What’s Captifying the World: Streamlining streaming—consumers are consolidating their subscriptions due to content fatigue

The Covid-19 pandemic fueled the hype for at-home entertainment, with Netflix seeing 37 million+ new subscribers in 2020 alone and Disney+ hitting over 100 million subscribers, just 16 months since their launch.

Although streaming skyrocketed during lockdown, there are signs that consumers are suffering from subscription fatigue.

Content is king

Captify analyzed billions of searches over the past six months and uncovered a 45% search uplift for subscription cancellations, indicating consumers are looking to consolidate the number of their streaming services.

Diving deeper into the triggers behind the cancellations, our platform uncovered a 170% YoY increase in the search index around content—high consumption since the beginning of lockdown has meant that audiences are exhausting content across current services, and streaming providers are under increased pressure to retain their content-hungry subscribers.

Surprisingly, consumers seem to be less influenced by subscription costs–triggers such as price and free trial have seen a decrease in consumer search interest, despite brands such as Netflix increasing the cost of its monthly plan.

Netflix churn

Captify analyzed the top searched for brands associated with cancellations, with Netflix commanding the highest search interest, followed by Disney+.

Brand share of search:

• Netflix—72%

• Disney+—25%

• Hulu—2%

• HBO Max—1%

Netflix releases many new shows but also cancels most original series before they’ve hit their stride. In 2020 alone, Netflix canceled 18 original series, and 14 of those were live for only one season, according to Insider. 

WarnerMedia’s streaming service, HBO Max is taking on Netflix, but with a unique strategy. They are positioning themselves as a human-first platform, promoting curated titles ‘recommended by humans’—from iconic shows such as The West Wing and The Office to HBO Max Originals.

In addition, Warner Bros’ entire 2021 movie slate will debut on HBO Max and theatres simultaneously. All of this suggests why their share of search for cancellations is low.

The power of search data signals

Fresh and dynamic data allows brands to monitor how motivations and consumption patterns are shifting as consumers enter the next phase of the pandemic. Brands can utilize these insights to spot opportunities to increase brand share of search and fuel their next marketing move.

Get in touch to request a demo of Sense, Captify’s new Search Intent Platform designed for brands to discover critical consumer behaviors and insights, pinpoint the intent and size of audiences and seamlessly activate programmatically across all channels—all powered by real-time intent.

*Data sourced from Captify’s global network from 03/08/20-03/08/21