To connectivity and beyond: how telco can boost streamings bottom line

To connectivity and beyond: Why ad-free streaming platforms should be serving up telco to boost the bottom line.

It’s been an open secret within the industry for a while, but in a move that will tighten the screws on an already competitive streaming market, Warner Brothers have confirmed that HBO Max will launch in Australia next year.

Consumers down under will soon be presented with more choice, and incumbents will face the even greater challenge of retaining customers as cost-of-living pressures continue to bite. When something’s got to give, it’s often our streaming subscriptions that find themselves in the crosshairs of family budget cuts.

I can tell you, Clarkson’s Farm producers better crack on with the next series, or else Prime Video might be up for a show-cause notice from my family’s Minister for Finance. Whether all three of my family’s streaming services survive the latest round of domestic cost-cutting remains to be seen, but I’m certain it would be a different story if there were more at stake than just one of my favourite shows.

That’s where telco comes into play—the perfect partner to secure customer loyalty, drive annuity revenue, and offer a walk-up start for streamers wanting to tackle churn head-on.

Forget the bundle; it’s time for streamers to embrace branded mobile and broadband.

Having spent the majority of my working life in the free-to-air or linear television business, I witnessed the rivers of advertising gold dry up to a trickle during COVID. We filled prime-time and once-lucrative slots with bizarre 3-minute recipe ads paid for by a major supermarket. We had the audience—television viewing was at a record high because people were confined to their homes—but advertising spend was in the toilet.

It highlighted the strategic importance of having a subscription model, quite frankly, of any sort.

Over the years, free-to-air television executives have been presented with the strategic and commercial benefits of selling their own branded mobile plans. “Why would we ever become a mobile virtual network operator?” they decried! The case was never compelling enough for them to turn their backs on some of their biggest advertisers—the network operators and their multi-million-dollar ad spends.

It would take a brave CEO to risk alienating a big telco advertiser by launching a branded telco with their competitor. But oh, how times have changed.

Mobile network operators are spreading their ad spend across multiple platforms, and television is no longer the darling it once was—far from it. I argue that now, media networks can, and should, have their cake and eat it too. Now is the time to convert the remaining free-to-air television viewers into paying mobile customers. For network-owned streaming services, it’s about increasing wallet share and customer loyalty with a branded mobile and broadband offering.

eSIM: Coming to a Television Screen Near You. How customers should be able to switch to a branded mobile offering from the comfort of their own lounge room.

The Australian Financial Review reported that the average number of subscriptions per household in Australia remained steady at 3.4 but is forecast to grow to 3.7 by 2028. Streaming services have achieved near-ubiquitous presence in American homes, as highlighted by the latest findings. According to Forbes, an overwhelming 99% of U.S. households now subscribe to at least one streaming service, with Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, and Apple TV+ topping the charts. The revenues are eye-watering. Add a telco offering into the mix, and it becomes even more lucrative.

But when you look at branded mobile through the lens of loyalty and churn, that’s when executives pay attention. While becoming a telco may not be on their agenda, lowering churn, increasing ARPU (Average Revenue Per User), and generating annuity revenue certainly are.

Luckily for Australian streaming operators, they don’t have to become a telco themselves to enjoy the benefits that branded mobile brings to a business. As for marketing, the savings for streamers are enormous.

All it would take is a QR code on a tile next to already curated content, allowing subscribers to Switch, Save, and Stream.

Last year, reports out of the U.S. suggested that a branded mobile play was indeed on the cards for Amazon. The frenzied speculation has since simmered down. Time will tell whether Australian streaming platforms lean into the enormous benefits of branded mobile.

But here’s some good news—filming for Clarkson’s Farm Season 4 has recently wrapped and is expected to be ready for binge-watching by mid-next year. The case for a stay of execution for at least one of our streaming platforms remains shaky, and three could still become two under proposed household austerity measures.

Safe to say, if I could switch to Prime Mobile and save money all around, there’s no way its namesake streaming service would be facing the chop.

As for Clarkson’s Mobile—don’t rule it out, but we think there are a few celebrities ahead of him who will be leaning into branded mobile. But that’s another blog for another time.