Podcast listeners have made their voices heard: they want shows to jump right into content and avoid the pleasantries that often accompany the start of a new episode.
According to data from a new study between Strategic Solutions Research and Point-to-Point Marketing, 33% of listeners want hosts to “dive into the main topic right away”, while an additional 42% say some chit-chat to begin an episode is ok, but they’d like hosts to “keep it short.”
Combined, that means 75% of those respondents say they’d like hosts to begin the content of a given episode earlier. Only 22% said they “love the banter between hosts” at the beginning of a new show.
“Three out of four listeners want the podcast hosts to either dive right into the main topic or at least keep the chit-chat short,” says Strategic Solutions partner Hal Rood. “A fast start is critical for podcasters and broadcasters alike. A quick way to grow, along with marketing, is simply raising the bar on your product execution.”
“One in three listeners stop early at least half the time,” added Point-to-Point Marketing CEO Tim Bronsil. “They cite reasons such as repetition, lack of structure, or episodes running too long. Eight out of ten consumers say they want podcasts to be an hour or less, and half want them to be under an hour.”
The recently released data is part of a larger study between the two companies called The Podcast Study. It is based on 1,200 podcast listeners who listen at least monthly. However, roughly 90% of the respondents labeled themselves as either weekly or daily podcast consumers.
The first webinar releasing data from The Podcast Study is scheduled for Thursday, September 11th at 2 PM ET. You can register for the free-of-charge presentation here.
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