Why Audio?

‍ As well as the benefits of being able to listen whilst multitasking, according to Trinity Audio, consumers also reported that some of their top motivators for choosing audio over other formats included ease, flexibility to listen when they choose, time-saving, and even improvements in personal growth and mental health. That’s why it’s vital for any business to integrate audio into their content, so that they can start capitalizing on this audio wave.

Audio news

Out of the broad range of audio topics available, the most popular proved to be News and Information, which makes up 62% of digital audio content according to Trinity Audio’s research. For publishers such as the Guardian or the New York Times, not only is their daily audio news content attracting a growing listenership, but also building loyalty with their audience and raising their revenue.

‍In fact, audio news content accounts for more than 10% of the overall downloads in the USA and can cover a wide variety of topics. Some of the most popular being weather, sports, politics, finance, digital, celebrity, culture and more.

‍A great example is this automated newscast in Germany from HNA, that is being created daily from existing content using API.audio by Aflorithmic, reaching over 5000 plays per day.

‍Another example would be this Daily weather newscast, also created with API.audio by Aflorithmic.

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‍ Daily news podcasts specifically, appear to be amongst one of the most successful genres as of late, with more and more publishers starting to tap in on the trend. Whilst others who initially launched pop-up podcasts due to lockdown, are going on to continue these podcasts long-term. Audio news has also been found to be one of the most effective ways of attracting a younger audience into consuming news content and keeping them engaged and coming back for more on a frequent basis. For example, Spotify's a:m daily news podcast in under five minutes, in Spanish.

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To learn more on how to integrate AI audio for Audio News, click here.

Podcasts

‍ The socio-economic impact of the pandemic over the past few years has undeniably affected how we consume media at present. Whilst radio listenership has decreased somewhat, podcast listenership is still on the rise.

‍Podcasts are digital audio files that are hosted online and available to stream or download over the internet. The main advantage podcasts offer listeners in comparison to radio, is that they can be streamed on-demand at any time, and users can subscribe to receive notifications when a new instalment is available. Podcast topics can be as diverse as business and technology, politics and culture, science, music, sports, leisure, comedy or personal development, to name just a few. The frequency of the episodes often vary from daily, to weekly, to fortnightly, or less often. However, in order to grow and maintain a loyal listenership, it's vital to release content consistently and let your audience know when they can expect more.

‍AI has now made it possible to create and automate short podcasts in a quick and cost-efficient manner with AI voices that meet almost 95% similarity to human voices in 2022. With Aflorithmic’s API.audio, there is also the possibility to clone a voice for your brand or project, or even integrate your own pre-recorded audio files, both of which would be useful for an interview-based podcast for example.

‍Once the audio content has been created, it can then be quickly and easily uploaded to popular podcast hosting and distribution platforms, like Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Soundcloud, Deezer, Pocketcasts, Overcast. Castbox, RadioPublic, Breaker, Podcast Addict, Stitcher, Acast, Listen Notes and more, enabling you to reach millions of listeners. Many of these platforms also allow you to monetize your podcast through advertising, sponsorships, exclusive memberships, subscriptions, and more. Meaning that your business can use API.audio’s technology to increase your revenue more quickly and easily than ever. According to “The Infinite Dial” report by Edison Research and Triton Digital, the percentage of US citizens who are regular podcast consumers has increased exponentially over the past years, with an average of just 9% in 2008, up to 37% in 2020, and 41% in 2021. Insider Intelligence have predicted that by the end of 2022, podcast listeners will account for 20.3% of all internet users, which equates to 424.2 million listeners worldwide. ‍

Shortcasts

‍ What exactly is a shortcast?

‍Well, true to their name, shortcasts are short versions of podcast episodes that are built around the main themes and ideas of an existing episode, or alternatively, can be short stand-alone episodes in themselves. They are usually no longer than 15 minutes, but can even be as short as 1-2 minutes long. This can be useful for those consumers who aren’t regular podcaster listeners, or prefer short-form content opposed to the length of some podcasts which can reach anywhere between 15 minutes to several hours long.

‍Check out The Social Media Digest Podcast from Aflorithmic’s partner Storyflash, the first AI social media podcast created with AI voices, with 2 synthetic hosts.

‍Shortcasts can be beneficial for more than just news outlets, in fact any business can use them to communicate either external or internal information in a creative, scalable and engaging way. Take this internal employee shortcast for example. This was created using Aflorithmic’s API.audio for a beverages company to update their employees on the business updates of the week.

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Article summaries

‍ Artificial Intelligence (AI) has also allowed businesses to convert readers into listeners in a cost-efficient and timely manner. How? Because Aflorithmic’s API has made it possible to integrate voices, sound templates, sound effects, mastering and personalization via a few simple lines of code, resulting in beautiful scalable audio. An extra benefit of API.audio, is the mastering presets for specific platforms such as Spotify, meaning that your audio will be of a professional quality that meets Spotify’s requirements. Audio can be integrated into your platform, website or app, simply by using existing text such as blogs and articles, and then turning these scripts into an audio experience for your audience in seconds.

As opposed to full-length article reading, it’s also possible to create short, punchy and informative audio summaries based on existing content that can act as business information or as a preview for your audience of what they can expect from the article. They can also serve as a quicker and easier way for your audience to consume your content.

‍Instead of long boring article readers, audio summaries like this German example on meedia.de can add real value to your audience.

‍Another example would be the audio summary at the beginning of this blog post, which was also created with API.audio by Aflorithmic, and demonstrates the type of audio content you could create for your brand using Aflorithmic’s API.

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Audio News and AudioStack

‍ AudioStack is a Text-To-Audio solution, which enables the ability to turn existing written content into engaging audio experiences such as audio news, podcasts, shortcasts or audio summaries. The audio production process can then be automated with a choice of 400+ AI voices, 50+ sound designs, 30+ sound effects, and automated sound enhancement and mastering.

‍To scale your podcast production and personalize your audio news 100x faster, and with a 99% lower cost than traditional audio production, contact our experts.

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About

AudioStack is a London/Barcelona-based technology company. Its platform enables fully automated, scalable audio production by using synthetic media, voice cloning, and audio mastering, to then deliver it on any device, such as websites, mobile apps, or smart speakers.

With this Audio-As-A-Service, anybody can create beautiful sounding audio, starting from a simple text to including music and complex audio engineering without any previous experience required.

The team consists of highly skilled specialists in machine learning, software development, voice synthesizing, AI research, audio engineering, and product development.

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Sources

https://www.trinityaudio.ai/numbers-and-facts-you-need-to-know-about-audio-content-in-2021

https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/daily-news-podcasts-building-new-habits-shadow-coronavirus

https://www.pewresearch.org/journalism/fact-sheet/audio-and-podcasting/

https://www.blinkist.com/magazine/posts/what-is-a-shortcast