KOLKATA: In a unique promotional gimmick, Netflix offered Indian audiences all of its content for free over a weekend last month. The move seems to have yielded fine results for the streaming service, as it has witnessed a sharp rise in app installs, open rate, daily active usage during that period, according to Kalagato.

After Netflix stopped offering a free monthly trial, the platform came up with this innovative marketing campaign to get more people to sample and subscribe to the service. On 5 and 6 December, non-users of Netflix could sign up with their name, email or phone number, and password and gain access to the content library without any payment. Following the overwhelming response, the streaming giant came back with round two on 9-11 December.

One of the most obvious impacts of this campaign by Netflix was an increase in app downloads during the promotion period, with the reach seeing a spike of 13 per cent during the weekend of 5-6 December, compared to average reach of the previous four weekends. Notably, the spike of 15 per cent was sharper on Sunday, compared to 10 per cent on Saturday. All other apps excluding SonyLiv and Wynk remained more or less consistent with previous weeks’ performance.

(Source: Kalagato)

Along with improved access, Netflix saw 243 per cent DAU jump during the weekend. Saturday saw a rise of 213 per cent whereas Sunday saw figures reaching 271 per cent over the previous four Sundays.

(Source: Kalagato)

This impressive uptick in activity on Netflix, however, did not have any discernible impact on the usage of platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Whatsapp, Twitter or YouTube. Among other OTT apps, Disney+ Hotstar and Amazon Prime Video saw drops of 11 per cent and 17 per cent respectively. SonyLiv and Wynk Movies also saw significant spikes in DAU — to the tune of 127 per cent and 148 per cent respectively.

Open rates for Netflix saw a spike of 135 per cent on average compared to the previous four weekends, 128 per cent on Saturday, and 141 per cent on Sunday. Amazon and Disney+ Hotstar, on the other hand, witnessed drops of six-eight per cent in open rates during this period. Some of these apps also saw lower time spent on their platforms. According to the report, drops of 10-12 per cent were seen across OTT apps of Amazon Prime Video, Disney+ Hotstar, MX player, Vodafone Play and Voot. On the other hand, Netflix saw a rise of 18 per cent in time spent on Sunday.