Podcast Advertisers Are Primed for Social Audio's 'Serial Moment'

With the latest fad in audio emerging quickly—social audio—common podcast advertisers like Mailchimp and SimpliSafe are watching before making any sudden moves, especially when it comes to the scale of the format and measurement capabilities. Podcasting has exploded in popularity in recent years, albeit from a small base. By 2024, podcast ad revenue will grow by 18% to $1.6 billion, according to the Interactive Advertising Bureau. 77% haven't heard of Clubhouse By contrast, Clubhouse—synonymous with social audio—has scale and awareness issues. A recent survey from the firm DISQO found that 77% of people hadn’t even heard of Clubhouse yet. But that hasn't stopped platforms like Spotify, Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, Discord and LinkedIn from debuting copycat features. “[Social audio] is not even available to most people yet,” said Mark DiCristina, vp for brand and Mailchimp Studios, the production studio arm of of Mailchimp, which shot to cultural significance when sponsoring popular true-crime podcast Serial. Clubhouse is still invite-only and iOS-only, while competitor Twitter Spaces is still in beta. “And because of that, it hasn’t found that killer app yet—something that captivates a mass audience and proves what’s special about it.” “With podcasting, Serial was probably the show that did that—that broke through into popular culture and showed people who were not early-adopter types what this format is and what it could be,” he added. “We just don’t know yet with social audio.” Calculating Clubhouse CPMs Clubhouse, with only 16.4 million lifetime installs according to Sensor Tower, doesn’t offer paid ads through its platform, but some sponsorships between brands and creators have cropped up. The platform has said that it will not introduce paid ads. “Really, it’s a scale issue,” said says Nathan Young, head of strategy for the Chicago studio of Deloitte Digital. “If there are only 500 people on this live chat—We measure in the advertising industry CPM, cost per thousand impressions. If we’re not even getting a thousand impressions on an ad, how do we price that? How do we make sure we’re getting our return on investment? How are you measuring that?” Live-read ads and dynamic ad insertion, which have been an important part of the growth of the podcast advertising industry, can be applied to social audio if platforms solve for scale and brand safety, said Young. He added that “time-shifted audio” would massively expand the scale of who can experience social audio. Outside of scale, the demographic of Clubhouse—for now—is still pretty narrow. “Our audience is entrepreneurs, small business owners, marketers, creative people—I can’t imagine that there are too many of them on [Clubhouse] now,” DiCristina said. Another regular podcast sponsor, home security company SimpliSafe, is monitoring the social audio space. You’ll hear again and again: proving it with measurement is what’s critical for a brand. They just want to know it’s working.Eric John, vp of the media center at IAB “We know the power of live-read endorsements from our experience with podcasts and YouTube, and are closely watching the social audio space to understand what opportunities might emerge,” said Alex Shear, ‎senior director of customer acquisition. Where social audio builds on podcasting is that it's more of a two-way dialogue, said Hilary Ross, vp of podcast media at the audio-focused agency Veritone One, which has sponsored a few podcast hosts on Clubhouse on behalf of clients. Improving listener engagement “The podcasting industry, which has traditionally been a one-way medium between host and listener, will now provide audiences the opportunity to engage with their favorite hosts by leveraging social audio, thus improving listener engagement,” said Ross. “This is a big deal for advertisers, and while there’s still a lot of unknowns surrounding how monetization on these apps will shake out, they offer advertisers exactly what they want—a highly targeted group of individuals in a highly engaging medium,” she added. Ultimately, podcast advertisers are looking for scale, brand safety and measurement. Eric John, vp of the media center at IAB, said that both podcasting and social audio are people-driven and influencer-driven media, so there’s some common ground. “Finding the right spokesperson, aligning your brand with the right conversation, I think that’s the same,” John said. “But proving the value and the ROI from that sponsorship—and ultimately ad-delivered—I think you’ll hear, again and again, proving it with measurement is what’s critical for a brand. They just want to know it’s working.” Reddit Previews Reddit Talk, Its Take on Clubhouse