Podcast 360 Episode 3
Podcast 360 Episode 3 - James Cridland of Podnews and Sharon Taylor of Triton Digital
Host: James Cridland
James Cridland: Well, Sharon, welcome! It is great to talk to you again. This is the part where you lay down your two truths and a lie, and I have to work out which is true and which is the lie. Do you wanna go and see if I can guess them?
Sharon Taylor: Yes. In no particular order.
Omny Studio used to bank with Silicon Valley Bank.
I had listened to podcasting before I joined Omny Studio.
Six months into being the Omny Studio CEO, I was legitimately asked by a staff member if I actually knew what Omny Studio was and how it worked.
James Cridland: Well, gosh, I'm going to use a little bit of insider knowledge and suspect that because Omny Studio is an Australian company, I'm going to suspect that that number one might be the lie, but you don't have to tell us yet because we have to guess at the end.
It's time for everybody else to get to know you a little bit better, though. I've got three questions for you. You've got 60 seconds to answer each and the producer will be holding up a stopwatch. And after that, then you get to pick up one of the subjects that we covered to go back and elaborate on. So are you ready for this?
Sharon Taylor: I am. And you know me very well. I'm sure not being verbose and sticking to 60 seconds is going to be really, really easy.
Q&A Session
YouTube is entering the podcasting scene, and Spotify has made a significant impact. What's your take on the future of RSS? Will podcasting remain in the open?
Sharon Taylor: I think that if podcasts were going to be video, they would have become video by now. I think there's a lot of exciting things that are happening in the video space. I think that it's great for discovery. There's a new audience hopefully awaiting us over there. I don't think the RSS is going away any time soon. I certainly hope it doesn't because I quite like the open nature of podcasting, even though it does present some challenges at times.
With the podcasting market evolving, do you think all podcast hosting companies are essentially the same?
Sharon Taylor: No, they're not all the same. While some aspects are table stakes, different hosting platforms cater to specific clientele. Diversity in the market is good, but do we need 48 of them and counting every day as someone decides to jump into the market with two feet? I don't know. But no, I definitely don't think they're all the same.
Lastly, what do you see as the future of podcast monetization? Ads, host reads, sponsorships, subscriptions—what's the dominant force?
Sharon Taylor: Live reads will always be at the core, but to surpass the $2 billion mark that everyone is trying to get to, we need scalable programmatic ads. So I think that there will be a world outside of the host read. I don't think all shows will keep doing ad reads. I think that some have a better base on Patreon. I like the fact that there's a lot of different elements of monetization. I don't think I can say it's going to be one thing or another. I like the fact that it’s this kind of weird mess that everyone is sifting through a little bit.
Deeper Dive
James Cridland: Excellent answers, Sharon. Now, you get to pick one of these topics to explore further. What would you like to delve into?
Sharon Taylor: Let's drill into the dollars a bit more—podcast monetization.
James Cridland: Great choice! How many podcasts out there are actually monetized?
Sharon Taylor: I would say not the majority. I mean, we host 16,000 different feeds at the moment. I'm just going to pull numbers, like it feels like the vast majority, like 90% plus are monetized. But going back to your second question, that's because we have an ilk of different customers and that kind of sets us apart from the other hosting platforms. You've got others like the Red Circle and Speakers of the world, they only want shows that are monetized.
James Cridland: So tell me a little bit about the type of customers that Triton has on the platform. You're an enterprise podcast host, aren't you?
Sharon Taylor: Correct, Yes. So we look after most of the commercial broadcasters around the world that have gotten into podcasting as well as large podcasting networks. And then like the top tier of the independent shows as well that are looking to dynamically insert ads, programmatically monetize those types of things.
James Cridland: And so some of the work that you do on your hosting platform is essentially allowing those people to monetize their shows and to get those ads from third parties into those shows. Is there an awful lot of programmatic monetization in that way or is advertising sold typically by the people who are making the shows In your case?
Sharon Taylor: The lion's share of the impressions that we deliver through direct sold. So it's people that have either got their own sales arm or are using a third party and they're trafficking everything. And then our system water falls down so that people can backfill with programmatic. We do have some that are programmatic first like and it is very region specific and depending on which DSP is active in which territory and how mature a market is in terms of direct sales. But yes, a largely direct sold is always going to lead and will for a while at least.
James Cridland: I find it a fascinating world. And I think the world of all of the different ways that you can make money in terms of podcasting, whether it's ads, whether it's host reads, whether it's sponsorship, but also getting money from your audiences as well, which is a really interesting side. And certainly I've had some interesting success with both Apple's subscription and also with Buzz Sprouts Tools as well, which is interesting.
Sharon Taylor: We just integrated with the Apple subscription stuff. I think a lot of people are playing around with it. I don't know that anyone's really formulated a full strategy. It's a lot of work. The data is showing that people don't really care for just ad free feeds and a subscription model. So you have to be willing to invest a lot more time and energy into creating bonus content or like trying to window things or get creative in that way. I would like a world where you could still insert dynamic ads into Apple subscriptions personally. I think that there is a world where you could have a paid show that is unique enough, desirable enough by an audience that they're willing to pay a certain amount for it, and you could still have a sponsor in order to pay for that content creation.
James Cridland: I think cable TV comes with advertising as well. So I think that that's absolutely a thing. Well, it's been really good to learn a little bit more about Triton. And there's just one more thing that I have to do here. I have to make my final guess for two truths and a lie. I think I'm going to rather boringly stick with my original answer, which was that I'm not convinced that Omny Studio originally banked with Silicon Valley Bank. But you're going to tell me now that I'm wrong. So what was the correct lie then?
Sharon Taylor: So I have to admit that I am ashamed of this… the lie is… listen to the podcast to find out!
James Cridland: Thank you, Sharon, for joining us today. To our listeners, catch Sharon in the host's chair on the next episode. Remember to follow us on social media and subscribe to Podcast 360. Until next time, happy podcasting!
Follow James Cridland @podnewsnet and Sharon Taylor, SVP of Podcast Strategy and Product Operations at Triton Digital
Thank you for joining us on this episode of Podcast 360.
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