
Podcast Advertising: What We Learned - jger15
https://ahrefs.com/blog/podcast-advertising/
======
perlgeek
I listen to quite a few podcasts, and I'm increasingly annoyed by ads being
repeated word for word in each episode.

There are two podcasts that do things a bit differently, which I enjoy more:

* [https://risky.biz/](https://risky.biz/) has short-ish interviews with the sponsors that focus not only on the product, but often on the market, insights that the advertiser gained from analytics that their products gather etc.

* [https://www.acquired.fm/](https://www.acquired.fm/) has 30s spots where they ask their advertiser one question, which gives the advertiser the option to show off some special knowledge in their area, but can also be interesting to the listener. And a different question each episode.

I'd love to get some metrics on how those approaches compare to the
traditional 30s to 60s ad reads (in terms of conversion).

~~~
halflings
The most unique ad readings are probably Bill Burr's, on his Monday Morning
podcast.

He would often read the copy sent to him by companies advertising, criticize
their terrible writing or the product itself... and he's not faking it either,
as he often loses these advertisers. (but it's Bill Burr! so not running out
of advertisers any time soon)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UlBreqGEQ70](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UlBreqGEQ70)

~~~
jiscariot
The Sherry's Berries reads were hilarious. It sounds like they were annoyed
with the first read, but came around to his style as they kept re-up'ing.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PMLn57oS9Yk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PMLn57oS9Yk)

------
AndrewKemendo
What I hoped would come through was something like:

ROI for that spend was XYZ. LTV for user acquisition was ABC compared to
Adwords/FB/print etc...

Is 129 signups good compared to other efforts? Are inbound leads from podcasts
more engaged or higher likelihood to pay than other channels?

I'm not sure what the value here is, other than saying something like "don't
spend advertising money in an ad channel if you're unfamiliar with the details
of the ad channel"

 _My main takeaway: it’s not always all about measurable ROI.If you look in
the right places, you’re likely to see some other kind of magic at work._

Sounds like good advice if you want to waste ad money, even considering the
"half of all advertising money is wasted..." koan. At the end of the day this
"magic" has to turn into measurable ROI.

~~~
HillaryBriss
yeah, i was looking for something like that too.

also, thank you for saying "waste ad money" instead of "waste ad spend". (some
people think it's a good idea to use "spend" as a noun. i wish i knew why. it
sounds idiotic.)

~~~
yazr
Are we ok with buying compute on AWS ?

~~~
HillaryBriss
ha! ya got me.

imho, "compute" is ok if a true technical person or nerd says it because it
makes them sound cooler. and they usually need as much coolness as possible.

but ad people use "spend" to make it sound like they have a specialized,
impenetrably cool language, one which alienates and excludes the rest of us.
but, the thing is, ad people are already cooler than the rest of us. that's
how they got their job in the first place. also "spend" is a dumb choice for
that because anyone can guess what it means.

that's my lame theory and i'm pretty sure no one else buys it.

------
daveFNbuck
It's very weird that the article starts by saying that the writer had never
listened to a podcast and ends without ever mentioning listening to a podcast.
You'd think when spending $50k on advertising in 6 podcasts, you'd at least
spend the 3 hours to listen to an episode of each one to better understand
what you're doing.

~~~
johnmorrow
Step 5: “Enjoy the shows when they air. Keep in touch to answer any final
questions along the way.”

She pretty clearly said she listened to the podcasts she sponsored

~~~
daveFNbuck
I guess I missed that. I read it originally as being more about enjoying the
results of the airing rather than listening to the actual show.

There's still no mention of listening to a podcast before paying them money or
why this would be important in creating an effective ad. I really expected
this to be one of the main points.

------
iambateman
One of the podcasts that does sponsorships best is the Fantasy Footballers
Podcast.

Every week they have a branded segment called “Pump the Brakes with O’Reilly
Auto Parts”. To intro the segment they sing “O O O O’reilly Auto parts” and
then keep going with the segment.

I’m surprised more shows don’t do branded segments...I always skip the 2
minute ad segments, but I sure know about O’reilly.

P.s. remember 2 years ago when every single podcast was sponsored by
Squarespace? I’m glad that the market has grown a bit since then.

~~~
lozaning
It like 100% ziprecruiter now.

------
snackbugs
I have this nagging belief that advertisers know well that nobody in this
generation wants to be advertised to, and that ads generally don't work as a
direct call to action. Something that allowing podcasters to loosely do ad
reads achieves is a small sense of authenticity.

This seems to fit in nicely with the assertion that they know people dislike
ads; when a podcaster stiffly or sarcastically reads an ad and throws in a
side comment, the ad-averse listener reads this as an irreverence to
commercial advertising that both the podcaster and the advertiser are both
acknowledging.

I truly think that the advertiser sneaks into the podcast listener's
authenticity dome this way, and I feel like this must be a well-understood
phenomenon for advertisers who buy ad reads on podcasts known for having a
primarily gen z and millennial audience.

Incidentally there's a podcast episode by New Models that briefly discusses
this idea, which they call the "authenticity dungeon".
[https://www.librarystack.org/new-models-podcast-
episode-07-a...](https://www.librarystack.org/new-models-podcast-
episode-07-authenticity-dungeon/)

------
lawnchair_larry
I found it odd that he wanted to pay the host to completely lie about their
experience with a product. I thought that violates FTC rules.

~~~
tptacek
The FTC requires the sponsor relationship to be explicit, which, on podcasts,
it always is.

~~~
posterboy
> ... which, on podcasts, it always is.

That wasn't the question and it's out of the question.

------
keiferski
I feel like there is some real innovation to be had in the podcast
monetization space. At this point, it's still basically treated like a radio
ad from 1935. Surely there is some unique functionality that podcasts have
over radio.

Throwing out some ideas:

\- Alexa integration lets you purchase/view the product directly after hearing
it advertised

\- "Choose your own ad" \- 5 different ads can be played, each for 5 seconds
each. You can then reply to say which one you want to hear about, which then
triggers a longer ad. If there is no voice reply, the default one will play.

~~~
dewey
I'm actually glad Podcasts are still like that and don't need any special
interaction. I don't mind the ads, especially if they are not pre-recorded but
just embedded in the show like on Gruber's Talkshow where he speaks them live
and sometimes guests even say something in the ad too.

~~~
dvtrn
If you appreciate this style of ad delivery (and don't mind
his...uh....language), comedian Bill Burr's Monday Morning Podcast and
Thursday Just Before Friday Monday Morning Podcast has some hilarious ad
reads. He hates doing it, he hates having to do it, and he openly mocks how
silly some of the ad copy can be.

Which apparently is fine by his sponsors because apparently they convert
incredibly well (it might also have to do with Andrew Themeles, producer and
comic as well allegedly is very particular about who they are willing to be
sponsored by since neither of them are hurting for the money).

But I agree, ads that are just naturally read and we get back to the show is
preferred. The minute someone tries to get 'disruptive' with ads in podcasts I
fear the whole house will come crashing down.

~~~
mactrey
My impression is that the vast majority of podcast listeners skip through ads,
because that's what I do. It's easy to hit the 15s forward button four times
and get right back to the funny interesting stuff. It's a lot harder to skip
the ad if the funny, interesting host is riffing over the entire ad read -
which means that the listener is still getting the product info, even if the
host is making fun of the copy the whole time. Other hosts I've seen include
references to the products they're hawking in the actual show (host response
to guest's story about sleeping on a mattress on the floor: "I hope that
mattress was a Leesa!") and I imagine they're getting a little premium for
that.

~~~
r00fus
That second approach is pure product placement. I'm sure it's being monetized.

------
TekMol
TLDR: About 126 paid trial signups for about $30k.

Comes down to about $238 per signup.

Now the question is: What is the lifetime value of an ahref customer?

Say 20% of the trial signups result in a full signup. And let's say they all
chose the lowest tier of $99/Month. And let's say they stay for a year on
average.

Then that's ... 126 * 0.2 * 99 * 12 = $29937

That would be about break even.

~~~
tekkk
As the article describes in the end of its second chapter:

 _Sometimes an existing user would mention that they were happy to hear about
us on their favorite show; sometimes a random person (not even in marketing)
would remember us from an old podcast mention. Even if they didn’t convert at
the time, they thought that Ahrefs was kind of cool—and this brand recognition
stayed in the back of their mind._

 _That’s when it all clicked._

 _We were going about it all wrong—rather than being a tool for lead
generation, podcast advertising is a tool for gaining exposure and brand
awareness._

Sometimes converting a benefit gained from service, podcasts in this case, to
monetary value is a simple matter of counting gained profit. But one has to
remember that not everything can be measured in dollars, such as brand
awareness. Doesn't help to pay the bills but I'd think of it more of a long
term investment.

------
andrewstuart
This is a really useful insight into podcast advertising. I've often wondered
what it costs to advertise on a podcast and here is the answer (in part at
least).

------
kylecordes
I think there was a time last year when a couple of mattress brands were
sponsoring the entire podcasting world. Quite amazing really, it shows that
even a medium priced mattress has a staggering amount of margin. Makes me
wonder why I am in the software business. (!!)

~~~
fphhotchips
Don't worry! Squarespace sponsors literally everything I listen to, so there's
money in software yet!

------
wenbin
If you just want to get those promo code without listening to podcasts, search
here [https://lnns.co/GCrJF9YQ-k4](https://lnns.co/GCrJF9YQ-k4)

------
myko
I love the "Hello from the Magic Tavern" ads

------
reaperducer
Silicon Valley "disruptors" discover they're actually reinventing the wheel.
Film at 11.

Welcome to radio.

~~~
_red
I'm not posting this as an "advocate" of Alex Jones, however his model works
well for a news site. There is no advertiser creep of the message, there is
not much outside influence at all.

Its a shame something like the NY Times didn't pivot to that model early on
(essentially a news site thats funded by in-house e-commerce).

Whats funny is that that model was the first model of media, and truthfully it
may be the future.

~~~
comicjk
A media company doesn't have a competitive advantage when making unrelated
products, compared to companies that specialize in those products. The Alex
Jones model is profitable because he exaggerates the benefits of his products
and trades on his viewers' mistrust of other information sources. The NY Times
would have to change completely to follow this strategy.

~~~
_red
>The NY Times would have to change completely to follow this strategy.

Becoming profitable will require lots of change.

------
dazc
For an audio based campaign I'd prefer a catchier and more memorable name than
'ahrefs'? Type that in slightly wrong and you get to a dead end pretty fast.

~~~
55555
<a href="s">are hyperlinks</a> in html.

~~~
dazc
I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you're trying to be helpful
but I don't get why this makes it a good name?

What was that ad I heard the other day, hrefs.com or href.com? Ooops!

~~~
sghi
I'd always (and always do) google an advert rather than trying to remember the
exact website anyway. If you search 'href sep' or 'hrefs seo' or even 'aref
seo' it always still comes up as the first result for me.

------
balibebas
> From July to October 2018, we’ve seen 126 paid trial signups from “podcast.”

We all know surveys lie (even if they're required) so the conversion numbers
aren't telling the whole story. If my company were burning tall coin like this
and not somehow tracking micro-conversions I'd probably have to tell the
marketing lead sorry no holiday bonus for the next 38 years.

Honestly they could've probably hired a temp-worker with a good voice and a
lot of Podcasting buddies and gained more traction for the cost of feeding a
homeless man. What a colossal waste of resources.

