We’re back with Friday Five after our Thanksgiving break! This week, we’re diving into Spotify’s big push to incentivize video podcast creators, Apple’s shift to selling ads directly, young readers’ growing engagement with news, top paywall platforms, and the publishing industry’s impressive sales growth this year, powered by strong performances in book sales.
Spotify will start paying video podcast hosts based on how well their videos perform
Spotify will soon begin to offer video podcast creators more performance-based compensation, as a way to challenge YouTube's current dominance in the video podcasting arena. Although creators are already able to monetize podcasts on the platform, this is a new incentive for them to add a video alongside podcasts. To further boost the views of these videos, premium subscribers in several markets will be able to access ad-free video podcast viewing. As Spotify begins to roll out more video content, they also plan to add more video features, including chapters, comments, pinch-to-zoom, thumbnail scrubbing, and more. Read more on TechCrunch.
Apple is selling Apple News ads directly for the first time
As a new way to offset their hardware sales slowdown, Apple has begun directly selling advertising space within its Apple News app, a shift from previous reliance on third-party vendors. Under this new model, publishers will receive 70% of the ad revenue from ads sold by Apple within their articles, while retaining 100% of revenue from ads they sell directly. With this move, Apple hopes to increase revenue for both Apple and Apple publishing partners. Read more on Axios.
Young UK adults read average of six news stories per day, research finds
A recent study by Newsworks reveals that young people open an average of six news stories each day. The study, which tracked the online habits of young individuals in the UK (aged 15 to 29), contrasts with earlier research indicating that only 25% of 18 to 24-year-olds reported visiting news sites on a weekly basis. Even more tellingly, the study found that news websites receive more engagement than entertainment or music platforms, such as YouTube and Spotify. This discrepancy suggests that young adults interact with news content more frequently than they self-report. Newsworks CEO Jo Allan says that this is encouraging, noting that: “In an era of fake news, young readers place huge respect, value and trust in journalism. News brand environments are highly valuable in the hearts of young people, and for an advertiser’s bottom line.” Read more on PressGazette.
Navigating Paywalls: 2025's Best Solutions for Publishing Success
Addressing the significant challenges publishers face in monetizing digital content, this post reviews and rates five paywall platforms as potential solutions. It emphasizes that over-reliance on advertising can degrade content quality, often resulting in "low quality clickbait content." Instead, the post advocates for well-implemented paywalls as a means to generate consistent revenue while preserving reader trust. In short, “The right paywall solution helps publishers to easily gatekeep their valuable content and keeps the revenue ball rolling.” Read more on SoluteLabs.
Publishing Industry Sales Rose 7% Through September
The publishing industry has had a great year so far, with book sales rising 7% from January to September 2024. Key drivers included strong performances in religious books (up 18.4%) and adult fiction (up 13%), bolstered by a 32.3% surge in digital adult fiction audiobook sales. Hardcover books and digital audiobooks were big winners, though children's and young adult nonfiction declined by 4.3%, and eBook sales slipped by 3.7%. Higher education course materials also saw an estimated 5.3% sales increase, while university presses reported a 4.4% boost. All in all, it's been a promising year for books, with audio and print formats leading the way. Read more on Publishers Weekly.