Evergreen Podcasts acquires Rhapsody Voices

• Exclusive: Evergreen Podcasts has acquired Rhapsody Voices. The deal unites the teams, talent, and assets of both companies; Rhapsody Voices founder Mike Jensen becomes Chief Business Officer at Evergreen.

  • Our sister publication the Podcast Business Journal interviewed Mike Jensen in September 2023.

• The winners were announced for the Audio Production Awards in the UK.

• Podcasting is the fastest-growing ad format in Australia, according to data from IAB Australia. Podcast advertising for the quarter was up by 26.5% year-on-year at AU$31.4mn (US $20.5mn). Podcasts account for 40% of all online audio ad spend in the country (streaming gets 60%).

• Podbean has returned to the list of companies certified to the IAB Podcast Measurement Guidelines. The company is now certified to v2.2.

• BBC Sounds, the broadcaster’s proprietary radio, music and podcast app, has signed a licensing deal with Goalhanger to carry two of its podcasts. The shows will be ad-free, and time-delayed - The Rest is Football (“quality analysis and insight on all the latest stories from the world of football”) will be delayed by two days, while The Rest is History (“a vast range of historical topics”) will be delayed by eight weeks. The shows will continue to be available elsewhere.

  • Goalhanger will receive a fee from the BBC for its shows to be available in this way, which we understand is based on total listens within the BBC Sounds app. Goalhanger was one of the companies most fiercely opposed to the BBC’s podcast monetisation plans, which were designed to push audiences to the BBC Sounds app.

• Podpage now supports “podroll” lists. A podroll, supported by podcast hosts like Buzzsprout, Blubrry, RSS.com and Transistor, and by apps like Podcast Guru and Truefans, lets you recommend other shows to your listeners. Now, if it’s in your RSS feed, Podpage automatically creates a page for its pro users. Here’s the page for Ask The Podcast Coach. (Podnews podcast pages also support them).‌

• Spotify for Creators is discontinuing its US-only Listener Support program - which let listeners pledge a monthly recurring amount to support your show. “After a period of learnings, we are shutting down Listener Support on January 2, 2025 to prioritize programs and resources that are more impactful to creators.” Alternatives include our sponsor Memberful.

• “Podcast Growth Connect” tells us that a client has “been following your podcast and deeply admires the value and actionable insights you provide” and would like to be a guest. The company’s unfinished website uses a address in Sydney that doesn’t exist alongside a telephone number based elsewhere; the client apparently wants to be a guest on our New Podcast Trailers feed. “Those are not automated email, my team members researched them from the internet. Sometimes leads could be mismatched, it’s a general issue,” says Anisur Rahman Shuvo, the company’s founder, adding “Please keep your nose aside.”

• Further reading: “Adapt or Get Left Behind: The Future of Podcasting Is Multi-Platform”, says PAVE Studios’ Max Cutler. “The future of podcasting isn’t audio—it’s multi-platform shows that transcend formats, platforms, and audiences, with video as the driving force of this transformation.” … Do we need to kill the word “podcast?” - wonders Caloroga Shark Media’s John McDermott … Amanda Cupido has released Let’s Talk Podcasting: The Essential Guide to Doing it Right (that link helps support Podnews) - "Amanda has been there and done that - with a trail of #1 shows, she knows what’s what,” says our Editor.

The Tech Stuff - with RSS.com

• The Podcasting 2.0 “board meeting” this week discussed a significant change to the mechanism behind streaming payments in podcasts - the proposal is to optionally be able to link a podcast app to an existing service like Strike, a Bitcoin banking app, or to a Nostr wallet, for payment; and to use a new protocol, “lnaddress”, to receive money. The required changes to receive money will require updates to existing streaming payment apps, and to every podcast RSS feed that accepts streaming payments. Currently, payment details are hard-coded in the RSS feed and use “keysend”, a protocol only used by podcasting: the changes move payment details out of the feed into a file containing one or more payment destination addresses, and offers more interoperability with other payment platforms. Other benefits include easier onboarding for listeners - and leaving the system open to bank transfers or even credit card payments in future.

• The streaming payment piece is important to get right, painful though change can be. Suzanne Santo (Spotify | YouTubeMusic), had a song played on Boostagram Ball episode 26, and within five minutes of the show ending, said: “So far I’ve accumulated $7.77, which is more than I’ve received from Spotify after 28,000 plays.” Boostagram Ball currently gets under 1,000 plays a week.

• Joining Bluesky, like everyone else? Do your brand a favour and use your domain name as a nickname - easier to read out on your podcast and comes with full verification. Bluesky has a guide. We’re @podnews.net over there, by the way. Also find our section sponsors @rss.com over there too.

• One for anyone doing RSS feed parsing: fastfeedparser is “10x-100x faster than traditional feedparser”.

• Podnews podcast pages have restored links in show descriptions (with rel=“ugc”). That lets us link out to websites mentioned in show descriptions, without the links counting for spammers.

Tips and tricks - with Memberful

• podcastvideos.com, a podcast studio based in Rogers AR, USA, has published a show development guide - a step-by-step guide to define your plan, audience, format and approach. It’s a good overview, especially when it comes to naming shows.

Podcast News

Congratulations to Cameron Reilly and Mick Stanic, who released the first podcast (“blogcast”) from Australia 20 years ago this week. G’Day World episode 1 included a section called “the problems with the name ‘podcasting’” (how things have changed!) Cameron went on to run The Podcast Network, which had more than 100 shows by 2007. His current feed contains a chat with Ewan Spence, twenty years on, looking back at their history in the space.

Podtastic Audio covers 'The Dirty Secrets of Podcast Scams and How to Spot Them’ this week, from fake “listener boost” services to phony sponsorships and sketchy guest booking offers.

Channels with Peter Kafka interviews Chris Balfe of Red Seat Ventures, who “helps stars find audiences and make money via podcasts and YouTube”. Balfe notes that, unlike podcasts, 70% of viewers of his content on YouTube find it because of the algorithm - in Kafka’s words: “an algorithm that brought them there (today) is an algorithm that could not bring them there tomorrow”.

Stephen Bartlett’s Diary of a CEO has reached one billion views and listens. Bartlett said: “I owe the success of The Diary Of A CEO to the now 50-strong team behind the scenes—this is a result of their hard work and talent.”

The dicks are coming to a small town near you. True crime show Small Town Dicks has announced its first tour, taking in tiny places like Portland, Phoenix, Denver and Los Angeles in February. Fans of the show will get a rare glimpse into the detective’s experience during an interrogation and learn about the strategies detectives use to build rapport during these crucial conversations.

The Archery Parent Podcast launches today - the only Archery podcast hosted by an Archery mom. The show offers expert interviews, practical advice, and real-life stories to help parents navigate the unique (and relatively unknown) world of Archery, and to assist them with supporting Archers at every level, all around the world.

Unlike The Archery Podcast which launches today, The Archers is an every day story of country folk, and slightly confusingly doesn’t mention Archery at all. Broadcast since 1951, this twelve-minute daily show has over five million listeners in the UK. In the latest episode, Jakob finds himself on the spot, and some new arrivals cause chaos in Ambridge.