You are viewing your 1 free article this month. Login to read more articles.
PRH Audio to work ‘hand-in-hand’ with authors as it trials AI recording methods
Global president Amanda D’Acierno discusses the future of audiobooks, and how PRH Audio plans to use AI to expand its catalogue.
Using artificial voices generated with Artificial Intelligence (AI) to record audiobooks “can open a door” to new possibilities for the format, according to Amanda D’Acierno, the global president of Penguin Random House (PRH) Audio. While these technologies are not advanced enough to replace the work that humans do today, D’Acierno says PRH Audio is considering how AI can allow the publisher to further grow its audiobook catalogue.
Since becoming audio publisher in 2008, D’Acierno has seen the market evolve and grow dramatically. She notes that when she started in the role, PRH Audio was producing around 500 titles annually, which today has exploded to 2,000 titles in the US and thousands more across territories. By last year, PRH had recorded more than 30,000 hours in locations ranging from abandoned mines to the South of France.
PRH Audio is already “integrating AI in our pre- and post-production work and publishing processes”. The emphasis is on remaining an “author-first company”, and D’Acierno says PRH will “work hand-in-hand” with writers while experimenting with these “ever-evolving” technologies.
“Artificial voice and AI tools can open a door to make titles available that weren’t previously viable to record, and we’re exploring the use of these technologies to expand our catalogue,” explains D’Acierno, who took on the role of global president in August. “Right now, AI can’t replicate an incredible human performance, and there will always be appreciation for that among listeners,” she adds.
D’Acierno was appointed global president at a crucial moment for audiobook publishing, almost a year after Spotify entered the market and as listener numbers “reached a tipping point in the US”, with more than half of Americans reporting having listened to an audiobook. “The exploding popularity of audio content among consumers is itself a trend—we’ll take the lessons we’ve learned in mature audio markets like the US, UK and Germany to build and expand the markets worldwide in regions like Latin America and Asia,” she tells me.
In her new role, D’Acierno will work to grow PRH Audio’s publishing across territories, while continuing to oversee the publisher’s audio business in America. She will work with PRH Audio teams across the world as they acquire rights to more books, growing the publisher’s list in new languages, while also investing in new production facilities to grow its recording capabilities.
The publisher already has 32 recording studios in New York, Los Angeles and London, among various other cities, and D’Acierno explains that being able to record in-house makes audiobook production more flexible and efficient. Renovations are also currently underway in the New York and LA studios, which will be ready for recording early next year. “Even with robust in-house studios, we’ll always need to supplement with booking external studios as well and will continue to record worldwide anywhere individual productions require,” she adds. As “consumers expect simultaneous global availability of many forms of entertainment”, the goal is to get audiobooks to as many listeners—and in as many languages—as possible.
Spotify has played a key role in helping audiobooks reach new audiences, according to D’Acierno, especially “the casual book consumer” who can now access audiobooks on the same platform on which they listen to music and podcasts. “What Spotify users are choosing to listen to is distinct from what we’re seeing at other retailers—in particular, romance and mystery titles overperform among these listeners,” she adds. “More options for consumers are healthy for any marketplace. Listeners’ habits, preferences and budgets are different and there is plenty of room for multiple retail platforms and lending platforms to coexist.”
I’m a firm believer in working closely with our print colleagues to reach the broadest possible audience for an author
However, there is still a way to go when it comes to reaching audiences old and young. She sees “an enormous opportunity” in the children’s audiobook business and stresses the importance of working with partners who “bring more stories to little ears in a kid-friendly way”. The Yoto and Tonies devices, for example, allow children as young as three years old to listen to audiobooks by inserting physical cards into the players. D’Acierno is “bullish on fast-growing alternative audio formats”, and says that these “provide a new way to consume audiobooks”.
When it comes to reaching adult readers, the emphasis is on “producing the audiobooks people want to listen to, with quality recordings that will keep them coming back for more”. D’Acierno’s goal is for all books to be available both in print and audio, and she says that there is still “plenty of room to grow” globally. “We’ve made huge progress towards that goal as a company and as an industry,” she adds, “but still have work to do and are actively looking to acquire more audio rights and to exercise those publishing rights in more languages.”
Digital marketing and social media have also expanded the publisher’s ability to connect with readers, and D’Acierno says that PRH Audio has allocated an “unmatched” level of resources to running advertising campaigns, developing its audio influencer programme and sharing content from recording studios with listeners.
The global president says that the growth in audio has not been at the expense of print sales, as the two “have grown in tandem”. She argues that audiobooks increase overall reading levels and that publishing titles in various formats unlocks access to time-poor readers who can listen to audiobooks while also going about their daily activities. “I’m a firm believer in working closely with our print colleagues on complementary promotional campaigns including all formats to reach the broadest possible audience for an author,” she explains.
D’Acierno will feature in a keynote interview at The Bookseller’s FutureBook Conference on 25th November. For more details, thebookseller.com/events/futurebook-conference
