Hey podheads, hereās issue #38.
Dollarspeak
Podcast advertising revenues saw robust growth in 2018, according to the third annual Podcast Revenue Report by IAB and PwC. Podcast ad spend rose by 53% from $314 million in 2017 to $479 million in 2018. Based on current trends and surveys, IAB projects revenues of over $1 billion by 2021.
Highlights:
The revenue share of dynamically inserted ads rose from 41.7% in 2017 to 48.8%. Baked in ads still, account for a majority of the revenues.
Although the share of host read ads reduced to 63.3% in 2018 from 66.9% in 2017, they remain the dominant source.
Programmatic ad buying is slowly increasing and accounted for 1.3% of all ad buys in 2018, up from 0.7% in 2017.
You can check out the full report here.
Money talks
Speaking of ad dollars, Tim Ferris, host of the chart-topping podcast, The Tim Ferris Show is running a six-month test during which heāll remove all ads from the show. Instead, heāll be soliciting direct donations from listeners. Hereās his rationale:
#1 ā Iād really love a more direct relationship with my most dedicated listeners, readers, and fans.
#2 ā Sponsors and ads chew up a TON of time that Iād rather spend finding and doing cool things I can share with you.Ā To be clear, I donāt think advertising is evil, but the sponsor model consumes a lot of my time and energy. Iād much rather focus on finding and doing cool things that I can share with you. Thatās why many of you read my books or listened to the podcast in the first place.
#3 ā Over the years, thousands of readers and fans have asked me, āHow can I thank you?āĀ Aside from the books, Iāve never sold any products, courses, or otherwise. Fan-supported subscriptions allow you to say āThank you, and please do more,ā while having a more direct relationship with me.Ā
Spotify watch
This is big news! Spotify announced a partnership with Higher Ground, the production company started by the Obamas. The partnership will see the Obamas develop podcasts exclusive to Spotify. Higher Ground launched in 2018 with a partnership with Netflix, but details are scant at this point of time. Will keep my eyes peeled for more details on this.
Weāve always believed in the value of entertaining, thought-provoking conversation. It helps us build connections with each other and open ourselves up to new ideas. Weāre excited about Higher Ground Audio because podcasts offer an extraordinary opportunity to foster productive dialogue, make people smile and make people think, and, hopefully, bring us all a little closer together. - President Obama
The Obamas are the second presidential family to get into podcasts. A couple of weeks ago, Bill Clinton launched Why am I telling you this, which features conversations with Chelsea Clinton, the Clinton Foundation staff, partners, and other guests.
Stations
Spotify Stations, an experimental app that was launched in Australia is now available in the US. The app is similar to Pandora, instead of picking songs, you choose a station to listen to.
Interestingly, Spotify is taking a crack at the podcast discoverability problem and is testing podcast playlists. Playlists contain curated episodes across genres.
Oh and speaking of Pandora, the music streaming platform launched a desktop app for Mac, but it doesnāt support podcasts yet.
What is dead shall never die
And it is official. Apple at the Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) announced that it is killing iTunes and launching standalone apps for podcasts, music, and TV. Interestingly, Apple will also use Machine Learning to index all podcasts and make them searchable.
Apple also announced some important changes to the way podcasts are categorized. This critical piece by James Cridland has more on this.
Apple vs Spotify
Itās been fun to track the Apple Vs Spotify data published by Voxnest. According to the May report, Spotify is gaining on Apple.
Over the course of two months,Ā Spotify has gainedĀ dominance in five new markets,Ā Honduras, Slovakia, Hungary, Finland and Indonesia. Demonstrating a continued move intoĀ Spanish speaking marketsĀ and new control in centralĀ Eastern Europe.Ā Big progress in a small window. Ā
March 2018
May 2018
Moneymakers
Rey Mashayekhi publishes an interesting piece in Fortune on how investment banking giants are jumping on the podcast bandwagon. The financial services industry is quite notorious for its excesses. Donāt worry, Iām not going on a rant about the big bad banks. One particular excess the industry is famous for is the almost industrial scale production of financial content. Donāt get me wrong, these institutions put out some amazing content and have played a big role in democratizing our understanding of high finance. But the sheer abundance of the content means that most often than not, most of this content gets very little play.
And as the global economy has become increasingly financialized, this problem has only gotten worse. Podcasts can rather be a wonderful solution, and it looks like the big investment banks are realizing it. Some of the biggest from Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan in the US to UBS and Barclays in Europe have launched multiple podcasts in a bid to find wider audiences both for their brands and their research.
Wall Street banks have taken a similar approach, using publicly available podcasts to deliver research and commentary in a more accessible format available and to a wider audience. Yet the format and structure of these shows varies on a case-by-case basisāranging from quick-hit breakdowns of key current issues, to more in-depth programs featuring a multitude of voices.
A couple of months ago, Robinhood, the popular stock trading app and a recent entrant to the unicorn club acquired MarketSnacks. The company runs a popular newsletter and a podcast.
Bytes
Apple has reportedly restricted select Chinese podcasts in China - Rita Liao/TechCrunch
Recode finally folds into Vox.com. The digital media giant had acquired Recode in 2015. Ezra Klein and Kara Swisher/Vox
Once dominated by white hosts, now is an 'exciting time' for Asian American podcasts - Saleah Blancaflor/NBC News
Hereās something to cringe at. Goop now has a podcast for men. If you donāt know how monumental a scam Goop is, checkout this NYT profile of Gwyneth Paltrow, the face behind the company - Ruth Graham/Slate
Infinite Dial expands into South Africa.
Tom Webster, senior vice president at Edison Research explores the four barriers hampering the podcast universeās growth - Admap
Audiboom expands its ad sales team.
Mediawatch
Paywalls are all the rage. Every digital publisher wants some of that direct reader revenue, given the declining ad revenues but itās easier said than done. Hereās what Wired learnt one year after it introduced a paywall.
Iām a little disappointed with this story. Blendle, pay-per-article news aggregator is ditching the service in favor of a subscription service.
Quibi, the mobile-focused video streaming service led by Jeffrey Katzenberg, and Meg Whitman is set to launch in April 2020. The new streaming service will compete with Netflix, Hulu, and the to be launched Disney+.