With the ability to stream and pause live TV it’s no wonder our attention spans are dwindling. Or are they?
Arguably, it is completely dependent on the activity as to how much attention or time we give a project – plus, there’s no actual proof on the matter (Maybin, 2017). I’ve always been the sort of person to watch TV or a movie while I’m getting jobs or work done, so catch-up TV and streaming services like Netflix and NowTV are perfect for me.
Since its creation in 1997, Netflix has gone from strength to strength (McAlone, 2016). When Netflix decided to start creating their own content, they ran algorithms on user’s data to work out ‘what the public wanted’ (Kleinman, 2017). Funnily enough, their key ingredients turned out to be (recently disgraced) Kevin Spacey, director David Fincher and British political dramas (Kleinman, 2017). The weird part being Netflix executives predetermining the popularity of a show that hadn’t even started yet, and what a great success House of Cards turned out to be (Carr, 2013)! Seemingly, they know what we want, even before we do.
They’re a company that prefer ‘hype’ or ‘viral’ marketing methods as opposed to traditional tactics. I mean, their Twitter channel alone is entertainment enough! On average, early last year, new Netflix original shows produced 30% more mentions on Twitter than that of new shows aired on network or cable TV (Franck, 2017). Arguably, this popularity is spawned by many Netflix series being added all at once, giving users the ability to binge watch the shows and therefore giving them more chance to go viral for a longer length of time (Franck, 2017)..
One of my personal favourite viral methods is that of the reincarnated dystopian sci-fi that is Black Mirror; which has its own Twitter account (cue slight series 4 spoilers). One of their most recent analogies being that of calling out Toyota’s new driverless van’s: one of which ran someone over in the most recent series with a simple ‘we tried to warn you’ type tweet (Joho, 2018). The tweet itself, retweeted on the 8th January 2018, has earned over 134,500 retweets and over 350,000 likes.
In addition to this, Netflix created a tremendous amount of hype surrounding Stranger Things Season 2. They collaborated with a number of reputable brands, including but not limited to Reebok, Topshop, Spotify and PlayStation (McCarthy, 2017). Not to mention their ‘Upside Down’ London (McCarthy, 2017)! The release of the new seasons’ teaser trailer created so much buzz on social media that it surpassed all of the 65 brands mentioned during the Super Bowl (Reuters, 2017). I don’t know about you, but I was personally very excited to see The Upside Down in the ‘real world’. I’ve always been the sort of person who would pick the Disney themed tissue box over the boring Sainsburys own one. I am definitely someone that hype marketing works on, because I love being able to join in and be a part of things I enjoy.
Anyway, it’s clear that Netflix wants to become its own entity, their transformation within the last 20 years has been astonishing (Bishop, 2017). Plus, I don’t think they’ll be slowing down soon. With a back catalogue of Orange is the New Black, Stranger Things and Daredevil to name a few, along with popular ‘reincarnated’ TV shows like Black Mirror and Arrested Development; they have done little wrong in my mind at least. Netflix have a clear marketing strategy and I for one am extremely excited to see what’s next.