Podcasting Lacks PR, But It's Audience Remains Strong

Ask someone if they listen to a podcast; and there’s absolutely no way to predict their answers. Somebody could be an avid fan or not at all. Somebody would know of one from their memory – there’s really no in between. What’s fascinating is to come across a marketeer and find out how little value podcasting is to them. Don’t trust me, trust these statistics: YouTube lately released podcast tools to all. YouTube worth $160billion approximately launching podcasting as a tool, Yes they have done their market research just fine. As per Statista, revenue in the Music, Radio & Podcast segment is projected to reach US$1,740.00m in 2023.

Podcasting; the underdog of the communications industry

Now, as a nation that’s widely exposed to radio since donkey years, the concept is not a whole lot new. It’s just re-packaged and ‘podcast’ as a term still sounds foreign to some. It is surprising because as per Podcasting, India is ranked the third in podcasting industry after USA and China. Approximately 150 million Indians will consume audio streaming, highlighting a huge opportunity of growth for podcasts currently, it states. The trend and affinity to podcasts emerged hugely during the pandemic, people found it easy to put it on and run around doing chores. So yes, the market is there and so are podcasters who are thriving but what it lacks is media attention. Media planners and buyers still don't consume podcasts enough and so the affinity to the medium is quite low, consequently leading to a slow uptake of podcasts in the media mix. Simply put, their understanding is quite nascent, they still don't know where to listen to a podcast.

Why does a podcast work as a great medium for brands? The reasons are plenty!

1. Podcast consumers and listeners offer a niche category for podcast creators. They find an audience in people who are well aware of what they’re seeking
2. They provide for ultimate brand integration because it reaches a targeted group of audience. The marketeers know exactly who they are reaching out to, which makes podcasts the ultimate source for branding
3. As stated in an article by Spiceworks, ‘A recent study from BBC, Audio: Activate, revealed that brand mentions within a podcast deliver a 16% higher engagement rate than the surrounding content — which is unique when comparing brand mentions in radio, which typically scores 5% lower than surrounding content.’
4. Podcasts allow empathetic communications; it allows the brands to personalize the communications and after COVID this has become a huge 'focus' area for brands. As brand custodians, we need to a) imbibe empathy at the core of communications b) advise and educate the clients on why it will be profitable for them 

A lot of the resistance towards accepting podcasting as an important tool also stems from our cultural response to accepting something new. Generally, Indians want risk-proof & guaranteed victorious investments. If it is in trend, it’s bound to work. But taking the risk as a first mover in the market, the resistance still persists. That doesn’t take away from some clients/brands who are experimental and not conservative.

Another challenge that is often brought to light is the reducing attention span in people. It is the era of visuals and ‘reels,’ but also, quality content. IF there’s one thing we have learnt today is not even Bollywood can do away with bad content these days, not even with a humongous star power. The focus has to be exploring good content and focusing on the genres that will actually remain heavy on podcasting – majorly those that cover the 'how’s and why’s.’ Some such are Health & Fitness, Lifestyle, Luxury, Products, Financial Safety, Planning & Investments, Life, Motivational & Spiritual content integrated with stellar storytelling.

Podcasting Penetrating Regions

As reported by IAMAI and Kantar, about 351 million of India’s 692 million active internet users are in rural parts of the country and as per the report, ‘Internet in India’, there will be 900 million internet users by 2025 led by rural growth in India. With a penetration like this and easy availability to internet, this doesn’t come as a surprise that it is helping the medium reach regional markets at a rapid rate.

Podcasts were earlier considered to be premium, something that only elite would consume but that is a huge misconception. Many popular podcasters have shared that currently, there are more shows in regional languages other than Hindi and English and that they enjoy an audience in Tamil, Bengali & a Punjabi consumers amongst other languages. Even if we check the figures at Spotify India, one of the top audio streaming platforms has content being created in 13 different languages. Further, the audience is slowly becoming habitual to the long-form content.

Who would have thought?

We must be living under a rock to not realize the power of regional influencers. In fact, top brands are now investing in regional influencers to tap the non-urban markets. There is undisputable surge of regional communicators who reach the remote audiences and have the power to help brands take over newer, more loyal consumers.

Going by the words of Agith George Kuruvilla, Co-Founder & CBO at Ideabrew Studios, "Podcasts will be a bigger game-changer when actually the influencers will take to Podcast as a medium."

Fortunately, podcasting is spreading massively in the regional markets, as we’ve discussed above. And thankfully for us, regional influencers are the real MVP. So, it’s time we put 2 & 2 together, eat our own dog food as marketeers and unbound the great potential of podcasting – at the scale it deserves to be nationally.