Audible devotees are getting better acquainted with their listening habits, thanks to January’s launch of #AudibleStats in the Audible app. The annual wrap-up offers fun insights, such as the customer’s top genre, author and narrator, and which day of the year they spent the longest listening. With the hyper-personalized feature, “we’re able to say ‘this is who you are as a listener,’ and can really let each person’s accomplishments shine through,” says Rich Allen-Page, Director, Global Outbound Strategy, whose team, Global Marketing Operations, helps to produce #AudibleStats.

Rich first joined Audible in 2018, leaving a career in banking and finance. He wanted to have more fun in his role and work with a brand whose goals were meaningfully tied to customers. “I wanted the runway to innovate and make things happen,” he says.  Citing our People Principle, “Articulate the Possible and Move Fast to Make it Real,” Rich says, “I love being able to have a conversation with someone about an idea, and saying, ‘Let’s figure out how to make it happen right now.’ Audible allows me to be that person.”

As soon as he came aboard, Rich noticed the stats email had a great deal of potential and could be an opportunity to engage with customers about their listening behaviors. At the time, stats were only emailed at the end of the year and included total listening time, number of titles, and top genre. He onboarded a third-party vendor specializing in email personalization and eventually rolled out listening stats quarterly, drawing upon even more data points to deliver insights that customers would find interesting and enlightening.

Rich says that the stats they choose to include are not there to “compare you with other listeners—everyone is on their own journey.” Rather the goal is “to get you excited about your listening and to encourage you to keep going. They’re in the spirit of exploration and self-discovery, and to help you kickstart your listening year.” 

The year-end wrap up work really kicks off in the summer, with Rich’s team and our Growth Marketing team working in tandem with several others across Audible, such as Global Customer Experience Creative, Global Marketing Operations, Product and Tech, Social Creative and Global Social, to evolve the stats feature and ensure it offers the most value possible. In 2023, the teams launched a quarterly stats email, plus a new push notification in December that let Audible users know (if they had opted to receive push notifications) how their stats were looking with just one month left to go. 

Now, thanks to the team’s collective efforts, Audible is also able to share with our social networks some fascinating insights about an entire market’s listening habits. For instance, in the US, the top Audible Originals for 2024 were 1984, Mad Love, and A Murder to Remember, with the top three genres being sci-fi/fantasy, literature and fiction, and mystery/suspense. France’s listeners learned that their top genres also included YA; in Italy, bios and memoirs appear in the top three; and in India, titles about business and careers were among the most listened to.

To show each listener how they’re part of something bigger, Audible also shares the world’s collective listening stats. “Two years ago we were almost at 4 billion hours of listening,” Rich reports. “Last year, we were able to say we were over 4 billion hours of listening, and for 2024, we were at over 5 billion hours of listening worldwide. The stats help us say, ‘You’re a piece of this puzzle and helped contribute to this huge achievement and community.’”

As for Rich’s own stats, he says, “It’s all kids’ listens. My daughter can’t fall asleep without Audible!” His app is largely commandeered by his young daughter, who uses the Kids Profile to listen to titles like Disney Frozen: Olaf’s Quest or Legend of Sleepy Hollow, both recent additions to Audible’s offering from Disney Press. “She thinks I make the books,” he laughs, “so she asks me to rewrite the scarier parts.”