It cannot be denied that Hulu has had a good 2009, full of growth and innovation. But 2009 is now at an end, and 2010 is going to see Hulu facing new challenges. What will the new year hold for the free online television service?
Hulu On The Rise
has had a fairly rapid rise from being an also-ran to a competitor. The American public – who after all are the only ones allowed to access the service – has taken to it well enough for it to now be considered mainstream.
2009 has seen Hulu rise to the number two spot for video views in the U.S. and then cement that position with impressive growth. OK, so it’s a long way behind YouTube in number one but the chances of the Google-owned site being caught are zero.
Hulu In 2009
In a blog post designed to wrap up 2009 and look forward to 2010, Hulu CEO Jason Kilar details some usage stats, some of which are more interesting than others.
The number of people using Hulu monthly grew to 43 million over the course of 2009, which is a rise of 95 percent. However, the big rise occurred at the beginning of the year, with 41.5 million viewers tuning in in April. Since then growth has stalled apart from a spurt in October.
Monthly streams have grown to 924 million, a 307 percent increase from last year. This is impressive, as it indicates that viewers are watching more streams each per month. Those who use Hulu clearly love it.
Content has more than doubled, with content partners having increased from 130 to 200, with Disney/ABC being the biggest catch. And the number of advertisers has swelled from 166 to 408.
And In 2010…
2009 was certainly a good year for Hulu. However, 2010 brings with it new challenges.
There’s a big chance Hulu will (at least partly) switch to being a paid-for service. All the signs are pointing towards it, with three execs involved with Hulu having intimated as much. Advertising revenue may have increased but obviously not enough for those at the top.
Then there is the international roll-out which has also been hinted at very strongly. The U.K. was/is meant to be the first port of call for the company but no concrete plans have yet emerged to that end.
Conclusions
I have my doubts whether 2010 will prove to be as good a year for Hulu as 2009 was. Any move towards requiring subscriptions will see viewers abandon the service, and all the good work of the past two years will be lost.
Then there is the chances of the competition outdoing Hulu at its own game, with YouTube and Apple both eyeing opportunities to offer premium programming, for a price.
