ReportWire

Tag: subscribers

  • Paramount+ Black Friday deal: Get either the Essential or Premium plan for only $3 per month for two months

    Paramount+ has launched its latest streaming offer, giving new subscribers two months of access for $6 total through December 2 for Black Friday. With prices rising across other platforms, this short-term deal offers a chance to explore either the Essential or Premium plan and see which fits your viewing habits best. Yes, you can pick either plan and get the $3-per-month deal — of course, that makes the Premium plan the better option in terms of the greater discount.

    Paramount+ continues to expand its catalog with a mix of current CBS shows, exclusive originals, classic TV and live sports. The service is available in two main tiers: Essential, which includes ads, and Premium, which removes most of them and adds a few key extras like 4K streaming, offline downloads and live CBS access. Both tiers include select Showtime programming, giving subscribers a taste of the premium network’s lineup.

    Paramount+

    Get two months of either Paramount+ plan for only $3 per month for Black Friday.

    $6 at Paramount+

    The Essential plan provides access to more than 40,000 episodes and movies, along with live coverage of the NFL on CBS and UEFA Champions League matches. It supports up to three simultaneous streams, making it a practical choice for households that share accounts. The Premium plan builds on that by offering ad-free on-demand viewing (with exceptions for live broadcasts), higher-quality playback and the option to watch CBS live in participating regions.

    Paramount+’s growing library combines new releases with well-known favorites, offering titles from across CBS, MTV, Nickelodeon and Comedy Central. Sports fans get live coverage of key events, while movie watchers can find recent cinema releases from Paramount Pictures joining the lineup throughout the year. The inclusion of Showtime series in both plans adds another layer of variety, with dramas and documentaries available alongside the core Paramount+ content.

    If you’re keeping an eye on subscription costs, an offer like this is a practical way to test the service without paying full price. It also gives you time to see whether the Essential plan’s ad-supported setup or the Premium tier’s extras are worth the difference.

    If you’ve been watching your streaming spend as prices go up elsewhere, this deal from Paramount+ offers a well-balanced opportunity to experience both plan levels at a lower cost. Paramount+ is one of the best streaming services thanks to its vast selection of original shows like Star Trek: Discovery, Ink Master and Frasier. If you’re ready to stream big shows and live events without a heavy commitment this Cyber Monday offer is one to keep in mind.

    There are plenty of other Black Friday streaming deals to consider as well. Here are some of the best ones:

    • Disney+ Hulu bundle — $60 for one year: The Disney+ and Hulu (with ads) bundle is on sale for $5 per month for one year (for a total of $60) through December 1. New and eligible returning subscribers can take advantage of this deal, and considering the bundle typically costs $13 per month, this deal represents more than a 50 percent discount on the standard monthly price.

    • Apple TV+ — 6 months for $36: Apple TV+ is offering six months of access for only $36 for Black Friday, which comes out to a discounted price of $6 per month for the six-month period. The deal is live now for new and eligible returning subscribers and runs through December 1, giving you a chance to stream shows like Silo, The Morning Show and For All Mankind for less. The biggest caveat to the deal is that you must subscribe directly through Apple and not through a third-party service.

    • HBO Max — one year for $36: HBO Max’s Black Friday deal gives subscribers one year streaming for $36 through December 1. This Black Friday streaming deal is on the ad-supported option, which normally goes for $11 per month. With this discount, you’re getting it for $3 per month for one year. You can sign up via HBO Max’s website or, if you’re a Prime Video subscriber already, via that service as an add-on.

    • Sling TV Orange — day pass for only $1: Sling TV launched Day Passes earlier this year, giving users one-day access to a variety of its packages. This deal cuts $4 off the normal price of a day pass for Sling Orange. With that, you get unlimited access for 24 hours to Orange’s more than 30 channels that includes ESPN, CNN, TBS and others.

    Georgie Peru

    Source link

  • MasterClass subscriptions are up to 50 percent off thanks to Black Friday streaming deals

    If you’ve been waiting for the right moment to try MasterClass, now’s a great time to sign up. The online learning platform is offering 50 percent off all annual plans for a limited time with its Black Friday sale. With hundreds of classes across topics like cooking, writing and music, it’s one of the best deals we’ve seen from MasterClass this year.

    MasterClass has built a reputation as one of the best streaming platforms for learning new skills and creative hobbies. The service features courses led by industry leaders who share practical insights drawn from their own careers. Whether you want to cook with Gordon Ramsay, explore storytelling with Neil Gaiman or study filmmaking with Martin Scorsese, the range of topics is broad enough to appeal to almost any interest.

    MasterClass

    Classes are organized into short, easy-to-follow video lessons, making it simple to fit learning into a busy schedule. Each one comes with supplemental materials like downloadable workbooks, assignments or behind-the-scenes notes that add extra depth. New classes are added regularly, so subscribers have a steady flow of fresh content throughout the year.

    Subscriptions are structured around annual plans that unlock the full catalog. You can watch classes on most devices, including smartphones, tablets and smart TVs, and your progress syncs across platforms. Offline viewing is supported too, so you can download lessons to study during travel or commutes.

    Beyond creative skills, MasterClass has expanded into professional growth and wellness topics, with courses covering leadership, communication and mindfulness. It’s not just about inspiration; the platform’s focus on actionable advice makes it a practical choice for anyone who wants to pick up new skills or refresh existing ones.

    Normally, annual plans cost anywhere from $120 to $240 per year, so up to a 50-percent discount represents significant savings for new or returning subscribers. If you’ve been thinking about joining or gifting a membership, this promotion is one of the best times to do it.

    There are plenty of other Black Friday streaming deals to consider as well. Here are some of the best ones:

    • Apple TV+ — 6 months for $36: Apple TV+ is offering six months of access for only $36 for Black Friday, which comes out to a discounted price of $6 per month for the six-month period. The deal is live now for new and eligible returning subscribers and runs through December 1, giving you a chance to stream shows like Silo, The Morning Show and For All Mankind for less. The biggest caveat to the deal is that you must subscribe directly through Apple and not through a third-party service.

    • Paramount+ — two months of Essential or Premium for $6: This Black Friday deal brings the monthly price of either Paramount+ tier down to just $6 for two months, or $3 per month. The obvious better deal is on the Premium plan, which typically costs $13 per month.

    • HBO Max — one year for $36: HBO Max’s Black Friday deal gives subscribers one year streaming for $36 through December 1. This Black Friday streaming deal is on the ad-supported option, which normally goes for $11 per month. With this discount, you’re getting it for $3 per month for one year. You can sign up via HBO Max’s website or, if you’re a Prime Video subscriber already, via that service as an add-on.

    • Sling TV Orange — day pass for only $1: Sling TV launched Day Passes earlier this year, giving users one-day access to a variety of its packages. This deal cuts $4 off the normal price of a day pass for Sling Orange. With that, you get unlimited access for 24 hours to Orange’s more than 30 channels that includes ESPN, CNN, TBS and others.

    Georgie Peru

    Source link

  • Xbox Game Pass subscriptions have begun to taper off

    Xbox Game Pass subscriptions have begun to taper off

    Game Pass, Microsoft’s subscription service for games, has 34 million subscribers as of February 2024. Microsoft revealed the number in a blog post where it shared its plan about the future of the Xbox business.

    The latest number reveals that Game Pass growth has slowed down drastically. It took Microsoft three years since Game Pass launched in 2017 to get to 10 million subscribers in April 2020. In the next five months, the company added five million subscribers, and hit 18 million subscribers by January 2021, a growth rate of nearly 90 percent per year. A year later, the company announced that Game Pass had 25 million subscribers. Over the last two years, Game Pass has added nine million subscribers, which would be an average annual increase of just 18 percent.

    Game Pass lets players pay a monthly fee to Microsoft for unlimited access to an evolving library of games that they can play on their consoles or PCs. In an announcement on Thursday, the brand’s leaders revealed plans to bring Xbox games to more platforms including the PlayStation 5 and the Nintendo Switch, both of which have far more users than Xbox. There are currently no plans to offer Game Pass on either Sony or Nintendo’s platforms.

    Pranav Dixit

    Source link

  • Google Is About to Delete Inactive Accounts. Here’s How to Avoid A Massive Gmail Bounce Rate. | Entrepreneur

    Google Is About to Delete Inactive Accounts. Here’s How to Avoid A Massive Gmail Bounce Rate. | Entrepreneur

    Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

    “If a Google Account has not been used or signed into for at least two years, we may delete the account and its contents,” Google announced in a blog post, and that time is coming soon. In December, the tech giant will begin removing inactive accounts along with their content across Google Workspace, which includes Gmail. The policy applies only to personal Google accounts — but for businesses like yours, that may result in a spike in bounces.

    Why Google will start purging abandoned accounts

    Google’s decision to weed out inactive accounts is another step the company is taking to prevent security threats like spam, phishing and account hijacking.

    “If an account hasn’t been used for an extended period of time, it is more likely to be compromised,” Google’s VP of Product Management Ruth Kricheli explains. Abandoned accounts have weaknesses bad actors could exploit. Old passwords and a lack of two-factor authentication make them vulnerable and “a vector for unwanted or even malicious content, like spam,” adds Kricheli.

    How to prepare and avoid a massive Gmail bounce rate

    For businesses like yours that use email to connect with customers and prospects, Google’s move is a high bounce rate alert. With Gmail being the largest email provider in the world, your email list likely contains many personal Gmail accounts, especially if your business caters to consumers.

    Email providers consider a bounce rate under 2% acceptable. But once you’ve crossed that threshold, your emails can start landing in the spam folder. Bounces tarnish your sender reputation, which is a 0 to 100 score Internet service providers (ISPs) use to determine whether you’re a legitimate sender or a spammer. The closer to 100 your score is, the more ISPs trust you as a sender – and deliver your messages to the inbox. Lower scores mean your emails could be spam.

    So, how can you prepare beforehand and avoid emailing addresses that may bounce? Being proactive is much easier than fixing the damage.

    Related: 5 Simple Tweaks for Better Email Deliverability

    Remove inactive subscribers

    Many businesses hold on to subscribers longer than they should. Having a sizable email list can give you a wider reach. However, in email marketing, engagement trumps such vanity metrics. Also, if someone hasn’t opened your emails in more than six months, what are the chances they’ll ever start engaging again?

    So, segment unengaged subscribers and try to win them back with an enticing offer. Make sure you put it right in the subject line and preview text so they can’t miss it. Then, remove non-openers and keep only prospects who click. Before Google starts deleting them, it’s best to prune these accounts yourself to avoid any bounces.

    Validate your entire email list

    Observing how your inactive subscribers react to a targeted campaign gives you useful audience insights. But inactive subscribers aren’t the only risky types of contacts you could have on your list. Abuse emails, for instance, belong to individuals who tend to report many emails as spam. To avoid potential spam complaints, some email marketers prefer to weed them out using an email verifier.

    There’s also the issue of temporary email addresses, which many people use to avoid giving out their real address. Temporary emails self-destruct and cause your emails to bounce, so deleting them from your database is good prevention.

    On average, almost a quarter of your database goes bad yearly, according to ZeroBounce’s Email List Decay Report. The upcoming Gmail purge will only add to this natural data decay, so validate your list again to ensure it’s safe to use.

    How Google will delete inactive accounts

    While Google’s policy took effect in May 2023, it won’t affect inactive Gmail users until December. The tech company will delete abandoned accounts in several phases, starting with those people created and never used again. Could you have any such email addresses in your database? Check your email marketing reports. If any subscribers signed up for your emails but never opened your messages, remove them immediately.

    Related: How to give your email marketing a boost ahead of the holidays

    Abandoned accounts are hurting your email marketing

    As a business owner trying to reach your customers’ inboxes, you must always be aware of your sender reputation. Bounces and spam complaints affect it dramatically, but so does poor engagement.

    When people don’t react to the emails you send, ISPs interpret that as an indication that your content isn’t helpful. As a result, your emails are more likely to go to the junk folder. That’s why email marketing best practices involve regularly pruning unresponsive subscribers. Their mere presence on your email list hurts your email deliverability. And when they’ll start bouncing, the damage will be even more severe.

    So, reevaluate the health of your email list so that your newsletters and campaigns can make it to the inbox. The Gmail purge is the best reason to look into the quality of your contacts today.

    Liviu Tanase

    Source link

  • 5 Steps to Fuel Your Email Marketing Efforts Before the Holidays | Entrepreneur

    5 Steps to Fuel Your Email Marketing Efforts Before the Holidays | Entrepreneur

    Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

    People spent $1.14 trillion online and $270 billion in the U.S. during last year’s holiday season. For businesses like yours, the coming months have the highest sales potential — and for that, you need a reliable strategy.

    Email marketing is competitive 365 days a year, but the last quarter? It all comes to a head. With so many companies fighting for attention and dollars, you can’t afford to have anything go wrong.

    From figuring out the right offers to preparing your email list, here are five steps you can take today to get better holiday email marketing results.

    Related: 8 Simple Email Marketing Tips to Improve Your Open and Click Through Rates

    1. Create different offers for each audience segment

    Your customers’ journey with your company can be wildly different. For instance, a repeat customer will have different needs compared to a prospect who just created an account on your website. So, when you and your team brainstorm holiday email campaigns, you must take these details into account and segment your audience.

    If the effort of splitting your list intimidates you, stay focused on the benefits. Open rates are 14% higher for segmented campaigns, which means you’ll have higher chances to convert.

    2. Verify your customers’ email addresses

    Now that you’re clear on the offers for each customer segment, it’s time to check the health of your email lists. Looking at your most recent email marketing reports is a good place to start. For instance, if your bounce rate exceeds 2%, you know it’s time to run your databases through an email verifier. Otherwise, your email deliverability will suffer. This is not a time when you can risk having your emails go to spam.

    After verifying more than six billion email addresses in a year, ZeroBounce found that only 57% of them were valid and safe to keep. Your email list decays monthly, so remove obsolete data and also check every new address you gather.

    Related: 11 Common Email Marketing Mistakes (and How to Fix Them)

    3. Run an email blacklist check

    Have you noticed a steep decline in your open rates and clicks in the past few months? Your IP or domain could be blacklisted. Mailbox providers (like Yahoo or Gmail) and anti-spam organizations maintain email blacklists to block senders with a history of spam-sending. However, even senders with good intentions can land on a blacklist if they don’t maintain healthy email lists and follow best practices. In most cases, emails from blocked senders never make it to their recipients.

    Email blacklists are updated in real-time. The best way to find out if your IP or domain is flagged is to use a blacklist checker. Such tools run tests against hundreds of blacklists and alert you if there’s trouble.

    4. Part with subscribers who never click

    Every email list has its devoted fans, who open every email, and subscribers who rarely or never click. While these email addresses don’t bounce, their lack of interaction sends Internet service providers (ISPs) the wrong message about you. If a large segment of your list doesn’t open your emails, are you relevant enough to be in the inbox? Unengaged subscribers may cause your campaigns to go to spam, so if you haven’t removed them in more than six months, now is the time.

    You may be nervous about reducing your email list right before the holidays, but you’ll enjoy more engagement. Since they haven’t opened any of your emails in months, those subscribers weren’t likely to convert anyway.

    5. Send a gift to boost engagement

    To increase engagement ahead of the holidays, start warming up your prospects a few weeks before launching your campaigns. An effective tactic is to create a series of educational emails to relieve some of your customers’ pain points. Whether you run a B2B or a retail business, think of free content offers to create your emails around. A free e-book, infographic or useful video can go a long way in building trust and standing out in people’s inboxes.

    Remember: healthy engagement feeds your email deliverability, showing ISPs that your content is relevant. Nurture your audience with outstanding emails before you go for the hard sell.

    Related: 5 Things You Can Do Now to Improve Email Marketing

    Bonus tip: keep sending those great emails

    Aside from sending compelling content, sending it regularly is what helps your email marketing the most. If throughout the year you’ve been inconsistent, now you want to gradually ramp up volume. You’ll build a stronger connection to your customers, and your email deliverability will benefit.

    Avoid sudden and drastic volume increases, as ISPs can flag that behavior as suspicious. The more predictable you are, the better chance you have of getting your email campaigns in the inbox.

    Liviu Tanase

    Source link

  • Almost 25% of Your Email List Has Gone Bad in the Past Year. Here’s How to Fix It. | Entrepreneur

    Almost 25% of Your Email List Has Gone Bad in the Past Year. Here’s How to Fix It. | Entrepreneur

    Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

    By 2025, more than 4.5 billion people worldwide will have at least one email address. Email is a profitable marketing channel because it provides a direct and personal line of communication with prospects. But it only works if your emails land in the inbox and allow you to connect with your target audience.

    Many obstacles will prevent an email from reaching the inbox, but the most common one is an outdated email list. And email lists tend to decay quickly. Within just one year, almost 23% of the average database becomes obsolete. The percentage may be higher for B2B companies, with people changing jobs more often in the past three years.

    This rapid degradation of email data causes poor email deliverability, missed opportunities and a decrease in conversions. Let’s see some of the reasons why – and how you can always have a healthy email list.

    Related: 3 Tips and Tricks You Can Use to Drive Email Deliverability During The Holidays

    How the quality of your list affects email deliverability

    Reaching the inbox is closely tied to your sender reputation, also known as your sender score. Internet service providers assign this score to every sender so they can automatically determine whether your emails belong in the inbox or in the spam folder.

    Everything you do as an email sender – from the content you send, to how often you send it and how much people engage with it – builds your sender reputation.

    Your email list quality plays a vital role here. For instance, if you get many bounces (more than 2% per email) or too many spam reports (more than one for every 1,000 emails), your sender score takes a hit. That means your email deliverability is at risk as your behavior begins to resemble that of a spammer.

    While data decays quickly, there are proactive steps you can take to always keep your email list fresh. Here are a few key habits you will benefit from.

    Start by verifying your email list

    With 22.71% of an email list going bad yearly, this is the best place to start. You want to run your database through an email validation service and see how many of your contacts are still safe to use. This may cause your list to decrease in size – but it will increase in effectiveness. Removing potential bounces and other obsolete emails repairs your sender score and gives you an email deliverability boost.

    Prune out dormant subscribers

    Nothing impacts the health of your list like invalid and fake addresses, but dormant subscribers can cause your campaigns to land in spam, too. They affect your engagement rates (opens, clicks, forwards), thus telling inbox providers that your content is irrelevant. Furthermore, some of these subscribers may not even be using those addresses anymore. So not only will they not click, but those emails may start bouncing as they get deactivated. The best way to avoid that is to remove disengaged subscribers every three to six months.

    Related: 8 Simple Email Marketing Tips to Improve Your Open and Click Through Rates

    Handle complainers with care

    Like bounces, spam complaints have a negative impact on your sender score. To Internet service providers, they’re a clear signal that your emails aren’t just irrelevant – they actually bother people. Spam complaints alone can be reason enough for your campaigns to start going to the junk folder.

    To prevent that, make sure to remove complainers right away. Emailing those subscribers again will only make things worse. Additionally, you could use email verification to detect users who have a history of reporting many emails as spam. Taking them off your list allows you to mitigate the risk of spam complaints and protect your sender score.

    Bonus tips to keep your list engaged and boost email deliverability

    A healthy database is key to good email deliverability, but it’s not the only factor that contributes to your sender reputation. To keep your emails landing in the inbox, try to:

    • Send your subscribers the content they signed up for. Whether you promised great discounts or educational emails, keep your promise and strive to over-deliver.
    • Avoid long breaks from sending emails. You’ll see higher engagement when you’re present in people’s inboxes consistently.
    • Invite people to reply to your emails. Replies are the best kind of engagement – to inbox providers, they indicate a highly trustworthy sender.
    • Reassess your email service provider every year. Could there be a better one for you out there? Always go with a reputable company that ensures high deliverability.
    • Install real-time email verification software on your registration and sign-up forms. That way, you block bad data at the source and keep your email list fresh for longer.
    • Be flexible with your copy. Test your subject lines, tone and email length and notice the patterns that tend to get more clicks. The more people react to your content, the more trust you build with inbox providers.

    Email lists degrade fast. To increase your deliverability, make sure to follow these tips and get the most out of the emails you send.

    Liviu Tanase

    Source link

  • Netflix Has ‘Monster’ Q3 With 2.4 Million New Subscribers, Forecast Beat, And Profits

    Netflix Has ‘Monster’ Q3 With 2.4 Million New Subscribers, Forecast Beat, And Profits

    After half a year in misery that forced dramatic changes across the company and the entire streaming industry, Netflix bounced back in its third quarter earnings in a big way, topping forecasts, adding 2.4 million subscribers and even making money.

    The company released results and an investor letter after markets closed Tuesday that also marked a return to the company’s traditional swagger, as it tweaked competitors for losing money, bragged about a string of big hits led by Dahmer – Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story, and said viewer engagement far outstrips other major streaming services, “with room for growth.”

    “After a challenging first half, we believe we’re on a path to reaccelerate growth,” the investor newsletter says. “The key is pleasing members. It’s why we’ve always focused on winning the competition for viewing every day. When our series and movies excite our members, they tell their friends, and then more people watch, join and stay with us.”

    Shares, which had drooped 1.67% during the day, shot up more than 13% in initial after-hours trading, briefly topping $274 a share. That’s still far below the stock’s stratospheric heights of last November, when prices topped $685 a share.

    Prices plummeted after a disastrous April earnings call, when the company reported its first drop in subscribers in a decade, followed a quarter later by an even bigger drop of about 1 million subscribers.

    The relatively small initial drop, however, sent investors to the exit door, forcing the company to begin cutting spending, laying off hundreds of employees and contract workers, killing some projects, and most notably announcing a new ad-supported tier, which launches in 16 days.

    Netflix’s drop also forced a reckoning on the rest of the industry as investors began looking at metrics beyond subscriber adds, and started pushing companies to say when they’d begin making money on streaming. For most, the answer is 2024 or after.

    Netflix appeared to answer all those questions for itself on Tuesday:

    • It’s beating forecasts, at least its own, as it slightly exceeded expected revenue, operating income and membership;
    • It’s growing again, adding 2.4 million subscribers, to 223.09 million worldwide, a rise of 4.5% year over year;
    • It’s making hits. Beyond Monster and some other Dahmer-related programming, the company debuted several other big hits, including Season 4 of Stranger Things (the season’s second half debuted at the very start of the quarter), Korean-made Extraordinary Attorney Woo, $200 million spy thriller The Gray Man, and romantic drama Purple Hearts;
    • People are sticking around to watch a lot. Engagement – one of those newly valued Wall Street metrics – far exceeded competitors in the United States and United Kingdom, with 8.2 % of video viewing in the UK and 7.6% of U.S.;
    • It’s making money, and everyone else isn’t: “Our competitors are investing heavily to drive subscribers and engagement, but building a large, successful streaming business is hard – we estimate they are all losing money, with combined 2022 operating losses well over $10 billion, vs. Netflix’s $5 to $6 billion annual operating profit.”

    The company reported $7.93 billion in revenue, up 5.9% year over year, but down slightly from Q2, which hit $7.97 billion. The company credited the higher revenue to more subscribers, up 5%

    Net income hit $1.398 billion, and diluted earnings per share remained high at $3.10. Free cash flow topped $472 million, dramatically up from Q2’s $13 million, and the negative FCF of the second half of 2021.

    The company forecasted a much tighter set of results for 2022’s last quarter, however, with another decline in revenue, to $7.78 billion, a big drop in net income to $163 million, and diluted earnings per share to 36 cents. That’s despite a projected big bump in subscribers again, up 4.5 million to 227.59 million worldwide.

    LightShed Partners’ Rich Greenfield wondered in a note published before the earnings came out if Netflix’s “approach to advertising (is) primitive on purpose,” designed to milk the $65 billion or so spent annually in legacy broadcast and cable, rather than take on the data-informed precision of YouTube and Facebook. Those legacy ad revenues are seeing a significant outflow to connected TV and streaming as advertisers follow the shift in viewing habits.

    Also unclear, Greenfield wrote, is how Microsoft’s reported $5 billion in revenue guarantees over the next five years will impact Netflix’s Average Revenue Per User, another newly prized metric. Microsoft is Netflix’s technology partner on the ad tier.

    Netflix has long wrung more revenue from its subscribers than most competitors, especially Disney, whose roughly equal global subscriber totals have been plumped by tens of millions of Indian subscribers paying far less per month for Disney+/Hotstar subscriptions.

    David Bloom, Senior Contributor

    Source link