As of May 1, Findaway Voices has eliminated its 20 percent distribution fee for audiobooks purchased on Spotify; authors will earn 50 percent of the list price they set. That means Spotify now offers the highest royalty authors can make when distributing their audiobooks via Findaway Voices. (Spotify acquired Findaway in 2022.) Learn more.
Not unrelated: Authors like Cory Doctorow and Brandon Sanderson have spoken out about Audible’s less-than-friendly terms for authors and have opted not to distribute there. Audible pays a lower royalty to indie authors who are not exclusive—25 percent versus 40 percent. It will be interesting to see how Audible reacts, if at all, to this very pointed attempt to attract authors to the Spotify platform. A press release from Spotify says, “We at Spotify are just at the beginning of our journey supporting independent authors—we have many plans for how to help authors expand their reach, maximize revenue, and ultimately build a strong audiobooks business. This update to Findaway Voices is one of the first steps in that journey.”
Jane Friedman has spent her entire career working in the publishing industry, with a focus on business reporting and author education. Established in 2015, her newsletter The Bottom Line provides nuanced market intelligence to thousands of authors and industry professionals; in 2023, she was named Publishing Commentator of the Year by Digital Book World.
Jane’s expertise regularly features in major media outlets such as The New York Times, The Atlantic, NPR, The Today Show, Wired, The Guardian, Fox News, and BBC. Her book, The Business of Being a Writer, Second Edition (The University of Chicago Press), is used as a classroom text by many writing and publishing degree programs. She reaches thousands through speaking engagements and workshops at diverse venues worldwide, including NYU’s Advanced Publishing Institute, Frankfurt Book Fair, and numerous MFA programs.
