Netflix
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Overview of the company
Netflix is the largest DVD rental company in the world, distributing approximately 2.2 million dvds a day they operate on user interaction and reviews. They suggest movies based on previous movies that you have watched and reviewed to suggest titles that you would like that you might not necessarily heard of. You can subscribe to monthly plans that range from be able to have 1 DVD at a time all the way to 4 DVDs at a time. Prices range from 8.99 a month up to 23.99 a month. You can also stream a collection of movies online on any computer with access. Netflix has the number one goal at providing the best possible customer satisfaction. They created a user friendly website interface which allows customers to easily browse the movie catalog as well as look at suggestions from netflix of movies that they might find interest in. With web technologies improving every day Netflix is always looking for ways to improve its business practices. For example with the recent blu-ray technology that came out, Netflix is now able to offer it to their customers for a slight increase in membership fee of 2 dollars per month.
History of Netflix
Founded by Reed Hastings in 1997 netflix it grew exponetially to one million users in two years. Reed Hastings wanted to create a DVD rental service in which you could rent what ever movie you want and not be bound by the main stream titles in blockbuster. Over the 12 years that netflix has been a business it expanded to a customer base of 10 million subscribers.
Innovation and the long tail
With user interation and reviews Netflix uses the The Long Tail as a business model. the long tail movies that are used are ones that are not mainstream and that users wouldn't necessarily think about renting. There are so many movies out there, and not all of the ones you see in theaters are the good ones. Based on your preferences Netflix will recommend movies that you might never have heard of, but if you give it a try chances are you will like them. Before the age of technology we were a hit driven society. If something was not mainstream chances are that it would not get our attention. With the low cost of having this movies in their inventory it attracts customers in search of something new and it brings people away from just renting the new releases. On the netflix website they have a section where it recommends to you all different kinds of movies most from the middle to the long tail. Netflix uses this business model just like its counterparts ebay, amazon, and google.
Recent News
Innovation has always been a strong suit for Netflix and recently they have run live streaming of concerts as well. They have teamed up with Microsoft and its XBOX 360 so that you can stream movies through XBOX Live.
Once Netflix got big they started a competition. If anyone could come up with an algorithm that can improve Netflix recommendations by 10%. The winner of this competition will receive 1 million dollars.
Netflix is trying to team up with as many technology companies as they can in order to provide the best service possible. You can now use some blu-ray players and TVs to stream the movies onto your television rather than watching it on your computer. They have also made it available to stream with your windows media player for computers with the vista operating system.