The death of podcasting has, surprise, surprise, been greatly exaggerated. Don’t believe me, ask Travis and Jason Kelce. The brothers have signed a deal with Wondery reported to be worth around $100 million. Now, Taylor Swift may have played a helping hand in this, but it demonstrates that there is still major money in podcast land.
In recent times there have been big new deals for Call Her Daddy – host Alex Cooper signed for a reported to be $125 million with SiriusXM, after the end of her agreement with Spotify. The all-star Smartless lineup also joined SiriusXM, heading there from Wondery for big money.
Those are now established shows but there have been breakthroughs too. The likes of The Rest is Politics and the News Agents used big-name hosts to bring in big listener numbers. Away from news and politics, Lily Allen is having success at the BBC. The show she makes with Miquita Oliver, Miss Me?, is doing well with younger audiences, according to the broadcaster. Also on the BBC, The Tooney and Russo show is set up nicely to deploy the popularity of the Lionesses as we head towards Euro 2025.
You can barely move for content creators starting podcasts!
Peak Podcasting
“People like podcasts”, especially when famous people are on them, is not exactly a startling revelation. However, it is worth remembering once in a while. There have been various pieces about “peak podcasting”, including one from the Evening Standard in April about political shows and another from The Guardian which was released a year earlier. The silly money might not be floating around any more, with the focus on shows that are sustainable and can grow, but I think that is rather a good thing. Nobody needs to give Prince Harry and Meghan Markle millions to not do very much.
I don’t pretend everything is perfect though. There are clearly various squeezes on the ad market. Getting people to find your new podcast is hard and I do fear that shows without celebrity presenters (uhum…) will find it increasingly difficult to get a hearing. The market is crowded and people only have a certain amount of time they can dedicate to listening. However, with hard work, success is still possible if your show is good enough.
The talk of “peak podcasts” and similar is just another example of the negativity around media, usually from within the industry itself. There is no need to swipe at a success story.
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