Sponsored by RedCircle. Get your free podcast advertising campaign plan here. Thank us later.
- There has been an adverse reaction to Spotify’s announcement that it is to add play counts to podcasts on its app - reaction which appears to have taken the company by surprise. Spotify issued a statement on Threads addressing creator concerns, telling creators it “really appreciates the honest discussion”, and that it’ll “share more” on Friday. (The responses are not great.) We don’t, yet, see any play counts published in the app.
- Spotify has also been a little more open about how the play statistics are worked out. On an updated page, the company says that “plays” are the: “number of times a Spotify user actively watched or listened to your content on the Spotify app. Plays are only counted once per user per session, so if you play an episode, pause, and resume playing, that counts as one play.” Elsewhere, Spotify points out that plays of trailers or clips are not included.
- How different is a “play” on each platform? The Podnews Weekly Review has a total audience size of 185 people on both Spotify and Apple Podcasts over the last 60 days. But, the play count? On Spotify, we’ve had 715 “plays”; but on Apple Podcasts, we’ve had 2,800 “plays” - almost four times as many “plays” from the same audience size. Apple measures any touch of the “play” button - probably explaining Spotify’s example above. (Here’s our overall stats, by the way, for the same time period: 11,817 downloads).
- One of the highest pain points in the Podnews Report Card earlier this year was that different platforms don’t measure the same thing. We noted at the time that Spotify for Creators, Apple, and YouTube do not use the IAB standards.
> > > Read more of today’s podcast industry news stories on the Podnews website: and get our free daily newsletter.
Classifieds - your job or ad here
- Pod Engine: 10x Faster Guest Booking — AI-superpowered podcast search, outreach & more. Trusted by top agencies. 14-day free trial.
- Don't sell a Patreon ❌, sell your subscription ✅! — Supporting Cast is completely white labeled, so your brand is always front and center. Build YOUR subscription & community, not Patreon's
Gold supporters: Buzzsprout, Mowpod, Mamamia, PodMatch, The $100 MBA, The Podglomerate, Sounds Profitable, Cloud10, RedCircle, Simplecast, SALT, Cohost, Podscribe, PAVE Studios, audioBoom, Resound, Steve Lack: Audio, Audiohook, Companion Arts, Riverside.fm, Jar Podcast Solutions, Podchaser, Awesound, Disctopia, Evergreen Podcasts, Knucklehead Media Group, We Edit Podcasts, Acast, Podpage websites
Silver supporters: Audacia Audio, Gamut Podcast Network, Bumper, Goalhanger, Sounds Debatable, Magellan AI, PodVault, Voxtopica, ARN's iHeartPodcast Network Aust, The Podcast Haven, Frequency, Gumball, Storyboard, Ausha, Podium , Truefans, Huberman Lab, Jonekiri, Ask Ralph Christian Finance, Gilded Audio, PodAnalyst, The Roost, Compliance Podcast Network, Castbox, SoundStack, Red Seat Ventures, POW PR, Tink Media, Beamly, Message Heard, Health Podcast Network, matchmaker.fm, Blubrry, Double Elvis Productions, Sonic Influencer Marketing, Diversion Podcasts, Jam Street Media, Rhapsody Voices, Rephonic, Lemonada Media, Transistor, Heartcast Media50, Ossa Collective, Wondery, Headliner, Castos, Podcast Taxi, Oxford Road, Optimal Living Daily, Zvook, Content10x, Ad Results Media, StreamGuys, Hear.Here.Singapore, Podcast Partnership, She Podcasts, Cleanfeed, Podigy, Podcast Movement, Revolver Podcasts, Adopter Media, Lower Street, School of Podcasting, Sonix, Edison Research, Signal Hill Insights
Our supporters pay for Podnews, so everyone can read it. Join them today.
Image: Orbital 101 Studio