on ITV2 from September.)
This follows other kids’ services closing in recent years including a whole raft of Disney services.
It’s clear that streaming will be the default delivery mechanism that feels natural for those coming through as the viewers of tomorrow.
This will leave policy makers with big choices regarding use of spectrum, the value of PSB channels and how to give prominence to news and “public purpose” programming in a world when navigation is far more complex than linear services.
Here’s the full story about ITV kids:
https://www.radiotimes.com/tv/entertainment/citv-channel-close-itvx-kids-newsupdate/
And finally (guest written by BHC’s Chris Davis)
Well, it’s impossible to write about the media this month and not mention the trouble of the BBC with one of their biggest stars, Gary Lineker.
I have no intention of repeating the pages of comment here – only to point out the bigger issue, that every time the BBC faces external pressures from politicians and negative press, alas much of it self-inflicted, then trust in the business falls.
For the first time in my career the effect has mean that – perhaps only temporally – but who knows, that the commercial channel ITV’s new is now more trusted by the audience than the BBC’s.
The full details of the poll carried out by The Observer/The Guardian are here:
But the key issue is that policy failures can lead to real reputational damage and all organisations need to be aware of that. Clear comms are required and staff, contractors and suppliers need to understand what is expected from their service and their interaction with third parties – whether in the real world or the digital / social platforms.
The BBC has commissioned the highly respected former Disney and ITN exec John Hardie to lead a review into social media guidelines for freelancers – expect more coverage, and muck-racking when that report is issued later in the year.
That’s it for now, more next month. And for all your leadership communications and media development needs, please get in touch with Beech Hill Consultancy.
www.beechhillconsultancy.com