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A guest article from Juraj Vanko, Chief Marketing Officer, Filmzie
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Over the past decade, paid film subscription services have transformed audience viewing habits and the distribution strategies of film studios. Just look at the way Netflix released its Oscar-touted Power of the Dog, with the shortest of theatrical screening windows before being available only via the streamer. Despite some resistance to the perceived threat that streamers pose to traditional cinema, the holier-than-thou awards world has realised they can’t be ignored – streamers are a dominant and relevant force in the movie industry. Butthe only constant is change, and the industry continues to evolve. In streaming, first we had the SVoD (Subscription Video on Demand) platforms, like Netflix, and now we are seeing the rise of alternatives like AVoD (Advertising Video on Demand).
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Free ad-supported streaming platforms known as AVoDs are set to become far bigger players over the next couple of years. AVoDs are seeing huge growth in engagement from viewers who are unable or unwilling to pay for an increasing and seemingly infinite number of subscriptions – a phenomenon we call subscription fatigue.
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According to figures from Semrush, there were 28,625,810 searches in the U.S. alone for “watch film online free” or similar terms between July 2020 to July 2021. That is pretty much the equivalent of the population of Texas looking for free ways to watch a film online. That’s significant demand for free quality content.
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These free streaming platforms are building up stronger catalogues of content, in part due to increased spend on filmby big brands providing bigger content acquisition budgets. Major brands like Mercedes and P&G have realised that there are massive advantages from putting their advertising budgets into AVoD platforms. Mainly, they can control and target their ads at relevant engaged audiences.
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We’ve seen a 109% increase in the time U.S. viewers are spending watching content on our Filmzie platform in the past year. These are viewers who are well aware the ads are necessary for them to watch the films and TV shows for free – it’s a compromise they are happy to accept. Besides, the amount of ad time on a AVoD is almost half that on a typical U.S. broadcaster. As budgets get bigger, the quality of the shows also increases, which is a huge driver for more viewershappy to pass up a couple of minutes on ads rather than committing to a monthly subscription cost. This is a cycle which is set to build momentum.
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Alongside the big brands, TV tech companies like Samsung,Hisense, and Netgem are integrating these AVoD platforms on to their Smart TVs and set-top-box devices. Viewers simply search for the show they want to watch through their Smart TV platform and the AVoDs provide them for free if the showis available in their catalogues. With bigger-names and more sought-after titles being acquired by AVoDs, the demand for these platforms continues to increase to new audiences. Increased visibility, discoverability, and access to free qualityfilms and series raises these streamers’ value to the big brands and to the Smart TV providers, resulting in more budget and more integrations.
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Beyond simply integrating AVoDs onto their TV systems, tech companies are now also beginning to service their own linear versions of the channels and taking a cut of the ad revenue as their fee. The fact that these are only just starting to come into effect is one sign that free, ad supported content is still in the early stages of its development.
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There’s a lot more headroom for this market to grow. In fact,according to figures from Digital TV Research, the AVoD market is currently valued at $29.9 Billion and is expected to have revenues of $56 billion by 2024.
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The rise of new competitors, new sources of funding for filmmakers, and a wider range of choice for viewers will drive more creativity and the production of even more high-qualitycontent. And with many of the means of watching this set to be via free ad supported platforms, access is likely to beincreasingly democratized for the general public. Expect to see more premium content becoming available for free in the coming years.
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Some background info on Filmzie.
Filmzie is completely free with a diverse film and TV catalogue of over 1,000 titles, now available in the US for all Roku TV owners to access via their smart devices. It is designed for film fans eager to discover new movies and offers expertly curated films and series from a broad collection of both iconic and new works. Serving as more than just a film library, Filmzie allows its viewers to build communities for discovering, discussing, and reviewing movies.
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