With the rise of TikTok and the enduring popularity of short-form content, hundreds of creators have soared to digital fame with short, fast-paced video content. But increasingly, creators who began their careers in short-form video are shifting to a more dependable and lucrative source of income—podcasts. 

The shift comes amid the uncertain futures of social media platforms such as TikTok and Twitter, and the limited incomes that many creators have reported earning from various platforms’ creator funds designed to compensate them for their content’s performance.

Cody Kolodziejzyk, also known as Cody Ko, and Noel Miller—who both initially achieved online fame in the mid-2010s on the now-defunct short-form video platform Vine—established an independent podcast network, TMG Studios, in 2021, anchored by their comedy show “The Tiny Meat Gang Podcast.”

Though the two continue to create social media content on platforms such as YouTube and have also extended their careers into live comedy shows and music, podcasting has become Kolodziejzyk and Miller’s primary source of revenue over the past two years, the duo told Ad Age. And they’ve since brought on several other comedy creators to their podcast network to help them reach similar financial success through brand sponsorships, merchandise sales and other revenue streams.

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And with more creators prioritizing podcasts, brands including SeatGeek and Liquid Death, among others, are following these creators into the podcasting realm. Aiming to engage with creators’ built-in, adoring audiences, brands are sponsoring podcasts through both traditional mid-roll ads read by the creator hosting the podcast and new sponsorship opportunities opened up by the fact that many of these creators are including a video element in their podcasts, such as product placement or studio branding. 

“Podcasts can be a very, very lucrative form of media, because if a fan is sitting in a car for an hour listening to you speak, that introduces a lot of opportunities for brands and ads,” Kolodziejzyk said. “We'll do four ad reads per episode, and so that, depending on the CPM, can add up pretty quickly. That's something that we take care to bring to our other talent—the opportunity to monetize at that level—because you don't really see that with other forms of media. It's really hard on TikTok, for example, to make any money.”

Others are pulling back from social platforms altogether. Brittany Tomlinson, a creator who professionally goes by Brittany Broski and traces her internet fame back to a viral TikTok video of her reaction to the taste of kombucha, launched a podcast last month—and hasn’t posted a video on her TikTok account with over 7 million followers since. And Christina Najjar, also known as Tinx, began a podcast in early 2022 after launching her influencer career on TikTok in 2020 and growing a following of over 1.5 million. In a recent interview with Glossy, Najjar pointed to her podcast and weekly radio show on SiriusXM as the primary focus of her career in 2023.

Related: Tinx shares influencer marketing advice for brands 

Six-second videos to hourlong podcasts 

After the shutdown of Vine in 2017, Kolodziejzyk and Miller ventured into podcasting together with “The Tiny Meat Gang Podcast” while still producing content for their individual YouTube channels and other social platforms. They eventually developed that show into a full-fledged podcast studio, complete with a team of about 16 editors, producers and other employees and a lineup of six additional shows. 

Unlike social media platforms, which are subject to unpredictable changes in their algorithms and the types of content they prioritize, Kolodziejzyk and Miller discovered that podcasting offered them more flexibility to experiment with different types and formats of content—and ultimately more control over their income, they said. 

“Podcasts kind of stand alone, and that allows a creator to monetize and explore this awesome format without having to worry about the TikTok algorithm, or anything of that sort,” Kolodziejzyk said. “They allow the creator to just be more free and comfortable in their careers, and still monetize, as well.”

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Kolodziejzyk and Miller spent multiple years saving up their income from brand partnerships through their flagship podcast and their individual social media channels and “reinvesting it back into [TMG Studios],” Miller said, focusing on the potential to “expand [podcasting] into a business, rather than just treat it like a paycheck.” 

“There were a couple of years where we mentally treated [brand sponsorships] like, ‘Let's not just take this money. Let's hold on to it, and see if we can achieve something bigger,” he added. “And now, I feel like our podcasts have opened up the door to develop longer relationships with brands. Our podcast and our podcast network fuels a lot of our brand relationships, these days.”

The comedy duo has partnered extensively with SeatGeek, NordVPN and Liquid Death, among others, for in-episode ad reads. And on YouTube, each of TMG Studios’ podcasts consists of a video element in addition to the traditional audio-only podcast format, which offers additional sponsorship opportunities for brands. For example, Liquid Death cans are frequently placed on the set of “The Tiny Meat Gang Podcast,” and Kolodziejzyk and Miller will drink from them during podcast episodes. 

Because ad reads can last anywhere from 30 to 90 seconds, Kolodziejzyk and Miller can flesh out an endorsement of a brand or product further than they would be able to in short-form video content, they said. And because podcasts effectively allow audiences to listen in on lengthy conversations between their favorite creators and get a sense of those creators' interests, hobbies and other things shaping their daily lives, these ad reads often “resonate with [their] audience more than a standard ad read would on another platform,” Miller added.

Many of the brands sponsoring TMG Studios’ podcasts are entering into long-term partnerships with Miller, Kolodziejzyk and the other creators in their podcast network, he said. For Miller, “that world of [one-off sponsored posts] has kind of gone away.”

“What makes [podcasts] different from any other medium is that you can get in these spaces where the audience knows something very particular about you, and then when you start to engage with a brand, the audience actually knows full well how it affects you as a person,” he said. “It’s very unique compared to just doing straight brand plugs on a YouTube video or on Instagram, and it’s a very different relationship that you've developed with a brand.”

Podcasts also serve as a significant income stream for Brooke Averick and Connor Wood, two comedy creators who skyrocketed to TikTok fame in the weeks following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. The two launched the “Brooke and Connor Make a Podcast” podcast through TMG Studios in 2022 after frequently hosting joint livestreams on TikTok together and realizing their followers enjoyed listening to their long, comedic conversations and begged them to start a podcast, Wood said.

“We're still posting a ton on TikTok because we have our individual careers that we still prioritize,” he said. Wood has just under 745,000 followers on the platform while Averick has over 1 million. But the podcast “is definitely more lucrative than any individual TikTok could be, because there's so much audience power—there's more engaged audiences and more involved audiences.” 

Both Wood and Averick still earn most of their income from brand deals on TikTok and Instagram, Averick said. In the past few months, she has partnered with brands including Dunkin’, Grubhub and Prime Video across TikTok and Instagram, while Wood has worked with Colgate, Coors Light and DraftKings, among others. But they now “prioritize the podcast” and enjoy the creative freedom that comes without the need to churn out a certain number of TikTok videos to remain successful and relevant on the platform, she said. 

“There’s not the pressure surrounding [TikTok] anymore, because we have a podcast that's consistent with an engaged fan base every week,” she added. “There’s always a threat that TikTok could shut down one day. But podcasting feels like it transcends the app, and it will always be relevant.”

“I think we both used to think of ourselves as TikTokers,” Averick said. “But I wouldn't necessarily say that now.” 

'Owning your audience' 

Though Kolodziejzyk and Miller are fairly unique for launching their own podcast network rather than sticking with just a single show, creators starting their own podcasts is not a new phenomenon. However, this new wave of creators leaning into podcasts as a main source of their income largely consists of those who first grew to prominence as short-form creators who are now seeking revenue streams less reliant on the whims of social media platforms, said Mahzad Babayan, a digital talent agent at United Talent Agency. 

“You can’t own your audiences on social media,” she said. “And the most important thing that creators are realizing now—and it's something that we've been incredibly bullish on as representatives in the space—is the need to really diversify and build your audience outside of your main [social] platforms. I think that’s why creators are really looking to build their audiences and their businesses off-platform: so that they can have real longevity in their careers.”

Podcasts are a highly effective medium for creators aiming to strengthen the sense of connection their followers feel toward them—which can be difficult to accomplish in the limited timespan offered by TikTok videos or Instagram Reels. Roughly half of U.S. adults reported listening to a podcast in 2022 in a survey from Pew Research Center, and one in five said they tune into a podcast “nearly every day.” And in a recent study from IPG Mediabrands agency Magna and Vox Media, 75% of consumers pointed to podcast hosts as the most influential force driving their actions and life decisions—including, notably, their purchasing habits. 

“The difference of this new kind of wave of creators is that they truly understand how Gen Z and younger millennials are au fait with shopping from brands built by creators,” said Crystal Malachias, senior VP of global growth and innovation at marketing agency R&CPMK. “And as much as creators themselves are changing in terms of their business acumen, audiences and consumer habits and beliefs are changing, too. They feel more affinity with these creators, and most will want to support them in their endeavors, because they admire them so much. And they admire them for more than just being on the silver screen, per se.” 

R&CPMK has seen a growing “trend toward the diversification of content and the diversification of revenue streams” among creators in recent months, said Aaron King, VP of influencer, growth and innovation at the agency. Similarly to how people can click through channels focused on different topics on a TV, more and more creators are expanding their online presence to new mediums, such as podcasting, or simply to additional social media platforms, and offering a new experience to their audience on each of these channels, he said. 

Broadcasting company SiriusXM has also witnessed this shift in creators who got their start in short-form video entering the audio space, said Kelli Hurley, SiriusXM’s VP and global head of revenue partnerships, in an email. Najjar’s podcast, “It’s Me, Tinx,” for example, was launched through the company, and comedy podcast “Therapy Gecko,” in which creator Lyle Drescher dons a gecko costume and green face paint as an “unlicensed lizard psychologist,” is sold and distributed by SiriusXM, Hurley said.

“Podcast communities are engaging with their favorite hosts everywhere they can—on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, in-person, and more—in between episodes,” Hurley continued. “And that’s also exactly where brands want to be.”

A new way to reach creators’ audiences

Host-read ads, which have for years been an intrinsic element of the podcast space, have “always separated podcasts from the rest of the media ad landscape,” Hurley said, as they offer brands the opportunity to have the host serve as a more-engaging mouthpiece for the brand’s messaging. And as a growing number of consumers, particularly those in Gen Z, are already looking to creators on social media for product recommendations, sponsoring a podcast put out by creators with existing, loyal followings across social media can be a more effective way to tap into those creators’ audiences. 

SeatGeek has funneled its influencer marketing efforts almost entirely into long-form creator content, including podcasts and YouTube vlogs, said Sarah Kettler, the brand’s VP of brand, consumer and enterprise marketing. 

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“We've tried the ‘hashtag ad’ posts in the past, and we just don't see the same level of effectiveness,” she said. “We find that this longer-form content—YouTube vlogs, podcasts—they’re more cost-effective, and they also allow you to create longer-term relationships with creators. They really integrate the brand into the piece where it's not just only tagging us in a post. It's more dynamic and more personalized, like we're a part of the story.” 

SeatGeek currently sponsors multiple shows on Kolodziejzyk and Miller’s podcast network, and began partnering with the two on their main podcast, “The Tiny Meat Gang Podcast,” in 2017, she said. They initially teamed up with the two creators on their YouTube channels, and after seeing how Kolodziejzyk and Miller wove SeatGeek into their videos and treated the brand “almost as a character,” the brand followed the duo into the podcasting space in 2018. The ticketing app now sponsors additional shows that have since launched through TMG Studios, including Wood and Averick’s show, Kettler said.

The brand works closely with several other podcast creators, as well, including sports analyst Pat McAfee and sports commentator and creator James O’Brien, who releases podcasts through his sports and entertainment company Jomboy Media, she said. 

“We find the most success for us comes from podcasters who have built a very passionate brand and community in and of themselves,” Kettler said. “We're looking for the podcasts out there that have inside jokes that only their audiences would get—audiences that are really listening every time they put out new content, and creators that could veer off topic and their audiences would still enjoy it.”

Kettler is also excited by the emergence of video podcasts, which have taken off among several of the creators shifting to podcasts from social media platforms—where many of those creators were largely producing video content. At TMG Studios, video is prioritized equally as much as audio in the podcast production process, said Ryan Faucett, the network’s executive producer. 

“We're not just working in an audio editor now—we're incorporating video editing and visual effects and coloring, and all of those complexities that go into video are super important,” he said. “And we see that as such an importance because we really believe that video podcasting is going to play a huge part in podcasting as a whole going forward. “I don't think that you're going to be able to have a really huge successful podcast years from now without having a video component.”

For creators, adding a video component to their podcasts can help audiences who were introduced to those creators on video-heavy platforms such as TikTok and Instagram transition more seamlessly into the new channel; and at the same time, listeners can choose to listen to their podcasts in a more traditional, audio-only way while commuting or doing chores, Faucett added. And for brands, having a video added on top of the traditional audio of a podcast can present new opportunities for their products, logo or other branding to show up in the creators’ shows. 

“More and more advertisers are also looking at the video content of creators’ podcasts, not just the ad reads within them,” UTA’s Mahzad said. “And creators are also amplifying their podcast content on other mediums like TikTok,” which opens up the opportunity for brands to appear in front of the creators’ following across multiple mediums, she said.

Some creators newer to the podcasting scene, such as Tomlinson, have urged their listeners to tune into the video version of their new shows—likely seeking to ease her millions of TikTok followers to engage with the familiar, albeit much longer, video format. 

“All you audio listeners, come on over to YouTube,” Tomlinson said at the start of her first podcast episode, which garnered over 470,000 views on the platform in the three weeks following its release. “Seriously, come hang out on YouTube. You’re missing the party.”