Safe space podcasts for women see rapid growth on medium

New research and dramatic increases in listenership show that podcasting is creating a safe space for women to freely discuss important issues around mental health, physical health and sexual health that are avoided by other mediums.

Creators are recording more podcasts that are opening taboo discussions to cater for the market’s interest and create healthy debate around women’s health and wellbeing, which is leading to a steady growth in consumption by female listeners.

Acast recently surveyed 1000 people in the UK and the US of both sexes and found that 92% of people are now open to hearing discussions about sensitive and less spoken about topics, with 58% of women now expecting it. 

The survey follows reports from the Centre of Intimacy Justice saying that of 60 businesses surveyed that advertise for women’s sexual health, 100% were knocked back by Facebook and 50% were actually suspended, while men’s sex products were not penalised.  

This research shows an alarming difference in the comfortable standard of advertising and discussion between genders.

With all this in mind, it’s easy to see why female podcast listeners have jumped 78% since 2018 in the US according to Nielsen Research. 

The graph shows a 4 million plus jump in female heavy podcast listeners since 2018, as more women find new podcasts that welcome and explore the content that is important.

According Acast’s previously mentioned study, the sensitive topics podcast listeners want to be covered are mental health (73%), money problems and debt (55%), medical/health problems (52%), sexual health (49%), suicide (48%) and sexual pleasure (45%).

You can see the manifestation the represented data in the Australian podcasting market, with popular podcasts unpacking what would be considered sensitive female topics.

The Life Uncut Brittany Hockley and Laura Byrne podcast has been firmly placed in the Triton Digital Australian Podcast Ranker top 10 with 1,807,602 monthly downloads as of February 2022 showing extreme popularity of subject matter.

Some more examples include It’s a lot with Abbie Chatfield, In Bed with Georgia Grace, Jordy Lucas’ It’s All Her, She’s on the Money and Phoebe Parsons’ Confessions of a Trainwreck which recently featured on RadioToday discussing the challenges faced by women with endometriosis. 

The sector is taking strides to normalise taboo discussions one podcast at a time.