Nine months ago the BG Ad Group in Marietta, Georgia approached a metro Atlanta newspaper with an idea to increase non-traditional revenue, digital downloads, and hyperlocal following. The idea? A hyperlocal podcast. The model has scaled to other newspapers in Georgia. Click for a case study in hyperlocal branded podcasts. Continue Reading
The fifth annual RAIN Podcast Business Summit played on Zoom to a large virtual audience today, presented by iHeartRadio, Stitcher, Triton Digital, and founding partner NPR. Other sponsors supporting this event were Megaphone, AdsWizz, WideOrbit, and AccuRadio. In a compact 3.5-hour schedule, 22 speakers held forth on the business side of podcasting. Click for lots of quotes. Continue Reading
In the company’s Q4 earnings call last week, iHeartMedia CEO Bob Pittman and COO/CFO Rich Bressler emphasized podcasting and recent digital audio acquisitions, and touched on a new view of international opportunity for iHeart. Click of tap through for details and quotes. Continue Reading
Evergreen Podcasts has introduced a sports channel, appropriately named Evergreen Podcasts Sports Channel. The new sub-network, carved out for listeners and advertisers seeking to target those listeners, is stocked with six shows as of today — a mix of new and existing podcasts. Click for details. Continue Reading
The RAIN Podcast Business Summit, the leading podcast business event now in its fifth year, is set as a Zoom event on Wednesday, March 3, starting at 10am ET.
Info HERE
Register (free) HERE
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In Entercom’s Q4 earnings call this week, podcasting was prominently referenced as part of the company’s digital initiatives. One investor asked whether selling off podcast acquisitions Cadence13 and Pineapple Street Studios might be in the future, if the acquisition value of those outfits exceeded their revenue potential. CEO David Field’s answer was definitive. Continue Reading
Digital audio advertising exchange company DAX is announcing today that it has reached agreement with NPR to manage the public radio juggernaut’s Canadian podcast ad inventory. The agreement establishes DAX as the exclusive third-party partner for handling sponsorship deals across NPR’s podcast inventory in Canada. Continue Reading
Digital audio was emphasized numerously in the Q4 earnings call of Cumulus Media, supported by a slew of numbers. Podcasting is up in every way for the company, and Cumulus is not particularly acquisition-minded. Click through for details and quotes. Continue Reading
TED is a highly differentiated brand, and its TED Radio Hour (150 episodes; #1 in Apple Technology) and TED Talks Daily (160 episodes; #1 in Spotify Business) are steady category leaders. TED cites that its podcasts are downloaded an eye-popping 1.65-million times a day. It makes sense for TED to extend its brand patina outward, and that is what the company has done with TED Audio Collective. The pitch to advertisers: “Stand out from the pack in an oversaturated market.” Continue Reading
Acast, the international podcast hosting platform and advertising marketplace, has acquired RadioPublic, the podcast network and tech innovator founded in 2016. It’s a partnership of values and technology affinity. Click through for details and context. Continue Reading
James Cridland returns with a richly informative newsletter about radio around the world. The decline of top 40. Live radio on smartphones. A song list from 1996. Much more. Continue Reading
by Jeff Vidler
In this valuable column, Signal Hill Insights President Jeff Vidler lays out the six keys to podcast discovery on the creator side. It’s based on survey research conducted as part of the Canadian Podcast Listener 2020. Continue Reading