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Will offer some data points from Spotify's Investor Relations [1] that add some additional color to the anecdotes from previous comments: - Total MAUs grew 27%

Will offer some data points from Spotify's Investor Relations [1] that add some additional color to the anecdotes from previous comments: - Total MAUs grew 27% Y/Y to 345 million in the quarter (...) Based on the behavior we see when users first join Spotify, we are confident that podcast usage has been a factor in the accelerated net additions. - The strength in Ad-Supported revenue was led by our Podcast, Direct, and Ad Studio channels, with Podcast and Ad Studio both growing over 100% on a Y/Y basis. Podcast performance benefited from strong underlying demand from advertisers with a 50% increase in the number of companies spending in this channel vs. Q3 - As of Q4, we had 2.2 million podcasts on the platform (up from more than 1.9 million podcasts in Q3). Of note, 25% of our Total MAUs engaged with podcast content in Q4 (up from 22% of MAUs in Q3 2020 So the short answer is that podcasts help increase usage of the platform (and with better margins than music, probably due to copyright and leverage of artists vs. content creators) [1] https://investors.spotify.com/financials/default.aspx https://investors.spotify.com/financials/default.aspx

bedhead 6y ago
These bullets are conspicuously free of important details. "Podcast usage has been a factor" - okay, how much? Answer: no idea. "The strength in Ad-Supported revenue was led by our Podcast, Direct, and Ad Studio channels, with Podcast and Ad Studio both growing over 100% on a Y/Y basis" - okay, but from what starting point and how much did it contribute? Answer: not saying. "25% of our Total MAUs engaged with podcast content" - okay, how much? Answer: not saying. Obviously podcasts help increase metrics, but even Spotify either doesn't know or won't say, meanwhile all this discussion ignores the flip side of the coin which is how much this is all costing the company.
- rtpg 6y ago
  One podcast was saying that their show subscribers coming in from Spotify was like... 0.x% of total listeners, across several shows. This was sometime last year, things could have changed but to be honest nor everything is a multi-trillion dollar industry and Spotify spending like or is is a pretty good application of wealth redistribution from VCs to artists

bedhead 6y ago

These bullets are conspicuously free of important details. "Podcast usage has been a factor" - okay, how much? Answer: no idea. "The strength in Ad-Supported revenue was led by our Podcast, Direct, and Ad Studio channels, with Podcast and Ad Studio both growing over 100% on a Y/Y basis" - okay, but from what starting point and how much did it contribute? Answer: not saying. "25% of our Total MAUs engaged with podcast content" - okay, how much? Answer: not saying. Obviously podcasts help increase metrics, but even Spotify either doesn't know or won't say, meanwhile all this discussion ignores the flip side of the coin which is how much this is all costing the company.

rtpg 6y ago
One podcast was saying that their show subscribers coming in from Spotify was like... 0.x% of total listeners, across several shows. This was sometime last year, things could have changed but to be honest nor everything is a multi-trillion dollar industry and Spotify spending like or is is a pretty good application of wealth redistribution from VCs to artists