Good day, Insiders! Welcome to your Thursday version, and good day to the brand new of us becoming a member of us right here — thanks for doing so. As we speak, as a lot as I want this wasn’t the case, we’ve to speak extra about Spotify and its Joe Rogan happenings. However then Aria is making a particular Thursday look to catch you up on the earnings information you’ll want to know.
Spotify-palooza
We left off in Spotify’s ongoing Rogan debacle with the open query of what would come subsequent. The corporate publicly issued its moderation tips on Sunday, together with a plan to roll out COVID-19 advisories on any podcast episode that discusses the virus. Since then, properly, issues have occurred. Let’s catch up in bullet level type:
- Brené Brown, who put her unique Spotify reveals on pause “till additional discover,” issued a prolonged be aware explaining her resolution on Instagram. She says she’s in ongoing discussions with Spotify management to study their moderation insurance policies and the way they are going to be utilized. No new episodes have been revealed but.
- Musicians David Crosby and Stephen Stills joined their pal Neil Younger in wanting to drag their music off the platform. Crosby also wants “very badly” to talk with Taylor Swift. I’m wondering about what!
- White Home press secretary Jen Psaki issued a touch upon the state of affairs and stated: “Our hope is that each one main tech platforms — and all main information sources, for that matter — be accountable and be vigilant to make sure the American individuals have entry to correct info on one thing as vital as Covid-19,” including, “and that actually consists of [Spotify].”
- As we speak, Roxane Homosexual revealed an op-ed in The New York Occasions saying she’s pulling her podcast The Roxane Homosexual Agenda from the platform. “Joe Rogan and others like him can proceed to proudly encourage misinformation and bigotry to huge audiences. They are going to be properly rewarded for his or her efforts. The platforms sharing these rewards can proceed to look the opposite method. However at the moment no less than, I gained’t,” she writes. (For us podcast nerds, I did, in fact, should ctrl+F to see if she talked about Luminary in any respect — a uncommon advertising alternative — and she or he didn’t.)
Then, yesterday, on the company entrance, a pair main issues occurred. For one: Spotify introduced its quarterly earnings. Income’s up, subscribers (180 million) are up, and month-to-month customers (406 million) are up. Curiously for us, Spotify says promoting now represents 15 p.c of its income, and due to that, it’s going to start out experimenting with windowing content material quite than totally distributing it as an unique, says CEO Daniel Ek. Additionally within the name, Ek positioned the corporate as one hyper-focused on audio creators with the said aim of reaching 50 million on the platform. Broadly, issues are chugging together with Spotify’s podcast technique, though traders did deliver Rogan up a pair instances and, in a single case, requested whether or not any account cancellations have been displaying up in newer numbers. (Ek stated it’s too early to say.)
Which brings us to the second massive factor that occurred on the firm yesterday — a significant distinction to a tame name with traders. Executives, together with Ek and Daybreak Ostroff, chief content material and promoting enterprise officer, addressed workers in a city corridor the place Ek clarified why he doesn’t consider Spotify as a writer and basically instructed workers they’ll have to just accept that Spotify licenses, distributes, and monetizes The Joe Rogan Expertise. I revealed the whole thing of Ek’s 15-minute speech right here, together with further quotes in reply to workers’ questions, of which there have been many. I additionally get into the rising rigidity inside the corporate, with workers questioning how you can sq. the work they do, significantly round range or science, with what Rogan and his friends say.
There’s a lot for us to chew on, frankly, and I’m going to save lots of an extended column for Tuesday, however one of many soundbites that caught my consideration was Ek’s rationalization for why Spotify pursued exclusives within the first place. To cite myself:
“Regardless of Rogan’s present by no means being obtainable on Spotify previous to its deal, this system was essentially the most searched podcast on the platform, he says, and when the corporate determined to enter the podcasting trade, its catalog was ‘not that differentiated’ from opponents. It had been struggling to make offers with ‘important {hardware} companions like Amazon, Google, and even Tesla,’ on condition that they have been constructing ‘comparable streaming companies with basically the identical content material.’
‘To fight this, we wanted to seek out leverage, and a technique we may do that was within the type of exclusives,’ he says. ‘To be frank, had we not made a few of the selections we did, I’m assured that our enterprise wouldn’t be the place it’s at the moment.’ He says the corporate now operates the primary podcast app within the US.”
It’s wild to listen to this so plainly put, and I feel it may possibly assist us all higher perceive the broader motivations behind the tech world’s push into podcasting. Sure, it’s about signing up customers and inking content material offers and guaranteeing a well-rounded app expertise, however it additionally comes all the way down to protecting opponents wanting extra. In Spotify’s case, exclusives are a preventative measure towards even greater tech firms’ stranglehold on working techniques and {hardware}. You may see why Spotify speaks so loudly about Apple and antitrust, although Ek doesn’t point out the corporate by title.
On Tuesday, we’ll talk about Spotify’s mission, as outlined by Ek, so your homework is to verify that a part of the story out now, so that you’re properly ready!! Ebook membership!!
Now, a bonus nugget for you Sizzling Pod Insiders that didn’t make the piece: Ostroff additionally addressed Science Vs’ be aware from earlier this week about dedicating its present to combating misinformation on Spotify and says she had “a really constructive dialogue” with host Wendy Zukerman and could have one other subsequent week.
“We’re very glad for Wendy and Blythe to have the ability to make reveals that signify completely different factors of view. And we actually encourage having completely different voices on the platform, so we’re getting collectively, and we’re assembly, however I feel we’re already having nice conversations, and we’re very encouraging of a unique perspective because it pertains to what Wendy and Blythe wish to do.”
And now, I’m going to step away and let Aria take it from right here:
$100M+ price ticket for My Favourite Homicide +
We’ve lastly bought the numbers. Amazon’s latest cope with My Favourite Homicide and the remainder of the Precisely Proper Media podcasts price over $100 million, in line with Lucas Shaw at Bloomberg. Amazon good points the unique rights to promote adverts for the reveals, which can even go stay one week early on Amazon Music and Wondery Plus earlier than being playable elsewhere.
Incomes in your love
I listened to all these gravel-y, recorded voices on firms’ earnings calls with a purpose to spotlight some numbers and likewise deliver you some juicy quotes you can solely get by tuning in. From Apple, The New York Occasions Firm, and SiriusXM, right here’s what you’ll want to know at the moment.
First off, all three firms set information this yr. The fourth quarter of 2021 was Apple’s greatest ever, yielding $123.9 billion in income. It was additionally the NYT’s “largest ever quarter for digital promoting,” and 2021 as a complete was its “second greatest yr ever for web subscription additions.” And for SiriusXM, 2021 marked a report excessive for income, clocking in at $8.7 billion.
Whereas Apple didn’t supply up any specifics about cash and podcasts, NYT did. When requested how the corporate would possibly money in on audio (e.g., by means of The Every day, via the beta NYT Audio app), CEO and president Meredith Kopit Levien had this to say: “In any state of affairs, we’re optimistic that audio’s going to play a giant and vital function, both straight or not directly, in our subscription enterprise.”
Right here’s what could be extrapolated from Kopit Levien’s imaginative and prescient. Contemplating that The Every day has not solely pulled in appreciable promoting income for the Occasions however achieved the work of, as she stated, “directing consideration to different podcasts,” even when The Every day itself by no means will get paywalled, it might quickly be used to funnel individuals towards Occasions merchandise that do get paywalled, podcasts or in any other case.
Now, concerning SiriusXM, get a load of this: advert income inside the Pandora division (which incorporates Stitcher) elevated from 2020 to 2021, despite the fact that Pandora listeners went down — like, by loads. Final yr, there have been 6.6 million fewer month-to-month listeners than there have been in 2020 (an 11 p.c drop in listenership), however it doesn’t appear to have achieved a lot hurt. That could be as a result of Stitcher has been so successful, although. Because the report states, “Stitcher and the corporate’s off-platform promoting companies contributed $348 million of income, representing almost 23 p.c of [Pandora’s] whole income.”
In case you really feel so inclined, you possibly can dig deeper into the numbers in both the written statements (Apple, NYT, SiriusXM) or the recordings of the earnings calls (Apple, NYT). The calls specifically are all the time a time, however whoever publishes the recordings with out transcripts or the flexibility to vary playback pace, I don’t forgive you.
—
That’s it, of us! Aria can be right here tomorrow, and I’m again Tuesday. Bye-bye!
