US premium streaming service Hulu Plus has surpassed 6 million subscribers. At the end of 2013, Hulu counted five million subs.
The milestone was announced by the company at the Hulu Upfront event in New York City. Hulu also said it ordered a second season of Deadbeat, which has become one of the most watched shows on the service in its first few weeks since airing. Additionally, Hulu has set premiere dates for second season returns of The Awesomes, Quick Draw and East Los High.
“It’s not enough for us to simply invest in acquiring and producing great shows…we want to make sure viewers know where to find them – only on Hulu and Hulu Plus. To that end, over the next year, we will more than triple our content marketing spend to grow awareness for, and interest in, Hulu Originals,” the company wrote on its blog.
Research shows that on desktop alone a viewers spends an average of nearly 50 minutes per session on Hulu and they stay on Hulu for longer stretches than any other ad-supported premium video site in comScore’s top 100. Since 2008, more than 1,650 advertisers have leveraged the Hulu service.
For advertisers, Hulu is also introducing new possibilities to reach customers for instance with the new In-Stream Purchase Unit. Later this year Pizza Hut will be the launch partner. The unit will enable consumers to make an order for pick-up or delivery without ever leaving the Hulu environment (see picture).
Hulu also said it will begin delivering a selection of ad-supported full TV episodes on mobile devices – for free. Additionally, later this summer, Hulu will be launching the next generation of the Hulu Plus iPhone app.
