This is an archived page from 2019. Find out more
This time the coverage comes from Bloomberg with a very long article entitled “Everybody Makes Podcasts. Can Anyone Make Them Profitable? Bloomberg’s Gerry Smith writes the podcasting generates a lot of enthusiasm and little revenue, but that could be changing.
Smith points out that about 73 million Americans listen to podcasts monthly and industry revenue is a minuscule $313 million. (For context, that’s about how much revenue BuzzFeed Inc. alone generated in 2018.) Smith says there are several lines of thinking about how to close the enthusiasm-revenue gap. “One focuses on the programming logjam, which can make choosing something to listen to a frustrating experience. Several startup websites and apps, including Piqd, Listen Notes, and Podchaser, are trying to match listeners with lesser-known shows. Larger platforms such as Spotify and internet-radio giant Pandora Media Inc., which honed this functionality in music, are now applying it to podcasts.”
Smith also writes that the podcasting industry is now focused on broadening its market. Some fear that podcasting has become a community talking to itself—a coastal thing, like electric scooters and avocado toast, which may soon reach saturation. Courting the millions of Americans who’ve heard of podcasts but don’t listen will mean diversifying their subject matter.
Smith also believes the podcasting advertising model will have to evolve as well. “One of the reasons there aren’t more Procter & Gambles on board is that the medium’s best consumption metric is the inexact one of downloads. Who hasn’t downloaded a podcast and then forgotten about it or immediately deleted it?”
Read the full article HERE