VideoNuze Posts

The average minute audience for Super Bowl LV was a record 5.7 million viewers across all digital platforms according to data released by CBS Sports. This year’s streaming viewership was up approximately 67% from last year’s 3.4 million when the game was broadcast on Fox. It’s also over double the 2.6 million streaming viewers for the game two years ago, the last time it was broadcast by CBS.

CBS Sports also said that viewers consumed over one billion streaming minutes, a first for Super Bowl viewing. CBS All Access also enjoyed a record day for new subscribers, unique devices, streams and time spent viewing. The game featured lots of clever ads for Paramount+, which launches on March 4th and will fold in CBS All Access.

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Last Friday’s announcement that Magnite is acquiring SpotX from RTL Group for almost $1.2 billion was further evidence of connected TV advertising’s momentum and the combined company’s market opportunity. Considering Magnite’s pro forma financial results with eMarketer’s forecast of CTV ad revenue shows how much potential growth lies ahead for the combined company.

In its release, Magnite said the combined company would have $42 million of pro forma CTV ad revenue ($15.3 million from Magnite and around $27 million from SpotX) in Q4 ’20. Magnite also said the $42 million would have represented around 34% of Q4’s revenue for the combined company. It further said the combined company would have had pro forma revenue for 2020 of $350 million, so applying the same 34% proportion, the combined company would have had approximately $119 million in CTV revenue in 2020.

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Welcome to the 547th edition of the VideoNuze podcast, with my weekly partner Colin Dixon of nScreenMedia.

A couple of weeks ago on our podcast, Colin and I discussed how both AVOD and SVOD services keep growing strongly. This week we explore two specific examples. In AVOD, YouTube’s ad revenue hit $6.9 billion in Q4 ’20, up 46% and for the full year ad revenue hit $19.8 billion, up 31% from 2019.

Meanwhile Crunchyroll, the anime OTT service, announced it’s up to 4 million subscribers, adding a million in the past 6 months, a record growth rate. Like many other streaming services, Crunchyroll appears to be benefiting from Covid. Colin and I explore what’s behind both companies’ success and where things go from here.

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YouTube advertising revenue grew to $6.9 billion in Q4 ’20, up 46% from $4.7 billion in Q4 ’19. YouTube’s results were reported as part of parent company Alphabet’s Q4 ’20 and full year 2020 earnings released yesterday. YouTube’s ad revenue accounted for 15% of Google’s total ad revenue of $46.2 billion in Q4 ’20, up from 12.4% of Google’s total ad revenue of n Q4 ’19.

Critical to YouTube’s ad growth is the macro trend of reduced linear TV viewing, especially among younger audiences. This makes it harder than ever for brands to reach these viewers, a tailwind that is helping all ad-supported streaming services.

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Sell-side ad platform Magnite has unveiled an open beta of its “Unified Decisioning” solution which gives CTV and OTT publishers the ability to have direct sold and programmatic demand compete for available inventory. By doing so publishers can maximize yield while the decisioning still respects deal priority and business rules such as frequency capping and competitive separation.

Paige Bilins, Magnite’s VP of Video Product Management said “publishers are eager to tap into the efficiencies that programmatic provides without relinquishing the control they are used to when selling directly to buyers.” Magnite said that Unified Decisioning works with all major ad servers.

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The number of scripted original TV shows released on broadcast, cable and streaming dropped slightly from 532 in 2019 to 493 in 2020 according to FX Networks, which has been tracking the number for the past 10 years. FX chairman John Landgraf previously dubbed the spiraling number of scripted originals “Peak TV.” Back in 2009 there were 210 scripted originals, according to FX.

The reduction in 2020 is likely a temporary pause due to the effects of Covid shutting down productions and shifting network strategies. That’s because the streaming industry, where the majority of Peak TV originals has come from, is continuing to expand aggressively, in both subscription and ad-supported.

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Welcome to the 546th edition of the VideoNuze podcast, with my weekly partner Colin Dixon of nScreenMedia.

Comcast reported its Q4 and full year 2020 this week and as usual, the divergence between residential video and broadband subscribers was stark. Remarkably, Comcast now has nearly 10 million more residential broadband subscribers (28.3 million) than residential video subscribers (18.9 million). The pandemic furthered the divergence, with 1.9 million broadband subscribers added in 2020 (up 47% vs. 2019) while video subscribers declined by 1.3 million (nearly double the 671K lost in 2019).

Broadband has been Comcast’s core strategy for a while now, and we discuss how Peacock is one of the beneficiaries. Peacock now has 33 million sign-ups and is well ahead of plan. Peacock has also made some strong content moves with “The Office,” “Modern Family,” the WWE Network and some sports coming over from NBCSN which is being closed down.

Listen in to learn more!

Click here to listen to the podcast (22 minutes, 52 seconds)

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The VideoNuze podcast is also available in Apple podcasts, subscribe today!

The Global Video Measurement Alliance (GVMA) has added four new members, BBC Studios, WildBrain Spark, Digitas and Weber Shandwick. GVMA is an industry coalition backed by Tubular Labs to standardize measurement for digital video viewership and engagement. GVMA uses Tubular Audience Ratings, which measures de-duplicated unique audiences and minutes watched on Facebook and YouTube.

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