A report by Anatomy entitled, The Young and The Brandless, provides an in-depth look at the media consumption, content discovery habits and network brand recognition capabilities of people aged 18 to 26, the age group known as “young millennials”. The survey took answers from 3,100 people in the age group throughout the US.
The report shows that young millennials who primarily watch on TV sets, are on average better than desktop and mobile viewers, at connecting broadcast program brands to network brands. The report also shows that 50% of young millennials only watch TV on desktop or mobile devices and linear viewing is declining year by year, while desktop and mobile viewing is growing year by year. So, in order to future proof a network brand, it is important for networks to improve their promotion on desktop and mobile devices.
Young millennials who watch primarily on desktop and mobile devices are, on average, better than TV viewers at connecting OTT program brands to their related network brands with the exception of Netflix. The overall brand awareness of these OTT networks lags behind that of the broadcast networks. Without the benefit of broadcast TV, OTT services have less room for error in their non-linear digital promotion efforts, and consequently brands such as Amazon and Hulu are going to find it a challenge.
The key millennial viewing trends highlighted in the study include the following:
- 71% of young millennials watch television content on OTT platforms with 50% watching exclusively on desktop or mobile devices.
- 58% of young millennials find out about new programming through friends, family or on social media.
- Netflix yielded the highest brand awareness scores in comparison to other OTT platforms and broadcast networks. 65% of young millennials matched Netflix programs to the Netflix brand, while in contrast only 31% of young millennials matched ABC, CBS, and NBC programs to their respective brands. Amazon programs were only linked with Amazon 20% of the time and Hulu came in at just 15%.
The report can be downloaded from this link.