Blog: revenue

Read our latest daily deep dives, hot takes, and exciting updates about the entertainment world. Check out the latest insight from your favourite analyst, or search by coverage areas - music, entertainment and fandom, creator economy and social.

Ads in WhatsApp Stories: is this the next ad frontier in social?

Cover image for Ads in WhatsApp Stories: is this the next ad frontier in social?

Hanna Kahlert

20 Jun 2025

Business Strategy

Meta has announced that it will be rolling out ads in WhatsApp’s ‘updates’ tab. This marks a move to monetise what has, up until now, been a platform with not so impressive revenue to report. A major issue for WhatsApp is that, as a direct messaging platform, it has been very difficult to mone...

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Are we reaching peak fandom?

Cover image for Are we reaching peak fandom?

Mark Mulligan

1 May 2025

Business Strategy

With streaming revenue growth slowing to 6.2% in 2024, the recorded music industry’s attention is firmly fixed on superfans as the ‘get out of jail free’ card. The growing sophistication of artist merch has reached the stage where fans can buy Taylor Swift fashion bags and shop her jewelry ran...

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How economic volatility will impact US labels’ fandom monetisation push

Cover image for How economic volatility will impact US labels’ fandom monetisation push

Olivia Jones

25 Apr 2025

Business Strategy

It has been an eventful few weeks for the global economy, to put it mildly. Since President Trump’s initial announcement calling for a universal baseline tariff on foreign imports to the US at the beginning of this month, global financial markets have been in flux, affecting nearly every sector fr...

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Is streaming music's final form? And if not, what's next?

Cover image for Is streaming music's final form? And if not, what's next?

Tatiana Cirisano

3 Apr 2025

Business Strategy

Key takeaways from this blog: Music is not stuck – it is shifting. Fans now engage through remixes, memes, and behind-the-scenes content, not just through streaming Streaming is losing cultural ground.

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How PlayStation broke its hardware and active user records in Q4

Cover image for How PlayStation broke its hardware and active user records in Q4

Rhys Elliott

13 Feb 2025

Business Strategy

Sony released its financial results for calendar Q4 2024. Here are the high-level results: Sony generated revenues of $27.9 billion As always, its Game & Network Services (G&NS) Segment – PlayStation – was the biggest segment (38%) Sony Music accounted for 11% and Sony Pictures for 9% of...

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Why Spotify only hit profitability now (but will do so again)

Cover image for Why Spotify only hit profitability now (but will do so again)

Mark Mulligan

13 Feb 2025

Business Strategy

Spotify finally registered its first profitable year in 2024. It has hit net profit in individual quarters before – most recently in Q3 2023 – but this is the first year it was profitable throughout the year.

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Bootlegging is the scourge of many industries. Could it be music’s greatest strength?

Cover image for Bootlegging is the scourge of many industries. Could it be music’s greatest strength?

Tatiana Cirisano

7 Feb 2025

The word “bootleg” has long left a bad taste in brands’ mouths. Quite literally defined as “illicit goods,” these unauthorised versions or replications of clothes, handbags, concert tees, and other items have long plagued brands.

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The unflattening of music

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Mark Mulligan

30 Jan 2025

Cultural trends

[This post builds on two other recent MIDiA posts: Background music and What got you here ] At the half way point of the decade it is a good time to reflect on how the business of music is reshaping the culture of music – and where this is heading.

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What got you here won’t get you there: how Spotify built a new business

Cover image for What got you here won’t get you there: how Spotify built a new business

Mark Mulligan

17 Jan 2025

Business Strategy

Since its inception, Spotify has been, and continues to be, the streaming music market’s lightning rod. This is due to its continued ability to maintain leading market share and the fact it is the only leading global DSP that is independent and therefore has to focus place more focus on commercial...

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Can subscriptions keep the lights on for social?

Cover image for Can subscriptions keep the lights on for social?

Hanna Kahlert

19 Oct 2023

user-generated content

Digital advertising has long been the financial backbone of the digital world. It has underpinned the business models of the likes of Google and Meta, and its absence has been the value proposition of subscriptions, which now dominate digital entertainment.

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Are mobile game advertisements a legitimate trojan horse for podcast downloads?

Cover image for Are mobile game advertisements a legitimate trojan horse for podcast downloads?

Annie Langston

12 Oct 2022

podcast downloads

real podcast listener

Podcast marketing is still somewhat new terrain in the digital audio market. Not only are podcasts a niche activity, but the market is fragmenting with the development of more shows. This oversaturation is making it harder for any individual show to grow its audience.

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Key takeaways for podcasting from SiriusXM and Spotify’s earnings

Cover image for Key takeaways for podcasting from SiriusXM and Spotify’s earnings

Annie Langston

4 Aug 2022

Two audio giants with investments in podcasting — Spotify and SiriusXM — published their second quarter earnings for the year. SiriusXM saw marginal year-over-year growth in revenue – around 4% – although it was still able to increase its paid subscribers by 23,000 users, bringing its total ...

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Quick take: Overwolf hints that UGC is the future of entertainment

Cover image for Quick take: Overwolf hints that UGC is the future of entertainment

Hanna Kahlert

18 Nov 2021

Media and Marketing

The gap between creation and consumption is closing. Entertainment behaviours no longer follow simple dynamics of viewing or listening. Increasingly, they comprise a variety of activities from sharing with friends, to using basic creator tools to interact with and create new aspects within other ent...

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WWE Q3 Earnings – An innovative digital strategy helps WWE overcome COVID-19 disruption

Cover image for WWE Q3 Earnings – An innovative digital strategy helps WWE overcome COVID-19 disruption

Alistair Taylor

12 Nov 2020

World Wrestling Entertainment

WWE’s Q3 2020 results provide a fascinating insight into how a live event-focused entertainment business has successfully navigated a global pandemic. In its financials for the quarter , WWE saw a 19% revenue increase year-on-year (YoY), with Q3 2020 revenue at $221.

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DAZN financials: Growth reliant on premium domestic rights

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Alistair Taylor

14 Sep 2020

DAZN’s 2018 financials highlighted the difficulty of encouraging a transition to consume live sports digitally with its existing portfolio of rights. DAZN has not yet released its 2019 financials, but MIDiA has constructed a robust and accurate subscriber and revenue model for the sport-centric st...

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COVID fallout: BBC no longer considers UK Athletics value for money

Cover image for COVID fallout: BBC no longer considers UK Athletics value for money

Alistair Taylor

19 Aug 2020

COVID-19 exposed live entertainment as a vulnerable asset class , specifically following the pandemic-enforced postponement of live sports . One of the hardest hit during this hiatus and ensuing uncertainty has been athletics, which saw its largest engagement driver and the ‘greatest show on earth...

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FuboTV adds key sporting rights to portfolio following Disney deal

Cover image for FuboTV adds key sporting rights to portfolio following Disney deal

Alistair Taylor

2 Jul 2020

Sporting rights

FuboTV, the US over-the-top (OTT) internet-delivered TV service launched back in January 2015 as a soccer-centric proposition. In that time it has established itself as a niche distributor of live streams of MLS and LatAm soccer matches to US, Canadian and Spanish audiences.

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Move Over Mickey, The NBA is Set to Become Disney World’s Star Attraction

Cover image for Move Over Mickey, The NBA is Set to Become Disney World’s Star Attraction

Alistair Taylor

27 May 2020

Australian Rules Football

COVID-19 forced sports leagues to think outside the box for restarting live sports. The UFC wanted to rent a private island , the NRL to ferry players to and from games, and the WWE performed to empty arenas .

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Can BT Lay the Smackdown on Its Rivals?

Cover image for Can BT Lay the Smackdown on Its Rivals?

Alistair Taylor

3 Jan 2020

addressable audience

This Saturday at 1am GMT BT will debut its live broadcast for WWE Smackdown, having acquired the exclusive rights from long-term UK broadcaster Sky in June 2019 . This signalled the end of Sky’s tenure as the home of WWE content, which first began broadcasting wrestling coverage to fans back in th...

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Why the UFC Wants to Replicate the Yao Ming effect

Alistair Taylor

25 Jun 2019

audience culture

The NBA is the third highest grossing league globally, generating $7.4 billion in 2017, behind domestic rivals MLB and NFL. Whereas the MLB and NFL have largely struggled to entice a truly global following, the NBA have become synonymous with Chinese sports fans, and offers a template for the Ultima...

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