Ears Wide Open: Oscar’s Audio Ad, Spotify’s Dominance, & Rooster Teeth’s Downfall
Chief Audio Officers, it’s time for an all-new Industry Edition of the Media Roundtable.
Dan Granger (Oxford Road Founder & CEO) is back on the host microphone, joined by fellow agents of influence, “Funkle” Kyle Jelinek (Oxford Road VP of Client Strategy) Spencer Semonson (Oxford Road Media Buyer & Planner Extraordinaire), and Neal Lucey (Oxford Road EVP, Strategy & Product). And we’re overjoyed to welcome back James Cridland, the world’s favorite Radio Futurologist (Podnews, Podcast Business Journal).
We’re talking Oscars, why brands need to focus on female listeners and hosts, Rooster Teeth shutting down, whether or not Crime pays, and so much more. Let’s dig in.
“If you're looking for them to make a great impression with your ad, first, you need to make a great impression on the host.”
Dan Granger (Oxford Road Founder & CEO)
Like Pulling Teeth 🐔- Rooster Teeth was a pioneer for YouTube and after 21 years (and being acquired by Discovery) they appear to be closing their doors. We’ve worked with their podcasts for years and have only stellar things to say about them as partners (and how well they performed for clients). The podcast network’s being shopped around–here’s hoping they find a great new home; for CAOs, a strong recommendation to try placements on their shows when they do.
The Host with the Most 😮- Spotify is dominant for listening, but also for hosting podcasts. Their free service, Spotify for Podcasts hosted ~31% of all episodes published in February according to Livewire Labs, dwarfing 2nd place Buzzsprout’s 9%. But Spotify for Podcasts is pretty limited for advertising options. In fact, Joe Rogan switched to Spotify’s paid option, Megaphone (#5, 4%), after just a few weeks. Something to watch for CAOs – will Megaphone’s share grow, creating greater advertising opportunities?
Crime Pays 🕵️- IAB Australia's 'Crime Pays Report’ shows that compared to listening habits, advertisers under-index on true crime podcasts (whoever designed the report clearly had a lot of fun doing it). Advertisers are understandably hesitant to align their brand with challenging contexts, but the study recommends testing the genre with a few ‘how to’ tips, since it’s so effective. Two suggestions for CAOs – match the understated tone and try a light thematic tie-in.
There is so much more covered in this episode (including Spencer’s new iPhone-buster) that we can’t cover here–so to get all of the audio insights you won’t get anywhere else, tune into the full episode by engaging with the link below.