Franchise-less ABS-CBN continues its expansion efforts through its remaining platforms, the latest development being A2Z’s debut on digital boxes.
This will arguably expand the free tv channel’s reach, courtesy of ABS-CBN TV Plus, the broadcast company’s own marketed digital box. This progress comes a month after the birth of A2Z, the product of ABS-CBN’s blocktime agreement with Bro. Eddie Villanueva-owned Zoe Broadcasting Network Inc., allowing some of the shows and movies produced and acquired by the network to be available again to analog television viewers.
With A2Z’s limited coverage, however—it can be seen in Mega Manila and parts of adjacent provinces—a big chunk of ABS-CBN’s previous audience share remains cut off from the services of the network. While Kapamilya Channel, ABS-CBN’s pay channel, recently received a boost, following its debut on CignalTV, viewers in Kapamilya bailiwicks in Northern Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao are still unable to watch their favorite Kapamilya programs because A2Z’s coverage doesn’t include areas outside Mega Manila and not all can afford cable tv’s monthly fee.
There are prior efforts, too, to boost both A2Z’s and Kapamilya Channel’s reach, with A2Z’s availability expanding to cable television a few weeks after its free tv premiere, and Kapamilya Channel’s arrival on CignalTV, and the continuous streaming of Kapamilya shows via Kapamilya Onlive Live.
The most recent significant development in ABS-CBN’s campaign to reclaim its lost audience share, nevertheless, is A2Z’s finally becoming available via digital free tv. It can be recalled that the number of TVPlus users stands at approximately 10 million, as of today.
That figure plus more than 1 million users using other digital receivers—including GMA Network’s Affordabox—makes ABS-CBN’s reach considerably much higher, and probably two-fold bigger.
So what could this mean to the embattled TV giant which has been reeling from its recent misfortunes—the pandemic and the eventual shutdown of ABS-CBN on free television?
While, like its previous efforts, this may still be seen as a small step towards its complete recuperation, ABS-CBN’s return both to free analog and digital free tv may produce the much-needed augmentation to amplify awareness among Kapamilya viewers who have been missing the network and its programs. As more and more people learn that ABS-CBN is available on many more accessible platforms, viewers will only find ways to access ABS-CBN.
Are you one of those loyal Kapamilya viewers who after watching their favorite shows on ABS-CBN—this time, on Kapamilya Channel and A2Z—hurries to get online to rewatch clips cut from the episode they’ve just seen? A2Z’s expanded coverage through its availability in digital boxes may help Kapamilya viewers continue this habit, and thus may help the speedy accumulation of views of the videos uploaded on various Kapamilya YouTube channels.
Indeed, the power of the word-of-mouth will extremely do these videos a favor, but their initial availability on free tv may greatly help to send them to YouTube’s trending videos chart. And as ad spending continues its active shift from traditional to digital and online platforms, this development may only mean favorably for ABS-CBN, whose biggest revenue-generating platform has just been ordered to shut down.
During the onslaught of the recent typhoons, A2Z also took advantage of its ongoing expansion to reach those in need of help, launching A2Z News Alert for the first time to give Kapamilya viewers updates on current events. While this may not mean the eventual inclusion of ABS-CBN’s flagship newscast, TV Patrol, to the channel’s current line-up, this may spawn further developments that many Kapamilya viewers will be happy about.
But perhaps, the greatest significance of A2Z’s arrival on every digital box is the joy it will definitely bring to those who have terribly missed their Kapamilya shows and now can see them again for free. And given how things have been rolling out quite favorably for ABS-CBN in the past few months, it doesn’t sound absurd at all if audiences start to hope for ABS-CBN’s inevitable return to its former glory.
