Amazon is starting to engage in more synergy between the brands they own. An example of this is incorporating social book discovery site GoodReads into their complete line of modern Kindle e-Readers, so people can share and discover new e-books together. Today, Audible has announced that they are adding audiobooks into GoodReads and people can listen to samples and add audio titles into their GoodReads shelf.

The Goodreads “Listen” feature, which will be rolled out in the coming days. There are 180,000 free audio samples available and if you like what you hear, you can add the title to your “Want to Read” shelf. For Goodreads members in the U.S., U.K., France, Germany, or Australia who are not yet Audible members, you can take advantage of their free trial! Once you click on the Listen icon, you will see a link to the trial. Sign up and you’ll receive two free audiobooks plus a 30-day free trial of Audible.

Audible is the undisputed market leader in audiobook production and distribution. Matthew Thornton the Director of Communications at Audible told me that “Audible content includes over 180,000 audiobooks and other spoken-word programming from leading audiobook publishers, broadcasters, entertainers, magazine and newspaper publishers, and business information providers. Non-audiobook content includes lectures, meditations, language lessons, comedy and periodicals.” Audible has added 40,000 titles their store in 2014, a very slight increase versus 2013. In both 2013 and 2014, Audible Studios and ACX productions account for just about half of all titles added to the Audible storefront.

I think incorporating audiobooks into the GoodReads experience is good for users and will hopefully increase the adoption rate of audio across the board.

