Report: YouTube is Working on Podcasts Pages and New Creator Tools

YouTube could have big plans for podcasts creators this year, including the launch of a dedicated podcast homepage on the platform. The company could give podcast creators a more established presence on YouTube with dedicated pages for their shows and new podcasts cards in search results.

The information comes from Podnews, which obtained an 84-page internal presentation detailing YouTube’s new podcasts strategy. YouTube plans to have a new podcasts homepage at youtube.com/podcasts, an URL that doesn’t work yet, and the video platform also plans to improve the way it brings podcast episodes to YouTube by leveraging RSS feeds.

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YouTube is also a major advertising platform for Google, and the company plans to offer audio ads sold by Google and other partners. Another page of the document also mentions the launch of new metrics for podcast creators, as well as the ability to integrate YouTube podcast data into industry-standard measurement platforms.

According to a previous report, YouTube has been trying to attract podcasters by offering them up to $300K “grants” to launch a video version of their podcast on YouTube. Last year, the company also appointed Kai Chuck, a 10 years YouTube veteran as its new podcasting lead.

If YouTube has been hosting podcasts for many years, the company has been lagging behind Apple and Spotify, which have both made bold moves to become the top podcast platform. Spotify has acquired several startups in the podcast industry and has been investing in exclusive shows, while Apple has launched new monetization options with paid podcast subscriptions.

Google already has a dedicated Podcasts app on the web and mobile devices, which has remained pretty barebones compared to the competition. Despite its video-centric nature, it really makes sense for YouTube to become Google’s main platform for podcasts, as it’s already the home of many content creators on the Internet.

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Conversation 2 comments

  • dftf

    31 March, 2022 - 11:00 am

    <p>I can’t see this working under the current limitations of YouTube — free users cannot listen to the app in the background; you have to pay for that feature. Given one of the entire points of podcasts is that they are audio-only, and so you can just listen to them while you do other things, then will they perhaps permit this for podcasts specifically? If not, I can’t see the point in having to keep the YouTube app open for audio-only… at that point, I might as well get video too!</p><p><br></p><p>(Oh and without paying you also cannot download content to watch offline, which is again something many people do with podcasts. Though you <em>can </em>actually get this for free by manually installing the <em>YouTube Go </em>version of the app, where this feature is included as-standard.)</p>

    • Chris_Kez

      Premium Member
      31 March, 2022 - 11:30 am

      <p>Excellent points! Thank you.</p>

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