With each passing day, the streaming landscape looks increasingly just like the beast it desired to kill: cable television.
The upcoming platform bundle talks come as major streamers promote ad-supported plans, limit password sharing and give attention to live sports broadcasts. The goal of exponential subscriber growth, fueled by pandemic lockdowns, has modified. Wall Street wants profits.
The key to this may increasingly be depth, not breadth.
Last 12 months, many streaming services began shrinking their once-robust content libraries to pay lower licensing fees. (Streamers should pay to license even their own movies and TV shows, as when NBC contributed greater than $500 million to purchase back the rights to NBC’s “The Office” in 2019).
Facing profit pressure and increasing competition for viewers, streamers have begun removing content to avoid remaining fees and royalties. This dynamic has divided major streaming corporations into two camps: buyers and sellers.
On the one hand, it’s Netflix, Amazon AND Apple — corporations that agnostically license content from other studios to enhance their streaming libraries. Then there it’s Disney, universal, Warner Bros. Discovery AND The most vitalthat use content accrued over many years to create their own services and in addition generate capital by auctioning it off to the very best bidder.
“Brands that are acquiring these titles are looking at how to be more cost-effective by not making things, but by buying licenses,” said Stephanie Fried, chief marketing officer at Fandom, the world’s largest platform for entertainment fans.
Sellers receive money and buyers receive content that has a proven track record of reliability and value to consumers. This is particularly true for Netflix, which is a brand new entrant to the Hollywood market and, because of this, has fewer long-running, engaging series. Just have a look at how NBC’s “Suits” performed on the air last 12 months.
It’s value noting that Netflix is already profitable. Amazon and Apple have said they see streaming as an adjunct to their overall business, not itself. The remaining major streaming players are still working on profitability.
Narrowing your content libraries naturally means that you must diversify.
The initial boom of latest platforms during the last 15 years has seen most entrants take a “one-size-fits-all” approach in an try to turn into the one streaming service needed. This meant that, aside from the user interface, most streaming services began to look similar over time.
Fried said this lack of distinction could ultimately have negative effects because the landscape becomes stretched. She suggested that streamers have a look at the sort of content their subscribers eat and choose complementary shows and films that are not yet licensed.
This model has proven successful for smaller streaming services akin to BritBox, which offers a wide selection of British dramas, crime stories and period pieces; and Shudder, which focuses on the horror genre.
For example, Netflix, which has found success with nostalgic sitcoms like “Friends” and “The Office,” could add similar shows like “Fairly Odd Parents” and “Hey Arnold,” Disney’s “Boy Meets World” and ” According to Fandom “American Dad” and NBC’s “Saved by the Bell.”
The fandom, which hosts more than 50 million wiki pages covering entertainment across TV, film, games, comics and more, has “a extremely good sense of the overlap between all these walled gardens,” Fried said.
Apple TV+ original shows like “Severance,” “Defending Jacob,” “Home Before Dark” and “Servant” fascinated and terrified viewers. This type of dark investigative thriller, with its focus on a character-driven narrative, would be a good fit for films like Warner Bros.’ “The Leftovers.” Discovery, Netflix’s ‘Haunting of Hill House’ and early seasons of Disney’s ‘Twin Peaks,'” Fried said.
On Amazon Prime Video, subscribers selected action-packed series akin to “The Boys,” “Jack Ryan,” “Reacher” and “Invincible,” in addition to high fantasy series “Rings of Power” and “The Wheel of Time.” ” Fandom data suggests that series like Netflix’s “Jupiter’s Legacy,” Warner Bros. Discovery’s “My Adventures with Superman,” Paramount’s “The Mayor of Kingstown” and Disney’s “The Americans” will further attract viewers to the streamer.
Similarly, Fandom data can inform streamers what shows they should invest in when looking to create a new product.
At Disney+, family entertainment is paramount. Fried noted that Disney’s best opportunity to differentiate itself is to double down on its leadership in kid- and family-friendly content. Meanwhile, Disney-owned Hulu has seen success with “feel-good” 30-minute sitcoms and prestige dramas, according to Fandom data. According to Fandom, NBC’s “Parks and Recreation” and the ’90s version of “Fresh Prince of Bel-Air” along with Paramount’s “The Babysitter” could serve Hulu viewers well, as could Netflix’s “Queen’s Gambit” and “Black Mirror” and BBC program “Orphan Black”.
Universal’s Peacock focuses on crime dramas and medical dramas, while Paramount+ is the place for viewers to get their sci-fi fix. At Warner Bros. High-quality, prestige programming has long been HBO’s bread and butter, with fantasy titles like “Game of Thrones” and “The Last of Us” attracting younger audiences.
Strong performance and a doubling of viewers in some segments means retaining viewers for longer, Fried said: “When they give thought to limiting your services, we expect, ‘I am unable to, because they’ve all my X programs.’
Disclosure: Peacock is the streaming service of NBCUniversal, the parent company of CNBC.
