With September in full swing, I’m gonna take a quick second to list out what Sounds Profitable’s gonna be hosting this year at Advertising Week NYC. On October 6th and 7th The Podcast Zone returns for networking opportunities and panels (including Tom Webster debuting new data). Sounds Profitable partners can still grab tickets to the event at a steep discount. October 7th YMH and Sounds Profitable are once again putting on a Night of Podcast Comedy, taking over an NYC comedy club with standup from podcast-savvy comics. While the Podcast Zone stage is already booked solid, there are some limited sponsorship opportunities still available for both the zone and the Night of Podcast Comedy (hit reply or get in touch if interested).
Part one of Sounds Profitable’s annual Podcast Landscape study is now live, this one focusing on core podcast metrics. As revealed in early teases, audience expectations of podcasts to be video or audio have shifted slightly since last year. “Audio only” expectations have shrunk 5%, while “may be either” increased 4%, with the extra 1% going into “usually video, may be audio.” As Tom Webster said during his Podcast Movement keynote, he pitches this less as audio losing ground to video podcasting, and more a sign that audiences like having a choice. Especially with further data showing podcast consumers on YouTube still quite regularly consume those video podcasts primarily as audio experience. Multicultural consumption continues to grow in podcasting’s audience, as well. 55% of Americans 18+, on average, consume podcasts at least monthly. Despite the white dudebro image one finds in SNL skits, white audiences technically bring down the overall average, as white respondents only clock in at 52% total monthly podcast consumption. 65% of Hispanic Americans partake, 62% of Black audiences consume, and 66% of APAC audiences are tuning in. A significant driver of growth in podcasting over the past year has been multicultural audiences and video.
A quick check-in on podcasting’s main competition for ad dollars. Investment in streaming and connected TV (CTV) has steadily increased in recent years, with it becoming commonplace for big brands like Hyundai to shift more of their linear TV budgets into CTV. Demand is high, spend is high, but margin remains the same. Buyers report streamers, eager to move inventory, are bringing down costs behind closed doors in exchange for time commitments. For example, an anonymous buyer says Disney and Amazon ask for year-over-year commitment increases of 20 to 30% in exchange for lowering CPMs (cost per thousand impressions).
Team hires, studio rental fees: The hidden costs of creators by Alexander Lee
While not specifically targeting audio podcasters thinking of upgrading to being YouTubers as well, this piece does the job of outlining in more concrete terms the costs of doing so. While audio podcasting remains one of the mediums with the lowest barrier to entry (the two main limitations being ‘a device with a microphone’ and an internet connection), video podcasting comes with some extra baggage. In addition to new gear, there’s the space needed for the set, hiring a team to run the business and act as production crew, paying an expert specializing in clickable video thumbnails, lighting and tech costs, time spent re-speccing into video production, and the extra tax complexities involved with doing all of the above.
As for the rest of the news…
- The Podglomerate and New York Festivals and Radio Awards are presenting a free webinar on October 1st at 1:00p.m. EST titled “From Script to Success: Production Secrets from Trophy-Winning Podcasts,” featuring podcast production crew from NPR, CBC, and The Boston Globe.
- Acast now has AI ad production capabilities in their ad platform, with the ability to generate audio in “any language.”
- the fwd. Network is growing its true crime slate with the addition of The First Degree.
- Quill and Right Side Up have teamed up to publish a new guide called Branded Podcasts v.s Podcast Advertising: What’s Right for Your Brand?
- Oliver Gilpin has a new post looking at the recently-announced Collab feature YouTube is rolling out for ads – which allows YouTube Shorts ads to appear to be posted ‘by’ both the brand and the creator – which is being used by an ad campaign with the NFL and Jimmy “Mr. Beast” Donaldson.
- Empower has acquired Ocean Media, an agency with a fair amount of podcast work, for $1.5 billion dollars.
- AI advertising platform Smartly has announced an integration with Spotify Ads Manager that’ll allow brands and agencies to run Spotify audio and video campaigns directly from Smartly.
