After video overload, it's the rise of audio-only platform! Is that killing the video star?

Before Clubhouse, India was already home to Leher. With aural platforms that promote conversation and networking flooding the virtual world, we can’t help but wonder: Is audio the future?

For Vikas Malpani of Leher, audio and video are just mediums. “The real trend is social media, conversations and networking,” says the co-founder and CEO of the Indian answer to Clubhouse, which actually launched in 2018. “What’s happening is that the virtual and real worlds are merging now. Socialising happens virtually these days, even before it moves offline. In real life, it’s hard to find people of the same intellectual level as you, or ones who have the same interests. But, at platforms like Leher, you can do that,” he adds. On Leher, as in Clubhouse, you can make your own rooms and converse about whatever you are passionate about. Listeners can come in and out. And you can also create “clubs” where an invite is sought. “We are happy that Clubhouse is here now. When you are the first to do this, people are hesitant, but when the market opens up, it’s better for everyone,” he says of the app, which he co-founded with Atul Jaju. 

Launched in 2018, Leher now has audio, with an option for video interface. You can host a live session or record it, and it’s available on Android and iOS platforms, unlike Clubhouse. The app also has over 1.7 lakh users, a majority of whom are young Indian professionals, between the age of 22 and 40. Language is no barrier, and hence, it’s doing well in Tier II cities as well. 

Garima Surana, podcast host of Popkast with Garima

Leher’s rise is a clear indication that audio is seeing a growth in interest. Even as OGs like Spotify, Saavn and Audible, continue to attract new users and grow in content, the medium is getting a new entrant regularly. Besides Clubhouse and Leher, there’s Headfone and Twitter Spaces. Rumours are afloat of Facebook looking at an audio interface as well. 

While until last year, videos and images were the rising mediums, it’s being theorised that the lockdown, which brought on screen fatigue, may have hastened the speed of the rise of audio. 

Vikas Malpani and Atul Jaju of Leher, India’s answer to Clubhouse

According to an audio OTT report by Kantar and VTION in 2020, music streaming platforms saw a 42 per cent increase in time spent on their platforms in March 2020. The data also points to a change in listening pattern on these platforms. There has been a 52 per cent growth in the incidence of listening in the afternoons—between 2 and 6 pm, and an 80 per cent rise in late-night listening—from midnight till morning. 

Audio books, too, became more popular. Auditing firm Deloitte estimated in August 2020 that the global market for audio books will grow by a whopping 25 per cent in 2020, up to $3.5 billion. Podcasts also have been gaining popularity, which was clear when Spotify paid podcast host Joe Rogan a reported $100 million for exclusive rights to his podcast.

Podcaster and RJ Salil Acharya

As Malpani says, “For creators, these platforms can be used to converse and network, which eventually can lead to real-life advantages.” As podcast host and RJ Salil Acharya of Radiocity says, “Audio is now your Doordarshan of India. It’s just so easy to do—all you need is a phone to record on. Investment is minute. When I do a show, people ask me if there is a camera, as they then have to get ready. It’s still overwhelming, but with audio you don’t have that problem.” 

In a way, Acharya articulates the one big reason audio may be gaining popularity. But, he does say that for it to be monetised will take some a few years. “You need to worry about content first. There is a gestation period for it to start paying off.”

Aditya Kuber of Ideabrew Studios, which produces audio content and Pratham Khandelwal, co-founder of Headfone

Software engineers Pratham Khandelwal and Yogesh Sharma started Headfone in 2018 after they left Facebook, but it’s truly taken off in 2020. “Facebook was doing experiments with audio when we left, but why would people come to a site where they are already using their eyes to see content, to listen to it? So, there was a market for a separate need. These days, we sometimes don’t want to use sight, like when we are walking, travelling, commuting, or at night before sleeping. So, we need a platform that enables it,” says Khandelwal, who says that the most popular content on Headfone is fiction—mostly horror and thriller stories. The app has six million installs (five times more than when they launched) and has mostly Hindi content. “We plan to diversify and make content deeper. We want to have a big repository that a listener can dig into. If you like horror, we will give you more of that.” 

Along with indie startups such as Leher and Headfone, even Twitter has joined the “conversation” with Twitter Spaces. A Twitter spokesperson tells us, “People come to Twitter to talk about what’s happening, and in December, Twitter started testing a new way to bring conversations to life with Spaces—live, host-moderated audio chat rooms. While voice Tweets opened the door for expression using audio on Twitter, voice messages in DMs give people another way to express themselves in private conversations. Now, Twitter is testing Spaces. It brings people together to connect with their Twitter community directly in an intimate, conversational space and adds the nuance that can be heard in someone’s voice to the public conversation.” 

For podcaster Garima Surana, who hosts Popkast with Garima, getting her nuanced voice out is imperative. “It’s no secret that audio is the future and when I say audio I don’t just mean podcasts. Audio will be the closest to a frictionless human computer interaction. For instance, with smart speakers, social audio apps, skills on audio and new methods of interacting with technology will be driven by audio in the near future with big tech focusing on it. But, as a creator, I feel sad when the average listen time of my podcast is 19 minutes of a 35-40 minute episode, and brands still run behind 10 per cent engagement on a 1M influencer account,” says the 26-year-old, who hopes that audio can take off in an even massive way in the future. “What I find particularly irksome is audio creators succumbing to the trap of creating content for Instagram. We need more audio-led apps  such as Clubhouse and Leher that can promote audio creators’ catalogue, so that we don’t have to dance and point to reels.” 

To Surana, what Aditya Kuber, co-founder of Ideabrew Studios, which is an audio content production firm, says, could come as a hopeful sign for the future. “You have to realise that video has a head start of 10 years, thanks to YouTube. Audio is the future, but the scale is still to be ascertained,” says Kuber, who has now produced 50 shows. His last word is this, “What we are trying to do is get brands involved at the initial stages itself. Indie lifestyle brands are now competing with bigger brands by collaborating with audio content, so they can reach their target audience, which is mostly below the age of 30. And it’s this same age group that is listening to audio platforms. So it will happen. The future is bright.”

1.7 lakh 
Number of users of Leher

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