Disney revealed on Wednesday that 157 million people worldwide view ad-supported content each month on its streaming services, which include Disney+, Hulu, and ESPN+.
This figure represents the average monthly use over the last six months and includes 112 million domestic users.
There is currently no industry-standard approach for determining the size of the worldwide streaming advertising audience, despite the fact that conventional TV sources have a standard system for calculating ratings and viewership.
Disney Advertising has “sought to establish a globally consistent approach and methodology to estimate ad-supported audience numbers,” according to the business. At the annual CES tech conference in Las Vegas, a premier gathering for the media and advertising industries, it is giving an update and further details on its ad-supported streaming business.
Rita Ferro, head of worldwide advertising at Disney, stated in a news release that the company “sits at the intersection of world-class sports and entertainment content, with the most high-value audiences in ad-supported global streaming at scale.
We wanted to be the first to provide our industry with more transparency regarding the methodology used to estimate our monthly active users who are engaged globally and supported by ads.”
According to the company’s explanation of the approach, the score is based on active users that have continually watched ad-supported episodes and movies for more than 10 seconds across all three of Disney’s streaming platforms.
To estimate the total number of users, the number of estimated users per account is multiplied by each active account,” the statement said. Users who subscribe to several platforms may be included more than once since the estimated active users are added across the applications without de-duplication.
Increase in tiers with ad support
Making money from streaming has become a top priority for media corporations, and advertising has emerged as a crucial tool for this purpose. Although many platforms started out as subscription services free of advertisements, streaming services have recently offered users more affordable, ad-supported tiers.
Disney is attempting to direct its consumers toward its ad-supported tiers, according to CEO Bob Iger. Since releasing Disney+ with advertisements in late 2022, the business has increased the cost of commercial-free solutions.
One of the first streaming services to provide an ad-supported alternative was Disney’s Hulu. Disney+ added an ad-supported tier more recently.
Disney announced in November that it has 122.7 million Disney+ Core users, excluding Disney+ Hotstar in India and other regional nations. There were 52 million subscribers to Hulu and 25.6 million paying customers to ESPN+.
Executives on the November earnings call stated that over half of new Disney+ subscribers in the United States were selecting the less expensive, ad-supported tier, adding that this “bodes well for the future.” Historically, the company has not disclosed the precise number of subscribers on each platform that pay for the ad-supported option.
During the call, Disney said that a greater mix of users on its more affordable, ad-supported tier and wholesale services caused the average income per user for domestic Disney+ customers to decline from $7.74 to $7.70.
In November, executives expressed their confidence that streaming will “be a significant growth area” for the business.
The firm stated at the time that its combined streaming division, which consists of Disney+, Hulu, and ESPN+, generated $321 million in operating income for the September month, as opposed to $387 million in the same period the previous year. Before the bell on February 5, Disney will release its fiscal first-quarter profits.
