by Thinus Ferreira
On Tuesday night Netflix launched a new viewership website and viewership lists, "Netflix Top 10" where the global video streaming service said it would from now on publish, on a weekly basis, various top 10 lists for its film and TV content.
The new weekly Netflix viewership data release on Top10.Netflix.com is in line with Netflix's recent promise to be more transparent with the industry about its various viewership metrics, with Netflix that plans to include the publication of occasional "speciality lists" about various genre viewership on its service as well.
From now on Netflix will publish a weekly "Netflix Top 10" every Tuesday. This list will be based on hours viewed from Monday to Sunday the previous week, for both original Netflix as well as licensed titles.
Netflix is breaking down the various lists available into a global top 10 lists for Films (English), TV (English), Films (non-English) and TV
(non-English), as well as customised rankings for over 90 countries.
At launch, the "Netflix Top 10" website is available in English and Spanish, with the streamer that plans to roll out more language options in 2022.
Each season of a series is measured
separately, so seasons 2 and season 3 of Stranger Things might appear at the same time on a specific list. Weekly reporting is rounded to 10 000 to account for any
fluctuations in internet connectivity around the world.
Last month Netflix CEO Ted Sarandos promised the industry that Netflix is "trying to be more transparent with talent; with the market", and admitted that the service's user data and ratings have been a "big black box, mostly" for the past number of years.
Netflix is now becoming more transparent about its viewership information, although companies like South Africa's MultiChoice - that slavishly followed Netflix's playbook of being completely secretive about how many people are watching what - is still cagey and untransparent about the ratings, subscriber count and actual viewership data of its Showmax video streaming service in South Africa and across Africa.
Last week Friday Calvo Mawela, MultiChoice CEO, during the investors' call for the release of MultiChoice's latest 6-months financial report until the end of September 2021, told investors that MultiChoice is still not willing to divulge any Showmax subscriber counts or willing to be more transparent about any specific viewership information because of "competitors" like Netflix.
Meanwhile Showmax continues to release vapid press releases devoid of any actual empirical ratings or viewership data as Showmax continues to make unsubstantiated "record viewership" claims for its small but growing service.
'An important step forward'
The new weekly "Netflix Top 10" lists are in addition to Netflix's daily country Top 10 that the streamer introduced in 2020, which will now also be based on hours viewed.
From now on Netflix will update its overall lists - first published in September 2021 - as new titles become "mega hits". These lists are based on the total hours viewed in a title's
first 28 days on Netflix.
Netflix is making use of the independent accounting firm EY that will review Netflix's new metrics, with Netflix that will publish EY's report in 2022.
Netflix has stated that figuring out how
best to measure "success in streaming" is hard and that traditional measures like box office or share of audience - designed to help advertisers understand success on linear TV - is no longer relevant
to most streamers, including Netflix.
"Having looked at the different options,
we believe engagement, as measured by hours viewed, is a strong indicator of a
title's popularity, as well as overall member satisfaction, which is important
for retention in subscription services," Netflix says.
"We recognise,
however, that hours viewed does favour longer series and films."
Netflix, therefore, plans to occasionally publish speciality lists as well, for example, top
documentary features or reality shows.
Netflix says that the new viewership lists and methodology is "an important step forward for Netflix, the creators we work with and our members."
"People want to understand what success means in a streaming world, and these
lists offer the clearest answer to that question in our industry."
"Most of all,
though, we hope our new weekly Top 10 on Netflix will help fans discover new
stories and join new conversations - whether it's understanding your friend's
new-found passion for chess, the value of a won or what's going on with all
those cool cats and kittens."
