Gone Fishin’: Sounds Profitable will be taking next week off for summer break. After tomorrow morning’s issue of the Download Recap, the next time you’ll hear from me will be Monday, July 7th. Try to stay cool out there, and don’t forget the sunscreen.
Serious about Wellness: Unlock the power of purpose-driven podcasting
Today Sounds Profitable published a new report sponsored by SiriusXM Media/SiriusXM Podcast Network. The study looks at data from The Advertising Landscape 2025 with a specific focus on two of podcasting’s fastest-growing segments: Self-Improvement, and Health & Fitness. In the overall Advertising Landscape survey, respondents were asked which podcast genres they had consumed in the past 30 days, Self-Improvement scored 22% and Health & Fitness just below at 21%. The two also share significant overlap, as 45% of H&F consumers also consume SI, and 44% in the other direction. While advertising to both can reinforce frequency, the two audiences are also demographically different enough to reinforce reach. For example, H&F skews towards an older, established audience with higher income and education completion, while SI is younger, more diverse, and has higher Hispanic representation. Which is to say: an advertiser buying both audiences is buying into extremely complementary, growing segments of podcasting.
How Podcasting Can Cover Demographic Blind Spots by Tom Webster
Webster shares a table of data that’s sat with him from The Advertising Landscape’s survey of 5,000+ respondents, covering consumers of 22 different ad-supported media channels. Specifically, he discusses a chart of responses to the question “without looking anything up, please list up to three brands or products you remember seeing or hearing advertised in the past week.” For the sake of screen-space, here’s the graph. The results show brands with strong digital and social ad platforms skew heavily towards younger demographics, but building those healthy platforms created blind spots in their media mixes. And some in the opposite direction, such as insurance brands like Liberty Mutual having good recall with the 55+ age demographic but low amongst 18-to-34-year-olds. Podcasting offers the solution to these blind spots, with the ability to reach engaged audiences in all age groups. Podcast audiences are actively choosing to spend the time of an ad break to support content they care about instead of scrolling past social ads or skipping video ads.
Video on Spotify (Besides Podcasts) [Multiple Sources]
Starting off: Natalie Jarvey has a leaked pitch deck from Spotify. The deck reportedly is aimed at attracting YouTube creators into starting Spotify video podcasts, agnostic of whether the creator actually makes “a podcast.” As Jarvey notes, in recent months the Spotify podcast charts have started to feature more and more shows from popular YouTubers that are effectively re-uploads, such as cooking creator Nick DiGiovanni hitting #1 in the Arts U.S. chart. The deck reportedly invites YouTubers to “bring your video to Spotify” without specifically mentioning podcasts, though it does use video podcast data to demonstrate the platform’s watchability. A platform that’s attracting the attention of a broadcast-to-podcast. Ten has announced a new deal with Spotify to broadcast their free-to-air news show 10 News+. The program will now also be released as an hour-long daily video podcast, available for viewing momentarily after the TV broadcast (as well as simulcast live on YouTube).
Back in May, Publicis Groupe acquired Captiv8 to give the holding company the creator ID, campaign management, and measurement capabilities of one of the largest influencer tech platforms. In response, independent agencies have doubled down on investing in new tech, partnerships, and hires to outmaneuver the appeal holdcos like Publicis for brands looking to spend on content creators.
As for the rest of the news…
- Triton Digital has published the May version of their Canada Podcast Rankers, including CBC/Radio-Canada leading in publishers with 2.3 million average weekly downloads.
- YouGov has a fun new survey asking Americans about their habits while eating meals (spoiler: listening to music/podcasts is the fourth most common eating behavior).
- SiriusXM Media and Edison Research have published The Gen Z Audio Report, a survey of 2,010 respondents aged 13 to 24.
- Evergreen Podcasts has a new true crime production with journalist Carol Costello, The God Hook: The Ohio Craigslist Killings.
- The Hollywood Reporter covers Apple’s celebration of 20 years of podcasts with 20 stand-out podcasts (including, of course, Serial).
- Campaign Middle East has an overview of how/why podcasting is thriving in the MENA region.
- 91-year-old Canadian sportscaster Don Cherry has retired from podcasting after 313 episodes of Don Cherry’s Grapevine Podcast.
