At its Upfront presentation last year, Hulu unveiled its live television streaming service, which offered a combination of live and on-demand programming. To date, the biggest learning is that “over half of the consumption in our live bundle is factually on demand,” says Peter Naylor.
“That tells me the future of TV is a blend of live and on demand viewing,” Hulu’s SVP of Advertising & Sales adds in this interview with Beet.TV.
It’s all part of the “inflection point” that is evident in the TV industry as viewer preferences are driving programming choices.
“The evidence is everywhere,” Naylor says during a break at the Advanced Advertising Summit. “You see a collapse of gross rating points, particularly against scripted content and even live content you’re seeing kind of a sand-papering down of a linear television experience.”
At the same time there’s the “explosion” of OTT subscriptions and usage, underscoring shifting viewing habits.
“The viewer’s expectations around television have changed. They want what how and when they want their TV and they expect it. Anything other than being in control and having all the choices they have is not desirable.”
In May of 2018, Hulu became the only pay-TV service to offer live and on-demand channels, original series and films, and a library of premium streaming TV shows and movies, all in one place.
Noting that some 4 million U.S. households had cut the pay-TV cord in 2017, Naylor says what felt like “a long, slow steady change has reached a fast and sharp inflection point of change and we’re seeing it everywhere.”
He dubs Hulu’s ad sales approach as the best of TV meeting the best of digital.
“We are happy to transact with the TV community against their fifteens and thirties with their conventional campaign parameters, like age and demo and geo. No problem.”
For the more digitally inclined, there’s more of a focus on impressions, targeting and data-informed media buys.
“The automation that we’re seeing take off in the browser space for conventional display is absolutely made its way to the video space. We use Telaria as our SSP and we’re plugging into all the other on-ramps of demand.”
This video was produced at the Advanced Advertising Summit in New York. Please find more videos on this page from the Beet.TV series presented by 4C.
