“I’m cancelling my cable and watching everything on Hulu and Netflix."

We first started hearing this a few years ago, and today, it’s even easier to see the validity of a cable-free home. There’s tons of free content online, Netflix is less than $10 a month, and we can rent movies and TV shows from iTunes and Redbox on the cheap. Then there’s Hulu, Hulu Plus, Amazon Instant, Crackle, Vudu, Cinema Now…hey, I could rattle off on-demand TV and movie streaming services all day, baby! And all the while, the cost of cable keeps going up.
While you may not have cancelled your cable service yet, the options consumers have for internet-based television programming — and streaming devices that allow them to watch comfortably on their TV — are expanding by the day. Meanwhile, the programming itself is getting better, and high profile shows call for high budgets.
Some media research companies are predicting that cable providers could lose up to 20% of their paying customers in 2012. But what about in 2013? Or 2017? If the shift is towards ad-free services like Netflix, how drastically will this affect our industry in the long term?
The answer isn’t quite clear. But in my humble opinion, we’re slowly moving towards the most significant shift in advertising strategy since the birth of the Internet.
Big things are happening, people, and CurrentMarketing will be ready! Will you?