NEW YORK, OCTOBER 2, 2024 – In a world filled with distractions, podcast listeners continue to stand out for their unwavering passion and active engagement, which marketers can benefit from as well. Today, MAGNA, the media investment and intelligence unit of IPG Mediabrands, in collaboration with Spotify, the world’s most popular audio streaming platform, released a study on preferences and how podcast listeners consume content. The study, titled “How to be in Podcasts,” offers a playbook on how brands can maximize their impact in the podcast realm.

The MAGNA Media Trials study highlights that podcasts have highly engaged, lean-forward audiences, with 62% of listeners actively engaged with content and paying close attention and 66% express strong passion for their favorite podcasts – two significant factors marketers should leverage. Listening to a podcast is an immersive experience that captivates the listener’s attention through content and ads.

The study was conducted in the US using ‘test ads’ to analyze four strategies for ads: ad length, music, voiceover tone, and contextual alignment. The research findings show that all forementioned strategies play a part in how listeners react to podcast ads.

Here are the key findings of each strategy:

• • Contrary to expectations, longer ads create more memorable experiences for podcast audiences, with 30-second ads showing a +36 pts increase in memorability, especially among potential new customers.
  • Upbeat music in ads infuses excitement and energy, increasing purchase intent by +6 pts and brand trust by +7 pts.
  • In the absence of music, mellow voiceovers capture more attention, are easier to follow, and lead to higher ad recall (+31 pts) and purchase intent (+12 pts).
  • The alignment between the ad and podcast content has a profound influence on performance, with ads that complement the podcast content (+18ptst) resonating more with listeners and evoking excitement about the brand (+17 pts).

To read the full study by MAGNA Media Trials and Spotify, click here.

About MAGNA
MAGNA is the leading global media investment and intelligence company, and part of the IPG Mediabrands network. Our trusted insights, proprietary trials offerings, industry-leading negotiation and unparalleled consultative solutions deliver an actionable marketplace advantage for our clients and subscribers. We are a team of experts driven by results, integrity, and inquisitiveness. We operate across five key competencies, supporting clients and cross-functional teams through partnership, education, accountability, connectivity, and enablement. For more information, please visit our website: https://magnaglobal.com/and follow us on LinkedIn.

About Spotify
Spotify’s platform revolutionized music listening forever when we launched in 2008. Today, more listeners than ever can discover, manage and enjoy over 100 million tracks, more than 6 million podcasts titles, and 350,000 audiobooks a la carte on Spotify. We are the world’s most popular audio streaming subscription service with more than 626 million users, including 246 million subscribers across 184 markets.