Before we get into the news, a quick heads-up that Sounds Profitable’s own Tom Webster will be presenting new data and findings from the landmark Podcast Landscape 2024 study in a free webinar with Crooked Media VP of Sales Giancarlo Bizzaro. The two will discuss how the study’s findings show the real story behind “audio vs. video,” why podcasting remains fundamentally audio-first even with video’s crucial discovery role, and strategic implications for both podcast creators and platforms. Register now for the live webinar on Wednesday, November 20th, at 2:00 p.m. EST.
Spotify’s Push for More Video Podcasts Puts Networks on Defense by Ashley Carman
As announced last week, Spotify has ramped up their focus on video content with a new monetization path and partnership program. Starting in January, Spotify Premium users in the U.S., U.K., Australia, and Canada will no longer encounter dynamic ads on video podcasts, with monetization changing to paying those podcasts based on watch-time, rather than ad impressions. One potential outcome of this YouTube-style watch time focus is content that’s traditionally more difficult to sell ads on (e.g. political conversation podcasts and hard news content) will be able to generate profit off direct audience engagement rather than rely on ads.
Facebook is changing its primary metric to ‘views’ by Mia Sato
In an effort to bring Facebook video more in line with Instagram metrics, Meta has announced Facebook is pivoting to Views as the core metric on videos, photos, text posts, anything someone can post to the platform. For the Reel functionality specifically, Facebook will count “a view” as how many times the video is played. For everything else on Facebook, a view represents how many times that piece of content shows up on a user’s screen (if it appears multiple times, each instance counts as a new view). With this push towards views as a metric, and with the audio side of podcasting moving towards video content, a new question comes to the surface: in a world where video and social media are all using “views” as metrics, can they be compared equally?
Ask Your Doctor – From Optimizing the News
After a 15 year gap, the Food and Drug Administration has updated its advertising guidelines for drug manufacturers. The new rules require TV and radio ads present major side effects of drugs in a “clear and conspicuous and neutral manner.” Anticipating this change, many pharma advertisements have adhered to this for years. An open loophole in the FDA’s authority over pharma ads is social media, as influencers and telehealth companies don’t produce the drugs and thus aren’t beholden to the FDA requirements. This might become a moot point in January, as incoming Department of Health and Human Services pick Robert F. Kennedy campaigned on banning direct customer advertising by drug companies.
Creative agency strategists predict that marketers could course-correct to more cautious, conservative messaging in light of the election results early this month. While likely not as literal as ads suddenly depicting nuclear families and white picket fences, Innocean USA CCO Jason Sperling anticipates marketers course-correcting for the election will sink into “faith and family” tropes, including return to nostalgic ad concepts like adopting pets, greeting returning veterans, and outward patriotism. Consumers react well to seeing themselves depicted in advertising, with 58% of U.S. consumers telling a March YouGov survey that diversity and inclusion in advertising influenced where they shop. 69% said a diverse staff mattered for their shopping choices. In June an meta-study found “inclusive” advertising drove a sales uplift of 16% compared to less-progressive ad content.
As for the rest of the news…
- Audioboom exceeds forecasted profit expectations in a new trading update
- Triton Digital has expanded its Demos+ audience metrics feature to the Netherlands
- Ad Results Media has hired Craig Stein as their new SVP of Media Planning
- Celebrity podcaster and venerated talkshow host Conan O’Brien will host the 2025 Oscars
- AdWeek has joined the growing list of major publications discussing podcasting’s role in the 2024 election.
