By Marco Hugo Barsotti MHB 
A sector worth 5 billion dollars, growing at 20% per year. A field where — even with video in the mix — the spoken word still makes the difference, and a phenomenon that now brings together 18 million people in Italy. But above all, a context where you do not need to be a major publisher (or work for one) to earn money. We are talking, of course, about podcasts, and we explore the topic with the founder of RSS.com, an internationally-minded Italian who is part of the group shaping the future of this fascinating medium.
RSS.com
In an article published a few days ago (AI Tags in Apple Music and in Podcasts Produced by Artificial Intelligence: Real Protection for Listeners or Pointless New Bureaucracy?) we mentioned an important company headquartered in the USA but with an Italian soul: RSS.com. On that occasion we contacted co-founder Alberto Betella, asking for and obtaining an interview covering what we consider the topics most relevant to podcasters today: the status of the Italian market compared to the English-speaking one, the development of video podcasts, and content monetization. What follows is the transcript of the interview, which took place on March 18, 2026 via video call.
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Who Is Alberto Betella
Alberto Betella is the co-founder of RSS.com. He holds a PhD in Affective Computing (Emotion AI) and has built his career at the intersection of innovation and technology. Before founding RSS.com, he served as Chief Technology Officer at Badi, a startup that raised over 50 million dollars in venture capital and grew its user base to more than one million. He subsequently became CTO of Alpha, the moonshot factory created by telecommunications giant Telefonica, where a health-sector initiative spun out into an independent company with a 30-million-euro investment round. In 2006 he developed Podcast Generator, one of the first open source tools for publishing podcasts, which supported a global community of podcasters for over a decade and laid the foundations for the creation of RSS.com.
The Interview
(Newslinet) – What is RSS.com?
(Alberto Betella) – RSS.com is a podcast hosting platform: we help podcasters publish, distribute, and monetize their shows. We are among the top 10 in the world by number of new episodes published and, as of today, we rank seventh globally with 3.1% of new episodes published in February 2026. What sets us apart is that we are not just a hosting service — we are a technology company. We hold a US patent on AI voice synthesis for dynamic advertising, a proprietary spam detection system, and an internally built analytics engine. We are among the platforms that have concretely adopted several open standards from Podcasting 2.0.
Some Key Figures
(NL) – How is podcasting growing?
(Alberto Betella) – Podcasting is growing steadily at a global level. According to the Infinite Dial 2026 by Edison Research, in the United States 58% of Americans aged 12 and over have listened to or watched at least one podcast in the past month (167 million people), and 45% in the past week (130 million). Furthermore, according to a Deloitte estimate reported by Podnews, the global podcast advertising market could reach 5 billion dollars in 2026, with 20% year-on-year growth.
Podcasting Is No Longer a Niche
It is no longer a niche phenomenon: it is a consolidated mass medium, with an advertising industry growing at rates that surpass many traditional media outlets.
Video Podcasting
(NL) – Is it true that video podcasts are overtaking audio ones?
(Alberto Betella) – No: video podcasts are growing, but audio remains dominant. 92% of weekly podcast listeners say they “listen” rather than “watch”, even when using YouTube. It is true that those who have recently started listening to podcasts tend to prefer formats with video, especially on YouTube, but for the vast majority of the audience audio remains the primary format. The strength of audio podcasting is that you can listen while doing something else: in the car, at the gym, walking. Video is a complementary format, not a substitute.
RSS and Open Multi-Channel Distribution
(NL) – But isn’t video a distortion of a product that was born in audio form?
(Alberto Betella) – In fact, some video podcasts should not be considered podcasts at all. In recent years there has been a trend toward calling almost any content a podcast: a person on YouTube talking about a topic, a filmed talk show, a recorded livestream. As the term became popular, the label was applied to content that does not qualify.
Video in Podcasting Is Not New
But video in podcasting is not new: iTunes and later Apple Podcasts have supported video for almost twenty years. The point is that a podcast has unique characteristics, the main one being the RSS feed, which allows open distribution across a great many channels and apps, without a paywall and without being tied to a single platform.
The Italian Market
(NL) – Is the Italian market still lagging behind?
(Alberto Betella) – I would not say it is lagging behind at all. There is no doubt that the English language and the US market are larger. However, in 2025 podcast listeners in Italy reached 18 million, representing 75% growth since 2018. There are also initiatives and associations such as ASSIPOD, with which we collaborate. And Italy is not behind in podcasting.
Podcast Generator
In fact, RSS.com would not exist without Podcast Generator, my open source project that I developed and launched twenty years ago, in 2006, right here in Italy, at the University of Bergamo, to bring to life Pluriversiradio, an educational podcasting project that was among the first of its kind in Europe. So there is genuine innovation in podcasting in Italy. If anything, it is a market that, for linguistic and demographic reasons, is smaller than the English-speaking one and especially the US one.
Monetization
(NL) – Let us talk about monetization: every creator finds themselves competing with hundreds of thousands of similar products. It is hard to stand out and therefore to sustain oneself…
(Alberto Betella) – Monetization in podcasting is not reserved for the big shows. The model has evolved. Today a podcaster has several options: programmatic advertising (inserted automatically), paid subscriptions via Apple Podcasts, sponsored content, and direct listener donations. The key is that you do not need millions of downloads.Podcasting 2.0
We support, for example, the Funding tag from Podcasting 2.0, which allows a donation link to be embedded directly in the podcast’s RSS feed. There are podcasters with niche audiences who, through recurring donations from their listeners, manage to cover production costs and sustain their show over time. You do not need to be Joe Rogan: you need an engaged audience, even a small one. And the right tools.
Value for Value
(NL) – One of the solutions proposed by Podcasting 2.0‘s Adam Curry is “Value for Value“, which uses Satoshis (the smallest fractional unit of a Bitcoin). Is it a concrete solution or too idealistic?
(Alberto Betella) – It is very concrete, but simply not widespread. We have supported Value for Value (V4V) since 2022, and we also allow so-called splits: if you have a guest in an episode or mention a non-profit organization, for example, you can share a percentage of the “boostagram” (donations with a message) you receive with them.
Team Editor, Audio Engineer, Co-Host
There are also podcasts that do value splits with the team: editor, audio engineer, co-host. The model works; it is not widespread because only a few podcast apps, mostly independent ones, support it, so it remains a niche.
How to Earn Money?
(NL) – In the description of your “All in One Podcasting” solution you state that a creator can “Make money with as low as 10 downloads from dynamic ad insertions.” How much can a podcaster realistically expect to earn at the start, and how much can a successful podcast generate in Italy today?
(Alberto Betella) – The advertising world works with CPM, meaning cost per thousand impressions. For programmatic “run of network” solutions, CPM in US podcasting averages between 5 and 10 dollars. So, even assuming a CPM of 10 dollars, 10 downloads generate only a few cents.
The Italian Case
In Italy, precisely because the podcast advertising market is smaller than the US one, there are generally fewer available campaigns and CPMs that tend to be lower.
Fill Rate
There is also another important factor: the fill rate, meaning the percentage of advertising slots actually filled with an ad. In Italy the fill rate is often lower because there is less demand. Many companies still invest primarily in TV and radio or other digital channels, without yet considering podcast advertising as a central medium. So even when a podcast has several available slots, some of that inventory may go unsold. As a result, revenues from Italian-language podcasts are on average lower than those from English-language podcasts, especially for beginning podcasters.
Tens of Thousands of Euros per Month
But when a podcast grows, revenues can nonetheless become significant — in the range of thousands up to tens of thousands of euros per month, depending on the number of downloads, the number of advertising slots in each episode, and the percentage of those slots that is actually filled. The reason we have lowered the threshold so much compared to most other podcasting platforms is not so much about the initial earnings themselves, but about the motivational effect this can have.
Monetizing Even with a Very Small Audience
Our podcasters have confirmed this: even earning a few euros from one’s own creations generates a sense of reward that helps you keep going. We know that “podfading“ (loss of motivation or lack of time on the part of the creator, Ed.) is one of the main reasons why many people stop publishing episodes, often when motivation drops. Allowing monetization even with a very small audience can therefore provide that extra push to keep publishing, improve, and grow one’s show.
Getting… PAID
(NL) – What are the steps to adopt this solution?
(Alberto Betella) – It is very simple. Through the RSS.com control panel, once at least 10 downloads in the past month have been reached you can activate what we call, with a play on words, PAID (Programmatic Ads Inserted Dynamically).
Pre-Mid-Post-Roll
Once activated, in just a few clicks you can choose where the ads will be automatically inserted: pre-roll (start of episode), post-roll (end of episode), and mid-roll, which can be positioned automatically by our system or manually marked by the podcaster in their episodes. From there, you start earning on autopilot.
Podcasting and Radio
(NL) – Do you have relationships with the radio world?
(Alberto Betella) – Yes, various radio stations, from very small ones to large groups, work with us for the distribution of their programming in podcast format as well. For example, we have been working for years with Grupo Formula in Mexico, one of the largest media groups in the country, founded in 1968. Their shows generate millions of downloads every month.
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Radio Stations Want to Offer Their Content On Demand Too
We see a clear trend: radio stations want to offer their content on demand as well.
Radio Does Not Disappear — It Expands
Listeners no longer want to be forced to tune in at a specific time; they want to be able to catch up with a programme whenever it suits them. Podcasting solves exactly that.
The Example of DeeJay
In Italy a historic example is Radio Deejay, which publishes many of its programmes in podcast format with dozens of shows in its catalogue. It is a natural direction: radio does not disappear — it expands. (M.H.B. for NL)