Hulu Drops Out of ComScore Top 10 Ranking

18 Aug, 2014 By: Erik Gruenwedel

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Hulu.com didn’t rate among comScore’s July ranking of leading online video ad properties. Or did it?

The ad-supported and subscription streaming service co-owned by The Walt Disney Co., 21st Century Fox and Comcast, has routinely ranked among comScore’s top monthly online ad-supported properties over the past several years, including a No. 1 ranking in June, 2011. It was in the top 10 through March this year — the most recent tabulation released by the Reston, Va.-based research firm.

comScore’s online video ad index tabulates streaming-video advertising only and does not include other types of video monetization, such as overlays, branded players or matching banner ads. More importantly, the index tabulates frequency, such as the number of ads subjected to viewers.

But for July, comScore didn’t disclose the number of video ads or frequency of ads per viewer. Instead, it opted just to rank properties by their market share of the U.S. online population.

Hulu has never ranked above 10% reach of the total U.S. online population, despite the frequency of video ads per viewer dwarfing the competition. In the March comScore rankings, Hulu ran more than 81 ads per viewer — nearly three times the frequency of ads per viewer generated by runner-up AOL.

Hulu not making the top 10 is likely more a result of comScore’s revised ranking than a reduction in the frequency of ads subjected upon its more than 6 million subscribers.

 

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