Television is in trouble. Americans streamed 43.5 billion videos in December 2011, up 44% since December 2010, according to comScore’s 2012 US Digital Future In Focus report released today. The study also showed that 105.1 million Americans now watch videos online each day, up 43% from 73.7 million in 2010.
comScore says YouTube is largely driving this, and that average minutes per video view, average videos watched per user, and total ads streamed are way up as well. TV and film studios should take notice and consider how they can create companion content to engage this growing audience and promote their traditional offerings.
Note that these stats are from an independent measurement service, and other measurements and internal traffic stats from the companies discussed may vary.
Other key statistics on American video watching habits in December 2011 compared to December 2010 include:
- The average video view length is up from 5 minutes to 5.8 minutes, showing an increasing willingness to watch longer form content
- The average viewer watches 239 videos per month
- Video advertising volume is rising faster than total videos streamed. The ratio of the number of video ads to total videos grew from 12.8 percent to 14.1 percent, with video ad volume up 20% to 7.1 billion ads served this year
- YouTube and other Google sites account for 21.9 billion of the 43.5 billion video view in December –50.4% of the total market. VEVO ranked 2nd with 801 million (1.8%), Hulu was 3rd with 777 million (1.8%), and Netflix was 4th with 431 million (1%)
- YouTube’s partner channel program has been a success, pushing more professionally developed content to viewers. In December, VEVO’s channel had 53.5 million viewers, Warner Music had 31.7 million viewers, and Machinima had 22.7 million viewers, indicating strong interest in Justin Bieber and watching people kill each other in Call of Duty