By Supantha Mukherjee

STOCKHOLM, (Reuters) – Spotify (NYSE:), plans to recruit hundreds of people to help boost its advertising revenue in Europe and abroad. The music streaming company is looking to grow its revenues from those customers who pay no monthly fees but still make up the majority of its users.

In an interview, Lee Brown, Spotify’s Head of Advertising Business, stated that the company is increasing its ads marketing team by more than 70% in Europe and Australia.

“We are investing in advertising. “Advertising is no longer a 10% share of our total revenue. I believe that this strategy will be a more long-term one.”

Brown stated that Spotify also has a 25-year-old international executive in the ad business to manage international sales. However, he didn’t give his name.

After being affected by the pandemic, the company’s advertising revenue, including paid subscriptions, and disseminating advertisements to non-paying customers, has seen its business grow again.

Of the total 365,000,000 monthly active users, around 12% is ad-supported.

Morningstar analyst said that an advertisement not only generates revenue but lowers costs as it results in fewer songs being played which, in turn leads to lower royalties.

An increase in podcast content (Spotify had 2.9 million podcasts at the end of the second quarter, an increase of nearly 12% over the three previous months) has helped to boost ad revenues. Podcasts draw in more people and allow for more ads.

It is planning to expand its tools for advertisers and make Megaphone, the company’s podcast publishing and advertising platform, available in Germany and France.

Last year, Spotify bought Megaphone. It allows podcasters to make ads for their programmes and receive income. The platform currently hosts around a third the 200 most popular shows on Spotify (NASDAQ)

Spotify has spent hundreds of million to expand its podcasting business. Apple launched paid podcast subscriptions earlier in the year, increasing competition for Spotify.

The Swedish company is expected https://www.emarketer.com/content/spotify-pandora-lead-us-audio-listeners to overtake Apple in podcast listeners for the first time this year, according to research firm eMarketer.