IMMERSIVE MARKETING 101: Our first article appeared in AdWeek yesterday. The first two points, about Native Integration and the Power of Audio as an ad unit, could have come directly out of a Pandora pitch. This all contributes to a body of work becoming known as “immersive marketing”, where the marketer weaves their message into content the consumer is already interacting with. Compare that experience to the forced mugging of interstitial ads, circa 2007, and you have the entire evolution of digital marketing in one microcosm. Fortunately for Pandora we’re already “where the puck is going” on this one. Very cool to be on the forefront here. http://www.adweek.com/brandshare/why-future-digital-about-aligning-experiences-173120#!/
THE POWER OF PODCASTING: The next pair of articles create a nice 1-2 punch for the popularity and efficacy of podcasting. Edison’s Larry Rosen is quoted in both pieces with some strong recall and favorability stats from their latest podcasting study. Given that the study was co-authored with the IAB (Interactive Ad Bureau), you can be confident that these numbers are legit. I would also argue that these stats could apply to other streamed content sponsorships, like say Questlove Supreme, since the client messaging is woven in the same way as the podcasts. Good ammo if you’re out there selling TAL or QLS extensions right now. (1) http://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/284176/podcast-sponsors-find-engaged-audiences.html (2) http://adage.com/article/media/study-advertisers-increasingly-interested-podcasting/305738/?utm_source=digital_email&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_campaign=adage&ttl=1473870509
MORE TWEAKS AND MORE SUBS FOR APPLE MUSIC: And finally, yesterday Apple held a news conference to announce the new iPhone7 and iOS10 operating system. Within the launch news Tim Cook unveiled Apple Music’s new “more sleek” interface. One interesting Apple Music stat for us is that they now claim 17M worldwide subscribers since Apple Music’s official relaunch last September. You may remember Apple said they added 10M at the six month mark, so the new sub velocity is slowing some. Granted 17M is still an impressive one year total. What’s interesting is that this growth is happening while Spotify is growing their subs and while Pandora’s free service is at an all-time high AAS (Average Active Sessions). So streaming is not a zero-sum game – meaning Apple’s growth isn’t coming from one of the other pureplays. More than likely their deriving audience from the continued migration of AM/FM listening over to all-things streaming. One other quick item of note is the # of Apple Music’s exclusive releases Tim Cook mentioned. This has obviously been their bread and butter strategy to drive new subs. Wondering how that will change once more labels stop doing exclusives. http://rainnews.com/apple-music-has-17-million-subscribers/
Have a great Thursday guys!