Netflix is the latest twist on the video streaming service’s efforts to sustain its recently rebounding subscriber growth as more households curb discretionary spending amid increased competition and inflationary pressures. Among them, we are lowering prices in some smaller markets.
The low prices launched earlier this week have affected more than 30 of the roughly 190 countries where Netflix’s streaming service is available. Regions where prices are falling include the Middle East markets of Yemen, Jordan, Libya and Iran. European countries such as Croatia, Slovenia, Bulgaria, and sub-Saharan African markets.
Netflix has not changed prices in any of its largest markets, including the United States, where it has increased prices regularly over the past four years to offset the cost of its programming lineup, which includes popular series such as “The Crown.” not. And “Stranger Things”.
Netflix has established itself as the largest video streaming service, but it competes for audiences with other well-financed rivals such as Apple, Amazon, and Walt Disney Co.
These factors cost Netflix about 1.2 million subscribers in the first half of last year, prompting the company to introduce an ad-supported option for just $7 a month in the US. The most popular plan. That gives Netflix a rebound in the second half of last year when he added 10 million subscribers, and his longtime CEO and co-founder Reed Hastings gets comfortable enough to step down last month. I was able to.
In another attempt to get more subscribers, Netflix has started cracking down on rampant password sharing. This makes the service free for an estimated 100 million people worldwide. Netflix has already cracked down on practices in Latin America earlier this month and in several other countries, including Canada, New Zealand, Portugal and Spain. , is expected to come into force in the United States by the end of March.
Netflix’s new co-CEO Greg Peters hinted during a quarterly conference call last month that he’s looking at ways to attract more subscribers in smaller markets, but using lower prices as a lure. “There are a lot of people around the world in countries that we don’t have a deep presence in, but there are more opportunities to attract them,” Peters said.
In that same call, Peters also indicated that Netflix sees little need for price cuts in markets such as the US. In the US, the company’s service has already proven valuable to longtime subscribers. “We think of ourselves as irreplaceable goods,” Peters said.
Still, Netflix lost 920,000 customers in the US and Canada last year, leaving 74.3 million subscribers in the region at the end of December. Despite declining subscribers, Netflix’s price hikes in the U.S. and Canada boosted revenue in the region by 9% last year to nearly $14.1 billion. Financial gain has become more important to Netflix as it has become more difficult to attract more subscribers as it now focuses on profit growth.
