On Saturday 15th February, the day after Valentine’s Day, we got told some truly heartbreaking news in that, entertainment presenter, Caroline Flack, had taken her own life. However, the morning started very differently with the Duchess of Cambridge, Kate Middleton, across the front of most UK newspapers with the news she’s featured in the ‘Happy Mum, Happy Baby’ podcast. This is a pretty big deal, not only for the podcaster who managed to get her as a guest but for podcasting alike.
Let me take you back to 22nd June 2015. Barrack Obama was President of the United States. He agreed to be featured on the WTF podcast hosted by Marc Maron. Obama went to Maron’s garage, which had to be modified for his visit. It was an interview which was unlike most other interviews as Obama just sounded like a regular guy, very personable, approachable and very open interview sharing his views.
So why was this such a big deal? Well, firstly it showed how podcasts can be very intimate, enlightening and educational. But, secondly, it re-launched podcasts to much wider audiences.
Podcasting was originally a format in the mid-’90s called audio blogs. Basically, people recording their thoughts and placing them on blogs. Then a Guardian journalist in 2004 called it a “Podcast” and at the height of the popularity of the iPod Apple then named a section in iTunes after the term. It was a very confusing space at first as it was a mixture of audio and videos. There were some well-produced but then a lot of hobbyists making them in bedrooms. Radio stations even got in on the act and removed music from shows for rights reasons and flooded iTunes. People soon moved onto other platforms like YouTube and podcasting plateaued in the background. After Obama featured on WTF in mid-2015, podcast platform host, Libsyn, reported that this episode got 750,000 listens within the first 24 hours. Since it’s received millions. The biggest thing was it bought people who didn’t necessarily know what a podcast was to listen to a podcast. Then once there, have a look around and see what other podcasts there were to enjoy.
Fast forward to 2020, there are as many as 900,000 active podcasts in the biggest podcast provider — Apple Podcasts — and crazy stats about high engagement rates etc. There have been podcasts turned into successful tv shows and other big names creating podcasts as they see it as a great way to connect and tell stories. Edison Research in a survey in the last year pointed to the fact how 51% of American’s either knew what a podcast was or had listened to one themselves. This had grown year upon year by over 6%. In the UK radio market, we’re interestingly seeing BBC Radio One and Capital FM breakfast shows audiences growing but the rest of the schedules dropping. Is that to listen to podcasts?
I went to a podcast conference towards the end of 2019 and the big question which caused a lot of debate was “is a podcast now considered a mainstream platform?” I think the common agreement amongst everyone was “no, not yet, but not long until it could be considered so”. I’m now thinking that for the Royal media department to agree for Kate to appear on a podcast, rather than elsewhere, they are now seeing podcasts as a route forwards.
One thing for sure, it’s going to be interesting to see if any listening numbers will be shared in the coming day, weeks and months. Then this time next year, we can then see if the answer to whether podcasts are a mainstream platform has changed!?
Here are some useful links…
Here is the Duchess of Cambridge on Happy Mum, Happy Baby
http://aca.st/045608Here is Barrack Obama on WTF Podcast http://www.wtfpod.com/podcast/episodes/episode_613_-_president_barack_obama
Here is Marc Maron sharing his thoughts once the President had left. Best wear headphones as it features some bad language.
http://www.wtfpod.com/podcast/episodes/episode_614_-_the_president_was_here
Be great to hear your thoughts on whether you consider a podcast to be mainstream.
