Roku, Inc. (NASDAQ:ROKU) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

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So look, we collaborate closely with streaming services to create bespoke campaigns for them and prove that our media is accountable. And one thing that’s great about the Roku media platform is that we can test the effectiveness of ads, and we did this in fact, with our own movie, WEIRD: The Al Yankovic Story, I mentioned. And we did so using a holdout group. And on the on-platform media associated with weird, we drove more than 60% lift in unique viewers versus the old out group. So we even make our own media accountable. It’s pretty great. And one of the reasons the industry respects Roku so much. And then there are things like Roku Pay, which enables easy one-click sign up. It’s another valuable tool to offer our content partners. That’s less on the engagement side, but obviously, in the subscription side.

And then premium video streaming services experience higher retention using Roku Pay than they do on other third-party billing platforms. That was cited from a recent study by Antenna. So Again, you’re right, the movement toward engagement, flatters Roku and moves Roku partner’s priority list, particularly in this world where they have to be so focused on effectiveness and efficiency.

Nicholas Zangler : Great. No, that’s great color. Just one quick follow-up on that. There is one very, very large streaming service that seemingly doesn’t really partake in some of these engagement strategies. And it’s not just on Roku, it’s under the other streaming service as well. Just I don’t know if you have any thoughts there on whether you would expect like the full market to engage in including just the absolute largest streaming services as well.

Charlie Collier: Well, look, you nailed it in your question, there’s going to be a shift toward not just acquisition, but engagement. And when you build engagement, you need to build impressions and you need people to watch the programming. And again, Roku is uniquely positioned to be right there for the viewer at the moment of decision and will help will help drive partners’ businesses. That’s how we think of every large streaming service as our partner, and we help them build engagement.

Anthony Wood : This is an — this is Anthony. I mean I would just I agree with all that. We have — we believe we can help all our streaming partners on a very positive ROI basis, build engagement, but we don’t have any insight or can’t comment on what any particular company might or might not do in the future.

Operator: And our next question will be coming from Michael Morris of Guggenheim.

Michael Morris : First, Anthony and/or Charlie, you guys have made content acquisitions in the past, I mean most notably, Quibi. I’m curious how you would think about putting capital to work in acquiring a library of content or more content is something bigger going forward as opposed to what we’ve seen with some of your originals and licensing. So how are you thinking about potentially acquiring something bigger? And then second for Steve, in the fourth quarter, you materially outperformed your guidance. I’m hoping maybe you could help us understand what changed that led you to kind of come in so far ahead on the top line. And as we look at your guidance for the first quarter, it can’t help us think that we should probably be thinking it could come in a lot higher just like it did last quarter. Why wouldn’t we think you could beat that number by 8% since you just did that in this past quarter?

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