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The Future of Media Advertising: CTV IS THE FUTURE, BUT LINEAR IS STILL A VIABLE MEDIUM

Media Partners Worldwide — Fri, 04 Aug 2023 18:17:28 +0000

In the rapidly evolving landscape of media advertising, connected TV (CTV) is undeniably the future. The US market has witnessed a remarkable shift in ad spending, with CTV ad spend surging by 21.2% year on year, while linear TV ad spend has contracted by 8.0%. This year alone, US CTV ad spend is projected to reach an impressive $25.09 billion, whereas linear TV will still account for a substantial $61.31 billion.

Analyst, Paul Verna, emphasized on a recent podcast that the future of CTV is already here, not years down the road. Despite the tremendous growth of CTV, linear TV continues to offer substantial value to advertisers.

Both linear and CTV formats have their advertising use cases, as US adults still spend a significant amount of time on both platforms: 2 hours and 55 minutes for linear TV and 1 hour and 55 minutes for CTV. Linear TV remains particularly valuable during major events such as the Olympics, the World Cup, and US elections, as it attracts a broader audience, including older demographics. Plus, the cpm pricing is a lot more attractive for Direct Response clients.

However, CTV holds great promise due to its expanding audience base and precise targeting potential. Advertisers don’t have to completely reinvent their marketing strategies when transitioning to CTV, as the basic creative units remain like traditional TV.

The current leaders in the US CTV ad market are Hulu, YouTube, and Roku, with respective spends of $3.63 billion, $2.89 billion, and $2.19 billion this year. Hulu’s prominent position can be attributed to its early adoption of the ad-supported model. YouTube is also gaining ground as 45% of its viewership now occurs on TV screens, indicating a shift from smartphones to CTV. Advertisers should consider YouTube as a crucial platform for TV advertising.

While the CTV ad spend leaderboard might not experience significant shifts, new players are entering the ad-supported space. Disney+ and Netflix introduced ad-supported tiers last year, and though they are expected to become major players, building up their ad businesses will take time. Additionally, Amazon is contemplating an ad tier for Prime Video, which could lead to a surge in CTV ad spend as brands seek to leverage Amazon’s retail media data. Furthermore, free ad-supported TV platforms like Amazon’s Freevee are experiencing growth in viewership and content offerings.

In conclusion, while CTV unquestionably represents the future of media advertising, advertisers should not disregard linear TV from their media mix. Both formats offer unique advantages and cater to different audiences, making a balanced approach essential for a successful advertising strategy in this dynamic media landscape.

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The Benefits of Social Media Ads

Media Partners Worldwide — Wed, 11 Jan 2023 23:37:45 +0000

As a company, we deliver leads for ERTC and tax clients through TikTok’s platform, so we understand the power of social media. Many business owners use Google to advertise their business through monetized adverts that are added to their business pages or websites, to make money per click. However, there is a new market in the advertising world that takes the form of social media. Whether you are savvy at advertising and you know the benefits of social media, or you are considering efforts to diversify your advertising campaigns, here are five reasons to consider pivoting your efforts to other advertising channels.

More Customer Reach

The key difference between ad-centric data like Google ads is understanding how the target demographic is measured. For example, there are keyword-centered ads, which rely on a click, and the idea of intent. That is, the customer is responsible for making their interest known– intent.

Social media advertising on platforms such as TikTok, Facebook, and Instagram, are based on demographics and the interests, likes and dislikes of the user. One of the biggest benefits of this type of advertising is that your product can target new users, so even if someone has never heard of your product or service, the simple introduction to it might draw attention, and the user will see some sort of advantage to your product being implemented into their lives.

Cost Effective

Whether you are just starting out in your advertising journey or you’re a seasoned professional just seeking a quick ad on socials, social media advertising can be a solution that makes your bank account happy. While having a bigger spending budget is ideal for optimization and traffic increases, it isn’t completely necessary. For comparison, Pinterest is the most low-cost option, with $0.13 per click for a smaller ad-campaign, while LinkedIn tends to run on the more expensive side. Deciding which one is right for you comes down to where your business is at in terms of budget and in terms of traffic, given that LinkedIn tends to have the most B2B pay off which will help you generate more leads and reach a larger audience. Hence its heftier price tag.

Gain Insight on Consumer Audience

Perhaps one of the most innovative things about social media advertising is the ability to pair your demographic insights and knowledge with the built-in software that accompanies these platforms. Social media platforms have a wider net, giving you the ability to target as many people as you need in a myriad of ways that coincide with your advertising goals. By implementing this method of performance metrics, and analyzing your demographic by age, gender, region, and even devices they use, you can then realign your ad campaigns to better support the audience that you are seeking to influence.

For example, Facebook has its own advertising hub that provides details down to the user’s relationship status, which can then help you streamline the goal of your product ad in a way that is authentic to your product and business. Although if you are seeking a more interactive approach, Instagram story ads provide a feature that includes a poll option, which allows a user to interact directly with your business. This assists you in understanding the audience members pain points when it comes to how they feel about a certain product or service, or even your ad performance in general. It also helps make the customer feel like they are a direct, important piece of your business puzzle.

Format Options

One of the prime benefits of social media advertising is the many format options that you can choose from. Social media offers endless creative license over how you show up as an advertiser and as a business owner. There is really no end to what you can do because there is a method for whatever tact you choose. Perhaps the coolest thing about the platform options is the ability to choose long-form or short-form content, rectangular or square space, or even colorful versus black and white.

The most important thing is that you use your ad space as a type of real estate investment, a digital investment, that is. Short form video content as well as social media story platforms like Instagram and Facebook provide easily digestible, bite-sized content pieces that do not overwhelm the audience and make the perfect case for a product or business.

Not only do you have an endless number of options to work with, but you also can make your ad space unique and singular to the content you want to push out, digitally and socially.

Crush Your Goals

With advertising, particularly on social media, you may have different goals, and those goals may align with different campaigns. Whether you are seeking to drive traffic to your website, increase app use or drive e-commerce sales, you are essentially guaranteed visibility through any channel you choose.

A method that is prevalent in today’s advertising is funneling through conversion. Whatever the campaign is, you can choose to funnel it to a certain type of conversion. For example, converting traffic into sales, and clicks into website traffic. If you are running an ecommerce store and want to entice people to add to their cart, you can select that as an option before the campaign goes live.

But always make sure that your creative ad copy aligns with what you want your target audience to pay attention to that day, or even for that week. Streamlining every part of your marketing strategy will save you time and energy and yield the results you want.

The advertising ecosystem is one of the most open in terms of your ability to diversify your marketing strategy, and in turn diversify your audience and increase engagement. The key is finding the right platform for you and not being swayed by one or the other simply due to popularity or ease of access. Each platform can yield successful results if you figure out a way to utilize it that will not only benefit your business aesthetically, but also fiscally.

Ready to get started with social media advertising? Contact Media Partners Worldwide today!

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How To Build an Effective Influencer Campaign for Your Niche Business

Media Partners Worldwide — Tue, 16 Jun 2020 07:04:49 +0000

How To Build an Effective Influencer Campaign for Your Niche Business

Influencer campaigns have grown more popular in recent years and continue to increase in use. The reason? They work. Whatever your target market is, there are influencers who can help you reach a greater audience — and this is especially true in niche businesses. Whatever niche your business is in, you can find people online who are interested and involved in it. The thought leaders and trendsetters creating content within each niche become influencers who attract a following on blogs, social media, and podcasts. When you partner with niche influencers, they create content around your brand for their followers. They promote your business to people who are already interested in your niche — your target market.

Why Influencer Campaigns Work for Niche Businesses

The reason influencer marketing works is that when it comes to making purchases, people tend to look for recommendations from people they know — even people they may only know online, like those they follow on social media. There’s a level of trust that influencers have built with their audience, and 88% of people trust online reviews by others. Who better to recommend a product or service than someone who is interested in the same niche? It’s like word-of-mouth advertising, amplified and targeted.

Our experience has shown that influencer marketing is cost-effective and has a great ROI. The average earned media value per dollar is $5.78. That’s why most digital marketers are planning an influencer campaign this year, including niche businesses. Sales and marketing professionals have found that influencer marketing is as effective or better than other forms of marketing, according to 89% of marketers.

Create a Plan for Your Influencer Campaign

The first step in an influencer campaign is like other marketing campaigns: Set goals. What do you want your niche influencer campaign to accomplish — more followers, more sales, better awareness? Plan out what your company will achieve by working with an influencer in your niche.

While creating your plan, be sure to look at what other companies in your industry are doing with their influencer campaigns. What have competitors done in the influencer space? How will your campaign stand out from what they have already done?

How to Find the Right Influencers

With your influencer campaign plan in place, the next step is to look for people who can help you achieve your goals. You could follow social media hashtags, research Facebook group administrators, and use paid tools to scope out influencers. Or you can let Media Partners Worldwide match you with our portfolio of vetted influencers. Whether you’re looking for one specific influencer or celebrity, or a carefully chosen group of micro-influencers, we can connect you to the most influential people in your niche.

When it comes to niche businesses, in many cases working with micro-influencers is most effective. Micro influencers don’t have millions of followers — they typically have 1,000 to 40,000 followers — because they create content around such a targeted niche. However, micro influencers tend to have better engagement because their followers are extremely interested in the niche and tend to be more loyal. So keep in mind the most popular people on social media aren’t necessarily the ones you want to partner with.

Measure Influencer Campaign Success

As with other campaigns, you need a way to check your metrics to determine how effective your campaign is, and what your ROI is. Work with Media Partners Worldwide to make tracking seamless. We will create a unique link, UTM code, or discount code to track where your campaign traffic comes from. We measure clicks, impressions, engagement, and other metrics to give you the data you need to gauge your marketing efforts.

Media Partners Worldwide has a team of knowledgeable, experienced professionals who bring proven success to your influencer campaign. Influencer marketing has been a part of our strategy in helping clients get results. Our expertise with influencers to promote niche brands helps you reach your marketing goals. We can take care of all aspects of an influencer marketing campaign. Please contact us to discuss your goals for your niche business.

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Podcasts: Who’s Tuning In and Why Should I Care?

Media Partners Worldwide — Mon, 01 Jun 2020 07:37:39 +0000

Podcasts have become an increasingly pervasive part of American culture. More and more people are tuning in to their podcast of choice over their PC, tablet, smartphone or home assistant.

It looks like this trend is here to stay, so the question for many companies is: How can podcasts be effectively incorporated into marketing strategy? The following information will discuss some outstanding podcast-related statistics, and how businesses can leverage these insights to their advantage.

How Popular are Podcasts?

The simple answer is: very popular. Over the past several years, the number of monthly podcast listeners has grown at an explosive rate. As of this writing, 55% of the U.S. population has listened to a podcast, and 24% (in other words, almost 70 million people) listen on a weekly basis. Moreover, experts predict that the number of active podcast listeners in the United States is expected to reach approximately 132 million by the year 2022.

Who Listens to Podcasts?

The reality is that just about every age demographic (with the exception of children aged 11 and younger) contains a significant share of podcast listeners. Research indicates that individuals in the age range between 20 and 40 make up the majority of avid fans; however, a sizable percentage of senior citizens (aged 55 or older) also regularly tune in.

Furthermore, the popularity of podcasts is growing across all age groups. For instance, from 2017 to 2019 the number of monthly listeners aged 12-24 jumped from 27% to 40% — a major increase!

Which Podcast Genres are Most Popular?

With over 1 million distinct podcasts on the market, there’s no end to the niche topics that are being covered within the industry. Nevertheless, the 4 most popular podcast genres, among both casual and avid fans, are:

Music
TV and movies
Comedy
Technology

The “Kids and Family” genre takes the 5th spot among casual fans, while “Games and Hobby” podcasts are the 5th most popular genre among “avid fans” (i.e., listeners that consider themselves extremely interested in a certain subject).

Examples of popular podcasts in the above-mentioned categories, as well as other genres, include Mogul, Dissect, The Televerse, The Hawkins Report, This American Life, and TED Radio Hour.

When Do Consumers Listen?

A large share of light users (casual listeners) follow podcasts at home, or during their work commute. On the other hand, heavy users tend to listen to podcasts anytime they are away from home. In both cases, a high percentage of listeners tune in during their transit to work, whether that’s in their car, on a bus, or on the subway.

How Can Businesses Leverage Podcast-Related Insights?

There are several ways that companies can turn the above-mentioned data points into actionable insights to grow their business. For example:

Companies can target genres with the widest appeal. Unless a company offers a product specifically designed for a niche audience, organization leaders should explore ad placement on podcasts that are popular among their consumer base, such as those in a particular genre of music.
Marketers can tailor ads according to light vs. heavy usage. If most of the company’s target demographic falls within the “light user” category, then the marketing team may want to publish short, attention-grabbing advertisements. On the other hand, if they are targeting heavy users then they may be better served by generating longer commercials.
Business can target specific consumer segments with relatable messaging. For example, since so many podcast listeners consume this form on media on their morning commute, many companies may be able to spin their marketing message to play on commute-related pain points (e.g., heavy traffic, long wait times, sleepiness, and so on).

Many advertisers are using podcasts to increase brand awareness and build their consumer base. For example, Blue Apron has partnered with Adam Carolla to promote their product on his podcast. Sling Media has seen engagement rates from podcast ads 2 to 3 times greater than radio spots. The Great Courses, a series distributed by The Teaching Company, has leveraged “baked-in” ads on podcasts like Malcolm Gladwell’s Revisionist History.

An estimated 75% of listeners not only pay attention to podcast ads, but also follow specific calls to action after hearing them. That being the case, many advertisers have found that targeted ad campaigns on popular podcasts is a clear path to marketing success.

Podcasts in the Time of Coronavirus

How have podcasts fared since mid-March, when COVID-19 first broke out on a global scale? In some sectors, podcast listenership actually went down when the first “stay at home” orders were enacted. For example, analytics firm Chartable showed a 10% month over month decrease in downloads from February to March for their participating podcasts.

However, other sectors have seen massive gains. In Italy as a whole, there’s been a 10% increase in podcast listening. In the United States podcasts about television and entertainment, like 2 Black Girls, 1 Rose, have seen a major influx in subscribers.

Advertisers are changing their marketing tactics to account for listeners’ changing habits, and the “new normal.” In fact, 92% of the Association of National Advertisers’ members say that they’ve adjusted their creative messaging strategy since mid-March.

Many advertising firms are using direct CTAs when the screen is in view, and more subtle, story-oriented ads for when listeners may be multi-tasking (e.g., working out, cooking, and so forth). They are also using carefully selected phrasing in their ads; for instance, they may avoid such terms as “sick beats” or “going viral.” Some elect to not even mention COVID-19 by name.

Whether things go back to normal sooner or later, the bottom line is that podcasts are here to stay, and they will no doubt continue to grow in reach and popularity in the years to come. With some planning and effort, you can take advantage of this trend and promote the growth of your business.

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What Does Corona Virus Mean for Advertising?

Media Partners Worldwide — Tue, 17 Mar 2020 19:33:14 +0000

We have lived through Swine Flu, Ebola, SARS, and now Corona Virus. What makes Corona Virus unique is the fact that it is officially a pandemic. The point of this article is not to spread fear (there is enough of that) or tell you what you already know. The point of this article is to talk about what this means for the advertising and marketing community.

We see that the stock market is down. This is a reflection of the significantly reduced economic activity. People are stocking up on essentials and trying to stay home as much as possible. Restaurants are offering take-out and delivery only, if not closing doors completely. Major metropolitan cities are implementing city-wide lock downs, closing bars and other places where large groups of people are gathering. Many large companies are having their employees work from home until further notice. Students are transitioning to online classes.

The question that marketers are constantly asking is, “Where is my audience?” This question is relevant now more than ever. Audiences are shifting and the way the general population is operating has changed almost overnight. So, what does an increase in remote workers mean for advertisers? It just means that our audience is in a different place!

Nielsen Scarborough USA+ reports 90% of Americans working from home listen to AM/FM radio. People are clinging to any sense of normalcy they can find nowadays. Listening to radio can provide this sense of comfort, that things aren’t completely upside down.

“AM/FM radio is the soundtrack of the American worker regardless of where they sit,” Chief Insights Officer at Cumulus Media & Westwood One, Pierre Bouvard, states. Share of listening studies see at work listening at 68%. This number jumps up to 75% at home. This study was conducted on people 18 and up in age during 2019.

An interesting insight seen in this table is the drop in engagement on other platforms at home. This can be attributed to people having other services on in the background.

A recent MARU/Matchbox report shows “…only half of at-home Pandora and Spotify listeners can actually hear the ads.” On the other hand, AM/FM radio ads are heard 83% of the time from at home listeners.

Data from smart speakers shows the prominence of radio listening. AM/FM radio is the number one activity in terms of share of time spent, holding 24% of the share. This is 60% larger than Amazon Music’s 15% share.

NuVoodoo came out with a very recent study showing the consumption trend for radio as Americans tune in for more updates on the pandemic. The study shows 27% of those surveyed claim they are listening to radio more during the pandemic and 37% say they are using it for local market updates.

So, what’s the take away? The take away is that your audience is still there! Engaged now more than ever!

Communicate how your product/services will be augmented in accordance with the pandemic where your audience is actually listening. The key here will be to frame how your brand can help.

Call us for great deals on remnant so we can help you realign your brand get back in touch with the world during these turbulent times. 562-439-3900

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Messenger Marketing: Why It’s Hot

Media Partners Worldwide — Thu, 12 Mar 2020 19:08:18 +0000

Mobile messaging is not a new technology or practice. We’ve all been doing it for years now. However, recent applications of its use in commerce has shown compelling reasons to think about implementing messenger marketing in your mix.

1. Popularity

Messaging used in business is becoming more common everyday. Why? Well, 87% of the global population engages in chat messaging of some sort. Over 100 billion messages pass through Facebook products everyday. To capture this huge volume of conversation, more than 40 million companies across the world leverage Messenger on Facebook. Click-to-Messenger ads on Facebook are one of the fastest growing advertising products that Facebook offers.

2. Intuitiveness

It just feels natural. Messaging is how people communicate with almost everyone. Friends, family, coworkers, etc. Why wouldn’t they want to communicate with businesses in the same way? Messaging is quick and flexible. 64% of people would rather message than call a company. 60% claim to be open to receiving personalized messages from companies.

What’s more is people already have the apps necessary to receive and send messages! There is additional friction regarding app download, new interface, or extra notifications. This convenience and familiarity makes it easy for brands to talk to their market through messaging apps. Canadian airline, WestJet, implemented a new chat bot for Messenger which resulted in a 24% positive sentiment lift as well as increased WestJet’s message capacity by five times.

3. Immediacy

One of the biggest advantages is that the communication is in real time. This is particularly powerful for industries like travel and hospitality. People can get flight notifications, hotel check-in updates, ask urgent questions, and make changes. All on the go. KLM airlines leveraged WhatsApp by sending booking confirmations, flight updates, and gate details to their thousands of passengers and their friends and family.

4. Scale-able Communication

Advances in natural language programming and artificial intelligence have made bots more intelligent and user-centric. This leads to companies being able to cater to many different customer needs simultaneously. GlobeAir, a private jet chartering company, used WhatsApp to improve its customers’ experience with the brand and smooth out peak business period demand which customer query fulfillment time by 33%.

5. Personalized Engagement

When artificial intelligence meets chat, companies can deliver information and promotions to individuals at scale. Studies cite that 91% of consumers are more likely to buy from companies who remember them and provide personalized offers. The other side of the coin is the sheer amount of time savings. Automated chat allows brands to do more with that freed up time. Singapore based resort, Marina Bay, harnesses the power of chat to accommodate basic requests and give recommendations. This allows the staff to tend to more complex issues or provide a more personal touch to others.

To wrap up, the popularity, ease, speed, scale, and personalization of messaging is great for companies that provide a service such as hospitality and travel. However, having a personal messaging mechanism set up does not guarantee automatic success. A Spectrm study of 242 brands revealed that 45% did not respond within 5 days of being messaged. Similarly, many brands are not providing bots with support staff for complex queries they cannot handle. For chat to be effective, it must be smart and responsive. With proper execution, chat can be one of the most powerful tools that brands leverage.

Give us a call to talk about what chat marketing could mean for your brand! 562-439-3900

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Is Your Target Audience Feeling Tech-Fatigue?

Media Partners Worldwide — Tue, 03 Mar 2020 19:45:35 +0000

All great things come to an end. Even the hyper-connected tech savvy consumer will eventually get tired of being on their phone constantly. A recent study from iHeartRadio sheds light on media consumption trends.

The results highlight the effects of “tech-fatigue”. This refers to consumers scaling back phone usage. This means less opportunities to reach your audience.

1. Digital Detox

The digital detox trend, coupled with data privacy and malware fears has made the mobile advertiser’s life difficult. 64% of participants in the study reduced their daily phone usage from 5 hours to 4 hours in the span of 14 months. That is a 20% drop in phone usage.

2. Broadcast Radio is Unaffected by Digital Detox

The listening rates for AM/FM radio have remained constant over the past 5 years. 90% of listeners have listened to the radio at the same consumption level, if not more.

3. Broadcast Radio Gets More Time Than Social Media

This one may be a bit hard to believe, but that doesn’t make it any less true. The average daily time spent per adult (18+) in the U.S. on radio is 102 minutes and 51 minutes on social media. Radio gets twice as much engagement time than social media.

The moral of the story is to prevent your campaign from being hurt by trends such as tech fatigue. Having radio in your marketing mix ensures reach, scale, and reliability.

Call us today for great deals on radio spots! 562-439-3900

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5 Ways to Generate Leads for Small Business

Media Partners Worldwide — Mon, 21 Oct 2019 20:28:44 +0000

5 Ways to Generate Leads for Small Businesses

As small business owners know, there are many challenges to be faced when starting your own company. One of those obstacles is generating leads. Finding the unique way to attract people to your business requires strategy, patience, and creativity.
Here are 5 ways to engage potential customers and get them on the path of eventually buying your product or service.
1. Strong Branding
Customers love authentic companies who are strong with their message and consistent with their content. Millennials are typically more likely to support a brand if they feel they are reliable. (Check out our blog on millennials here!) So, don’t try and be everything to everyone.
Keep your brand strong by having a clear definition of who you are and maintain this definition throughout your content, visuals, and products.
2. Newsletter
If you don’t have a newsletter, you are missing out on ample opportunities to engage with potential customers. Make sure you put a newsletter sign up in every possible place that makes sense on your website.
Email campaigns are a great way to fight your way through the internet noise and be seen. Create your newsletters to include industry news, product announcements, and insights from your company. For more tips, check out our post on email marketing here.
3. Blogs
Nowadays, most reliable companies have a blog. It allows your company complete control of what is said on your niche topic and it also allows opportunities to have the undivided attention of your reader.
Create posts with statistics and credible information to authenticate your brand and allow your readers to learn. Give it real value and don’t make it all about you. Of course, there will be room to promote your product or service. But foremost, relay engaging information and join conversations that are prevalent in your field.
4. Networking at Events
Don’t forget about the real world in this predominately digital market. By going to events, you will meet people, expand your network and gain referrals.
Bring business cards and put yourself out there. Even if the event doesn’t directly pertain to your business, go anyway as it can bring about valuable contacts and leads.
5. Offers
You want to get potential customers to visit your website and an offer is a great way to do that. But keep in mind, that the offer must have enough value to a visitor to merit providing their personal information in exchange for access to it. An example of this would be creating an ebook on something prevalent and informative to your niche, or a special coupon code that offers a discount if the customers provide their email address.
Then you can use this information to send out your newsletter or latest blog post via email, which will keep your customers coming back for more.

Once you put all these elements together, you will establish brand awareness, connect with the potential customer and find what strategy works best for your company.
For more information on lead generation or how to market your small business, contact us here at Media PartnersWorldwide via phone (562) 439-3900 or email [email protected]

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Five Podcast Myths Debunked

Media Partners Worldwide — Fri, 08 Apr 2016 23:56:20 +0000

By Gregory Galant

Reposted by: Clayton Gibson “Thou shalt podcast” seems to be the message handed down to marketers by new media pundits nowadays. It’s true that podcasting and advertising in podcasts holds a lot of promise for marketers. But this opportunity can easily be missed because of many of the myths out there, leading to doomed-from-the-start experiments in podcasting or lack of experimentation due to fear of the unknown. Let’s dispel the top five myths of podcasting and podcast advertising so we can focus on the facts. Myth #1: There’s a huge incentive to fast forward ads If you choose to place your ad or sponsor message in an existing podcast, will it simply be skipped? After all, Steve Jobs last year called podcasting “TiVo for radio,” emphasizing its on-demand nature. TiVo, of course, gives all us marketers nightmares of couch potatoes with their hand on the remote just waiting to skip the next commercial break. Podcast users are no couch potatoes. For audio podcasting, listeners set the iPod to their favorite show, then put their hands back on the wheel if they’re driving, mouse if they’re multitasking or treadmill if they’re exercising. It’s simply not worth it to fast forward a short, interstitial ad for most people. Even if they do have their hand on the dial, ads in podcasts can be made relevant, short and tasteful because of the niche and opt-in nature of the medium, removing the incentive to fast-forward that audiences have in mass media. Myth #2: You can’t know the profile of a podcast’s listeners or viewers You don’t need to hack into Apple’s database to know who’s using a podcast. Most podcasts have focused content that gives you a pretty clear concept of who’s tuned in. Many podcasters have been quite successful at getting their audience to fill out demographic surveys. Every single media file download can be tracked to determine where people are downloading from and what type of software they’re using to access the podcast. More and more podcasts even have community functionality on their websites that allow for profiling of users. The $20-billion terrestrial radio ad market still relies on diaries kept by a small handful of individuals. Podcasting offers a level of measurability unprecedented in similar forms of media. Myth #3: There are an abundance of phantom downloaders inflating statistics As podcasting gained steam, savvy marketers were quick to ask a very important question: “If people can subscribe to podcasts and get new episodes automatically downloaded by iTunes, won’t there be a lot of people who subscribe but don’t listen?” These non-listening and non-viewing subscribers would be phantom downloaders, and indeed would be a huge menace to anyone who uses podcasting as a marketing tool. Luckily our friend in Cupertino came to the rescue and put the kibosh on phantom downloaders. iTunes by default will stop downloading a podcast if the user doesn’t access one of the podcast’s last several media files. This means if someone subscribes to a podcast but doesn’t listen to it or view it, they won’t be a subscriber for long. Not only is podcasting opt-in, but it requires an ongoing commitment to stay opted in. Myth #4: Creating an effective podcast is cheap and easy Anyone can produce a podcast for next to nothing in cost. In your basement, you can use a $15 mike and open source software to launch your very own podcast. Okay, maybe a $15 mike is a little on the cheap side, but with only a few hundred dollars’ worth of equipment you can achieve pretty good audio quality. So if it’s so cheap to produce your own podcast, why not launch one today? iTunes is flooded with failed podcasts produced by marketers who ignored the two “c”s of podcasting: content and consistency. It’s easy to write out a script for a podcast pitching what your company does and have someone read it into a microphone. But who’d want to listen to that? Creating compelling audio or video content isn’t easy. It requires you to have great talent working in a dynamic format that entertains and informs users. And if you can do that perfectly only one time, you’re in trouble. A successful podcast builds audience over a series of consistently good episodes. Myth #5: You need to do distribution deals for a podcast Many podcast companies include in their pitch that they’ll give you some kind of unique and ill-defined “distribution” for your podcast. Don’t buy it. At least for now, all of the meaningful podcast distribution is free. As long as your media files are properly formatted and your RSS feed includes the right tags, you can get your podcast listed in iTunes and in all of the podcast directories that matter. Conclusion It’s easy to define what’s not true about podcasting (I’ve managed to do it in the number of words iMedia allotted me), but fully capturing podcasting’s true potential as a marketing tool in a brief article is impossible. While there are lots of success stories in podcast advertising, there’s still room for much more creativity and innovation in the medium. Now that we’ve got our facts straight, it’s time to explore the opportunities podcasting offers. Read more at http://www.imediaconnection.com/content/11221.asp#87rBJMeJqMIlbu2e.99]]>

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