The Numbers of Subscribers of Netflix in Nigeria and in South Africa and the Way Forward is Content Localization

The Numbers of Subscribers of Netflix in Nigeria and in South Africa and the Way Forward is Content Localization for Nigerians

Currently the numbers of Nigerian subscribers on Netflix are only  169,600+ out of a population of 106 million bankable adults. 

South Africa has by far the most paid subscribers on Netflix with 1,172,800 subscriptions, accounting for 73.3 percent of the 1.6 million subscribers in sub-Saharan Africa.

South Africa has 69.5 percent of the $135 million subscription revenue from the region in 2022. Netflix made $93.82 million from South Africa alone.

What are the challenges of Netflix in Nigeria?

What are the solutions?

I have written on the challenges and solutions in my previous articles in 2022 and 2023.

Showmax of the MultiChoice Group, the biggest and largest entertainment company in Africa has overtaken Netflix on the continent. I prefer to call the MultiChoice, the King Kong of African Entertainment Industry.

The MultiChoice Group and Comcast’s NBCUniversal Media are investing more than US$177 million into Showmax

The strategic partnerships with Comcast and HBO and the access to the biggest football leagues in the world have increased the international milage and patronage of Showmax in Africa and beyond.

Nigeria with the largest population in Africa actually has the largest viewers of content online on the continent.

There were 103.0 million internet users in Nigeria in January 2024. Nigeria's internet penetration rate stood at 45.5 percent of the total population at the start of 2024. Kepios analysis indicates that internet users in Nigeria increased by 2.2 million (+2.2 percent) between January 2023 and January 2024

Majority of them watch Nollywood videos on YouTube spending millions of dollars monthly on data.

Read the following reports:

Streaming swells monthly internet spend to N216bn - Businessday NG-

MTN Nigeria’s data revenues have risen from N102.99 billion in the six months ending June 2019 to N349.51 billion in the three months ending March 2024. Airtel Nigeria’s data revenues have grown from N28.81 billion ($80 million at N360.06/$) as of the three months ended June 2019 to N151.15 billion ($116 million at N1,303/$) as of the quarter ended March 2024. Average data usage per customer has grown from 1.63GB to 6.3 GB per month on Airtel. MTN’s average data usage per customer rose to 8.6GB as of the end of Q1, 2024.

Amid penetration surge, Nigerians spend over N500b on data in Q1 | The Guardian Nigeria News - Nigeria and World News — Technology — The Guardian -

In 2023, MTN alone raked in N1.07 trillion from data subscriptions, representing a 39.8 per cent growth from N764.82 billion in 2022. Similarly, active data users on the network of MTN jumped by 12.7 per cent to 70.66 million in 2023, rising by over five million.

Facts and Figures

There are more than 20 million people in Nigeria who can afford the monthly subscriptions for Netflix. But Netflix has to CONNECT with them in their most spoken languages by doing the following:

1. Content localization which MultiChoice has used to attract millions of more subscribers in Nigeria.

There should be Netflix Yoruba;

Netflix Igbo and Netflix Hausa

These are the biggest and largest tribes in Nigeria with more than 150 million people in Nigeria and over 20 million in other countries.

There are different types of content localization.

2.?

How the Numbers of Subscribers of Netflix in Nigeria Can Increase To Over 1 Million Before 2025

It has been done before by a multinational company in Nigeria. And the same method will attract thousands of new subscribers to Netflix.

The fact is millions of people in Nigeria spend 100 percent more on paying for data to watch videos on YouTube monthly than what subscribers to Netflix pay monthly in the country.

My younger sister buys 25GB of data on the MTN network monthly to watch videos on YouTube paying N500 for 2GB.

She is one of the millions of people in Nigeria watching movies daily on YouTube.

She is addicted to Nollywood and Hollywood movies; watching more than four movies daily in-between her duties in the house. And she also reads novels and her King James Version of the Holy Bible. 

Her neighbor on the third floor spends more than my sister watching movies on DStv channels of the MultiChoice Group in Nigeria.

Netflix can consult me for how to overtake Showmax before the new year.

I am an expert on what I have proposed to Netflix.

I was commissioned by the John's Hopkins University's Population Communication Services (JHU/ PCS) to produce fully illustrated booklets on family planning methods in Pidgin English, Igbo,Hausa and Yoruba for Nigeria in 1984 and updated in 1990. 

Therefore, I am an expert in content localization in Nigeria since when I was 21 to date.

I have also done field trips on demographics of the population of Nigeria.

- By Ekenyerengozi Michael Chima

Publisher/Editor,
NOLLYWOOD MIRROR® Series
The first book series on Nollywood and the Nigerian film industry since 2013.
Affiliate Partner,
Cinewav of Singapore
https://www.amazon.com/author/ekenyerengozimichaelchima
https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelchimaeyerengozi

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