For Creatives, Strategists & Marketers

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As more details about Netflix’s new ad-supported subscription tier emerge, a consensus is forming that the streaming platform is asking for quite a lot in return for relatively little. 

The Wall Street Journal and Variety are reporting that Netflix wants advertisers to pay $65 for a thousand views on its platform, which is considerably higher than most other platforms, and eyeball-for-eyeball more expensive than a typical Super Bowl spot. 

Variety describes that as a ‘soft’ price, though, meaning that Netflix is prepared to negotiate. Still, the streaming platform seems to be offering precious little in terms of targeting and measurement to sweeten the deal. 

According to reports, advertisers will only be able to target ads against Netflix’s 10 most popular TV series and certain genres of content – they will not be able to target viewers by gender, age, viewing preferences or by time of day, and they will only be able to target geographically at country level. 

Netflix is also believed to be capping frequencies quite strictly. According to The Wall Street Journal, brands cannot buy more than $20m of ads in any given year, and they will be prevented from showing the same ad to the same viewer more than once per hour and more than three times per day. 

AdAge (which reported a slightly lower CPM price of $60) is also reporting that Netflix will not have third-party measurement in place at launch to verify its metrics, nor will it offer metrics of its own beyond impressions. 

It’s worth stating at this point that Netflix’s official response to the reports is that it is all speculation and no decisions have yet been made. 

It could be that Netflix is just flying by the seat of its pants a little, and will add targeting and measurement options as it builds its ad platform. But given co-founder Reed Hastings' previous comments about wanting Netflix to be a safe respite from exploitative advertising practices, it's just as easy to imagine that they are ideological preferences. 

If Netflix is relying on the power of its brand and programming to attract advertisers then it no doubt has a strong hand to play. The comprehensive press coverage surrounding the launch of its ad-supported subscription tier is testament that. But the excitement won’t last forever, and if brands don’t feel like they’re getting good value or service from Netflix then they have plenty of other options. 

And given that Netflix has apparently moved the launch date forward to 1 November – to get to market before Disney introduces its own ad-supported streaming package – we might not have long to wait to see how it all shakes out.

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