Advertising on Streaming Services

Radio streaming services have become increasingly popular over the years as their impressive lister base continues to grow. While some elements of radio advertising remain constant, platforms such as Spotify, Pandora, and Apple Music have certainly taken over the scene.
They offer unique benefits and features for online advertising, such as access to local, regional, and or/national audiences, targeted ads, and much more. There are several streaming radio services to choose from when creating your advertising campaign. Though each with its own benefits and features. Our COMMANDOs are here to help you make the most of your radio budget, no matter which streaming platform you decide to advertise on!

Top Streaming Platforms:

• Spotify: 

  • Spotify offers both an ad-supported and a subscription-based ad-free version, reaching almost 300 million active users across the world each month, with more than 170 million of these users listening to the ad-supported version

  • Spotify reaches a younger demographic; 61% of Spotify listeners are between the ages of 18 and 34. Even more, Spotify offers interest-based audiences, including fitness enthusiasts, new parents, and commuters, allowing brands to reach a specific audience easily

  • Spotify reaches 92 markets and offers over 60 million songs and 1.5 million podcasts to listeners, with advertisement possibilities including audio, video, podcasts, and display

  • Brands can also sponsor sessions and playlists, do homepage takeovers, and more. Spotify ads also offer capabilities such as playlist, genre, and location targeting. In fact, their location targeting in the United States can go as small as a specific zip code

• Pandora: 

  • 115 million unique listeners each month

  • #1 ranking in 87 U.S. markets

  • Incorporated into 200+ car models and more than 2,000 connected home devices

  • Offering audio ads that come with a companion tile or banner; Pandora’s dynamic ads that can be personalized based on the genre of music, weather, or location; and sequential ads that start by building awareness and lead up to driving action. It also offers video and display ads

  • Pandora offers advertisers over 2,000 audience segments, such as genre, ethnicity, HHI, education level, marital/parental status, lifestyle, and shopping habits. Over 90% of our listeners stream on mobile and over 10% stream via connected home devices, though that percentage is fluctuating due to the current pandemic

  • Pandora listeners tune in to the platform for about 1.25 hours a day, and 90% listen to the free, ad-supported version.

• iHeartRadio:

  • 140 million registered users (with significant year-over-year growth) and reaches over 1,000 radio stations and 280,000 podcasts

  • iHeartRadio reaches 90% of the U.S. population

  • Listeners are active on the platform approximately 2.5 hours each day, primarily on mobile devices

  • The audience age demographics are also distributed evenly. The smallest demographics are those between the ages of 13 and 24 and those who are 65+ (both of which take up 10% of the audience each). The largest demographic is ages 55-64, taking up 23% of listeners

  • Not only do they have a large reach and great demographic targeting options, but they also reach more of the U.S. population than Pandora and Spotify

  • Unlike Pandora and Spotify, iHeartRadio does not offer an ad-free subscription, meaning your advertisements will never get missed by your target audience due to paid subscription

Whether it’s Spotify, Pandora or iHeartRadio, or one of the many other streaming options, everyone has found their preferred service. Although preferences differ from consumer to consumer, there’s one thing all music listening choices have in common: streaming or digital listening is the clear favorite. In a short span of a little more than five years, streaming options have grown to dominate the marketplace. The popularity in streaming has grown so much that New Album and New Release charts have refigured how they calculate “album sales” to incorporate the streams. As consumers make these shifts more toward streaming, advertisers need to keep up. Below are a few tips to put into practice when approaching this advertising medium:

• Audio ads should be an integral part of your marketing strategy

• When advertising on streaming platforms, keeping your message short, sweet, and entertaining is key to reaching as many users as possible 

• Regardless of what you’re advertising, interruptions aren’t generally appreciated. Natural, relevant audio ads that flow with the content are critical

• Remember that ads on these digital audio platforms will most likely play on mobile devices. Take advantage of this by building a digital banner that can easily be clicked by consumers

• Know the voice of your brand and then personalize it to your audience. Adapt your spots to your audience’s demographics, geography, and musical tastes to ensure that they are not disruptive but rather easy transitions between songs

Spotify, Pandora, and iHeartRadio are each valuable options when searching for a streaming platform fit for your business, your target audience, and your business goals. However, these three platforms are just a few of the many streaming radio platforms available. Regardless of which platform you choose to market on, OMNICOMMANDER can help. Our top-notch campaign team is exactly what you are looking for when it comes to building your next streaming ad campaign. Make sure you call us today.