SVOD, also known as Subscription Video on Demand, refers to video streaming where users pay a subscription fee in order to access on-demand content via a Smart TV, Set-Top-Box, gaming console, laptop, mobile or tablet device.
With the on-demand video space growing at an exponential rate, we expect to see SVOD revenues soar to $25.71 billion by the end of 2021. Being in the SVOD space has never come at a better time. It is crucial that you are delivering a premium service to your subscribers to help increase your revenues, and in this blog, we will detail five ways you can increase those all important revenues through your SVOD revenue model on your OTT platform.
1. Loyalty is key
One simple way to increase your SVOD revenue is by encouraging your audience to buy into your annual plans, instead of your monthly plans, to ensure that your audience stays with you for longer, as customer retention plays an extremely important role when trying to increase your revenues. Customer retention is key and can help in reducing acquisition costs as you do not have to spend large sums of money trying to attract new customers.
As an additional bonus, when users pay for the yearly subscription upfront, you get the amount in one go meaning it can be invested into various marketing efforts that help to attract new subscribers to your platform, resulting in greater revenues.
In order to reap the rewards of customers buying into the annual plans, you must ensure that you are offering a discount for subscribing to a yearly plan (you could even offer 3 or 6 month plans as well) to encourage people to buy in.
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This is an extremely important point to consider on your SVOD platform as you need to ensure that you are crafting a platform that appeals to your audience and includes popular and exciting content.
Take Netflix for example. Their extremely popular library of blockbuster movies, award winning TV series and popular documentaries, all make for a very appealing platform for users to sign up to. Netflix also has a library of award-winning ‘Netflix Originals’ films and series which only subscribers can access, providing potential customers with that all important incentive to subscribe. This move has proved to be incredibly successful for Netflix as they continue to remain the titans within the world of on-demand video.
Although many platforms don’t have a budget like Netflix to acquire such content, you must still ensure that you are delivering a library of appealing content or else subscribers will seem extremely hard to acquire. After all, they want good quality content at the click of a button.
3. Offer different subscription packages
For some potential customers, the thought of purchasing a yearly subscription plan can be rather daunting as more often or not they can be quite expensive. One way to work around this would be to offer a number of different subscription packages alongside your yearly one.
For example, you could look to provide a mobile package, a basic package, a standard package and a premium package each with different levels of access and features. This way, it eliminates putting off potential customers as you are catering for a wide audience depending on what they plan to get out of subscribing to your platform. Some potential customers may just want a mobile package which means they can access content on their mobile phones whilst on the go, whilst others may want a full cinema experience from home in 4K with the option to watch on four different devices at the same time. Someone who only wishes to consume content via mobile would not wish to pay the same as someone who has access to all features on the platform, hence why it is important that a number of different subscription packages are considered. This can help to grow market share and increase those all important revenues.
4. Capitalise on your niche
What is your specialist content area? What content are you providing that others aren’t? Capitalising on your niche is incredibly important to the growth of your platform and will play a pivotal role in securing those subscribers to help generate revenue.
With the likes of the big services such as Netflix, Disney+ and Amazon Prime growing their audiences significantly in recent years, it’s worth noting that niche subscription services have seen subscriber levels grow more than twice as fast compared to the seven biggest subscription services in the past two years.
Carving out a niche has clearly had a profound impact on revenue generation for smaller subscription services in comparison to the bigger services and has proven real growth in terms of subscriber numbers. This is down to the fact that smaller SVOD platforms have capitalised on a specific customer base. One point to mention however is that carving a specific niche can lead to a limited ceiling of growth, but if you are catering for your audience with the quality, niche content they are after, along with a sleek and well-designed application, your app is sure to be destined for greatness. Be sure to capitalise on your niche and watch subscribers grow, in turn generating that vital revenue.
5. Create a quality app with cutting edge features
Due to the streaming space becoming incredibly cut-throat, apps that now enter the market have lots to consider if they wish to stand out, hence the need for a high-quality, premium app with cutting edge features. Subscription businesses that want to see success in the coming years need to remember that they will be fighting for priority, so standing out is a must.
A good example of a brand delivering new, innovative and cutting edge features is BT Sport who introduced their ‘Watch Together’ feature last year. This new feature allows customers using the award-winning BT Sport app on mobile devices to watch, see and chat with friends in a split-screen view whilst streaming BT Sport channels. This is a great example of giving people more and staying ahead of the game, allowing BT Sport to stand out from other big players in the market through their new in-app feature.
As well as giving people more through cutting edge and exciting features, it’s also extremely important to note that the overall UI (User Interface) and UX (User Experience) of your SVOD platform will play an important role when trying to generate revenue, as users are more inclined to get rid of the apps that don’t satisfy their needs, making the look, feel and features of your platform of paramount importance.
We will no doubt see more and more users opting for OTT platforms that satisfy their needs in terms of overall UX through a compelling and engaging UI, and getting rid of those that don’t, hence the need for an app that goes above and beyond for their subscribers and looks to take the viewing experience to the next level.
Conclusion: The Revenue Generator
With three different monetisation models available, being SVOD (Subscription Video on Demand), TVOD (Transactional Video on Demand) and AVOD (Advertising Video on Demand), SVOD stands out as the most promising model to help generate revenue on your OTT platform.
With the on-demand video space becoming increasingly cut-throat, your SVOD platform needs to be premium quality, easy to use and full of attractive content if you are to gain and retain those all important subscribers that generate revenue.
With global SVOD subscriptions expected to rise to 1.6 billion by 2025, the space is set to continue to boom in the years to come. It’s important to remember that pushing the annual plans at a discount can play a pivotal role in keeping customer retention high, meaning you don’t have to pour additional revenue into acquiring new customers you’ve lost. Acquiring attractive content that subscribers want to consume is extremely important, and different subscription package offerings can make the difference between converting a subscriber and not. Capitalising on your specialist area and giving people more with cutting edge features on a high-quality platform will help you stand out from the rest as you’re taking the viewing experience for the subscriber to the next level. Bear these key strategies in mind, and you’ll be set to soar in what is a rapidly growing market.
