How podcast listening is being impacted by coronavirus
Welcome! I’m Simon Owens and this is the paid version of my tech and media newsletter. I’m fine with you forwarding this to non-paying subscribers as long as you encourage them to become subscribers. If someone forwarded this to you and you’d like to subscribe, you can click on this handy little button:
Let’s jump right into it…
How podcast listening is being impacted by coronavirus
As someone who writes a lot about the business of media, I’ve spent a good amount of time and reading and thinking about the myriad ways coronavirus will impact the media industry.
Yes, it’s generally bad for the industry, with advertising budgets plummeting pretty much across the board, but it’s also clear the effects aren’t evenly distributed. With the complete halt of pro sports, sports journalism has pretty much cratered, and the huge jump in layoffs and remote working has resulted in sharp increases in social media use, news website visits, and YouTube streams. Sure, media companies aren’t able to fully capitalize on this traffic, though some have reported an increase in paid subscriptions as a result of their coronavirus coverage.
One thing I’ve consistently wondered about is how podcasting will be impacted. Sure, you could argue it would also see benefits from increased leisure time, but podcasting is unique in that its consumption occurs at times when you don’t normally consume other kinds of media -- during walks, while cleaning your house, and on your commute.
It’s that last one that had me wondering if we’d actually see a dip in podcast listening. It’s always been known that a fair amount of podcast listening occurs while traveling too and from work, and my suspicion was that the increased leisure time wouldn’t make up for that.
I noticed a softening in my own podcast downloads over the last week or two. I put the question to my Facebook group, and one person responded, “There's been a drop in our podcast listens for sure, on a par with Christmas.” And then Podcast Business Journal added more data into the mix: “We are seeing podcast listening reductions from 12%-20% reported by podcasters and hosting platforms." Data released from Podtrac this morning found a more modest decrease.
So I guess my hunch was correct and podcasts are getting hit by the elimination of commutes. I wouldn’t be surprised if B2B podcasts like mine are suffering even more than average. After all, why would you want to listen about a work-related issue if you don’t have a job?
So here's the question: as the weather warms and more and more people go on walks to escape being pent up in the house 24/7, will they listen to podcasts? Up until now, podcasting as a medium has experienced strong year over year growth. 2020 could be the year that breaks that trend.
Why Cameo is such an innovative company
Marker published a fantastic profile of the company Cameo, and it just reinforced for me that Cameo is a brilliant product that created the perfect feedback loop for converting viral content into new revenue.
For the uninitiated, Cameo allows users to pay anyone ranging from Instagram influencers to A-List celebrities to record very short videos delivering some kind of personalized message. Though the messages are personal, users often will upload the videos to their social media accounts, and the best of them go viral.
The company has created this amazing feedback loop that leads to both wider exposure and more revenue.
To understand how, consider your typical viral content created by a site like BuzzFeed. It’s expensive to produce and it’s difficult to predict exactly which content will go viral, so it’s not like you can efficiently sell ads in advance, and you often have to settle for programmatic ads which may not be all that lucrative. And then when you begin producing your next piece of content, it’s not like it’s more likely to go viral simply because the last video or article followed that path.
Now take Cameo. There’s a high level of price flexibility; if you’re a rich hedge fund guy you can spring the $2,500 to get a video from a famous NBA player, but if you’re a poor college kid you’d probably be just as satisfied paying $50 to send a video from your favorite YouTuber. These videos are extremely easy to create, in that the celebrity spends 60 seconds recording it from their mobile phone. They can knock of a dozen in an hour without interrupting their normal flow of work.
Cameo makes it easy for the user to upload the video to social media, and the video has the Cameo watermark. It’s essentially getting fantastic user generated content from the world’s hugest influencers without having to pay anything upfront (Cameo gets a 25% cut of whatever’s paid to the celebrity). When the video then gets shared, not only does that attract more users to the platform, but potential celebrities as well. It’s a virtuous cycle.
And I don’t think it’ll be just a fad. Celebrities never go out of style and it’ll always be cool to get one to address you directly. I suppose the platform wouldn’t be too hard to copy, but Cameo already has so much of a head start in terms of having a huge menu of influencers on the platform; it’d be difficult for another platform to compete (unless maybe a YouTube or an Instagram go in on the game).
It really is a fantastic media business model.
Don’t forget
As a paying subscriber, you have the ability to email me directly with comments/questions I can possibly address in this newsletter. Here’s the email address: simonowenspremium@gmail.com.
And thank you for supporting me during these difficult times. Stay well everyone!