Sponsoring Your Podcast: Booze
By Holland Cooke
Media Consultant
BLOCK ISLAND, RI — Seventeen years ago (!) iPod was created to tote music. But it was consumers who reckoned that audio-is-audio and they started swapping spoken word content. This do-it-yourself talk radio was dubbed “podcasting,” back then referring to the device. Today that P.O.D. moniker acknowledges our “Programming On-Demand” culture.
“With hundreds of thousands of audio programs available on topics broad (NBA basketball, American history) to niche (knitting, Atari 2600 games), a wealth of stories and information is instantly available to stream on demand, whenever we want.”
— From “The New Generation of Audio,” an article in AARP Bulletin, read by radio’s heaviest users, Persons 50+.
Each year as Edison Research updates its ongoing “Infinite Dial” series, it has reported steady growth in podcast listening. In ratio ratings lingo:
- Monthly cume: 73 million Americans, 26% of us. (Up from 24% last year, 21% year-before, etc.)
- Weekly cume: 48 million, 17% of us. (15% last year, 13% year-before, etc.)
Now, Nielsen’s 2018 Podcast Ad Revenue forecast demonstrates that dollars are following ears:
- 2015: $69 million
- 2016: $119M
- 2017: $314M
- 2018: $402M
- By 2020: $659M
Looking for a sponsor for YOUR Podcast?
Nielsen Podcast Insights: A Marketer’s Guide to Podcasting” summarizes data on which products “avid fans” of podcasts are heavy consumers. And what jumps off the page is which product category is your best bet is your topic is any of the following.
- News and Politics
- Society and Culture
- Science
- Business
- Arts
- Technology
- Sports
The product category? Liquor. Not beer, not wine. Spirits. High-TSL listeners to podcasts on these topics significantly over-index listeners in general for booze purchases.
Nielsen’s report details other topic matches with other product categories, and you can download it at Holland Cooke.com.
Holland Cooke is a media consultant working at the intersection of broadcasting and the Internet; and he hosts “The Big Picture” TV show on RT America. Follow him on Twitter @HollandCooke
