What Do People Listen To On Their Smartphones?

Edison Research recently completed a study on smartphone usage and discovered that the listening habits of users isn't quite what we believed it to be. in fact, the results were pretty surprising.

• 54% listened to a radio channel
• 16% listened to music they own
• 15% listened to Pandora or other radio-like streaming services
• 7% listen to Sirius XM
• 5% to TV music channels
• 2% listen to podcasting

Heavy listeners (those defined by listening to 2 hours or more per day) have a slightly different consumption pattern.

• 43% listen to music they've downloaded and own
• 37% listen to streaming audio
• 9% listen to AM/FM radio
• 7% listen to podcasts

Finally, 87% of adults from 18 to 34 never let their smartphones leave their sides.

All that said, we're under the impression that the listening world belongs to exclusively to streaming, but that's far from the case, according to the study. While radio listening and downloads may be dropping, they're still a vital portion of our listening day.

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Getting Paid For Soundcloud Plays

Soundcloud has made the ultimate move of monetizing the platform by deciding to introduce advertising on the platform for the first time, it was announced recently. The good part about this is it gives artists a chance to actually get paid for their streams just like on YouTube.

Until now, the company derived its revenue primarily from Pro accounts, but as of August 21st the company introduced a new strategy designed to give users new tools for uploading and tracking engagement, growing Soundcloud's audience, and introducing adverts into the platform.

Soundcloud will implement a new partner program called On Soundcloud that provides a brand new Premier tier, which is invite only at the moment and includes advertising from 5 different components - native (not sure what that one is yet), audio, display, channel sponsorship and contests. The first five sponsors are Red Bull, Jaguar, Sonos, Squarespace and Comedy Central.

What's interesting is that Soundcloud doesn't have signed deals with the major labels in place yet, but has decided to launch anyway. That said, the company is said to be in talks about the agreement, and expects to have something in place by the time it rolls out its new subscription service. For the moment, the program is only available in the US.

Bottom line - Soundcloud is trying to become an audio-only YouTube, and having a revenue model in place in order to pay artists for their participation goes a long way to that end.

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The Implications Of iTunes Radio That Everyone's Missed

At long last Apple has launched iTunes Radio and so far the reviews are pretty positive. It’s extremely easy to use and provides enough features that many potential users will not even think about venturing outside the iTunes ecosystem for another service. in fact, a study in June by the GroupM Next determined that 34% of Internet radio users would switch from their current service on Apple’s brand name alone.

Do you think services like Pandora, Spotify, iHeart Radio and Slacker are worried? They should be, as a closer look at the study found that 46.4% of Pandora users, 47% of Spotify users, 46.1% of iHeart Radio users and 53.8% of Slacker users would leave their services for iTunes Radio when it became available.

But lets say that this study is seriously flawed and the attrition numbers aren’t anywhere near what was stated. The other services are still in for a world of hurt for the following reasons that seem to have been overlooked. Read more on Forbes.

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