Netflix says the ad tier reaches 70 million users worldwide

Netflix, a company that once rejected the concept of allowing advertising around its popular streaming content, now can’t seem to get enough of it.

The streaming giant said Tuesday that its ad-supported tier now reaches 70 million users around the world, up from the 40 million it revealed in May and the 22 million it cited in January — a growth trajectory that major marketers want to see before committing to it enter. Netflix’s advertising capabilities more seriously.

Netflix continues to see “steady progress in membership bases across all countries,” Amy Reinhard, president of Advertising at Netflix, said in a statement. “Now more than 50% of new Netflix ad plan signups are in ad-supported countries.”

While Netflix’s global numbers are impressive, most marketers don’t make global ad buys and instead choose to target different promotional messages to specific geographic regions, and media buyers in the US have indicated that advertisers want the Netflix ad tier to get more impressions overall generates. . But ad-level subscriber growth continues, which could draw new interest from Madison Avenue.

In the meantime, Reinhard said Netflix had sold out all available commercial inventory during the upcoming Christmas Day NFL broadcasts, the first time the streamer will show live games from a major sports league. Advertisers in the games include FanDuel and Verizon. FanDuel will serve as an exclusive sportsbook betting partner during a pre-game program that will offer a sponsored segment featuring on-show talent and offering analysis and predictions related to FanDuel’s odds for the games. Verizon will sponsor a segment that will take place before kickoff.

She also offered details about the sponsorship for the next season of “Squid Game.” The executive noted that Netflix “partnered with multiple advertisers in our twelve ad-supported countries, including Kia in Korea.” As part of that pact, Kia will spotlight its “New Sportage,” a crossover SUV, with a three-part series of linked commercials. Kia will also host a ‘pop-up’ event at Kia Unplugged Ground, a complex in Seoul.

Netflix has begun making new forays into audience measurement and ad tech, two other areas of increasing interest to major sponsors.

The company, Reinhard said, will use technology from VideoAmp, one of several new companies competing with Nielsen to count viewers, to “measure advertisers cross-screen and live viewership.” Both start with the launch of WWE on Netflix in January. In Brazil, Netflix will use Kantar Ibope CAV to investigate the reach and frequency of cross-publishers, to be announced in early 2025. And the company expanded its relationship with Barb in Britain in October to explore the viewing habits of subscribers at the ad-supported Netflix tier. there.

And in the US, Netflix has turned to Nielsen to measure live viewership for its NFL games. The streamer will add its own first-party data to the table, part of a new methodology recently approved by the Media Rating Council.

Netflix also said it has started its own ad technology in Canada, part of a move it unveiled earlier this year to break its partnership with Microsoft. “As we continue to evolve our advertising technology, we look forward to introducing enhanced forecasting capabilities and new targeting, reporting, measurement and insights,” said Reinhard. “Netflix’s internal advertising technology will be rolled out globally in 2025.”