The world as we know it changed over the past two years. Streaming entertainment became our connection to the world inside our otherwise locked-down homes. You couldn’t attend concerts, sporting events or anything with a live audience, but you could watch them from the safety of your living room. Streaming became part of our daily lives.
The question for the streaming industry is, what did we learn? Moreover, in what ways are habits changed forever? As the landscape shakes out, there’s a growing consensus on the direction of the streaming entertainment industry, in the connected TV space (aka TV brands), and even on Wall Street. The new rules of the road are as follows:
Independent streaming platforms will become the platform of-choice for many smart TV OEMs.
The balance of power among smart TV OEMs has shifted as many more in the industry now have an option to offer a branded experience. OEMs that once lacked the ability to offer their own platform now have an option: an independent streaming platform such as TiVo™ that allows them to retain customer ownership, along with the economic value to ongoing data collection of consumption behavior from targeted ad revenue for the foreseeable future.
Powered by TiVo essentially levels the playing field. With good reason, as much as 40% of the smart TV market is now seeking exactly the kind of embedded independent operating system and media platform that TiVo offers.
The smartest of the smart TVs offer a content-first experience.
In a recent survey, more than two-thirds of people asked said it takes eight or more entertainment services to meet their TV lineup needs. Similarly, another poll showed that 91% agreed access to multiple services from a single device improves the viewing experience.
Users today want to watch content across different platforms, whether it’s linear traditional TV, broadcast, or streaming apps. They want to float seamlessly from one content platform to another to land on the TV show, movie or piece of content they’re seeking.
But make no mistake—what viewers want is simplicity. Aggregating multiple platforms is merely a way to simplify access to choices. And it’s in understanding these choices where there is significant value to unlock.
This is a crucial point of difference between Powered by TiVo and many competitors. Whereas TiVo seeks to understand and connect viewers to their content of-choice, other streaming services have some level of economic interest in the content on the channels and app ecosystems they serve up to viewers.
In other words, you’re not watching what you want to watch. You’re watching what they want you to watch. Needless to say, one of those models has a better chance of higher engagement with fewer clicks to land on desired content.
Every quarter, TiVo gets more than 16 billion queries from users looking for content. With a full metadata personalization engine and 30 million households it services today via broadband and cable operators, TiVo has data that yields deep insights, making it now possible to build carousels of content platforms tailored to the unique, articulated searches of users and households. This can slash the time it takes to find desired content by more than 60%.
It’s not called a smart TV for nothing.
Listen up: Voice search capabilities will soon rule.
It’s estimated one out of every three viewers currently uses voice commands with their smart TV. This is a conversation we want to have since anything intuitive that reduces friction has a bigger future. As voice assistants and automatic speech recognition (ASR) become ubiquitous throughout consumer electronics, these same capabilities will become the standard in the streaming and smart TV space.
Navigating a connected TV will only become faster and easier in the future as voice search capabilities increasingly embed themselves into our daily life and quickly align with consumer behaviors. Juniper estimates spending via smart TV voice control will reach $500 million by 2024.
Powered by TiVo leads the category with natural voice recognition and ingenious search capabilities like contextual voice search. Can’t remember a movie title? Just describe the plot. It’s all about the viewer and providing the fastest, most intuitive way to connect to their content of-choice. It’s about time to content.
Global platforms, content, and advertising—Global everything.
The entire world is just one great big collection of content begging for aggregation on a level best described as super-aggregation. Limitations such as languages, regulatory constraints, advertising, contractual rights, and even compression technology will need to adapt to a bigger vision as platforms scale up and push boundaries beyond mere geography. Global advertising on connected TVs is expected to grow from $16 billion to $36 billion by 2026. Ultimately, streaming entertainment and content will be borderless as people everywhere learn to find their inspiration in every corner of the globe.
There’s nothing like a good interface to drive adoption.
If we’ve learned just one thing, it’s a reminder that it’s all about the viewer. It’s not just about serving up what they want to see. That’s essential. But it’s also essential to connect people to content in a way that’s appealing. People want the ability to search across platforms with a simple, intuitive interface. Tests with the TiVo streaming stick showed the product can drive 1.7 – 1.8 times the engagement level in viewership over traditional streaming sticks that offer up the exact same content.
The Powered by TiVo experience delivers faster time to desired content, fewer clicks, and a superior, more personalized experience that people want to engage in day after day not just because the content is right, but the interface is as well.
After the considerable changes we’ve all seen over the last two years, people are not simply going back to how they once lived. They want something better, starting with the options that allow them to retain control of how they live their lives. Home entertainment and streaming services are no exception, where free, familiar, and frictionless continue to rule the day.
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