Hulu recognized that a major customer pain point and barrier to entry are the commercials. So wisely, in early September of 2015, Hulu released the No Commercials plan which is the first time ever viewers could watch new episodes of the latest TV shows commercial-free. It seems weird, to thank someone for canceling their subscription. But, that’s how Hulu’s grown. By listening to the criticisms and the poking and prodding. By internalizing them and getting a tad hurt. Then taking it out passive-aggressively during the company softball game. But eventually admitting that they’re right - and making a change. So, the brand wanted to thank those who canceled their Hulu subscription. Thank them for sharing how much they hate commercials. For telling friends not to subscribe. It’s because of those who canceled, that Hulu introduced a commercial-free offering, improved the service, and became the best place to watch television.

Targeted and personalized emails were sent to viewers who had canceled their subscription, telling users that Hulu heard their frustrations and was making a change. The emails asked viewers to give Hulu another chance to prove that the service is the best place for their TV experience by offering them a free trial of the new commercial-free option.

The Open Rate for our email campaign was 21.1%, a very strong open rate for this channel, on-par with a lot of Hulu’s brand emails. We saw a 2.0% Click-Through Rate, far exceeding Click-Through Rate of Hulu’s content emails which average 0.5-1%. Most importantly, the email campaign was successful in converting both Current Subscribers and At-Risk Cancelers with a switch rate of .005% and .002%, respectively.