Top Five Spotify Podcast Deals Showcase Platform’s Drive To Be No.1
We all know that Spotify is the ultimate music destination, but it also has a massive podcast portfolio. It currently offers over five million different podcasts on its platforms and they are all free.
Still, Apple’s iTunes still remains more popular with both podcasters and listeners alike. The current podcast data for this gives 28 million podcast creators. This platform has the most significant share of 75% in US-based podcast markets alone.
There are however other major streaming companies who are equally eager to outshine these two behemoths as well. Amazon has recently hit five million podcasts which means it is slowly getting closer to Spotify.
By March 2023, Apple Podcasts had the highest number of listeners at number one. Their platform accounted for 38.7% of all podcasts played by listeners on various platforms while Spotify was second with 28%.
Even though Amazon Music is growing increasingly successful, they own just 0.8% of total podcasts audience members.
What Spotify Is Doing To Reach Number One
Spotify lags behind Apple significantly thus raising the question: How can it be improved?
Martin from Wired Clip spoke to us about this issue and said:
‘‘Indeed, Spotify’s heavy investment in high profile podcast deals is definitely instrumental in boosting up the podcast industry.’’
What drives growth in this highly competitive industry is acquiring top-tier talent and offering financial incentives that compete with big media players like Netflix, Hulu or YouTube? Thereby creating conducive environment where content creators can thrive within Spotify and encouraging more content creators into space therefore enabling richer diversity ecosystem for listening audiences.
This kind of growth funded by such deals also sparks interest as well as investment from other platforms thereby further expanding the overall audio market in general terms.
Based on what Martin says, it seems that Spotify focuses mainly on original ideas instead of click-bait shows or samey-type programs. They want to see more unknown artists and spaces for communities instead of money makers.
Obviously, this does not mean that Spotify podcasts are not profitable. In fact, these 5 podcasts are all vying for the number one spot on Spotify and making millions in the process.
The Top 5 Podcasts
Here is a snapshot list of the top five podcasts on Spotify right now:
The Joe Rogan Experience
Call Her Daddy
The Michelle Obama Podcast
StartUp Podcast
The Ringer
Joe Rogan Experience, The
This is a controversial podcast. Hosted by Joe Rogan who is an UFC Fighter and his friends talk about MMA, celebrities and political issues. His remarks often sound racist, anti medicine, misogynistic or anti-transgender rights.
Negative opinions have attracted more listeners which means higher viewership from angry comments and defensive fans.
His podcast is worth $100 million at present time while he averages about 190 million downloads per month.
Call Her Daddy
The Michelle Obama Podcast is hosted by the former First Lady and conversations are featured in its presentations. Here you can listen to inspiring talks from her as well as other popular guest hosts, because it is like Oprah Winfrey’s talk show.
Michelle Obama has not revealed how much she values her podcast, however, I suppose it must be higher than last two shows that we will discuss. She gets more than 1 million downloads per episode.
StartUp Podcast
StartUp is for people who want to start a business and this is an educational podcast. It is the most successful educational podcast globally and was recently bought by Spotify. The value of the show hasn’t been released since the acquisition was just done. Moreover, it averaged over 1 million downloads per episode.
The Ringer
The Ringer does both sports and pop culture podcasts that include discussion on sporting events, athletes and movies about sports in media.
This podcast currently costs $250 million but they have such a huge number of listeners on each episode that one cannot give a specific figure. This demonstrates that they follow their own interests instead of relying on their viewership – enabling more variety in what they produce.
Final Thoughts
Ultimately, controversial content always gains traction since it appeals to die-hard fans as well as angry commenters. Nevertheless, StartUp and The Ringer’s success indicates that there is still space for unique content on Spotify.
