By Mallory Mattingly
Many people ditched cable because of excessive commercial breaks, but as ads become increasingly prevalent on streamers, companies have implemented ad strategies so they don’t alienate audiences again.
According to television company Wurl, cable and broadcast services have about 12 to 16 minutes of ads per hour whereas most streaming platforms have four to eight minutes per hour.
“Excessive ad load is part of what incentivized people to leave cable in the first place,” one executive told Adweek. “We don’t want to repeat that mistake.”
Because of that, streaming companies began to “experiment with optimizing the ad loads they present to viewers in ways that were previously impossible,” per Adweek.
“You can’t cut to a commercial mid-explosion in DIE HARD,” another executive said. “Placement is as important as how many spots you run.”
Related: American’s Are Forgoing Cable TV Due to High Costs
So, if it’s a movie, the ads will likely be front-loaded with a break about halfway through. Live programming, like football games, carries the heaviest ad load, while episodic series fall in the middle. Traditional broadcasts already have built-in commercial breaks, but made-for-streaming content requires “break curation,” and many streamers rely on AI to determine ad placement.
The longer you’ve subscribed to a certain streamer also impacts ad placement. This “cohort-based customization” could mean new users won’t see as many ads at the beginning of their subscription.
“Not everyone needs the same cadence,” an executive said. “A new viewer might not see their first break until a third of the way through a movie, while a loyalist will get a standard pod every 10 or 12 minutes.”
While ads are slowly creeping into streaming, it doesn’t look like people will go back to cable.
According to Cord Cutters News, Warner Bros. Discovery shut down four more cable channels, and more are suspected to close.
This is because people are tired of paying for channels they don’t use. With streaming services, TV viewers can choose which platforms and content they want to pay for.
Per Homelinkd, the average American pays “about $100 a month for cable, and that’s just for basic channels. If you want premium channels or add-ons, your bill could easily be twice that amount.”
For that price, customers could get access to several different streamers each month.
Cable companies’ long-term contracts also tip people to favor streaming as they can come and go on a month-by-month basis.
As streaming companies successfully learn the delicate balance between pleasing advertisers and consumers, it seems that cable’s once strong hold over TV viewers is a thing of the past.
Read Next: Should Cable TV Rethink Its Business Model?
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