Netflix Inc. investors thought January was rough on the company's stock. Then came April.

Year-to-date as of market close April 20, Netflix shares are down 62.5%, equating to a loss of about $166 billion in market capital in less than four months. Much of that drop occurred in the span of 24 hours, with Netflix's unexpected first-quarter results pushing the stock down 35% in the April 20 trading day.

Not only did Netflix deliver a big miss on first-quarter paid membership additions and guidance, but it also posted its first membership decline in a decade. Three months prior, Netflix said it expected 2.5 million membership additions in the first quarter, a figure considered soft that caused the company's shares to drop 25%.

Rather than adding any subscribers at all, however, Netflix ended up losing 200,000 paid memberships, and it said it expects another loss of 2 million paid members in the second quarter. Part of this was due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The company suspended its service in Russia in early March, which resulted in about 700,000 membership losses. Netflix expects Russian account cancellations to extend through the second quarter and beyond.

"I know it's disappointing for investors, and it is for sure," CEO Reed Hastings said in an April 19 earnings interview. "This is when it all matters, and we're super focused on ... getting back into our investors' good graces."

To do so, Netflix will focus on improving programming and recommendations, monetizing shared accounts, and adding advertising-based tiers, the company said.

Of Netflix's 219.6 million global paid memberships, about 100 million of those share their accounts outside the household, Hastings said. Rather than convert those to new members, Netflix plans to increase its revenue per user by giving account holders the option to pay more for their shared account.

"With all of the account sharing ... when you add that up together, we're getting pretty high market penetration. And that, combined with the competition, is really what we think is driving the lower acquisition and lower growth," Hastings said.

Beyond account-sharing strategies, Netflix is also considering adding low-cost ad-based tiers.

Historically, Netflix has grown revenue per user by increasing prices, particularly in its U.S. and Canada markets. That strategy has contributed to some membership losses, but it has had a clear and immediate impact on net revenue growth.

Adding advertising tiers will not likely grow revenue immediately, Hastings said, as some current users will likely switch to the lower-cost ad-based tiers. But over time, given that many of Netflix's new members will come from lower-income markets outside of North America and Western Europe, the addition of low-cost ad-based tiers could add valuable market share.

Netflix's first-quarter revenue was $7.87 billion, which represented 9.8% year-over-year growth, well below the double-digit growth figures Netflix typically posts. Returning to double-digit revenue growth will motivate strategy in the near term, CFO Spencer Neumann said. The company guided for 9.7% growth in the second quarter, and it does not expect a reacceleration of revenue growth through 2022, Neumann said.

"We're trying to be smart about it and prudent in terms of pulling back on some of that spend growth to reflect the realities of the revenue growth of the business," Neumann said.