What is podcast advertising?

November 6th, 2009

At this month’s NETexponent town hall meeting we were fortunate enough to receive a lesson in podcast advertising from our in-office expert Syed Mohammed of online media agency Performance Bridge.  Syed has been a pioneer in podcast advertising, managing podcast campaigns for nearly three years.  He manages hundreds of placements in leading podcasts each month for a variety of advertisers.

 

In his presentation, Syed opened by splitting audio content into three categories-1. Podcasts 2. Internet radio and 3. Live-streaming digital radio. For the purpose of this tutorial, we’ll address only the relevant podcast advertising portion of his presentation.

 

Working with podcasts affords advertisers more flexibility compared to the other types of online audio content.  For one thing, podcast advertising uses customized advertising execution where advertisers can have product shout-outs (product name mentions) during the show or have hosts personally endorse the product and product placement. This kind of advertising gives the podcaster and advertisers the ability to place the product in the most appropriate area of the show.

 

As far as entertainment content, podcasts and podcast advertisements can accommodate talk radio style banter and quizzes or competitions.  For the convenience of listeners that want to continue on to the sponsors’ websites, podcasters can post accompanying text links in the show notes or banners. For comparison, live streaming audio is similar in advertisement opportunities, as it offers advertisers the chance to recruit host endorsements, product placement and pre-roll, post-roll and interstitial advertisements.

 

The advantage of podcast advertising

There is one serious pro of podcast advertising; because of the requirements placed on the audience to download and play the podcast (versus simply stumbling upon a radio broadcast), listeners are conspicuously more loyal to the podcaster and receptive of his or her messages.  As a result, the podcaster can engage the audience better.

 

How to track podcast advertising

Advertisers can track the success of the promotions through some of the typical avenues; they can utilize third party tracking systems or provide a custom URL at the end of the podcast instead of generic URLs.  This should be made convenient for the listener, however.  For example, instead of adding on to an existing domain, a shorter more memorable domain should be utilized- something like NETexponent.com/podcast.  You can also track all click activity and conversion activity from that URL via an Ad-server tag.  Finally, by offering a simple unique coupon code during a podcast, advertisers can track which podcasts are driving sales as well.

 

This is just a brief run-through of the knowledge Syed bestowed upon us, and we were all very grateful for the lesson.

Posted in Online Marketing by Alex W. | | 0 Comments