How viewers discover content can be a mystery, even to them, but advertising is key as are recommendations from friends and family or within the streaming service itself while smarter use of social media is a must.
It’s the complexity of the streaming content and device landscape a challenge for the discovery of new, quality content and an even bigger challenge for content providers.
A new report from Conviva, “State of Streaming: Content Discovery,” suggests that 38% viewers find a new show “by chance.”
It also gives some tactical advice for what content providers can do about it.
First up: advertising remains critical, provided the mix of advertising, targeting techniques, and creative units is adjusted to maximize streaming engagement.
Get it right and content providers can tap a $30 billion upside that exists in streaming advertising while better engaging their viewers.
When it comes to which medium to invest in for the most successful advertising, most respondents to the Conviva survey reported seeing an ad on TV, followed by 20% saying they saw the ad on social media. Up to 65% of long-form video is still consumed on the big screen. This suggests 30-second ads remain viable. Conversely, five- to 10-second ad units are better for smaller devices where 42% of shorter content is consumed on mobile phones.
READ MORE: State of Streaming: Advertising 2021 (Conviva)
Next, the report illustrates a direct correlation between high social media usage and high streaming video consumption, showing social platforms are key to new content discovery.
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- The Ever-Changing Scenery of the CTV Landscape
- TV is Not Dead. It’s Just Becoming Something Else.
- Converged TV Requires a Converged Ad Response
- Connected TV and the Consumer
- Connected TV Opens Up a Million Ad Possibilities
The average number of social media platforms used by a typical consumer is 3.4 while this number jumps to 3.9 for heavy streamers (and plummets to 2.3 for non-streamers). What’s more, high social media users are more than twice as likely to spend more than eight hours per day streaming.
The report further broke down word of mouth, the top overall source for streaming discovery, to reveal significant social media influence including friends talking about content on social media (20%), recommendations by a friend on social media (18%) and recommendations by a celebrity or influencer on social media (11%). In person word of mouth, including friend or family recommendations (34%) and friends talking about content in person (27%), was important also.
Summing up Keith Zubchevich, CEO, Conviva, said: “By leveraging advertising, recommendations and social media to curate and promote their offerings, publishers can expose viewers to new, quality content while simultaneously increasing their reach and brand loyalty.”
