Podcasting Hasn't Produced A New Hit in Years

An anonymous reader shares a report: Dawn Ostroff wants to find more hits. The chief content officer of Spotify is upset that her company isn't producing enough new popular podcasts, and has been putting pressure on her in-house studios to deliver. I've now heard the same message from every corner of the Spotify universe, though no one wanted to talk about it on the record. It's hard for new shows to find an audience. Every new show has a smaller audience than its predecessors. This is not specific to Spotify. Executives at studios large and small echoed the sentiment. While the overall audience for podcasting expands, the audience for individual new shows is shrinking across the board. None of the 10 most popular podcasts in the U.S. last year debuted in the last couple years, according to Edison Research. They are an average of more than 7 years old, and three of the top five are more than a decade old. ("The Joe Rogan Experience," "This American Life" and "Stuff You Should Know.") Only a few podcasts in the top 50 ("SmartLess," "The Michelle Obama Podcast," "Frenemies") are less than two years old. And none of them are in the top 25. This trend vexes executives and producers across the podcasting industry, who worry they are wasting a lot of money on new shows. Spotify, Amazon, SiriusXM, iHeartMedia and outside investors have plowed billions of dollars into production companies. Spotify has spent more than anyone, paying about $500 million for three studios. Where is all this money going if these companies aren't producing new hits?

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