Podcasts grow in popularity as media landscape evolves

Kelanie Robertson

Contributing Writer

Podcasts have become a craze over the last decade. While music has a tight hold as humans’ preferred listening, podcasts have quickly become a favorite audio alternative.

“While terrestrial radio reaches a large portion of the U.S. population, online audio and podcasting audiences have grown over the last decade,” said a recent study from Pew Research Center. “And revenue for news radio stations dropped over the past year after years of relative stability.”

Millions of individuals are shifting to podcasts for their entertainment and informational needs, so what does this mean for the rest of the broadcasting community?

David Nelson is a mass communication professor at UCO, teaching classes surrounding media, radio and audio production. Along with teaching, Nelson’s latest project has been hosting the podcast ‘The 33: Methamphetamine: A

Podcasting is benefitting from changing listening tastes. (AP/PROVIDED)

Love Story’ with Dr. Rashi Shukla. The podcast follows the lives of 33 people whose lives were impacted by meth addiction.

Nelson said that he does not necessarily see podcasts as a threat to other forms of broadcasting such as radio, but just as another outlet for people to use.

“In my opinion, both of them — music and podcasting — serve different purposes. I see music as something that our bodies and brains like as far as the rhythmic portion of it and the lyrics, and they are generally pretty short and pleasurable experiences,” Nelson said. “There is evidence that music has been part of human kind for thousands and thousands of years because of how music conveys culture, and biologically our bodies like it. Where I see podcasts, depending on why you’re listening to podcasts, is more knowledge-based.”

The overall number of listeners who still listen to the radio has been dropping since platforms like Spotify and Apple Music became available in 2011 and 2015, respectively. With podcasts becoming available on these platforms, radio and even TV news has seen even more of a drop in their usual listening/viewing numbers. The Pew Research Center reports that average radio revenue dropped by 24% in 2020.

Station revenue for stations in the all-news format dropped from $18.1 million in 2019 to $13.9 million in 2020.