Many well-known podcasts were originally projects for pleasure, not earnings. However, creating a podcast is a painstaking and long process that people want to pay off. One of these opportunities is advertising integrations. Read about formats of integrations into podcasts and their differences in the new Go Mobile article.
Interest in advertising integrations in podcasts is growing. Not only brands but also podcasters can come for advertising.
Podcast advertising for brands is an opportunity to increase product awareness, reach a loyal audience and get a message to your target audience through their favorite show hosts. Podcasters can promote their podcast through cross-promotion in “neighboring” projects with a similar audience.
Integration formats: what a podcast can offer
Podcast authors can name the same integration in different ways: jingle or pre-roll, section or branded segment. But in fact they have the same timing, goal and task.
Short formats
Dynamic ad insert
An advertising message that is recorded by the third party and automatically inserted by the advertising service into the listening application.
Pre / Mid / Post-roll
Brand story from 30 seconds to two minutes at the beginning, middle or end of the episode. The show host briefly gives information about the client, which is agreed in advance. Also, the authors or the advertiser can write the integration previously and insert it into the episode.
Such advertising can be offered to brands that only start to test podcasts as a promotion channel and want to briefly tell the target audience about the product.
Rubric
Information section for 5–10 minutes, prepared jointly with the brand. The rubric is used in the middle of the episode and the expert of the brand or another podcast can participate in it.
This is a more creative format because there can be added game mechanics to it. For example, the presenter and the expert can test the brand’s products.
“Win-win” conditions are created there because the client advertises his product and podcast listeners receive exciting and useful information. Now it’s one of the most popular integrations.
Special project formats
Partner episode
A podcast episode that is co-written with a client. The main speaker can be either a brand representative or a guest suggested by the podcaster. The entire episode is dedicated to the brand theme.
This format is suitable for brands that want to show expertise, talk in detail about the specifics of the product and inspire confidence in the audience.
Podcast branding
Integration into a podcast for the whole season. The podcast and the brand determine themes and concept of the releases together. At the beginning of each episode, the presenter announces the sponsor of the season. The podcaster can also place the brand logo on the cover of the podcast, but it’s optional.
Podcast from scratch
A project that a brand and a podcast studio or indie-podcaster create together from the very beginning — from the idea to post-production.
The format lets the brand create a project for its tasks and goals, build a loyal audience and show expertise. Listeners learn more about the benefits of its product.
Usually, brands from topics that are not yet so developed in the market come to create podcasts from scratch.
How to start collaborating with a brand
The collaboration between the podcast and the brand begins with a media kit — a document about the project that includes:
- ad formats;
- integration cost;
- audience data (gender, age, interests);
- listening statistics.
Before creating a media kit and sending it to a brand, it is important to understand what tasks advertising integrations solve.
If the client liked your media kit, you can discuss the details of the project.
How to Launch Cool Ad Integrations: 6 Tips
- Opt out of advertising integrations, if you feel that your listeners and the brand aren’t on the same wavelength. The podcast audience is ready for the offers they are interested in. An uninteresting product that isn’t related to the topic of the podcast will be ignored. And you may lose the trust of the listeners.
- Specify the goals and tasks of the client that he wants to solve with the help of a podcast. It helps to make the offer more relevant.
- Explore the client’s business. In advertising integration, it’s important to tell about the brand in an exciting and detailed way. So the presenter should be interested in the product.
- Make the ads come alive. The audience won’t listen to monotonous speech. In addition, this approach will spoil the listener’s attitude towards both the brand and the podcast.
- Record the integration yourself. The audience trusts the advertisement read by the presenter more than the unknown voice of the brand representative.
- Don’t be afraid to cooperate with agencies. It’s easier to draft documentation, coordinate integration and communicate with clients.
