OTT platforms have the streaming service game difficult (for competitors) and pretty interesting for its viewers. The year kicks off with Netflix’s offering their plans at a flat 50% discount.
To reply to Netflix’s pricing strategy, Amazon Prime is aiming to launch 1 new original Indian show every month this year. The Forgotten Army – Azaadi K Liye to be aired on 24th January. Anything between 10-12 titles could be aired this year.
“This kicks off a pretty ambitious year for us. I think our portfolio is looking quite interesting and hopefully, we will serve customers well. In 2020, we hope to have anything between 10-12 originals including a lot of new shows as well as a few returning seasons of extremely popular shows,” said Vijay Subramaniam, director and head, content, Amazon Prime Video India
Last year the OTT platform added quite a few returning seasons of Indian originals like Inside Edge 2, Comicstaan 2. They are trying the same thing but with more focus this time.
Amazon Prime caught hype with its original series (crime drama) Mirzapur and (thriller drama) Breathe starring Abhishek Bacchan and people were drooling over this OTT platform. In fact, Mirzapur was so famous that people subscribed to this OTT platform just to catch up with this series.
This year we will see the second season of Breathe and Mirzapur besides the third season of Comisctaan. Another game-changer from Amazon Prime is releasing a robust line-up of Bollywood blockbusters Hindi films on its OTT platform soon after they are released in movie halls.
After Telugu and Tamil languages, the OTT platform is speeding up content in Malayalam, Punjabi, and Marathi as well. It looks like Amazon Prime is taking the Indian audience very seriously and they don’t want to leave any region untouched.
It seems like OTT platforms are slowly replacing Traditional TVs in entertaining its viewers.
“What we have understood and learned from our customers is the right balance of frequency, size and scale and 2020 is all about these 3. WE will continue to learn; we are nowhere near being experts at this because the tastes and preferences of our customers evolve with time. What we also continue to improve on is the overall customer experience, whether it’s the user interface, the languages, and the value-added features” said, Subramaniam.
Amazon Prime Video is focusing on a variety of series but they have narrowed pitches to a few genres. Comedy being their focus due to the behemoth success of Comicstaan.
“We want to provide multiple seasons of a story because we believe when customers engage with a piece of content, they start owning it, then they want more of it. We don’t do self-contained show episodic stories with a beginning, middle, and end. We prefer them to be serialized because it allows for a habit for viewers to lean in and enjoy more characters. All said and done, we believe we are building a streaming habit in the country and it’s important to engage with customer continuously” said Subramaniam.
The OTT platform is yet to discover the biopic section but for now, they are trying their best to create an identity among Indian viewers. The news comes soon after Netflix announced a flat 50% discount on their annual plans.
The year 2020 seems to be an interesting year as both the leading OTT platforms are trying their best to attract 2.7 billion smartphone users across the nation. While Netflix is focusing on its pricing strategy, Amazon Prime Video is focusing on their content creation.
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