The podcasting industry is facing its first major setback, with Sirius XM reducing its podcasting budget, Amazon Music reducing offers, and Spotify freezing its budget for new podcasts.
This has led to shows that used to sell upwards of 80% of their adverts now selling closer to 50%.
Dave Hanley, the Chief Revenue Officer at Libsyn (a podcasting platform), says that advertisers are no longer excited by the space as the value for money is not as promising as it has been in the past.
- Platforms are starting to bundle podcasts together to address advertiser dissatisfaction. This allows new ad inventory to open up as ad sales for smaller podcasts are grouped with larger podcasts.
- Investors are becoming more interested in purchasing large packages across a series of medium or smaller-sized podcasts than to purchase expensive ad placements in more popular podcasts.
- With over two million English-language podcasts listened to in the U.S., the changes in ad purchasing strategies in this industry could have a significant knock-on effect on the rest of the advertising industry.
