The IAB released a new report showing that U.S. digital advertising revenue in the first six months of 2018 totaled $49.5 billion. The record high is a spike of 23% over the year-ago period. Digital audio advertising revenue for the half reached $935 million. This puts the segment on track to exceed the 2017 annual total of $1.8 billion in revenue. Continue Reading
Podtrac published its ranker of the top twenty podcasts in October 2018. Serial topped the chart for another month on the strength of a newly-released third season for the true crime program. Continue Reading
Podtrac released its podcast publisher ranking for October 2018. The chart reflected some recent developments in the podcast space, with iHeartRadio moving up to the second spot following its acquisition of HowStuffWorks. Continue Reading
Canalys has released its third-quarter market research on the global smart speaker industry. Worldwide shipments increased 137% on-year for a total of 19.7 million units. After a strong Q2 for Google, Amazon has regained its lead in the latest period, likely thanks to its big sales push on Prime Day. Continue Reading
Voice assistants and smart devices are one of the hottest topics for the audio industry, and a new report from Voicebot.ai, PullString, and the RAIN Agency traces the trend’s progress. According to the report, voice assistants have moved out of their first phase, marked by availability across platforms and languages and access to core features. It suggested that the second phase of voice will be marked by more nuanced features, use in more contexts, and availability on more connected devices. Continue Reading
CISAC, the International Confederation of Societies of Authors and Composers, has released its annual report. The organization saw a 6% uptick in global music royalties to reach €8.34 billion in 2017. Digital music collections grew 23.1% to surpass €1 billion. Continue Reading
YouTube paid more than $1.8 billion in ad revenue to rightsholders in the music industry from October 2017 to September 2018. According to the How Google Fights Piracy report, that figure brings YouTube’s total music industry payments to more than $6 billion in ad revenues. Continue Reading
The Consumer Technology Association conducted a survey of Canadians’ technology ownership. While products such as televisions, smartphones, and laptops demonstrated near-ubiquity, smart speakers did show promising signs in the market. Continue Reading
Anchor has released data about how and where people are tuning in to podcasts created on its platform. Following several pivots, Anchor is now a service for free and fast podcast recording and distribution. Continue Reading
Spotify remained the leading webcast streamer in July, according to the just-released report from Triton Digital’s Webcast Metrics Ranker, a comparison of stream listening volume among Triton’s top 20 clients. Continue Reading
In the recently released Q3 report from RAJAR (Radio Joint Audience Research), UK listeners are becoming more digital, while overall radio reach remains high. Continue Reading
Market research firm Strategy Analytics has another snapshot of the smart speaker market. The company released a ranking of the top smart speaker models in the United States from a poll of more than 1,000 people during July and August. The results for Amazon look positively rosy, full of potential for Google, and not-too-bright for Apple. Continue Reading