Multiple Studies Confim Audio's Effectiveness

This week, as hundreds of agencies and advertisers gather in New York City for the tenth IAB Podcast Upfront, building brands is on the minds of B2B and performance advertisers, two groups of marketers who typically obsess only over the lower funnel.

A recent Digiday headline stated, “Why Performance Marketers are Shifting Their Priorities to Build the Brand.”

Another headline blared, “Why B2B Marketers are Advertising More Like Consumer Brands to Break Through a Crowded Marketplace.”

Even podcasts, once the domain of direct response marketers, are shifting to brand. Last year, the annual IAB/PwC podcast ad revenue report revealed that brand advertisers represent the majority of podcast ad spend.

The number of commissioned Nielsen brand lift studies surges

A sure sign of brand marketers leaning into podcasts is the increase in brand lift studies conducted by Nielsen.

Since 2017, Nielsen has conducted an astonishing 1,300+ podcast brand lift studies. "Podcast brand lift studies provide advertisers valuable insights into how their ads are driving the metrics that matter most to their brand," said Arica McKinnon, VP of Commercial Strategy & Insights at Nielsen. "The proliferation of podcast brand lift studies Nielsen has conducted for various brands in recent years demonstrates the effectiveness of podcast advertising for long-term brand building."

Recently, Nielsen released a series of norms and key insights on their database of podcast brand effect work.

Key findings

• Nielsen’s just released podcast brand lift study reveals:Positive podcast content evaluation and host appeal generate strong advertising effectiveness
• Nielsen reports the terms with the greatest association with podcast content are interesting, entertaining, credible, authentic, creative, and fun. Few listeners associate negative terms with podcast content.
• The strongest associations with podcast hosts are likeable, credible, relatable, fun, and expert.
• The terms most linked with podcast ads are interesting, believable, natural, authentic, innovative, funny, and unexpected. Very few associate podcasts advertising with negative perceptions.
• Across 1,300+ studies Nielsen reports podcasts drive consistent growth in awareness (+11 points), likelihood to seek information (+8 points), purchase intent (+7 points), and recommendation (+6 points).

This week’s Cumulus Media | Westwood One Audio Active Group® blog examines 1,300+ Nielsen podcast brand-lift studies to reveal audio’s ability to create future demand and build a brand.