As everyone and their dog moves to online production, podcasters have long hunted for a way to monetize their goods. Apps are available that let you sell podcasts for a set price, but what about aggregation over multiple platforms and using varying monetization models? More important, podcasters don’t want to do all the computerin’ to make these things work. That’s why Libsyn created MyLibsyn, a cross-platform (web, iOS, and Android) system for disseminating free and paid content from a central app.
Libsyn has just created something akin to the Netflix of content syndication. Podcasters who join must offer one piece of premium content per month as well as make their back catalog subscriber-only. Although they already offer standalone Android and iOS apps for certain podcasts, MyLibsyn assists in podcast discovery by putting all the popular podcasts in one place and, by ensuring only quality product appears in the app, it reduces the chance that podcast listeners will be disappointed and move on.
Full disclosure: I recently moved my podcast to Libsyn after Mevio pulled the plug on their general production system, so I’ve been able to see how the products work firsthand. Fellow Mevio sufferers: Libsyn is offering free import from Mevio. I put the instructions here.
That said, the model is fairly interesting, especially considering how hard it is to bring good content to the fore in the crowded podcast marketplace. They’ve started the program with a few popular podcasts including the WTF Podcast with Marc Maron.
“It is a easy way for producers to make premium content available to their audience – and it does not require any special RSS feeds or other tech knowledge by the end users to subscribe and consume content,” said Rob Walch, Libsyn, VP of Podcaster Relations. “You sign up for a subscription to get premium content. And it really helps to support the producers directly.”
“We have a lot of producers with great evergreen content (all the big comedy podcasts) and many were looking for a way to better monetize their content,” he said. “This solution was really driven very strongly by the requirements of Marc Maron for his show and content. He was having an issue with others posting old content – and we needed a way to make sure premium content would be very secure.”
The company is also looking into making the service available for premium users including training customers who need to make video content available to a secure group of subscribers.
Podcasters can sign up here but you have to be a Libsyn customer and meet certain requirements to participate.