The Disney+ ad offer in under a minute

Disney+, the new titan on the streaming block has explained what advertising will actually look like on the platform.

Why it matters

Home to Marvel, Star Wars, and most of your childhood viewing, the prospect of advertising on Disney+ is tantalising, especially as the service continued to post stable subscriber growth (over 6% in the Q2) in what has been a difficult market. Advertising is expected to open it out to a vast new audience of viewers.

Bottom line seems to be that Disney’s highly controlled ad product will prioritise quality over quantity.

What they’re going to do

• Show four minutes of ads per hour (versus around 18 to 23 on traditional TV)
• Offer CPMs of around $50-$60 in the US, per ad buyers speaking to the Wall Street Journal.

What they’re not going to do

• Show ads to kids (if they have their own profile on their parent’s account)
• Show ads for alcohol
• Show political ads
• Show ads for rival studios or streamers (obviously).

Across the industry

The reincorporation of ads is similar to the eventual strategy of a lot of news brands: ads and subscribers can mix, and not only that, ads shown to signed-in, verified users are far more profitable.

Nevertheless, Netflix’s upcoming ad offer has been read as the company on the ropes. Its CEO has his past anti-ads hubris to thank for that. So if you take one thing from this, it’s to never say never.

But from an advertising perspective, this is a way into previously unavailable premium media. It will also be a fascinating snapshot into the kinds of effect that ads on streaming platforms can offer.

Sourced from WSJ, Variety, AdExchanger