Podcast Movement - The Growth, The Drama!

For those of you who attended Podcast Movement in Dallas last month, then you already know. For those of you who did not attend Podcast Movement, let me fill you in on some of the highlights.

As I have written many times, and here again: if you are not podcasting, you need to be. No question about it. Traditional radio revenue remains flat while podcast revenue by 2024 will have increased 700% since 2018. 700 percent! That’s a lot of dough-ray-mi-fa-so-la-ti-do.

And as I have mentioned in the past, Christian broadcasters, while limited to advertising over the air, have free reign to monetize their podcast inventory.

That being seared into your brain, let’s move to the Podcast Movement highlights:

1. Christian podcasters were in high attendance. I had the honor of moderating “The Christian Podcast: Reaching New Audiences” panel this year, and there were easily 75-100 people in attendance. Compare this to the ten that attended the first Christian podcast panel at Podcast Movement in 2018. Attending were representatives of some of the largest Chrstian broadcasting companies in the U.S. – YES!
2. In addition to the robust Christian podcast engagement, there were upwards of 1,800 attendees, all eager to learn tips and tools of the trade and identify what will help their podcasts grow in the coming years.
3. Video versions of podcasts were the predominant theme when talking to attendees, especially when looking to get in front of the younger generations. YouTube was on hand to talk about how they are trying to add more features for podcasts, and large broadcast organizations like NPR and Disney are partnering with YouTube for podcasting – which is good for us all, as this will help to drive development and features that everyone can use.
4. Programmatic/Monetization was also a huge topic of discussion as more and more podcasters are opting into easy ways to monetize their content without the need of having over 10,000 downloads (or more) to find a direct advertiser.
5. Large companies are working together. This, I think, is the coolest outcome. Over the last few years, some of the bigger broadcast and digital streaming services have been showing up in a big way, and while one might think they are “too big” or evasive, I found that not only were these companies willing to talk to anyone, they were willing to find ways to work together in one way or another; pretty cool indeed!
6. THE DRAMA! The Daily Wire sponsored Podcast Movement this year and they had cool prizes and the staff was eagerly talking to attendees. Ben Shapiro even came out to visit the booth and shake hands, take pictures, and sign autographs. But, as you may know, some people do not agree with Mr. Shapiro, so that is where the drama started. It was reported that one attendee created a tweet airing their displeasure in having the owner of The Daily Wire – and one of the country’s largest podcasters and radio hosts – at the show. The event organizers then made an apology for the “incident” and Twitter broke loose. The news of this was eventually covered in The Wall Street Journal, which gives you a pretty good idea of how big of a deal this became. Some say this is a part of Cancel Culture, which it may be. To sum it up, I will quote one of the Christian podcast panelists who said:

“if you’re going to be canceled, and you might get canceled because you’re a Christian podcaster, make sure it’s for Jesus and not for your politics.”

Amen.

Matt Kellogg is VP of Sales & Business Development at SoundStack, which simplifies audio through the development of platform-agnostic technology for creators and advertisers. matt@soundstack.com