Public Relations & Social Marketing Insight

Nielsen’s 2014 Advertising & Audiences Report found that while the average U.S. home television receives 189 TV channels, the typical consumer only watches 17 different channels. And with mobile devices like tablets and phones increasingly becoming go-to screens as well, it makes sense that some people may prefer having “cordless” viewing options, particularly young people who have grown up used to watching shows online — sometimes referred to as “cord-nevers.”

Yet a report by Leichtman Research Group found that the top pay TV providers have lost only about 0.2 percent of its customer based in the past couple of years. A study by Videorx.com that was cited in the January/February 2015 issue of Streaming Media Magazine also found that most of its respondents hadn’t completely “cut the cord.”

Instead, combining streaming services with traditional programming — in other words, creating individual viewing options according to your own preferences — is becoming much more the norm. Among the Videorx.com study’s respondents, for example, almost 60 percent subscribed to paid TV, and 66 percent had Netflix accounts and 48 percent Amazon Prime/Instant video accounts...