Audio Video News

One in four consumers who have subscribed to pay TV for less than 12 months are “extremely likely” to cut or shave the cord in the next six months, according to a survey released today by DVR pioneer TiVo.

The multi-country study also revealed that survey respondents watch of 4.4 hours of video content a day on average and half of them think it should be easier to find what they want to watch, given the amount they pay for TV service. More to the point, one in four say they are willing to pay more for a service that simplifies video discovery across all of the services they subscribe to.

Other key findings of the survey — which focused on subscribers of pay TV and over-the-top (OTT) internet TV service in the U.S., Europe, and Latin America — include:

• 38 percent of viewers turn off their devices when they can’t find something to watch.
  
• 55 percent of U.S. pay TV subscribers have subscribed to their current service for four or more years, compared with 42 percent in Western Europe and 32 percent in Latin America.
  
• In the U.S. and Western Europe, “tenured” pay TV subscribers are much more likely to be baby boomers instead of millennials, which is a stark contrast with Latin America where the distribution of age groups is fairly even. Among those in the U.S. who have been with their provider for four years or more, 51 percent are boomers and 11 percent are millennials.
  
• Almost half (49 percent) of U.S. pay TV subscribers who have had the service for four or more years subscribe to an internet TV service, compared with 67 percent in Latin America and 43 percent in Western Europe.

“As new, shiny OTT services and streaming devices continue to proliferate in the market and compete for consumer attention, there is considerable risk that younger generations may come to view pay TV as an antiquated service that doesn’t play a role in their daily lives,” said Paul Stathacopoulos, TiVo’s vice president of strategy and research. “Service providers must focus on delivering entertainment experiences that are compelling to a highly segmented viewer composition... Without a shift or focus on innovating the way consumers connect to entertainment, hyper-fragmentation will continue to be a barrier, driving consumer frustration…”

Voice control is an example of an emerging technology that is winning over consumers and shows great promise. Key findings among survey respondents who use voice-enabled devices include:

• 60 percent of global respondents who own a voice remote use it frequently or every day.
  
• 64 percent of those who own voice-controlled home assistants such as the Amazon Echo smart speaker use them frequently or every day.
  
• 59 percent of those with access to a voice-enabled video app use it frequently or every day.
  
• 61 percent of those who own voice-controlled wearable devices use the technology frequently or every day.

  “When it comes to voice technology, we see broad appeal across all generations and this year’s survey findings validate that claim,” Stathacopoulos said. “We believe voice will become the norm especially as voice assistants continue to enter homes and voice search technologies become more accurate and intuitive.”

  The research findings were culled from an online survey of 8,500 pay TV and OTT subscribers across seven countries, with 2,500 interviews completed in the U.S. and 1,000 interviews completed in each of the following countries: U.K., France, Germany, Brazil, Mexico, and Colombia.