Happy Friday War & Peaceniks! Let’s Go Shopping…
Welcome to Holiday Season 2022: When Media and Tech companies are laying off thousands, including their CEOs; subscription fatigue has taken firm hold; and the and economy has sledded head-first into an impression recession.
Happy Holidays!? 🎁
The fevered pitch in Media at year’s end comes from the shrill realization in countless board rooms that in the “New Normal,” not much is working rn.
Social Media built fortunes on being the fastest-growing and biggest fee-free ad platforms ever. That model seems over. SVOD dominated TV by avoiding ads, and charging below-market fees. That‘s over too. Gaming had a rough 2022, with OGs and new darlings struggling against bottom lines. And while streaming has gotten the Music industry back to black, the world’s biggest Audio platforms have never been profitable.
One question underpins all the chaos: What is Media’s new model?
Earlier this week, I used Hub Research data to demonstrate that today’s average consumers need a cocktail of 15 different services to get everything they want from their Media. They must make their own feedlist from 1,000 potential combinations of video, audio, reading, gaming and social media; across countless platforms, publishers, apps and aggregators.
This corn maze of 1000 content combos comes with hundreds of variations and limits on content and access, ranging from convenient to confounding. Front porches, walled gardens, long tails, rabbit holes. Consumers, publishes and advertisers have never had more choice. Or more hoops to jump through to get to it.
The current cacophony serves no one. Consumers are paralyzed by passwords & choice. Advertisers are inundated by myriad measurement, yet wholly unable to weigh apples versus apples. Social Media appears SHOCKED that their lockdown party ended, and epically unprepared for what comes next. Big Media TV chased the market’s disruptor too far, only to realize that blue sky was actually at the edge of a cliff. Over the last three years, major Media has attempted to build slightly new planes around those in which we are currently flying, while in flight. Now, many see the ground coming at the windshield, fast.
So, to deepen the BIG question: What’s the new Media Model that actually serves consumers AND offers a real, sustainable business model?
Hey! Let’s ask the consumer…
This fall I worked with PCH Insights to survey 19,000 Americans about whether they want to pay for their media, and if so, which?
At the very top of this piece, the chart shows the split personality of the Media Consumer. Unsurprisingly, the more income a home has, the more willing they are to pay for media. But, even on the lower end of the income scale, half of consumers say they are willing to pay for the media they want (48% of HHs under $35K).
What surprised me is the demographic most willing to pay for content: Adults 18-34 at 66%; with 62% of respondents 35-44 saying they’d pay for Media they want. This compares to less than half of those over 45 willing to pay.
When you ask what Media consumers are willing to pay for, the gamut gets spanned.
Different consumers will pay for different Media. Americans under 45 are 2X more willing to pay for Gaming than those over 45; explaining the enormous success of Live Service Gaming like Fortnite, PUBG and FIFA. More than twice as many people over 45 would pay for News as those under 45; ratifying the successful metamorphosis of the NY Times into a multi-faceted subscription machine, and Apple’s ongoing bet on their News product. Plus: keep an eye on that intangible significant “other” that 10% of consumers say they’d pay for (more on that in a minute).
Consumers show a spectrum of behaviors, ranging from desire to disinterest in paying for their Media. But what about the ads?
This👇 data is from a new study I just completed with PCH Insights, surveying more than 27,000 Americans about their attitudes towards advertising, aka Media Consumer Aditudes. We’re specifically studying the Modern Media Consumer’s feelings about mixing sub fees and ads on various streaming media. We will release the full study in January, but this chart gives you a sneak peek…
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