Analyst: Top 12 TV Providers Lose Subscribers in 2012

[PTBoardOp94]

As mentioned previously on this board, the large "cable" operators (Time Warner and Comcast) are bleeding customers, but the telcos (AT&T and Verizon FiOS) have been gaining. Dish and DirectTV are also gaining.

Net sum, the 80,000 lost subscribers are only a rounding error of 0.06% of all pay TV subscribers, and pay TV revenues remain strong.

http://variety.com/2013/tv/news/cord-cutting-at-last-hard-evidence-its-really-happening-1200484321/

 

[ShawnHill1]

I can't speak for other providers, but Time Warner Cable is definitely doing whatever it can to bring in (and keep) subscribers, offering plenty of incentives--namely those Visa gift cards that range from $50 to $200 in value, dependent on services you purchase. Before I went back to DirecTV earlier this year, I got into one of those TWC promotions, I added TV service to my already-existing internet plan. With that, they re-structure my packages into a bundle where I was eligible for the reward card (and I did get one when I subscribed to the internet service).

However, in order to get the new reward card, I had to maintain service for 90 days--I didn't quite make that mark, and as a result, I went back to DirecTV. I mainly watch sports, some documentaries, an occassional reality show (like Bar Rescue on Spike or Kitchen Nightmares on BBC America and CMT), sitcom and drama reruns, and movies; the girlfriend watches a ton of the Bravo and VH1 reality shows, as well as plenty of movies, while her son loves Nickelodeon, and to lesser extent, Disney and Cartoon Network. All that said, I'm really considering just dumping cable/satellite altogher once my DirecTV contract expires in the near-future, and go the OTA route with maintaining my Netflix and Hulu subscriptions for my movies and primetime fix, and just find a roundabout way to watch my sports.

There was something a story I saw the other day where HBO is seriously considering offering its Go online serivce in a standalone subscription, instead of having the requirement of being a subscriber of a participating provider. Of course, I would love for that to happen (as I'm sure many of you would too), but we know that the TV providers will raise a lot of hell if does become reality, or at least make things difficult.

 

[Markxxx]

Without seeing actual figures it's pointless. Let's say you have 100 customers and 50 of them are the lowest tier and they quit a service. So what? They pay so little that four of them may equal one high tier customer. So the loss of this isn't as bad as it seems.

Or let's say you lose 50 customers and they are all behind on their bill? Again so what? This is a customer loss but it's your gain. Recently I tried to explain this to my company where we took in more profit in 2012, simply because we collected more on our billings than in 2011, even though our business was greater in 2011, because we had very weak collection efforts and wrote off a ton. (It's an NPO).

You WANT to lose unprofitable customers while keeping your high tiered ones that pay on time.

I know from ATT in Chicago, they have grown from being very accommodating to not caring at all. In Chicago, Comcast is still the only realistic option in most parts of the city, as Uverse is slower and most parts still can't get Uverse and are stuck with DSL.

 

[PTBoardOp94]

You WANT to lose unprofitable customers while keeping your high tiered ones that pay on time.

Right. Time Warner Cable has been doing exactly that. Here's what they had to say in their full-year 2012 financial report:

Residential video revenue decreased (1.6%) driven by declines in video subscribers and transactional video‐on‐
demand and premium network revenue, partially offset by price increases, a greater percentage of
subscribers purchasing higher‐priced tiers of service and increased revenue from equipment rentals.

 

[Casey]

80,000 lost is such a small number, it could even be a rounding error. And it doesn't include numbers from companies outside the top 13. I know my local provider is gaining video subscribers from a top 13 company. There are hundreds of small telcos/muni's/cable co's deploying fiber and coaxial and offering video services in areas they previously didn't serve, like my ISP. Many of these companies/organizations are gaining customers, not losing them. If we included their numbers I bet we would see growth, not a decline.