July 18, 2024, 3:12 pm | Read time: 3 minutes
Good news for all podcasters on Spotify: A new smartphone app is now available, allowing them not only to keep an eye on the essentials but also to communicate with their audience.
Podcasts have become an integral part of music streaming services like Spotify. They offer an attractive option not only for the company itself but also for users and creators. The Swedish company now aims to meet this development by releasing a new version of its mobile “Spotify for Podcasters” app.
“Spotify for Podcasters” with Comment Feature
The highlight of the new version is undoubtedly the comment feature. This is intended to allow podcasters to communicate even better with their audience. Although creative minds have long had access to a survey function and the so-called Q&A feature, which lets them interact with their listeners.
However, the latter feature has a catch: Podcasters must first ask a question for users to respond. A significant portion of the Spotify community found this insufficient. Users repeatedly expressed the desire for a comment feature. Spotify is finally meeting this demand.
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According to Spotify, comments can be answered by the creator themselves or by other users–either with a message or a “like” in the form of a heart. In both cases, Spotify then sends a push notification to the respective sender.
But that’s not all the new Spotify app has to offer: Podcasters are immediately informed when they make it onto one of the Spotify charts or when their content reaches a new milestone. Also new: The mobile application is now available for all podcasts, regardless of the hosting provider. Previously, only creators who hosted their content on Spotify could use the app.
Users Increasingly Utilize Communication Options
Spotify offering podcast creators another way to interact with their audience is not entirely selfless. The Swedish company is also interested in ensuring that the minds behind the audio content strengthen their community ties. After all, the more and longer users listen to podcasts on Spotify, the higher the revenue for the Swedish company.
Spotify’s published figures show that such features are an effective means: This year alone, more than 9 million Spotify users have participated in a Q&A session or survey by podcasters–and the total number of Q&A responses and votes has grown by 80 percent year-over-year.
How the feature performs in everyday use remains to be seen–especially in dealing with offensive comments.