To attract and retain creators, SiriusXM plans to help them monetize their presences across all these surfaces, which in turn could help strengthen its subscription offering, said Walker.

The company also has plans to increase its market share by expanding its dominance in the car, and plans to launch a cheaper, ad-supported service to attract price-sensitive consumers. The initiative is tentatively slated to debut by the end of the year.

Improving measurement

To improve its measurement capabilities, SiriusXM has invested in clean room technology for GroupM clients in partnership with LiveRamp, which has enabled it to provide more accurate audience reach and frequency metrics.

Currently, 25% of time spent with media goes to digital audio, but only 8% of media spending is allocated to the medium, according to Walker, who aims to close that gap.

Attribution is more complex, especially now that more fans are consuming podcasts on audio, video, and social media platforms. Few attribution models allow audio companies to effectively track attribution across these various platforms.

That’s compounded by companies like Apple and Google making signals less available, as well as a constantly shifting privacy landscape. Currently, most brands have to take an ensemble approach to attribution, blending deterministic and probabilistic signals into a legible set of data.

“Audio has never been more culturally relevant,” Walker said. “Podcasts are a way for people to go deep, have nuanced conversations, and foster an intimate relationship with creators. There are still so many opportunities in front of us.”