Money Talks: A business podcast on the business of podcasts
Money Talks from The Economist
The Economist
4.4 • 1.2K Ratings
🗓️ 4 May 2023
⏱️ 32 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Around a third of Americans now listen to at least one podcast a week. That fact has not escaped the attention of advertisers, who spent nearly $2bn on podcast ads last year. But with more than 4m podcasts for listeners to choose from, the industry is facing a reckoning.
On this week’s podcast, hosts Tom Lee-Devlin and Mike Bird ask what the future holds for the business of podcasts. Michael Mignano, who used to manage Spotify’s podcasting arm, tells them that companies have realised they can be much leaner. And Nick Hilton, a podcast production company founder, explains why he thinks 2022 is the year when podcasting died.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | From this American life and WB Easy Chicago, it's serial. |
| 0:07.0 | One story told week by week, I'm Sarah Canig. |
| 0:14.0 | For many, that music, and those words, with a gateway to a new medium, podcasts, episodes |
| 0:22.7 | from the first season of serial, which was released in 2014, have now been downloaded |
| 0:28.4 | more than 300 million times. |
| 0:31.9 | In the years since then, the world of podcasting has boomed. |
| 0:35.8 | Today, there are more than four million podcasts spanning almost every topic imaginable. |
| 0:42.9 | The Joe, Rogen, Experience. |
| 0:44.7 | From New York Times, I'm Michael Borough. |
| 0:47.2 | This is a daily. |
| 0:48.2 | I am Michelle Obama, and this is the Michelle Obama podcast. |
| 0:54.4 | And a third of Americans listen to at least one podcast each week, and that has made it |
| 0:59.9 | big business. |
| 1:01.3 | Spotify spent nearly a billion dollars on exclusive podcasts, content, and linked 200 million |
| 1:06.9 | dollars for Joe Rogan. |
| 1:09.8 | As listeners tuned into podcasts, businesses like Spotify poured in money, as its chief |
| 1:15.4 | executive, Daniel Eck, explained to investors last year. |
| 1:19.5 | We saw such a significant opportunity to expand our platform and our audience, so we decided |
| 1:26.1 | to go aggressively after podcasting. |
| 1:29.4 | Now, Spotify and others are pulling back, as the industry grapples with over investment, |
| 1:36.0 | and a long tail of shows that are struggling to make money. |
| 1:39.7 | So, what does the future hold for the business of podcasts? |
... |
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