Amazon have started to inform subscribers that they will start adding adverts to their streaming Prime Video from the 5th of February in the UK, and from the 29th around the world. To remove them it’ll cost you an additional £2.99 subscription.
Frankly, they already show Prime Video ads for other movies at the start of each film and it annoys the hell out of me, if there are ads in the middle of movies as well it’ll be like watching terrestrial TV although they do say that they “aim to have meaningfully fewer ads than linear TV and other streaming TV providers”.
On normal TV, I refuse to watch adverts and pause a programme for 15 minutes while I go get a cup of tea so I can fast forward through each ad break. On normal TV there’s around 15 to 20 minutes of adverts every hour so you’re only really getting 40 minute programmes. It will be interesting to see how many minutes per hour Amazon insert and whether they’ll be at the start of a video or if they insert them in the middle.
Even if you pay to remove ads, they’ll remain for certain streams like live sport.
Amazon published research last year saying that 89% of people are receptive to streaming TV ads that are interesting, relevant or help to keep subscription costs down.
For brands looking to convert their streaming TV ads in to sales, the effectiveness of different types of advertising varies depending on the age of the audience the advertising reaches. More than a third (34%) of adult Gen-Z and millennials said they were likely to buy a product they liked after seeing it included within an interactive streaming TV ad, compared to just 10% of those aged 55+. In contrast, almost one in five (19%) of those aged 55+ said they would be likely to make a purchase if they saw a product they liked in a standard ad that automatically plays during streaming TV content.
The really interesting thing will be to see how Amazon Prime Video Ads formats are constructed. Unlike other streams such as Disney+ and Netflix, Amazon have a retail business and if they think the investment it worth it, they are one of the very few who could build in shoppable ads that could see a product arrive at your door from a click of your remote during an ad break. They’ve not announced any such intention, but it’s an inevitable step at some point in the future.
