Welcome to Hot Pod, a newsletter about podcasts. This is issue 252, dated March 31, 2020.
Pandemic watch. Let’s kick off with some data — specifically data on how the coronavirus pandemic and all the changes it has prompted to people’s lives has impacted podcast listening.
Podtrac published their latest report on listening trends amid the coronavirus crisis last night (it draws on data up until Sunday). The dip in listenership continues.
Some top-lines:
- U.S. podcast downloads — for shows measured by Podtrac — dropped 4 percent in the week ending March 29. That follows a 2 percent drop the week before (ending March 22), and a 1 percent drop the week before that (ending March 15).
- It’s a slightly different picture for U.S. unique listeners: That measure declined 5 percent in the week ending on March 29, after 8 percent the week before and 2 percent the week before that.
The post also contains genre-specific findings. Some really noteworthy things in there:
- It…
