Answerman

Why Isn't Streaming Platform Marketing More Competitive?

Annie asks:

“I always enjoy learning about marketing campaigns from the old days, like Pepsi vs. Coke and "Genesis Does What Nintendon't". But then I wondered: why isn't there much competitive marketing in the anime industry, inside and outside Japan? In an age of the anime streaming wars in the West, you never see Crunchyroll make ads taking swings at Hulu or Prime Video. Is it seen as too crass nowadays to mock competitors in marketing campaigns?”

So! Let me get this straight. You're basically asking me when will Crunchyroll make its own Kendrick Lamar-style diss track against Netflix, who in this instance is Drake (Sorry Netflix)? This is a great question. I have no idea why we aren't seeing a promotional blitz om the style of the early 90s Console Wars, or early-80s Cola Wars. It is worth noting that both ad campaigns originated out of American ad agencies. Yes. It's a bit of a dick-swinging thing to do. Maybe we are beyond it these days.

The absence of aggressive competitive marketing in the anime industry, particularly when compared to “legendary” campaigns like Sega's memorable "Genesis Does What Nintendon't," reveals some interesting insights about cultural differences, how the modern entertainment industry is structured these days, and evolving marketing philosophies. Starting in the 1970s and leading into the 1980s the United States witnessed a golden age of corporate combat with what became known as “The Cola Wars” exemplifying competitive marketing at its most audacious. I personally prefer Coca-Cola to Pepsi, which I find too sweet and the bubbles feel different in my mouth. No. I am not going to prove it with a blind taste test, which is wise because that's how it all kicked off between these twin behemoths of highly-carbonated sugary beverages.

Pepsi's famous “Challenge” campaign directly attacked Coca-Cola's market dominance through its deft deployment of blind taste tests. The rivalry was intense, and it led to a catastrophic rebrand and formula change in 1985 for Coca-Cola. Anyone remember “New Coke”?

Pepsi and Coca-Cola have been at it for decades. During the early 1920s and 1930s Pepsi approached its main competitor with an offer to sell to them following two bankruptcies, but each time Coca-Cola declined. Was the rivalry real? Some people thought so, including one hapless, but ambitious Coca-Cola employee in 2006 who was caught red-handed attempting to sell confidential company secrets to Pepsi for $1.5 million. Pepsi were the good guys in this story. They did not purchase the information and instead reported the illegal attempt to both Coca-Cola and the FBI.

Gaming followed a similar playbook in the 1990s. Gaming's first big acceleration into popular, mainstream culture happened in the late '80s and early '90s. It was defined by the rivalry by the two titans of the industry; Sega and Nintendo. Sega's aggressive "Genesis Does What Nintendon't" campaign didn't just promote their console, it directly mocked Nintendo's limitations while positioning Sonic as the cooler alternative to Mario. Later console iterations amped up the hype with industry upstart Microsoft featuring the controversial "Life is Short, Play More" campaign for the original Xbox launch. The ad was memorable for showing a person's entire lifespan in seconds, generating massive buzz, especially after it was banned by the Independent Television Commission.

The anime industry's restraint stems largely from Japanese cultural values that prioritize harmony over confrontation. The Console Wars was an American invention created by the Sega of America marketing team, specifically by the Director of Marketing, Al Nilsen who wanted to highlight the superiority of the Sega Genesis over Nintendo's aging NES console. Japanese companies tend to keep their disagreements and/or dislike of a competitor in private, or at least behind the discreet sliding doors of the local izakaya after office hours.

The Japanese concept of "wa" (social harmony) makes direct attacks on competitors feel inappropriate and potentially damaging to one's own reputation. This cultural foundation influenced how anime companies approached marketing from their inception, favoring collaborative growth over zero-sum competition.

Japanese business culture also emphasizes long-term relationships and mutual respect within industries. Unlike the Cola Wars, where Pepsi and Coca-Cola operated in completely separate ecosystems, anime companies frequently collaborate, studios work with multiple distributors, licensing deals cross company lines, and industry events bring competitors together as colleagues rather than enemies.

The anime streaming landscape operates fundamentally differently from those classic competitive markets. Crunchyroll, Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Prime don't create mutually exclusive ecosystems like Pepsi versus Coca-Cola. Instead, they often license the same content from Japanese studios, making today's competitor tomorrow's business partner. A streaming service that aggressively attacks a rival might jeopardize future licensing negotiations or industry relationships.

Moreover, anime fans typically subscribe to multiple services rather than choosing one platform exclusively. This multi-platform behavior means that attacking competitors could alienate shared audiences who use both services. The fan community itself values collaboration, and besides, anime enthusiasts generally want more content available everywhere, viewing the medium's growth as beneficial to all participants. If these competing streamers could do something about the price, it would be welcome, and maybe some of them will in the future as bundling becomes one of the hot topics in media, entertainment and communications.

Modern marketing has largely moved away from attack advertising across all industries. As we enter a new age of gaming, where it's increasingly integrated with our day to day lives and more connected than ever before, the best campaigns will need to leverage all manner of doo-hickys to grab our attention. Expect to see AI used constantly to predict our desires and behaviour before we even recognize those pangs of hunger, or desire to grab a controller. Don't be surprised if competing brands gamify your participation and reward you for it with loyalty points and discounts. Even with the use of machine learning, advertising will always rely heavily on creativity to get our attention.

Today's consumers, especially in social media-savvy demographics, can quickly turn against brands perceived as mean-spirited or unprofessional. Apple's disastrous 2025 iPad Pro commercial known as “Crush” showed a hydraulic press destroying traditional creatival tools like musical instruments, books, cameras, and paint buckets before revealing the new iPad. Artists, musicians, and creators voiced outrage across social platforms, interpreting the ad as dismissive of traditional creative tools and insulting to people who use them.

The gaming industry itself evolved beyond direct attacks. Sony's later campaigns like "To Michael" celebrated gamers themselves rather than attacking Xbox, while Microsoft's Halo campaigns focused on emotional storytelling rather than competitive jabs. All of the campaigns featured above have creativity at heart. They push boundaries. They do things differently, and ultimately they create a connection and elicit an emotional response in the viewer.

Anime marketing budgets are typically smaller and more targeted than major consumer brands, making companies focus resources on promoting their own content rather than attacking others. The industry also operates on different economic principles. Success is often measured by expanding the overall anime audience rather than stealing market share from competitors.

Additionally, the anime industry's international expansion requires maintaining positive relationships across multiple markets. Aggressive competitive marketing that might work in one culture could backfire in another, making collaborative approaches safer for global brands.

Rather than direct competitive attacks, anime companies employ subtler differentiation strategies. Brands like Crunchyroll, HIDIVE and ADN for example, highlight unique content libraries, exclusive releases, or superior user experiences without explicitly naming competitors. This approach allows them to compete while maintaining industry relationships and avoiding cultural friction.

The streaming wars do exist in anime, but they manifest through exclusive licensing deals, original content production, and feature improvements rather than public marketing battles. Competition happens behind the scenes through corporate negotiations and product development rather than in advertising campaigns.

The absence of aggressive competitive marketing in anime reflects a perfect storm of cultural values, industry structure, and evolved marketing wisdom. Anime Expo 2025 kicks off next week in Los Angeles, and for me, it provides a great example of anime marketing at its most aggressive, when it comes to the US market. Competition is fierce amongst the major players in anime streaming, as well as anime rightsholders like Bandai Namco, Viz Media, TOHO and Toei in terms of who secures the major outdoor and indoor branding opportunities, as wel as who gets the best pitch for their ever-expanding promotional booths.

One trend you will likely begin to notice at home in North America and across Europe will be more visible above-the-line (“paid”) advertising and marketing campaigns for individual anime brands as their Japanese owners take matters into the own hands when it comes to local marketing and promotion. Crunchyroll and Netflix are great at promoting their own brands, but they are somewhat unreliable marketing and promotional partners for individual licenses. Japanese producers and committees are starting to pool their resources to self-finance USA marketing efforts to help insure their programs success on platforms like Crunchyroll and Netflix.

While the Cola Wars and gaming's early competitive campaigns became the thing of marketing legend, they emerged from different cultural contexts and industry dynamics. The anime industry's collaborative approach may seem less dramatic, but it has successfully grown the medium from a niche Japanese export to a global entertainment phenomenon worth billions.

Perhaps the anime industry's restraint isn't a missed opportunity for exciting marketing campaigns, but rather a more mature approach to building sustainable, globally appealing entertainment ecosystems. In an interconnected world where today's competitor is tomorrow's partner, harmony might indeed be more profitable than war. Inshallah.

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