Digital Marketers are testing podcast and audio ads for the past 2 years. Podcast listeners are Early Adopters - the audiences most seeked after by marketers.

The challenge marketers face is that unlike traditional digital ads where everything is “trackable” - measuring the effectiveness of digital audio ads and podcast ads are not as straightforward.

Podcasts and Audio advertising is a bit more “traditional”. It requires localization and utilization of rigorous tests to find the right channel / podcast. Yet with all its complexity - Advertising on podcasts and audio ads is becoming extremely common by marketers.

We wanted to bring this guide to help you learn how to measure the results from your Podcast advertising campaigns.

Control Group

The United States alone, has over 15,000 radio stations across the country. Radio wavelengths are limited to around 40 mile radius, allowing (and forcing) Advertisers to take a regional approach to radio Advertising.

This can be used to the advantage of an Advertiser by creating experiments where Advertising campaigns run only in several regions, comparing the sales results of regions with campaigns on, vs. regions where there was no advertising activity.

The same approach is more difficult with Podcasts and Audio Ads, as user level targeting becomes less available with user identifiers becoming obsolete.

Switch On, Switch Off

Blackout is done by switching off Advertising for a period of time, reviewing sales lift, and switching campaign advertising back on to monitor the delta.

Blackout is probably the most common method of radio advertising attribution - and for Advertisers who use radio extensively - this is a very good way to run measurement.

For Advertisers who use multiple mediums and a media mix model - this method is not effective, and creates a potential opportunity cost that exceeds the gains.

Incrementality Testing

Incrementality testing provides operational insights for optimization. This method uses regular campaign changes to continuously provide insights over the value of paid media. 

This method works across platforms and can provide valuable insights at the granularity of campaign, demographics, media vendor, and medium.

Incrementality testing has been a holy grail in marketing , but only very few invested the resources required to evaluate it. 

With the current market conditions eliminating identifiable data companies are forced to make the effort of researching incrementality as the best alternative to measurement.

INCRMNTAL offers an incrementality measurement platform, allowing Advertisers to unlock the value of their marketing spend. Measuring the effectiveness of digital and “untrackable” activity, providing actionable insights for you to get the most out of your spend.

If you want to learn more, visit INCRMNTAL or book a demo today!