Author Topic: Effect of Apple Download Changes on Episode Downloads  (Read 1471 times)

Will Malone

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Effect of Apple Download Changes on Episode Downloads
« on: December 06, 2017, 08:54:11 am »
Apologies if this has been answered elsewhere, but I was hoping someone might be able to help me make sense of a trend I'm noticing.

For about two weeks, our podcast downloads have dropped fairly significantly. This trends seems to have started around the same time that Blubrry announced the change to download calculations for Apple devices. I was a little confused by the announcement. From what I understood, some types of downloads from Apple devices may no longer be counted because of app changes that resulted from the recent iOS update? Am I understanding that correctly?

I guess I'm wondering if those Apple download changes could account for fewer downloads per episode for the past two weeks or so.  I would say we're seeing about half the downloads we used to. There were also pockets of days where we had zero downloads, which is not unheard of but kind of unusual for us. Or maybe this has just been a slow couple of weeks. Would appreciate any clarification.

Thanks!

Shawn Thorpe

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Re: Effect of Apple Download Changes on Episode Downloads
« Reply #1 on: December 06, 2017, 10:10:29 am »
Please go here:
https://www.blubrry.com/contact/
Click the Select link underneath All Other Inquiries and choose Technical Support. Fill out the form with your questions and someone will get back to you with assistance.

Will Malone

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Re: Effect of Apple Download Changes on Episode Downloads
« Reply #2 on: December 06, 2017, 10:22:46 am »
Thanks - I'll follow up with support and see what I can find out.

David Naimon

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Re: Effect of Apple Download Changes on Episode Downloads
« Reply #3 on: December 07, 2017, 09:14:24 am »
Will,  this is the exact experience I've had with my podcast too (and several other podcasts on twitter have been complaining of the same thing).  Contrary to their initial posting that some podcasts might experience "slight" decreases "during the transition" these changes for me, you, and others have been large and according to my correspondence with blubrry are now permanent going forward.  If you learn different do let me know.
best,
David

Tom Williams

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Re: Effect of Apple Download Changes on Episode Downloads
« Reply #4 on: December 15, 2017, 07:03:41 am »
Thanks for sharing this Will. This is exactly what we've been seeing with our podcasts too. Circa 50% reduction in downloads since the change to download calculations for Apple devices. I thought it was just us. We weren't forwarned or even told about these changes so I've wasted hours trying to track down the problem as I initially thought it was an issue with either our media server or recent changes that the Apple Podcasts support team undertook for us. We count our downloads in the millions per year so for us this is going to have a massive impact on monetization. At least I now know what the problem is but I'm not at all happy with the lack of communication and the fact that evidently, our previous podcast download statistics were inaccurate.

I'm just heading off to check Twitter but does anyone know if users of other podcast metrics providers have reported similar?

Best
Tom

Jeffrey E Lackey

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Re: Effect of Apple Download Changes on Episode Downloads
« Reply #5 on: January 03, 2018, 01:32:58 pm »
Thank goodness I found this thread! We posted our latest episode December 16 2017 and expected a huge download rush - the topic was VERY popular and there was a LOT of Twitter chatter on the episode. Yet the numbers have been MUCH lower than normal. I've been trying to understand if there was a problem with the feed propagation or anything else that could cause the problem; we've been extremely disappointed. We also have been approached by a couple of potential sponsors and we need to give them our stats; they were very happy with the trends up and past episode numbers, but they're now leery of the drop in downloads.

Is this something that will be "fixed?" I KNOW we have more downloads that what is showing up every day. 

Shawn Thorpe

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Re: Effect of Apple Download Changes on Episode Downloads
« Reply #6 on: January 03, 2018, 01:48:10 pm »
Anyone that has specific questions about their stats, please go to the contact from linked above and file a support request. We may need account information from you that wouldn't be good to share on a public forum.

Jeffrey E Lackey

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Re: Effect of Apple Download Changes on Episode Downloads
« Reply #7 on: January 03, 2018, 01:50:34 pm »
So ---- as much as our download numbers are lowered since 12/15, (a LOT and we know that isn't accurate) we went to the new Apple Podcast Analytics pages. They show, for our latest episode, for the last couple of months (and it's only been out since 12/15) the episode only being downloaded to 1/10th the number of devices that our Blubrry stats are showing on Apple clients. One tenth! That absolutely is not correct.

Jeffrey E Lackey

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Re: Effect of Apple Download Changes on Episode Downloads
« Reply #8 on: January 04, 2018, 01:52:50 pm »
Does anyone know exactly how Apple is changing what they are reporting for downloads?