Digital Audio’s Role in Brand Safety [Whitepaper]
As the explosion of misleading and biased content continues to rise, companies may unwittingly find their advertising being displayed next to content they may not want their brand to be associated with. This has brought brand safety to the forefront of the digital conversation, resulting in an increased urgency for buyers to understand and trust their ad environment.
Pandora’s Maria Breza, Sr. Director Platform Management, contributed to a whitepaper led by the IAB with representatives from Triton Digital, Targetspot, WNYC, PMM, Spotify, ESPN and NPR to review and highlight digital audio’s brand safety advantages.
With music accounting for 54% of total audio consumption [1], maintaining quality for both the advertiser and the listener is our utmost priority.
Brand Safety and Digital Audio
Digital audio platforms have several natural advantages that enhance brand safety. The ability to control the context of an ad along with engaged listening creates a positive listening experience for maximizing the advertiser's message.
Other important elements such as measured audience engagement and in-app usage make digital audio an excellent investment for advertisers to spend their budgets with confidence.
You can read the full report here for all the benefits of audio advertising and brand safety, but here are a few examples of where Pandora works hard to ensure quality and brand safety:
In-App listening & non-skippable ads diminish the incidence of fraud
On average, in-app advertising contains significantly lower volumes of fraud than other channels. Less than 2% of fraudulent bot activity takes place in mobile in-app and display ad environments, as compared to 9% for display and 21% for video.[2] Additionally, when ads are non-skippable, these native ads are embedded directly into the content and helps to uphold a valuable and fraud-free environment.
Audio Gives Advertisers 100% Share of Voice
The nature of the ad experience in digital audio delivers value for both the marketer and listener. While listening to audio, listeners are only exposed to one audio message at a time, which offers 100% share of voice to the brand.
Visual Ads Served on Engagement
Our display and video ads are only served when a user is actively engaging with Pandora—such as giving a thumbs up, thumbs down, skipping a song or changing the station. Because they are already engaging with the platform, this means a high level of engagement and intentional interaction from the listener, gives advertisers greater confidence that their brand image is in a brand safe environment.
In conclusion, digital audio will continue to grow and evolve, and Pandora plans on continuing to grow and evolve with it. We know brand safety is a critical issue, and we are constantly working to offer more features for advertisers to validate that their audio advertising is verified and brand safe.
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[1] Nielsen 2017 Year-End Music Report US [2] Bot Baseline Report, a WhiteOps and the ANA Study 2017