Can Apple Make Premium Podcasts Happen?
Natalie Korach
While my head first went to "oh good, yet another premium subscription offering...", this may be sort of interesting:
SiriusXM is launching a premium podcast subscription offering through Apple Podcasts, as the audio company seeks to diversify revenue and grow their content listener base.
Starting on August 5, the subscription offering called SiriusXM Podcasts+ will be available for $5.99 per month or $44.99 annually directly within Apple Podcasts.
I had almost forgotten that Apple Podcast had a premium layer, because it's different than their other premium layers like Apple News+,1 you don't pay to upgrade the app to a tier, you pay for a certain package of content you'd like. It's a-la-carte. And that includes if other entities, like SiriusXM, offer their podcasts as a bundle through it:
Subscribers will be able to enjoy SiriusXM podcast offerings with ad-free listening, exclusive bonus content, and early access to new episodes. At launch, the offering will include a select number of the platform’s most popular podcasts, with plans to expand further this year.
The subscription will immediately include access to “SmartLess,” and select shows from the SmartLess Media slate; the entire Freakonomics Radio Network; “Last Podcast on the Left” and select shows from the Last Podcast network; as well as “99% Invisible,” “The Joel Osteen Podcast,” “Busted Open,” “The Bonfire with Big Jay Oakerson and Robert Kelly,” “Literally! with Rob Lowe,” and “Andy Cohen’s Daddy Diaries Podcast.”
It's perhaps not a bad idea to leverage Apple rails and reach for this. Then again, I'm not sure I know anyone who subscribes to premium podcasts through Apple's Podcast app.2 Maybe something like SmartLess will entice them, like Howard Stern back in the early days of Sirius. But it's obviously a different market and different model even. Whereas when Stern went to Sirius, it was 100% behind their paywall, even "premium" podcasts tend to still distribute their shows elsewhere (with ads). The few "pure play" premium podcasts haven't taken off in the same way – though none are Howard Stern either, of course.2
The closest analog there, for better, but mostly for worse, is probably Joe Rogan. He has his mega deal with Spotify, but after trying the exclusive route, it's now back to being fully distributed – including even back on YouTube, which they had previously pulled to try to build up Spotify's video offering a few years back. It's all about ad sales for Spotify, it seems. Again, a very different model than what we're talking about above.
Per the report, it also sounds like SiriusXM will expand this premium bundle to other services as well – so, beyond Apple Podcasts. That's interesting too. You can have a premium layer, but use it in the service of your choosing (assuming the service supports such premium layers and payments). This is perhaps more analogous to Amazon Prime Video's "channels" (which many others are doing now as well, including Apple). Will it work? Who knows. But it's a bit more compelling that just another service to subscribe to, I think.
One more thing: what if Apple were to take all of these premium offerings – SiriusXM, MSNBC, etc – and let you subscribe to them all via 'Apple Podcasts+'? Depending on what's included, that could work – though they'd have to work through the bundle economics, of course. Perhaps even more so if it's a part of the larger 'Apple One' bundle, which is how myself and many others subscribe to News+, for example.
1 And presumably soon, Apple TV+, which sure seems like it's going to add an ad tier, undoubtedly at a lower price point, at some point...
2 An app which remains kind of a mess -- and a full-on shitshow if you try to use it, say, on a Mac -- despite Apple helping to create the format. One wonders if it isn't baked into Apple Music one day to combat Spotify. I hope not, but I could see it given the little love it seems to get as a stand-alone app and if more of these premium offerings pop up...
3 Several years ago I wondered if Apple wouldn't try to sign Howard Stern when his SiriusXM deal was up for renewal. Less for this and more for a then-nascent Apple Music subscription service. He ended up re-signing with SiriusXM, of course...