Campaigns Targeting Young Voters On Streaming Radio

Digital ad spending by campaigns is expected to soar to as much as $1 billion this year, from $159 million in 2012, says media consultant Borrell Associates. Pandora is a favorite for candidates and advocacy groups appealing to young minority voters, who, ratings service Nielsen says, spend more time than average getting news and entertainment on mobile devices, reports Bloomberg.

With about 80 million users, Pandora is the No. 1 U.S. radio-streaming service. It ranks No. 3 in average monthly minutes per visitor among young people, behind Facebook and Google, ComScore says. About a quarter of its listeners are Latino.

That increases Pandora’s value to campaigns. “Being able to target them on mobile devices that we know they’re spending a lot of time on, especially with audio ads, which we know are particularly effective, gives us a leg up,” says Tim Lim, a partner at Bully Pulpit Interactive, a Democratic ad agency. He declined to comment on clients, but Clinton’s campaign has used the company, according to campaign spending records.

Pandora says more than 100 campaigns ran ads on its streams in the first three months of the year. It’s already exceeded its 2014 political ad revenue, and ads aimed at black and Latino voters are up 500 percent. “It feels like we’re going to see a lot of things accelerate as we get closer to the convention,” says Sean Duggan, a vice president for advertising at Pandora.

A record 27.3 million Latinos will be eligible to vote in November, and half will be millennials, the Pew Research Center shows.

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