The perceived high cost of pay-TV packages continues to be the number one reason for customer dissatisfaction, according to TiVo’s latest Online Video and Pay-TV Trends Report.
According to the report, which concentrates on North America, 86.7 per cent said price was the reason they cancelled a pay-TV service. While the number of those who said they had cut the cord in Q4 2017 is at its lowest point since the Q3 2016 survey, those who had been without a cable or satellite service in the last 12 months has increased by 6.1 per cent quarter over quarter and 4.6 points year on year.
The DVR and search specialist says this highlights the importance of subscriber retention to pay-TV providers. In addition to price consumers say they are using streaming services such as Netflix, Hulu and Amazon Video or using an antenna to get their basic channels. Price increased as a factor by 6.6 per cent year on year, while the other two reasons declined in popularity.
TiVo suggests that more use could be made of subscriber data to identify those with a higher risk of churn.
The report takes a look at smart speakers, such as Amazon’s Alexa or Google Home, where the fourth most-popular usage of smart speakers is to stream and watch video content on a TV.
Consistent with last quarter’s results, the living room and bedroom are the two most popular locations for smart speakers.
The living room increased in popularity by 3.1 percentage points on the quarter and the bedroom increased 5 percentage points quarter on quarter, while the kitchen decreased in popularity by 4.8 percentage points.