On the back of the Amazon Prime deal with the #rugby #AutumnNationsCup, a thread.

1. Concerns about audience.
Over 8m UK households are already Prime subscribers and, it’s estimated, over 15m people 25% of the adult population will be able to watch without paying extra.

2. Context: among online adults, Prime is already as big as BT Sport in Premier League viewing & is gaining ground fast on Sky & BBC. ( @Ofcom)

3. This is important because Amazon is just as focused on retention as on acquisition.
It needs to give existing subscribers reasons to stay as much as it needs to sign up new subscribers.
We can therefore assume that it knows rugby will appeal to existing Prime subscribers.

4. On acquisition, Amazon will not be interested in bringing a new demographic to rugby.
It will be after rugby’s traditional upmarket, older, male-skewed demo because a) they spend more
b) they attract big advertisers.

Amazon is already huge in advertising & wants more share.

5. There will be much talk of this deal being about driving pre-Xmas shopping, which has some truth.
But remember that 90% of UK shoppers already use Amazon and that 40% are already Prime customers.

6. Related. Amazon doesn’t *need* live sport in the way that legacy TV does.
Different businesses, different business models.
Take a look at its UK sales & growth trajectory to 2019.
And it’s having a monster 2020.