Currently, while the market of OTT platforms is getting crowded and users have to restrict themselves to only a couple of services, the competition is greater than ever. The owners of such platforms try to keep their audiences and encourage new growth of followers but is battling the dreading churn rate even possible and how to do it? 

How can you describe the OTT churn rate? 

OTT churn rate means the number of users that are lost by the service over a certain recurring period of time. It is basically one of the vital metrics that helps you measure how successful is your service. Ideally, the number of your OTT service subscribers would only grow, but it is important to side the freshly purchased subscriptions with the ones that have been canceled. Monitoring and comparing your services numbers with the competition and the market averages will help you assess the situation and guide you towards what is acceptable or a fantastic outcome. 

Voluntary or involuntary audience loss 

When describing this topic there are two important phrases that need to be mentioned. The description of different ways the churn rate is generated. It is vital to understand how this phenomenon occurs in order to prepare a proper plan for battling its negative effect and eliminating the problem. 

  • Voluntary churn

    – these are the parts of the audience that resign from their subscription plan on purpose. They may have already enjoyed everything that they are interested in on the platform, feel the lack addition of new exciting content, be dissatisfied with the performance of the service or decide the costs are just not worth it, nevertheless they decide to not prolong their purchase. 

  

  • Involuntary churn

    – such users cancel their subscription involuntarily due to some issues with payment systems, overlooking the purchase due date or other problems with the service functionality. In this situation, the issues may lay on the platform owner’s side and may be easy to fix if caught early. 

  

How to avoid voluntary and involuntary churn 

The first step should be identifying the issues and whether it is one of the both described above. Correctly sorting the problems allows for foreseeing the causes of preventing or discouraging the users from further subscriptions. The correct rule of action would be to address each issue separately e. g. if the problem seems to be the lack of interesting content the solution might be the addition of new materials or greater options for personalized suggestions. On the other hand, if the performance of the solution is lacking the best thing to do is start by checking and repairing the whole system, as a result, improving the user’s experience. 

Important factors to lower the churn rate 

  • Following the metrics – The vital point of each solution is its analytics system which not only helps in understanding the user’s paths through the application or their interests but also provides the information that is crucial for measuring the flow of the new and lost audience. 

  

  • Caring for user experience – Simplifying the navigation, refreshing the user interface, analyzing the features in terms of intuitiveness in short all the aspects that the viewer can see and engage with should be developed and maintained with the deepest care for the end-product and its usability. 

  

  • Taking the pricing into consideration – The price of the subscription should be adjusted accordingly to the market, the owner’s profit but also the readiness of users to pay that amount each pricing period. 

  

  • Platform maintenance and improvements – Although you may want to believe that our solution beats the competition and is the most innovative, you have to strive to better it every day. The market is always hungry and there are many who want to be at the top trying to outrun even the best. 

  

  • Generating user engagement – Try to follow the trends and implement the most fitting ones into your solution. Experimenting and conducting tests on a small scale can help you decide which ideas suit your audience and help it be more in touch with your content. 

  

  • Providing capturing materials – This one is a no-brainer, without something that will bring the viewers to your platform you will not have a chance to keep them. And the ones that are already there expect fresh, enticing materials delivered every time they finish another series. 

  

  • High personalization – With the millions of possibilities, there needs to be something that helps your platform stand out from the crowd, always think about adding new content formats, new devices that it will be available on, new suggestion options etc. 

 

  • Take advantage of modern technologies – Investment in innovative solutions such as Mosaic Multiview delivered by our partner Tiledmedia, which allows for an overview of all screens available in a stream and seamless switching through them will help you gain competitive advantage and exceed the expectations of viewers. 

  

Fight it step-by-step 

After all, when you want to provide the best solutions you definitely have to take into consideration the OTT churn rate factor. It may be hard to battle the issues that may come, but there are many ways to combat them. The most important thing is listening to the audience and implementing the changes with care with the help of the most experienced specialists on board.