In a bid to enable creators and to cater to Indians’ growing appetite for podcast content, audio entertainment streaming service JioSaavn launched a new service on Monday – JioSaavn YourCast. The latest offering allows podcasters to upload their shows onto the platform, with the potential to reach JioSaavn’s base of more than 100 million engaged users across the globe.
JioSaavn YourCast helps create an integrated, end-to-end support ecosystem that empowers independent podcasters with tools to get their stories listened to. The new platform also streamlines the content curation process for podcasters, as they can now simply submit basic details and links to their RSS feeds through an online portal. These details will be verified by JioSaavn’s in-house content team for authenticity and quality, after which approved shows will go live thereafter.
Speaking on the launch, Ishani Dasgupta - Lead, Podcast Partnerships at JioSaavn said, “At JioSaavn, our mission is not only to make podcasting a daily habit among more people by delivering the most diverse entertainment options to our vast and growing user base, but also to help content creators and Podcasters maximise their reach, visibility, and engagement of their podcasts. The launch of JioSaavn YourCast fulfils both these objectives. Through this unique offering, Creators will now be able to make their content available to a large and diverse audience base through the click of a button, Platform users will have a large array of culturally relevant podcasts spanning topics & genres that cater to every interest.”
The development further emphasises JioSaavn’s strong focus on the growing podcast market in the country. A recent PwC report has pegged India as the third-largest market for portable on-demand audio experiences and estimates that it will be home to more than 17.6 crore podcast listeners by 2023.
As per the streaming trends on the JioSaavn platform, categories such as Music, Film & TV, Stories & Culture, Crime, Chat Shows, Sports & Recreation, and News & Politics are popular with India’s millennial and Gen Z population, which is quickly becoming the largest consumer group. While the audience for podcasts is the highest in metros such as Mumbai, Delhi, and Pune, a significant number of listeners also hail from tier-2 cities such as Patna, Lucknow, and Bhopal.
Since 2016, the company says that the platform has registered a 10x increase in its podcasting catalogue and created over 200 hours of original content across a variety of culturally-relevant categories – numbers that can be expected to grow even further with the launch of JioSaavn YourCast.