July 2021: Top spenders, movers and shakers in podcast advertising
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Top 15 spenders in July
Top 15 movers & shakers in July
Skylight Frames
Skylight Frames previously concentrated their spend around major gift-giving holidays and even made our top movers & shakers list in April of this year with their Mother’s Day promotions. This mid-summer increase follows a broader trend of increased spend in the home goods category.
The ads in July were primarily host-read ads where the hosts added personal anecdotes and stories but they all followed a common theme of staying in touch. Many of them also mentioned sharing photos with family, and even more specifically, moms.
Skylight increased their investment 100x between June and July and focused their ads in mid-roll positions. The direct-response ads offered 10% off with show specific coupon codes. Hear ads on Red Collar and Dumb People Town.
Grammarly
Since we first detected Grammarly in September 2018, the online writing assistant has been spending consistently. The brand increased their investment by 78% in July, setting the record for their biggest spending month yet. We detected Grammarly ads on 17 new shows last month.
Prior to July, Grammarly’s placements covered a wide range of podcast genres with high concentrations in business, sports, and education. In July though, Grammarly added several ESPN podcasts to their lineup shifting the mix much more heavily into sports. The new ESPN placements were pre-recorded, but outside of these, the ads were mostly host-read.
The Grammarly ads were direct-response ads offering 20% off the premium service with show specific codes. All of Grammarly’s ads were in a mid-roll position. Hear the ads on One Click and First Take.
HydroJug
Founded in 2017, HydroJug is a half-gallon sized water bottle with features to serve athletes’ and bodybuilders’ needs. First detected in February of this year, the brand increased spend by 344% between June and July.
To date, the majority of the podcasts where HydroJug appeared have been heavily weighted to female audiences. In July, they added Believe You Me to their campaign plan; a show that has a 90% male audience.
79% of the ads are in a pre-roll position while the remainder are mid-roll. The ads are mostly host-read and the hosts took the opportunity to share their own experiences with the product. The direct-response ads offer 10% off with show specific codes. Hear ads on Whine Down and What We Said.
Methodology
Magellan AI analyzes podcast advertising data from the top 3,000 podcasts in the U.S., as ranked by Apple Podcasts. For parts of this analysis, we relied on Magellan AI’s proprietary model to estimate advertising spend. Our model incorporates a number of factors, including:
- The number of ads and variation in ad load detected for a given episode
- Number of downloads for each episode
- CPM, as reported on select media kits and estimated based on popularity
From time to time we adjust our model based on new inputs and user input.
Magellan AI creates tools that help marketers at brands like SimpliSafe, Wix, and BetterHelp spend intelligently on podcast advertising. Podcast publishers like WNYC and Audioboom use Magellan to track advertisers spending money in the podcast space. Learn More.
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