Wondery's narrative podcast studio will merge with Audible, with Chief Content Officer Marshal Lewy joining the new team. Creator-led shows will be rebranded under Creator Services. This change arises from the evolution in the podcast landscape, as video podcasting demands different strategies for audience engagement and monetization compared to traditional audio formats. Amazon's podcast acquisitions have not performed well, with ART19 holding less than a 1% share of total episodes published. Despite significant investments, Amazon Music's podcast downloads remain low at 1.6% of the US market.
As video podcasting has grown in popularity, we have learned that creator-led, video-integrated shows have different audience needs and require distinct discovery, growth and monetization strategies compared to audio-first, narrative series.
Amazon's decision should be read alongside the performance of its other podcast acquisitions. Amazon bought podcast hosting company ART19 in June 2021, which has never achieved more than a 1% share of total episodes published.
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