Pod-Alization: Spotify # 1 With Audience Reach; Podcast Advertising Pays Off; Call-In Podcasting?

 First Quarter 2023 Podcast Ranking: Spotify, SiriusXM, iHeartRadio

  Edison Research has announced the Top Podcast Networks in the U.S. based on total network reach for Q4 2022 – Q1 2023 among weekly podcast listeners age 13+. The top podcast networks are ranked by the reach of the producer or network that represents the advertising for the show, not the platform or app that the listener uses to access the podcast. 

Spotify, SiriusXM Podcast Network, and iHeartRadio take the top three spots, respectively. Spotify and SiriusXM have taken turns occupying the number one spot on the ranker over the past year. 

The list ranks podcast networks based on total audience reach from Edison Podcast Metrics. The Q4 2022 – Q1 2023 ranker includes an increased sample size implemented last year and is based on surveys of 10,797 weekly podcast listeners age 13+.

 Spotify promotes two-way interactive podcasting: Is that a good thing?

In 2019, when Spotify founder and CEO Daniel Ek announced that podcasts and podcasting would be the next phase of growth for the company, the streaming music company claimed to reimagine the future of podcasting by making a historically one-sided medium more engaging and dynamic for both listeners and hosts.

“Podcasting can be two-way; it can be interactive. It can be a format that helps people connect with each other, instead of just one-way broadcasting,” says Maya Prohovnik, VP and Head of Podcast Product at Spotify. “As Spotify has become the number one audio listening platform in the world, as we’ve gotten a critical mass of listeners and creators in one place, it’s allowed us to really innovate and add these new ways to interact over audio.” 

Prohovnik continues: "Q&A and polls enable creators to incorporate a level of engagement by asking questions or soliciting voted responses. The tools allow podcasters to directly communicate with fans in a way that’s more personal. And since we enabled these features for all creators on our new Spotify for Podcasters platform, we’ve seen the number of podcasters who use them more than double."

Of course, you have to be oh so careful what you wish for. Radio has historically been a two-way medium, with call-in shows and goofy morning shows with giveaways and silly comedy bits. 

As radio leaned into political call-in shows, and more extremist views, such two-way engagement devolved into festering echo chambers of hate and grievance. 

Only the decibel-deafening rants of local sports fans on a sports talk show can match that level of vitriol, especially if the local sports team has a losing record. Bobble heads are then smashed, and highly skilled players are denigrated and dismissed as losers.

So any tool can be twisted and contorted to damage the credibility of a medium. Spotify should be careful how its engagement tools are being used and to what effect.

 Podcast advertising effective, research shows

Acast, the world’s largest independent podcast company, has released new research on the effectiveness of podcasting for return on advertising spending among U.S. marketers. According to the study, which surveyed marketers who have spent on multiple podcast campaigns before, podcasts deliver a high return on ad spend, with more than two-thirds (67 percent) of US marketers saying for every dollar spent on podcasts they see a $2 to $6 return. An additional 20 percent of U.S. marketers said that for every dollar spent on podcasts, they see a return of $6 or more – the most of any other tested medium.

With this strong return, U.S. marketers are also increasing their investments in the podcasting space. According to this research, 68 percent of U.S. marketers said that their second campaign had a higher budget than their first podcast advertising campaign. In fact, marketers in this study were 34 times more likely to say they had increased their budgets from the first campaign to the second, indicating the overall effectiveness of the medium.

“There may have never been a more crucial time than now for marketers to deliver the highest possible return on every dollar they spend. Our research proves that advertisers understand the value of podcasting for return on ad spend, but it also shows that there is still a knowledge gap in the market for how to buy podcast ads most effectively,” said Gabriella Gregoris, Group Business Director of National Performance at Acast.

Acast research shows that more than half (51 percent) of U.S. marketers believe that investing in large podcasts delivers the best return on ad spend. However, podcast listeners on small–sized shows were 90 percent more likely to welcome more ads on the podcast and 29 percent more likely to say ads on the podcast were very influential than listeners of large–sized podcasts, according to research from Acast earlier this year.

Although marketers are seeing the value of podcast audiences and increasing their spend on the medium, podcasting still makes up less than one percent of total digital ad spend in the U.S.