Author: Jen Thorpe

Podeo Onboards Dukkan Media To Amplify And Monetize Its Podcasts

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Podeo, the Arab World’s foremost podcast platform, proudly welcomes Dukkan Media, a vanguard in podcast production, into its hosting and distribution platform. This synergy will elevate, monetize, and provide unparalleled reach for the captivating voices and stories brought forward by Dukkan Media’s podcasts.

Dukkan Media’s podcasts – hosted and distributed via Podeo – include Dukkan Show, recently acclaimed by Cosmopolitan’s “5 Arab podcasts you need to listen to,” “Forever Student” hosted by Stephan Muller, Legal-ish, Switch / Flicks, The Leap Podcast, and Freedom of Peach.

Dukkan Media’s podcasts are available across all listening platforms including Podeo, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Anghami, SoundCloud and wherever listeners get their podcasts.

Podeo offers podcasters and publishers best-in-class technology, enabling unparalleled monetization opportunities and reach, enhanced by advanced behavioral analytics and deep expertise in the regional podcast market.

Stefano Fallaha, Rodeo’s CEO & Founder, said: “Dukkan Media have pioneered the podcasting scene in MENA since 2015, and we are looking forward to further amplifying their shows and unlocking new monetization opportunities.”

Omar Tom, Dukkan Media’s Cofounder & CEO, said: “Watching Podeo’s evolution and their commitment to amplifying the region’s podcast market has been inspiring. Partnering with them was a natural choice for us. We look forward to growing together.”

AdLarge, Flightpath, and Sounder Announce State-Of-The-Art Integration for Seamless Campaign Execution

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AdLarge, Flightpath, and Sounder are thrilled to announce a first-to-market, groundbreaking integration that is set to revolutionize the podcast advertising industry. Leveraging the strengths of each platform, this collaboration brings together cutting-edge technology, brand safety, contextual targeting, and customized campaign execution to elevate podcast advertising campaigns to a new level.

Sounder, known for accurately, classifying publisher’s content for brand safety, suitability, and contextual relevance, has further expanded its capabilities by integrating with Flightpath. This integration enables AdLarge to tap into Flightpath’s Sales Availability Dashboard for campaign forecasting and planning, unlocking a new level of innovation and effectiveness for ad placement for all clients.

Key Integrations Include:

Precision and Trust at Scale: Target contextual and/or brand-suitable inventory across AdLarge’s full catalog that enables advertisers to target their message across relevant and suitable content bringing immeasurable value and security to the ad buying experience for the marketplace.

Seamless Campaign Execution: The integration simplifies the advertising process, making it more efficient and user-friendly. Publishers can now forecast advertising tags and navigate the complexities of advertising campaign execution with confidence and ease.

Enhanced Transparency and Accountability: AdLarge, long known for its commitment to transparency and accountability, and the first to partner with Flightpath, continues to deliver on its promise to advertisers.

“We are committed to providing the most effective and brand-suitable advertising to our clients,” said Ilwira Marciszek, SVP of Revenue Operations and Digital Sales for AdLarge. “Our partnership with Flightpath and Sounder is yet another way we are bringing to market tools that create innovative and unmatched solutions, transparency and continue to build trust within the entire process of podcast ad sales.”

“AdLarge is a proven leader in the industry. By bringing together two complementary partners like Sounder and Flightpath, we can work together to create significant value for the agencies and brands that Ad:arge serves,” remarked Flightpath CEO and Founder, Sean Howard.

Triton Digital Unveils Canada Podcast Trends Report

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Triton Digital, the global technology and services leader the digital audio, podcast, and broadcast radio industries, released its first Canada Mid-Year Podcast Trends Report.

The report accompanies its monthly Canada Podcast Ranker and provides insights into the evolving Canadian podcast landscape, including trends in podcast listening, a snapshot of the podcast listener, top genres, downloads, debuts, sales networks, and more.

According to the report, Canada’s most popular podcast genres were True Crime, News, and Comedy, with an average of 3.0 hours of content downloaded per listener, per week. Other notable findings include:

Listeners downloaded 4.4. episodes per week, on average, and 92% of podcasts were listened to on a mobile device.

The top day of the week for listening is Wednesday with peak times being between 10am-12pm EST.

The top sales network in the Triton Canada Podcast Ranker, in terms of average weekly download volume, is SiriusXM Podcast Network, followed by CBC/Radio-Canada and Wondery. 

Top podcasts include Dateline NBC (NBCUniversal News Group), SmartLess (Wondery Network), and Front Burner (CBC/Radio-Canada).

“As the Canadian podcast scene continues to evolve, we’re excited about the chance to highlight insights into Canadian listening habits,” remarked Daryl Battaglia, SVP Measurement Products & Strategy at Triton Digital. “Podcasting stands as a captivating and influential medium for storytelling and our debut mid-year trends report underscores our dedication to provide our clients with dependable and trustworthy data on podcast consumption and listener behaviors.”

The 2023 Podcast Trends in Canada Report incorporates data from numerous sources, including Triton’s Digital IAB Tech Lab certified Podcast Metrics service, which measures server log data from Triton’s Omni Studio platform and a variety of industry hosting platforms.

 

NPR Renews Relationship With Veritonic To Provide Sponsors With Audio Insights

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Veritonic, the industry’s comprehensive audio analytics and research platform, announced that NPR has renewed their relationship with the company, expanding their use of Veritonic’s audio-first Brand Lift solution to measure the impact of their client and sponsor audio campaigns. The continued partnership will allow NPR to provide clients across verticals including including Financial, Adult Beverages, B2B, Technology, and more with insightful and comprehensive brand lift measurement for NPR’s audio campaigns.

“We are thrilled to be expanding our use of Veritonic’s brand lift studies across podcasts and broadcast,” said Gina Garrubbo, President and CEO of National Public Media, NPR’s sponsorship subsidiary. “Data is power, and the actionable, full-funnel insights that Veritonic’s attribution and brand lift studies allow to provide NPR sponsors enable them to leverage audio to achieve the highest competitive edge, reach, and ROI possible.”

Veritonic’s Brand Lift studies offer advertisers valuable insights into how their audio assets impact their brand. The studies provide a deeper understanding of how audio contributes to achieving a client’s goals in terms of emotional resonance, awareness, favorability, intent, and recall. By equipping brands with these tools for validating their investments, Veritonic helps mitigate ricks and enhance the performance and ROI of audio across various formats, including streaming audio and podcast advertising.

“We take great pride in our ongoing partnership with NPR, supporting their clients and advertising partners with invaluable data,” said Scott Simonelli, CEO of Veritonic. “Through the utilization of our attribution solution and brand lift studies, NPR sponsors gain the ability to assess audio performance in a manner tailored to their unique needs. This empowers them with the essential data required to fine-tune their strategies, thereby ensuring a robust return on their investment in audio.”

For more information about Veritonic’s brand lift solution or to get started, visit www.veritonic.com or contact sales@veritonic.com.

 

Acast And Slip.Stream Strike A Chord With Podcasters In New Music Licensing Partnership

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Acast, the world’s largest independent podcast company, announced a new partnership with Slip.Stream, the largest royalty-free music platform, that allows Acast podcasters access to more than 70,000 songs for use in their content creation. The first podcast partnership for Slip.Stream will see all 100,000 Acast podcasters receive “Pro Level” access free for six months, and a special discount offer to upgrade to an annual Pro plan thereafter.

“Whether it’s used for intros or outs, or to set a tone or drive action in a plot, music is an important element that makes a podcast memorable and engaging for listeners. Now, through this partnership with Slip.Stream, Acast is making it even easier for podcasters to discover the right song for every transition, story climax, and anything else in their creative process,” said Veronika Taylor, SVP of the Creator Network at Acast. 

“Music has played a key role in the rise in production quality as podcasting has matured and today’s audiences have become accustomed to that high quality audio production and storytelling, including music in episodes can help podcasters to meet these heightened audience expectations for an engaging experience.”

“Music has the power to evoke the full spectrum of human emotion. Podcaster know how to tell a compelling audio story, but can often be challenged to find songs that fit their creative needs and are safe to use on their podcast,” said Jessie Korwin, Chief Marketing Officer at Slip.Stream.  “Through this partnership, Acast and Slip.Stream are helping more podcasters enhance their storytelling and create more engaging content for their audiences by giving them access to more than 70,000 songs they can begin using in their podcast production.”

Each week, Slip.Stream updates curated playlists for podcasters to pull from for inspiration in creating their own soundtracks.

This news follows a series of product innovations and strategic partnerships by Acast to improve the podcaster experience around the globe, including the recent Pod Power Up campaign, the Acast Amplifier Project, the Launch of AdCollab, and more.

David Krulewich (DK) Joins Audiohook As Chief Revenue Officer

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Audiohook, a leading media and technology company, announced the appointment of David Krulewich (DK) as its new Chief Revenue Officer (CRO). DK is an accomplished digital media entrepreneur with an impressive track record of success throughout his 15+ year career.

As CRO, DK will lead Audiohook’s efforts to expand its market presence, enhance commercial partnerships and spearhead revenue-generating initiatives. With the company’s commitment to providing innovative digital audio and podcasting solutions, DK’s leadership will play a pivotal role in executing the company’s go-to-market strategy.

Most recently, DK served as Executive Vice President of Programmatic, Podcasting, Data and Product at Katz Digital, a division of iHeartMedia. DK led a team of 15 driving hundreds of millions of dollars in media spend across streaming audio & podcasting. He joined Katz via their acquisition Audiology, a company which he co-founded in 2017.

Prior to Audiology, DK worked for Connexity, Inc. (acquired by Taboola for $800MM) where he managed relationships with major agency holding companies and oversaw a successful sales team. DK also spent several years at Yahoo! Inc. where he secured multimillion-dollar commitments from F1000 tech advisers. He joined Yahoo! Inc. via their $270MM acquisition Interclick Inc., where he was the #1 revenue generating salesperson. He started his career at Warner Media working for TBS, TNT, and truTV.

“I’ve been watching Audiohook and Jordan’s impressive trajectory for a while and I’m pumped to join the team,” added DK. “Audiohool’s commitment to delivering value to advertisers and publishers as well as their dedication to creating cutting-edge solutions aligns with my passion for delivering successful customer outcomes. I’m eager to work with the talented team at Audiohook and shape the future of audio technology.”

Lemonada Media Launches Full-Service Studio

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Lemonada Media, the award-winning podcast network that makes life suck less, announced the launch of Lemonada Partner Studios, a full-service studio for brand, talent, foundation and non-profit partners looking to create high-quality, original podcast. 

Given the demand for Lemonade’s unique ability to produce, market, monetize and distribute hit podcasts that break through the noise, the innovative network is beginning to partner with like-minded organizations and creators seeking a best-in-class audio experience.

“We launched the network with a goal of creating mass-market shows that make life suck less and are profitable business units for us and our talent partners. Given our success, there’s been demand for production and creative services, and we are finally in a position to say “yes,” shares Jessica Cordova Kramer, Lemonada’s co-founder and CEO. 

“We’re excited to already be working with top partners across legacy media outlets, studios, influential creators and non-profit partners, with more news coming soon,” adds Co-founder and CCO, Stephanie Wittles Wachs.

Since launching in 2019, Lemonada has quickly established itself as a leading independent podcast network reaching millions of listeners per month. The network has created and launched chart-topping series’ such as Wiser Than Me with Julia Louis-Dreyfus, which spent 29 days straight at #1 overall on the Apple Podcast charts; Blind Plea, which launched to #1 overall on the Apple Podcast charts, and Funny Cuz It’s True with Elyse Myers which launched to #1 in comedy on the Apple Podcast charts. 

Lemonada also has a well-established track record working with top partners such as The Jed Foundation, Marguerite Casey Foundation and Flourish Ventures.

For inquiries about Lemonada Partner Studios, contact Dawn Gunderson Taylor: dawn@lemonadamedia.com

 

The Economist Announces The Launch Of Economist Podcasts+

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The Economist announced that it is launching Economist Podcasts+, a new subscription to build on the success of its award-winning shows and support future growth. A subscription will include exclusive access to Boss Class, a new limited series on management; The Weekend Intelligence, a new Saturday edition of the Economist’s popular show on world news; as well as The Economist’s entire collection of weekly podcasts on business, science and technology, China and American politics.

“With our podcast audience doubling in the past three years to 5m monthly unique listeners, audio has become our fastest-growing platform and has proven to be an important way to bring our journalism to new and diverse audiences,” said Bob Cohn, president, The Economist. “We think the new shows and features that are part of the Economist Podcasts+ are a great addition to our strong portfolio.”

“The Economist has always ben know for its global reporting and in-depth analysis,” said John Priedaux, executive director of podcasts and US editor. “On our podcast, our journalists help listeners make sense of the big news shaping the world, from Xi Jinping’s global ambitions and the future of Russia to American politics and the impact of artificial intelligence. Podcasting allows us to take a lot of the qualities that make The Economist special and bring them to a wider audience. We’re looking forward to making some ambitious new series for Economist Podcasts+”

Launching in mid-October, the new service will cost $/£4.90 per month or $/£49 per year. Pre-orders go on sale today, and customers subscribing between now and launch will receive 50% off an annual subscription. Current subscribers to The Economist will enjoy all of the benefits of Economist Podcasts+ at no additional cost. The weekday episodes of The Economists’s flagship programme, The Intelligence, will remain available to non-subscribers, as will the sample episodes of weekly shows and limited series podcasts.

“The decision to create a subscription tier for podcasts is the logical result of our approach to our business across digital and print: we produce premium journalism for subscribers around the world and make it available at a fair price,” said Cohn. “We think podcasting ought to follow that model, and we believe this initiative will enable further investment in our audio offerings.”

Boss Class, a new podcast hosted by the author of The Economist’s leadership and management column, Bartleby, will be the first original limited series for subscribers. Andrew Palmer, the host of Boss Class, will bring the wry sensibility of the popular newspaper column as he takes on the future of management with CEOs, anthropologists and experts on everything from hiring to hybrid work.

Subscribers will also have access to The Weekend Intelligence, the Saturday edition of The Economist’s weekday public affairs show, The Intelligence. Featuring narrative storytelling and deeper reporting from Economist writers around the world, the weekend episode will, like the weekday shows, be hosted by Ore Ogunbiyi and Jason Palmer.

Since producing its first podcast in 2006, The Economist has built a stable of shows that showcase the breadth and originality of its journalism. Today the portfolio includes:

The Intelligence, a daily podcast on global news

World in Brief, a daily news briefing updated three times a day

Checks and Balances, a weekly podcast on American politics

Money Talks, a weekly show on markets, the economy and business

Babbage, a weekly podcast on science and technology

Drum Tower, a weekly podcast on China, hosted by correspondents in Beijing and Taipei

Editor’s Picks, three essential articles read aloud from the latest issue

The Prince, a limited series on the ambitions of China’s leader, Xi Jinping

Next Year in Moscow, a limited series on Russia’s future.

The Prince was a finalist for the 2003 National Magazine Award in Podcasting and the winner of the Human Rights Press Award for multimedia and Society of Publishers in Asia (SOPA) Award for best audio reporting. The British Podcasting awards has recognized The Economist for Best Podcast Network.; The intelligence for Best Current Affairs Podcast and Best Daily Podcast, and Money Talks for Best Business Podcast. Babbage was named the Best Science Podcast by the Association of British Writers in 2022.

Alitu Launches AI-Powered Showplanner Tool

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Podcast maker Alitu is delighted to officially launch their first entirely AI-powered podcasting tool, the Alitu Showplanner.

The tool is designed to help experienced podcasters and newbies alike to take a new podcast concept from idea state through to launch in minutes by auto-generating an entire podcast action plan for free.

User answer a few short questions about their podcast idea to receive feedback on their concept, along with a full, detailed, podcast action plan. Plans include a podcast pitch, ideas for their first five episodes, suggested format, audience profile, and ideas on how to make the podcast unique from other shows already on the market.

The tool also comes with a catchy podcast name generator and an auto-generated script for the show’s initial trailer, meaning creators can immediately get the ball rolling and record their first episode.

Once podcasters submit their idea and generate their action plan, they also have the opportunity to join a 7-day bootcamp, get access to a 2,300-strong community of fellow podcasters, and a free trial of Alitu to record, edit and publish their podcast – all for free.

Co-Founder and CEO of Alitu, Colin Gray, has said:

“Anyone who’s ever started a podcast knows how tough that first step can be – taking that half-baked idea you’ve had floating around in your head for ages and turning it into something solid. It’s the challenge that kills so many podcasts before they even begin. We created Showplanner as a way for the podcasting community to use AI as an assistant to jump the hurdle, so we can go on to create the best content we’ve ever made.”

Jacob Anderson, Head of Marketing at Alitu has said:

“Talking about AI in our creative spaces like podcasting can put some people on the defensive, like it’s a threat or will somehow dilute their work. We’re looking at this crazy new landscape wit ha totally different mindset: AI as a tool to assist podcasters in a way that wasn’t possible before, and level the playing field. Not everybody can afford consultants, producers, whole teams around them. Showplanner is our first tentative step towards giving podcasters real, AI-fueled superpowers.”