The future of the podcast business isn’t advertising or subscriptions. It’s both.

If you’re playing to be a part of that prized collection of three paid services, then subscriptions are a viable monetization path for you. For everyone else, ads are likely to be the best – and only – viable option.

The apparent limitation of the ad-supported media business model is that there will never be enough traffic to satisfy the beast. But while subscription revenue is stickier and gives creators more runway and short-term security, eventually the flame that started any new project will be extinguished. A new muse will need to be found.

Subscriptions are unbelievable. You have recurring revenue that, ideally, compounds month after month. Nothing else matters because you have growing subscriptions. And then it stops. Suddenly, you report a loss in subscribers. And panic ensues. Suddenly, you ask: should I have been so anti-ad all these years?