As a follow-up to RAJAR’s recent research into podcasting, the US based eMarketer.com has just released some forecasts for podcast revenues for the next five years.
The full report retails for $695, so you’ll excuse me if I limit my notes to the findings they publish on their blog.
They suggest that total audience for podcasts in the US in 2007 was 18.5m. RAJAR had a UK figure of 4.3m. So the US listenership is 4.3 times the UK one. Considering that the population of the US is roughly 5 times that of the UK, this seems quite reasonable – particularly as the UK has faster internet access than the US.
When the active audience is examined – those who’ve downloaded a podcast in the last week – the figures are 6.5m in the US and 1.9m in the UK; a factor of 3.4 times the size in the US. Again, I find this broadly believable.
What RAJAR hasn’t (and wouldn’t) been able to provide, is the value of podcasting market. eMarketer considers “advertising” to include sponsorship. I assume that also includes podcasts made to order for clients. The 2007 value is $165m which if we extrapolate, would equate to $38-50m for the UK market (using the multiples above) – or £19-25m.
Is this right? I don’t know, although I suspect that the proliferation of BBC programmes available as podcasts might suggest this is a bit high, albeit that these same podcasts are available to US consumers as well.
The report also predicts some significant growth in the next five years, with revenues rising to $435m by 2012, representing an increase of 264%. Let’s hope so!
Finally, they list some of the factors they believe are driving growth:
A number of factors are driving the growth of the podcast-user base:
I wouldn’t disagree with any of those areas. What closer analysis of RAJAR’s research has made me consider is that for a lot of people, getting podcasts onto their portable devices is still actually quite tricky. They don’t understand what “subscribe” means, and beyond the iPod and iTunes, there’s not a user-friendly system for the non-tech minded consumer to use.
As a result, many people now have mobile phones that are perfectly capable of playing back podcasts, but they’re not using them.
RAJAR’s research told us that more people play back their podcasts on their PC than anywhere else, and while a PC will always be convenient for many, I believe that this is more because consumers don’t know how to get podcasts onto their portable devices.
To continue growing the uptake of podcasts, radio stations and others have to provide clear explanations of how subscriptions work, and methods for getting podcasts regularly updated and onto their listeners’ devices as easily and painlessly as possible. Only then will podcasting become truly mainstream.
*As ever, these views are mine, and don’t necessarily reflect those of my employer, Virgin Radio.