How do you watch your favorite show? That’s the question Hub Research wanted to find the answers to in its most recent survey. In the report released this week, Hub investigates the differences in streaming habits between people who utilize smart TVs to stream content through dedicated apps and people who utilize a streaming media player like a Roku device or Fire TV stick.
The survey’s numbers offer some fascinating insight into the future of streaming devices. The first notable piece of data from Hub’s survey shows that while smart TV adoption is on the rise (74% of homes now have at least one), 44% of respondents still use a streaming media player in conjunction with their smart TV.
The numbers indicate that customers still see smart TVs as a bit of an unknown quantity when it comes to reliability. They probably enjoy using their smart TV, but would rather keep a streaming media device on standby in case a show won’t buffer correctly through the TV itself; and not all smart TVs carry the full complement of apps that most streaming devices do.
There is more evidence to suggest that smart TVs haven’t quite earned the reputation for reliability that streaming devices have, but they’re getting there. Customers, by a slim margin, prefer to navigate directly to apps rather than use buttons on the smart TV’s home screen. The reverse is true for customers who primarily use a streaming device to access content.
Smart TV owners are also more likely to use a branded button on their remote to start up an app than users of streaming players, but again the numbers between the two devices are similar. This suggests once again that while smart TVs aren’t quite at the level of streaming players, they’re catching up in the eyes of consumers.
The research also shows the power of a branded button in general. More than a third of users of both smart TVs and streaming media devices used the branded button instead of scrolling through their various apps. The data reinforces that customers enjoy the ease of choice and that the companies that are selected to be branded buttons on device remotes have a huge leg up over others.
Hub’s research also shows that while smart TVs have not quite caught up to streaming media devices in the aspect of customer trust, they will do so soon. Use of smart TVs and streaming media players has grown incredibly similar, which means customers are getting used to the idea that their smart TV can do whatever their streaming stick can do.
Looking to the future, it seems clear that smart TVs will begin to push streaming media player devices to the side.