Get heard for $0.02 per person...

We recently ran an ad promoting our podcast “The Crunch with Crib” on Spotify, to test the results and see how it all works.

There were a few learns, some big positives and some things we think could be improved upon but overall as a branding exercise, it was worth it.

Before we started

Spotify ads have a minimum spend of $250. However we recently received an update that ad’s could be switched off and the budget could be rolled over to another ad campaign #win

Audience targeting is similar to other ad platforms (think Facebook and Google) although there isn’t QUITE the amount of creepy data available. In saying that there are other things you can target based on audience listening behaviour. For example playlist category (like Focus or Exercise) and genre. Other targeting options are age, location & gender. The closest location we could get was Perth (no not as suburb specific as other platforms.)

Our Ad

Unfortunately, we weren’t able to link our ad directly to our podcast (that feature must be for larger artists haha) so we included a link to our podcast page. That was a shame as it would have been ideal to have people subscribe to the podcast from the ad.

We made our ad audio short (15 seconds) so it wasn’t too disruptive and people would be more likely to listen to it in it’s entirety

Results

• We ran our ad for 2 weeks with a $250 spend.

• Our demo’s were set to 25+ years old, based in Perth

• Our total ads served were 13,171, reaching 10,047 people

• Our total ad listens were 11,608 reaching 8,850 people. The total ad listen rate was 88.13%

• 41% of our ad audience were 25-34 with the remainder evenly split between 35-44 and 45+

• 29% of our ads were served after listeners were listening to Pop songs

• 52% of our ads were delivered to an iOS device, 32% to Android and 16% to Desktop

• We only had 5 people click through to the link on the ad (unsurprising)

• Our Spotify podcast downloads increased by 9% during the duration of the ad

I wondered how many Spotify users in Perth actually pay for a subscription so they aren’t served these ads? Data was difficult to come by and the best I could find was high-level subscriber data for the whole of Australia. In May this year, Spotify had 217M monthly active users worldwide with 100M of those paying for a premium subscription and they are growing 35% year on year.

I wasn’t surprised by the low click-throughs. As a Spotify listener, I would be unlikely to click through based on an ad played on Spotify.

BUT at a total cost per listen of $0.02, as a brand awareness exercise, this is far more cost effective than Facebook, Instagram or Google.

AND our downloads increased by 9% which is not insignificant.

I am an auditory learner and remember the ads I hear on Spotify or the radio – and I had lots of people tell me they had heard the ad.

We have been banging on about the benefits of audio and we’ll maintain that this is the way of the future. As Spotify learns more and more about its users listening behaviour and preferences etc it creates an even bigger opportunity to create an engaging brand campaign.

This is definitely a platform to keep an eye on, especially as they improve the delivery and targeting capabilities. If you are a larger brand, it’s worth implementing a long-term Spotify campaign as part of your marketing spend