A new Comcast study draws on a popular sentiment of many Americans living through COVID-19: “The days are coming together.”
That’s how the cable and broadband giant described it on a blog post Wednesday, noting that over the past two weeks Monday has become a more popular viewing day than Saturday in its roughly 20 million U.S. videos. Weekly viewing has generally reached typical weekend levels, and total viewing time is much up across the board.
Examining an audience through its Xfinity X1, Flex, Stream and non-X1 top boxes, the company found that the average household enters a full-time value of a full workday for TV viewing (from a linear and streaming source) on a weekly basis. The average customer now watches 66 hours a week, up from 57 in early March. Many U.S. states stayed home in mid-March.
Related Story
Kayleigh McEnany, White House Secretary of the Press, Is Asked Why She Discouraged a Coronavirus Threat — And She Tries To Turn The Boards On The Media
Late Night has gained 40% since early March, especially the hours between 11PM to 2AM. That pattern is likely to correct with a 6% decrease in viewing between 6AM and 8AM.
News programming has seen a drastic 64% jump since early March, though it peaked during the week of March 30. Since then, Comcast has recorded a 30% decline in COVID-related commands issued to its remote voice search control. Dramatic programming saw annoyance, while reality, comedy and performance remained relatively flat. (See diagram below.)
In separate interviews with Deadline in March, Comcast CTO Matt Zelesko and Brynn Lev, VP, Video and Entertainment, offered some insights on how they reacted to COVID-19.
Zelesko noted that Comcast’s goal has long been to make the customer experience as meaningful as possible. While many pay-TV providers are now integrating third-party programs into their offerings, Comcast was early to that game, acknowledging that broadband will drive those choices even if customers cut the traditional video cord. (Hulu is the newest arrival to Xfinity platforms.) Flex, which is given away for free to the company’s broadband subscribers, is similar to Roku or other connected devices, offering a range of channels over the internet and displaying content that consumers want .
During the coronavirus pandemic in particular, Zelesko said, “customers don’t necessarily want to pogo-stick from app to app.” He exploded that the explosion of streaming and subscription options means that “the customer suddenly has a much harder job subscribing to all of these services and figuring out which one to go to.” (Comcast itself recently invented Peacock, NBCUniversal’s new streaming offering.)
Flex and X1 were intended to draw viewers to individual shows rather than networks or distributors. If you like certain genres, stars, or program themes, they will be identified regardless of where they originate.
This orientation is “probably a source of some tension with content creators and providers themselves,” Zelesko said. “Netflix would immediately prefer that everyone just join Netflix and make their discovery there. But if we’re content here, then we lead a lot to the shows that someone wants to see, not necessarily where they’re watching it. “
Lev, a veteran of a 15-year-old company, had his hands full during COVID-19 given the unique operation and the combination of both constant change and stay at home. Her unit had to constantly fine-tune the process of how Comcast presents its offering through its menus and programming language as well as other discoveries such as voice.
She aimed to achieve a balance between machine learning and a human element. “A big part of our guide is fed by data, of course. That’s certainly a big piece. … We marry the editorial and the human treatment. I’ve implemented a lot more way for editors to have that freedom.”
Especially this spring, she added, “The single algorithms aren’t good at that, it’s knowing what mood you’re in.”
Here is a graphic from Comcast illustrating genre viewing before and during the pandemic:
"8" - Google News
May 07, 2020 at 08:29AM
https://ift.tt/2WAUXJE
Comcast Finds Home-Bound Viewers Watching 8 More Hours Of TV A Week: “The Days Are Blurring Together” - Smash Newz
"8" - Google News
https://ift.tt/2z1PBPz
https://ift.tt/3c1rzCJ
No comments:
Post a Comment