Roll the calendar back a few years and the streaming revolution was bringing the “a la carte” dream to consumers sick of being stuck with 500 cable channels to get the few they actually watched. The promise of getting to choose what you wanted to pay to watch, with easy service pauses or cancelations. Which was fine when Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Prime were the only three major streamers.
Now, consumers wanting to build their own bundles have to choose and manage subscriptions from a dozen or so major for-pay streamers. And choose between ad-free and ad-supported tiers. And maybe tiers that offer 4K content or extra out-of-home users. And FAST services that are proliferating like rabbits, even if much of what each offers is licensed to multiple other FASTs. Oh, and don’t forget traditional MVPD television service, still found in a majority of American homes.
So much for the new world of streaming making things easier for TV viewers.
Hub’s Monetizing Video study has been tracking how consumers have been navigating changing pay-model alternatives since 2018. The study explores which services and features offer the strongest value, as well as the current amount consumers pay for TV services compared with what they consider to be a “reasonable” amount or a “maximum” amount.
The study is designed to better inform companies about what makes one provider or service have greater perceived value to consumers than others.
Source: Interviews with 1,602 U.S. consumers age 16-74 who watch a minimum of 1 hour of TV per week.