Are you attending SXSW? We’ve created an incredibly short form so we can know who’s coming along. We’d love to see you there.
SXSW x Podcasting 2025 by Bryan Barletta
Sounds Profitable will be the lead sponsor of the Official Podcast Stage at SXSW 2025, the latest step in a three year journey bringing podcasting to one of the biggest networking events. What’s more, the stage will be located at the heart of SXSW in the Austin Convention Center proper. Nomono is set to be the official third-party mic offering, with the company recording audio and video of every presentation as well as interviewing attendees and giving live demonstrations at the event.
Keep ’em coming back: how to measure podcast audience churn and retention by Dan Misener
A piece looking at the utility of keeping track of both new and returning audience members, which has now been implemented as a feature in the bumper dashboard. Given most marketing of podcasts is built around the premise of convincing someone to sample what a podcast has to offer, audience growth thus necessitates a steady stream of new-net listeners. Being able to track week-by-week and month-by-month allows podcasters to track the rate of returning listeners versus net-new consistently over time.
Video podcasts rise in popularity, led by YouTube and Spotify
WARC has published a brief look at existing data showing the growing popularity of video podcasting. YouTube data shows that, on average, viewers consumed 400 million hours of video podcasts per month in 2024. Cumulus Media data shows the share of U.S. consumers watching has risen 12 percentage points since 2022. And as WARC notes, the marked increase in video podcasting means the creation of more ways for advertisers to take advantage of podcast-loving audiences.
Revenue Grows 22% In PodcastOne’s Latest Quarter
According to PodcastOne’s Q4 earnings report, the company saw a 22% year-over-year revenue increase, reaching $12.7 million. They anticipate to reach revenue of at least $51 million by the end of the fiscal year in March. Their growth is attributed to expanding PodcastOne’s programming slate up to 196 shows, surpassing 3.9 billion network downloads thanks to expanding relationships with A&E and debuting a podcast adaptation of The History Channel’s series Ancient Aliens. They also anticipate increased operational efficiencies as PodcastOne moves forward on their announced pivot to hosting on Amazon’s Art19 instead of their long-maintained in-house content platform.
Wondery closes in Mexico and Brazil by James Cridland
Podnews broke the exclusive story this morning that Amazon’s Wondery has closed operations in both Brazil and Mexico, announced via staff meeting earlier this week. Those impacted include Sarah Barrett, head of Mexico Podcast Content at Wondery until this week. The decision was announced the same week several Wondery Mexico podcasts were nominated for Ondas Globales awards.
As for the rest of the news…
- PodcastOne extend their podcast production partnership with KILLR Network
- Acast Research & Insights Director Tommy Walters has a new blog about teaching media buyers to be platform-agnostic when buying podcast inventory.
- The latest edition of the John Wordock Media Substack newsletter reflects on what kind of podcaster previous U.S. Presidents would’ve been.
- Christy Mirabal and Imelda Vergara-Skinder – formerly of Stitcher and SiriusXM – have launched The Listening Party Agency, a consultancy firm aiming to amplify podcast creators.
- Headliner has launched a template design contest inviting content creators to come up with a new Headliner video template and potentially win a year of Headliner Pro and their podcast featured prominently in Headliner channels.
- The Media Leader reports on Bauer Media agreeing to sell their stake in digital audio marketplace Octave to News UK
- AdWeek covers The Trade Desk missing their revenue target for the first time, which CEO Jeff Green attributes to missteps and “people mistakes” that are being rectified internally.
