by Gavin Gaddis
Podcast Week in New York opened with the Sounds Profitable Business Summit, and This American Life's Ira Glass set the tone in the opening session, arguing that podcasts go far deeper than most influencer content and that the resulting audience connection makes for more effective advertising. A later panel broached the topic of Spotify's skip button test, with Right Side Up's Krystina Rubino offering a blunt response to creator anxiety: "If your ads suck, maybe you should do better.” Acast CEO Greg Glenday argued the industry should raise ad quality rather than fear transparency. As Rubino said, “if you’re afraid of sharing consumption data with your advertisers, you have a deeper problem." The team behind Serial also announced Metro, an upcoming always-on narrative series launching in October with companion short-form video.
Josh Linforth, CRO at Genius Sport, makes the case for how new tech will shape athlete-led media. A recent partnership between Chris Paul, Genius Sports, and Words + Pictures demonstrates his model in action, using movement-tracking to feed data directly to fans with the same tech the players are already using. With 59% of sports fans following their favorite athletes on social media, and even more among younger audiences, access to that technology could be a significant differentiator for sports media, modifying how sponsorships of content like athlete-led podcasts would look like going forward.
PRX is handing its top job to a longtime insider. Chief Operating Officer Jason Saldanha will become president and CEO on October 15, succeeding Kerri Hoffman, who has led the organization for more than a decade. Saldanha has spent seven-plus years at PRX across business development, revenue, and partnerships including Hidden Brain and ProPublica, and brings earlier experience in commercial podcasting and radio. In a farewell blog on Medium, Hoffman reflected on a tenure that grew PRX into a leading distributor, launched Radiotopia, and moved more than $200 million to independent creators.
…as for the rest of the news:
SiriusXM Media is now the exclusive audio advertising representative for YouTube in the US, giving buyers guaranteed access to YouTube's audio inventory at scale for the first time this fall.
TYT named Airwave its exclusive advertising sales partner in a seven-figure deal spanning premium podcast, video, and live inventory.
Audacy makes the case that podcast advertising has graduated from experiment to permanent budget line in a new guide on the rules of podcast advertising.
YouTube's Emma Sweet breaks down podcasting on the platform on Podcast Perspectives, covering discovery, creator tools, and monetization.
The Podglomerate published a guide to turning a show into revenue, walking through the main monetization paths for podcasts of different sizes.
Red Seat Ventures' Supercast added live streaming, bringing real-time video, chat, and polls to creator subscription communities.
Steven Bartlett's Steven.com and Authentic launched OBSN, a venture platform planning to deploy up to $400 million into creator-led media companies and brands.
