Flexibility and ad-supported alternatives are key direct-to-consumer platforms

Direct-to-consumer platforms will have to strive to achieve as many subscribers as possible in the shortest time possible, be flexible, versatile, do bundling, and have ad-supported alternatives to be successful in Latin America, according to Tomás Gennari, CEO of BB, who feels these services -Disney +, Discovery +, Paramount +, HBO Max- are currently the ones that represent the biggest disruption in the region.

Gennari does not see a drastic cord-cutting scenario in Latin America. “Pay-TV is going to keep penetration levels stable. Of course, in some countries, it will drop, but the subscription pay-TV business is not going to crumble. What still prevails is SVOD as a supplement to pay-TV,” he emphasized and mentioned that for these direct-to-consumer services it will be vital to find as many subscribers in the least possible time, and as a company, they will have to be flexible and versatile, offer promotions and bundling with non-traditional telcos and operators, such as Mercado Libre.

He added that the ad-supported alternative is vital in Latin America to achieve the largest possible user base and complement those incomes with advertising sales.

He highlighted that the price strategy in Latin America has to be different from the one in the US because purchase power is smaller. “When we see the numbers of how many SVOD platforms there are per home in the US, it is around 5 or 6 per home, and the polls in Latin America reveal that in this region it is one or two platforms per home, many are not exclusively subscriptions, there are free and pirate ones as well. The amount of platforms homes in Latin America will be able to subscribe to, is undoubtedly lower,” he explained.

A huge opportunity these platforms offer is the rebirth of advertising sales that were impacted in 2019 and 2020. “We will see a rebirth of ad sales with different technologies,” he ended.