Spotify Acquires Chartable And Podsights As It Expands Podcast Audience

Audio streaming and media services provider, Spotify has on Wednesday announced the acquisition of two podcast tech platforms, Chartable and Podsights.

Spotify, one of the largest music streaming service providers with over 406 million monthly active users, having 180 million paying subscribers, as of December 2021 wrote in a statement that it would use the Podsights’ technology with a direct focus on the “full scope of the Spotify platform, including audio ads within music, video ads, and display ads.”

The acquisition of Chartable is primed to also weaponize Sportify with the podcast audience of the startup known for its authoritative podcast download charts. Since the technology of Chartable is similar to that of Smartlinks, Spotify beamed its focus on its podcasters crowd instead of its advertisers.

“These tools will make it easier for publishers to turn audience insights into action and expand their listenership while ultimately growing their businesses,” Spotify wrote.

Even though the final acquisition price hasn’t yet been made public, Spotify’s move marks as a first towards the first significant buy-out it has made this year, in a series of audio purchases.

According to The Verge, the two tech companies provides the suitable means for podcasters and networks to incorporate tags throughout their shows, “used to keep track of who listened to which podcast, if they heard an ad, and whether they took action upon hearing it”.

One of the talking point of these acquisitions is that the Swedish company is at the currently optimizing its ad platform to become the best in the market, while heightening its audio abilities and services. For Spotify to fulfill its mandate of having everyone buy its ads through its marketplace, its technology has to be improved to get accurate data of who is listening to placed ads and the action taken from their side after listening to the ad.

With the disparity between marketers and developers in securing good spending of their budget, the acquisition close the gap, while helping to both show creators and advertisers the accurate data and information needed.

Founded on 23 April 2006 by Daniel Ek and Martin Lorentzon, the Spotify platform pays royalties based on the number of artist streams as a proportion of total songs streamed, while also distributing approximately 70% of its total revenue to rights holders, most times  record labels, who in turn pay the artists based on individual agreements. The company has in the last couple of years initiated waves of podcast acquisitions, from advertising technologies, audiobooks, and top creative content, among others.

Recently, Spotify last year acquired Whooshkaa, Podz, Findaway, and Locker Room with the aim of extending the promotion of an extended list of audio content, coming before its acquisition of the prominent podcast ad platform, Megaphone.