Spotify has been investing heavily in podcasts over the past couple of years, with quite a lot of high-profile exhibits now Spotify exclusives. It will appear the following step within the technique could possibly be to roll out a subscription bundle solely for podcast content material.
As noticed by Selection’s Andrew Wallenstein and shared on Twitter, Spotify has been pushing out surveys to a few of its customers asking how they’d really feel about paying additional for his or her podcasts – which for the time being are free to hearken to inside Spotify, with adverts hooked up.
Throughout plans starting from $2.99 to $7.99 a month (that is about £2-6 or AU$4-11), Spotify suggests unique originals, bonus content material, early entry to episodes and the elimination of adverts could possibly be a number of the causes for customers to pay additional.
That is certainly not affirmation {that a} podcast subscription bundle is on the way in which in fact, but it surely suggests Spotify is considering it – and the corporate is all the time going to be trying to squeeze more cash out of its userbase.
Planning for the longer term
For the time being, you may hearken to podcasts by means of the Spotify apps whether or not or not you have signed up for a Premium subscription. Spotify makes use of a wise advert system to embed focused promoting inside podcasts, tailor-made for the people who find themselves listening to it.
Whereas that choice is prone to keep in place, it could be that some listeners are completely happy to pay additional to eliminate these adverts and have an uninterrupted listening expertise. Primarily based on the survey. it seems to be as if another goodies can be thrown in too.
The fabric despatched out by Spotify means that the podcast subscription would stay separate to a music subscription, so the 2 would not be bundled collectively – however that could be one thing else that Spotify seems to be at additional down the road.
In a non-committal assertion to The Verge, Spotify stated that surveys might or might not level in the direction of future product plans, and that there was no information to share right now. It seems to be as if 2021 will probably be one other fascinating yr for streaming providers.
