by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
I’m beginning to believe that Spotify was very smart to invest big in podcasts. It seems to me that we’re just about to go to the next level with podcasts. There is just too much slack, too many unfilled niches in the podcast industry for this not to be the case.
Let me explain.
Usually, any industry is going to consolidate into three or four major players. Or, something happens to make the whole issue moot. So, with blogs about 20 years ago, you had an explosion of really cool blogs that filled a number of niches.
And then social media came and, lulz, nothing matters anymore.
I mean, it’s a real, real struggle for me to get outside of my passive comfort zone and read any blog. I get all my information from Twitter. So, in a sense, at least for me, Twitter is the center of my online experience.
But there are two online spaces that draw my attention away from Twitter — Tik-Tok and Spotify. Tik-Tok because it’s strangely addictive and my be reading my mind (ha!) and Spotify because I love music….and I keep finding new and interesting podcasts to listen to.
In fact, if I had the right personality, I probably could start a very successful podcast. But, alas, I have no friends, no one likes me and I have no money to bribe people to pretend to like me enough to talk to me on a podcast on a regular basis.
But the point remains — there is huge growth potential for podcasts. In fact, it could be that, in the end, podcasts may just grow and grow until the metaverse finally arrives. Remember, all the other options are mature. YouTube is mature. Social media is mature. Blogs are mature. The only industry with any momentum and room to grow is podcasting.
And, really, all you need is a basic amount of infrastructure, talent, vision and access to Spotify. If you did a good enough job with the other elements, you could — potentially — grow organically.
Anyway, there is a window of opportunity, maybe two years, that if you came up with a great podcast idea that you could probably re-create the cool of Gawker Media back in the day.
Good luck.
