Podcast Advertising Playbook with Heather Osgood – Details, episodes & analysis

This week on The Podcast Advertising Playbook, host Heather Osgood sits down with Kirk Martin, host of The Calm Parenting Podcast, to pull back the curtain on what it takes to build a successful show while staying true to your mission. With millions of downloads and a dedicated audience, Kirk shares how he’s grown Calm Parenting into a go-to resource for parents—and why he decided to bring advertisers into the mix. In this episode, Heather and Kirk discuss: The inspiration behind The Calm Parenting Podcast and its evolution. Why Kirk started accepting advertisers and what makes a great brand partnership. How he balances authenticity with sponsorships. Strategies he’s used to grow his audience. What he wishes he had known before starting his podcast. If you’re a podcaster looking to grow your show while staying true to your voice—or an advertiser wondering what makes a podcast partnership successful—this episode is a must-listen!

This week on The Podcast Advertising Playbook, host Heather Osgood sits down with Shira Atkins, Global SVP of Business Development & Partnerships at Acast and former Co-Founder & Chief Revenue Officer of Wonder Media Network. With Acast’s recent acquisition of WMN, Shira shares insights on the evolution of branded content in podcasting and where the industry is headed next. In this episode, Heather and Shira discuss: The origins of Wonder Media Network and the market gap it aimed to fill. What Acast’s acquisition means for the future of branded podcasting. The biggest misconceptions brands have about branded content. How brands should think beyond audio to maximize impact. The evolution of podcast advertising and what’s next in 2025. If you want to stay ahead of the curve in branded podcasting, this episode is packed with expert insights!

This week on The Podcast Advertising Playbook, we dive into the evolving landscape of brand safety in podcasting and explore how it differs from other media like digital ads and social media with Valerie Reimer, VP Ad Tech & Product Partnerships at Acast. From the growing importance of audience trust to the unique challenges brands face when advertising in kids' content, we cover the key factors shaping brand safety today. Plus, we discuss the legal and ethical considerations brands must navigate and what’s on the horizon for the future of podcast advertising. Listeners will dive into: How brand safety in podcasts require more control over tone and trust compared to digital ads or social media. The ways in which brand safety goes beyond avoiding controversy and the necessary focus on relevance, tone, and building trust. Advertising in kids' podcast and key points for strict legal and ethical guidelines for age-appropriate content.

Have you ever wondered how advertisers know if their brand initiatives are working correctly? I am a huge proponent of data and Jeff Vidler, Founder of Signal Hill Insights is helping podcasts and advertisers measure their efforts with brand lift studies, surveys, and more.    “One thing we do have with podcasting is we have digital data that gives us census level data as a baseline that we can use and work from that and really give advertisers a chance to see how the mediums working.”   Jeff is able to work closely with other companies, such as Triton Digital, to blend survey and census data together to get a clearer picture of who is listening.    “You've got apps, like Spotify, that will give you demographics, but that's filtered through who uses those apps. It's not necessarily a reflection of their entire audience. There are household graphs that you can get, but IP addresses are not personal. So we think that surveys are an important step toward getting demographics into podcasts measurement.    To connect with Jeff, reach out to him at jeff@signalhillinsights.com or visit their website: https://signalhillinsights.com/   If you get value from the content, please consider subscribing and leaving a review! You can also follow us on social Twitter - @truenativemedia Instagram - @truenativemedia YouTube - True Native Media LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/podcastadvertising/

With limited inventory and only the top 1% of podcasts getting the advertising dollars, what happens to the rest of the smaller shows? How do they get a piece of the advertising pie?  Dave Hanley, Chief Revenue Officer for Advertisecast joins me on the podcast to talk about how they are working to open opportunities for independent podcasts with fewer download numbers to get in front of advertisers.    With their recent acquisition of PodGo, shows as small as 200 downloads per episode can have a shot at advertiser deals. This is also a boon for first-time advertisers testing podcasting. It allows them to spread their dollars across a larger sum of shows to test out genres, demographics, topics, offers, and creative. Fine-tuning their campaigns to graduate to larger, pricier shows.    Dave and I also discuss why continual education about podcast advertising is critical to its success and how we are both working towards better guiding brands to find deeper results.    You can connect with Dave via email: dave@advertisecast.com or visit the website: https://www.advertisecast.com/ If you get value from the content, please consider subscribing and leaving a review! You can also follow us on social Twitter - @truenativemedia Instagram - @truenativemedia YouTube - True Native Media LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/podcastadvertising/

I love this report from the IAB. I am always very excited for the IAB Upfront event when they share their findings each year. Most of the time, there are statistics that I am already aware of, but then there are some outliers that either bring me joy, or shock. This year, I am happy to report that I am overjoyed with the results. I would like to share my favorite stats from the study with you and tell you why I think they are important to focus on. If you are interested in podcast advertising and you are just getting started, please download our guide here: https://info.truenativemedia.com/marketers-guide-to-podcast-advertising If you are interested in podcast advertising, please reach out to us at True Native Media or connect with Heather on LinkedIn. If you get value from the content, please consider subscribing and leaving a review! You can also follow us on social Twitter - @truenativemedia Instagram - @truenativemedia YouTube - True Native Media LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/podcastadvertising/

I am fascinated by internal company podcasts and how corporate companies are taking advantage of audio to distribute communications to their employees. I have been following Graham Brown, Founder, and CEO of Pikkal, a corporate podcast agency in Singapore, for quite some time, so I invited him to talk to me about the work he does and find out how companies benefit from branded podcasts. "There's a big group of corporate people who have a significant need. It's not a content problem; it's a communications issue. So how do they speak authentically and communicate like humans? When you put it in the corporate context, a lot of that can be lost and obscured by the parameters of how companies traditionally communicate, through white papers or press releases or through the lens of coms, which tends to edit everything." Graham and I discuss options for advertising and why corporate podcasts are a global phenomenon. We also talk about some of the challenges Graham sees the industry facing and how we should look differently at the data we currently get from podcasts. (Which was so interesting). To learn more about Pikkal, visit the website: https://www.pikkal.com/ You can connect with Graham on his website: https://grahamdbrown.com/ If you are interested in podcast advertising, please reach out to us at True Native Media or connect with Heather on LinkedIn. If you get value from the content, please consider subscribing and leaving a review! You can also follow us on social Twitter - @truenativemedia Instagram - @truenativemedia YouTube - True Native Media

I loved chatting with Lindsay Smith from Ad Results about working with their clients on brand suitability, otherwise known as brand safety. "We like to focus on the term suitability because, as an agency, we don't want to deem what shows are safe or unsafe. Instead, we want to match brands with suitable shows for their core values." Lindsay shares her process for monitoring ad-reads and working with podcasts and clients to create high-quality ads that convert. We also talk about how brands have different suitability floors and how it's essential to recognize and cater to those differences to find success. We also address the rise of dynamic insertion and how that affects brand safety or suitability. To learn more about Ad Results, visit the website: https://www.adresultsmedia.com/ Connect with Lindsay on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lindsay-smith-678410165/ Connect with Heather on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/podcastadvertising/ If you are interested in advertising on our independent shows, please reach out to us at https://truenativemedia.com If you enjoy the content, please consider subscribing!

It is very hard for brands and indie podcasters to connect. Most of it is done manually with a direct relationship, network, or representation agency, like True Native Media. Mike Kadin saw an opportunity to help indie podcasters and brands to connect faster with RedCircle. "We started talking to these podcast creators and asking them, what are the challenges you face? And even more than making money, or making more money, was the need to grow their audience. They want more people to be able to hear what they are trying to say. And at the time we released some podcast hosting software, we had also built an underlying dynamic insertion engine that enabled dynamic audio and advertising opportunities." I chatted with Mike about what marketers want from the podcast industry in order to be successful and how the new technology and services like RedCircle can help bring more ad dollars to the space. "I spent a lot of time talking to marketers when I worked at Uber. I built software for marketers and they want to have that perfect 360-degree view of the customer. But I think there's no companies in the world that actually have a view like that." To learn more about RedCircle, visit the website: https://redcircle.com/ Connect with Mike on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-kadin-a341571b/ If you are interested in advertising on our independent shows, please reach out to us at https://truenativemedia.com Or connect with Heather on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/podcastadvertising/

The podcast industry struggles with transparency when it comes to pricing, results, and measurements. There are several reasons why this is the case. So I invited Marty Michael, CEO, and Co-Founder of Gumball (a podcast advertising marketplace), to the show to chat about how his software is trying to break the transparency barrier in podcast advertising. We discuss why brands won't share their results and pricing rates and why this makes it challenging for standardization across the podcast industry. We also talk about why it is so challenging to place ads and how innovation is happening to reduce the friction of ad buying in podcasting. To learn more about Gumball, visit the website: https://gumball.fm/ Connect with Marty on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/martymichael/ If you are interested in advertising on our independent shows, please reach out to us at https://truenativemedia.com Or connect with Heather on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/podcastadvertising/ ________ If you get value from the content, please consider subscribing and leaving a review! You can also follow us on social Twitter - @truenativemedia Instagram - @truenativemedia YouTube - True Native Media