Spotify is showing some podcast love by introducing a Spotify for Podcasters beta program. Through the platform, podcast creators can add their existing shows to the music streaming service and make them available to Spotify’s 180 million listeners around the world.
Once joining the beta, podcasters will see their current and future shows automatically linked on Spotify once they are uploaded through their host or aggregator. From there, hosts can view daily stats which include listening demographics, location, engagement, and more.
Since 2015, Spotify has offered podcasts. However, this is the first time the service has opened it up to everyone. As part of the beta, Spotify isn’t offering to host podcasts. Instead, users will see a link to the podcast feed.
According to Statista, Apple’s iTunes dominates the podcasts market with a 50 percent share in the United States. Spotify follows with 36 percent. Apple announced in June there are 550,000 podcasts on iTunes.
For podcasters, Spotify’s move is an important one that could make individual podcasts much more popular. Time will tell whether the move with allow Spotify to overtake Apple in the market.
If you’re a podcaster, we’d like to hear from you? Are you happy by Spotify’s move? Let us know in the comments below.