Philo Turns AI Into Subscriber Growth

THE CHALLENGE

Philo is a leading live TV streaming service focused on delivering affordable entertainment to consumers nationwide. As competition for streaming subscribers intensified, Philo partnered with Claritas to explore how AI-powered optimization could improve subscriber acquisition and uncover new insights into audience and creative performance.

Philo wanted to increase subscriber numbers for both Essential Trial (a 7-day free trial) and Essential First Pay (paid subscribers), while better understanding which creative approaches resonated with different audiences. The team needed a scalable way to move beyond traditional A/B testing and identify winning audience and creative combinations more efficiently.

SOLUTION

Claritas deployed AI Optimization (AIO) across Philo’s :30 CTV campaigns, enabling real-time testing and optimization of multiple creative and audience combinations. Using a control group with AI disabled, Philo was able to directly measure the impact of AI-driven optimization while uncovering actionable audience and creative insights. ​

As part of the evaluation process, Philo implemented its own holdout group to independently measure campaign impact. The findings mirrored the results surfaced by Claritas AI Optimization, confirming that the Claritas-managed campaign delivered superior performance compared to the control group.

The campaign delivered measurable subscriber growth and validated AI optimization as a performance driver within the first few weeks of campaign deployment:​

– 13.5% lift in Essential Trial subscribers​
– 66.7% lift in Essential First Pay subscribers​
– AI Optimization outperformed the control group with AI disabled​

Encouraged by the initial results, Philo is continuing to invest in an iterative test-and-learn approach. Most recently, the team introduced 15 new creative executions, allowing AI Optimization to identify the next wave of high-performing messaging and content strategies.