- The IMOP Insights Institute presents a study on audience behaviour in relation to a booming format for which almost 2% of internet users already pay.
- The Internet is adding listeners and minutes to radio, and podcast listening is starting with profiles close to the “culture and habit of radio consumption”.
- The world is changing and radio must adapt to the changes in technology, formats and themes demanded by the audience, especially the younger segments.
- Respondents point to comedy podcasts and dynamic formats, which include conversations or interviews, as their favourites.
- Top managers of commercial radio stations in Spain discussed the active role that radio is playing in the evolution of digital listening.
There is a lot of talk about podcasting today and the idea that podcasts are booming dominates, but there is a lack of rigorous data on the podcast world. Even among experts, there is no unambiguous definition. It is undoubtedly an emerging phenomenon that this study aims to delimit, to explain the keys that help to understand the world of sound and the singularities of its formats. In the words of Ramón Osorio, General Director of AtresMedia Radio: “Now we base our work on research, not on gurus, and podcasting is difficult to define. With this study we are beginning to define it better”.
Up to 21% of Internet users in Spain already subscribe to a podcast and, of all Internet users, almost 2% have taken the step of paying for audio content. This is revealed in the study ` Podcast and radio: opportunity or threat? A look at audience behaviour ´, presented by IMOP Insights, an institute specialising in advertising, media and public opinion research. It is a survey based on 3,448 interviews with Internet users aged 14 and over living on the Spanish mainland, the Balearic and Canary Islands, which offers some of the keys to this new way of accessing information, training or entertainment content.
The study has also analysed whether podcasts pose a threat to traditional live radio or, on the contrary, are an ally, and has shown that live audio continues to lead the way with authority. However, as the authors quote: “radio cannot be oblivious to the new demands of the audience: I consume what I want, when, how and from where I want”.
Radio stations – clearly precursors of this format – are a very important source of podcast generation, but today, creating content in this format is within the reach of anyone: “Not only is creation easy, but so is access, thanks to the existence of platforms, free or paid, that host podcasts whatever their origin”. Julián Velasco, former CEO of COPE, faces the transition to a digital world with enthusiasm: “The smartphone is the transistor of the 21st century (…) radio is still alive and contributing to the new scenario”
According to the study `’Podcast and radio: opportunity or threat? A look at audience behaviour ´, the trend is towards complementarity of listening modes, not “exclusive” listening. In this way, the Internet adds listeners and minutes to radio, and podcast listening starts with profiles close to the “radio culture”.
In this sense, Javier Visiers, General Director of COPE said during the presentation of the study: ” Radio is the gateway to digital listening. Sometimes we think that it is a medium that lags behind, but the studies say it is not “.
In the same vein Ignacio Soto, General Manager of SER, said: “The study confirms what we already thought at Prisa Radio about how the medium is developing, it confirms that the Internet is adding to radio” and added: “Digitalisation has allowed us to better target, for example: to create sound niches”.
The IMOP Insights has determined that a space is clearly opening up for niche audiences, which must necessarily complement the broad coverage and content of traditional radio, which in turn must transform itself and work on products for young people. “ The voice is in fashion, there are opportunities to rejuvenate the medium, as has always been done”, said Visiers.
With regard to the motivation for following a podcast, women and older listeners listen more to podcasts for information, learning or in-depth information, while men and younger age groups listen more for entertainment. In addition, humour is the preferred subject matter and dynamic formats, with conversations, interviews or talks, are the favourites over documentaries, monologues, lectures or fiction. This trend explains the need to adapt their communication code: lightness, easy follow-up, conversation mode in the face of the loss of immediacy of live broadcasting.
Isabel Peleteiro, director of IMOP Insights closed the event: “ It is a pleasure to see that that the world is moving, that radio is moving with it and that there is the intention to continue changing it”
The event took place at Impact Hub in Calle Piamonte, one of its six co-working spaces in Madrid, certified with the CeroCO2 seal.
