Tag: chartable

Evolving Brands’ Measurement Experience With All-New Spotify Ad Analytics

June 13, 2023

As digital audio continues to boom, advertisers and publishers need modernized tools to understand the impact of their ad investments. Since 2020, Spotify has led the charge with innovations like Streaming Ad Insertion (SAI), which offers deeper ad insights and reporting than was previously available for podcasts. We continued our investments in this space last year with our acquisition of Podsights as we endeavored to accelerate podcast ads measurement and ultimately, strengthen audio ad measurement across music and podcasts on platform and beyond.

Today, we’re taking the next step in that journey and launching Spotify Ad Analytics (SpAA), a global measurement service for brands and agencies of all sizes. This free tool provides advertisers with more ways to better understand their investments on and off Spotify. For publishers, SpAA unlocks greater opportunities to prove the value of their inventories to direct advertising clients.

To learn more, For the Record spoke with Kelsey Woo, a Senior Product Marketing Manager at Spotify who oversees product marketing efforts across Spotify’s advertising measurement, reporting, and insights tools.

Measurement in digital audio advertising lags behind other digital channels. What are some of the ways we’re addressing this with new tools like Spotify Ad Analytics?

Measurement remains an industry-wide challenge across all of digital audio advertising. In the early days, podcasters began monetizing their content by simply recording their ad reads directly into the audio file for a specific podcast episode—these became known as “baked in” or “burned in” ads.

The global shift in consumption from downloads to streaming has opened the door for advances in more data-driven podcast advertising measurement. When we launched SAI, we introduced impression-level insight to podcast advertising for the very first time. Rather than relying on download data, advertisers now had access to standard digital reporting like impressions, unique reach, and frequency, along with unique audience insights and creative performance metrics powered by Spotify’s first-party data.

Last year, we acquired Podsights to solve this measurement pain point for advertisers, both on Spotify and across the industry. Today, by announcing that Podsights is now Spotify Ad Analytics, we’re taking the next step in that journey.

Why the decision to offer Spotify Ad Analytics free of charge?

It’s no secret that we believe in the power of audio. And as marketers increasingly invest in this powerful medium, we want to support that industry-wide growth by making it easier to measure the impact of the format. That’s why we decided to offer Spotify Ad Analytics as a free service to all customers. We feel it’s not only important to make this type of data and foundational knowledge accessible to businesses of all sizes, but to also provide it with the expertise that comes from being the world’s most popular audio-streaming service.

Spotify Ad Analytics builds on a strong foundation to provide our customers with a one-stop shop for Spotify’s measurement and reporting solutions. It gives advertisers even more tools to better understand the value of their investments across Spotify and beyond—free of charge.

What does this mean for advertisers? What are the implications for publishers?

This new offering means that advertisers can measure more on Spotify. It also means both publishers and advertisers can measure real-time conversion tracking and attribution across an unlimited number of audio and podcast impressions. For customers who were previously working with Podsights, there’s no new installation required—they’ll get access to more tools and features just by logging in.

Why is measurement so important for both of these groups? How will Spotify Ad Analytics help accomplish their goals?

Ultimately, Spotify Ad Analytics will help advertisers understand which media strategies are helping them reach their goals. In turn, this allows publishers to prove the value of podcast advertising and further accelerate the growth of their podcast businesses.

We’ve been testing the expanded capabilities since late last year, most recently partnering with advertisers like Grammarly and Shopify to measure the performance of streaming audio ads. We’ve received great feedback on the ability to streamline reporting surfaces and easily understand the holistic impact of different media types, so we’re really excited.

Spotify advertisers in Australia, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Mexico, New Zealand, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the United States can now use Spotify Ad Analytics to lean into the power of streaming to provide even more accurate and actionable insights across Spotify ads. Learn more here.

2022 Saw Even More Advancements, Acquisitions, and Excitement at Spotify

December 27, 2022

Earlier this month, we all had a chance to revisit what we listened to most in 2022 with Wrapped. From the year’s top artist (congrats on the three-peat, Bad Bunny) to identifying our listening personalities (where the “Deep Divers” at?), fans worldwide shared their listening habits. But that’s only the icing on the cake. The year also saw new content offerings such as audiobooks and more programs to support diverse and underrepresented voices, all designed to bring the best experience to listeners and creators.

Ring in 2023 by reliving Spotify’s highlights from 2022.

Commitment to platform safety

At the start of the year, we shared several actions we’re taking to balance creator expression with safety, including publishing our Platform Rules and taking steps to ensure creators and users alike understand what’s permitted on Spotify. This summer, we unveiled the Spotify Safety Advisory Council, an interdisciplinary group of experts that are providing our teams with an outside-in view of the safety landscape and helping us ensure that our products and policies address the needs and concerns of our users, creators, and artists around the world.

Acquisitions expand our offerings

Early in the year, we acquired two podcast technology companies: Podsights, a podcast advertising measurement service, and Chartable, a podcast analytics platform. This move helped us uplevel measurement for podcast advertising and give publishers a new way to grow their business through insights and promotions tools.

Over the summer, we closed on the acquisition of Findaway, a global leader in digital audiobook distribution. Findaway works across the audiobook ecosystem with a platform and offerings that serve authors, publishers, and consumers. Their technology and know-how helped accelerate Spotify’s entry into audiobooks earlier this fall.

As the world’s leading audio streaming platform, it made perfect sense to bring Heardle, the beloved interactive music game to Spotify. It has provided a fun and innovative way to help fans discover new songs and artists.

We also acquired Kinzen, a global leader in protecting online communities from harmful content. Our partnership with the Dublin-based company, which began in 2020, has been critical to enhancing our approach to platform safety. The company’s technology and unique approach helps Spotify better understand, prepare for, and prevent abuse trends from emerging on our platform.

Frequency carves out a spot for Black creators

We expanded Frequency, our global initiative and holistic destination for celebrating Black art, entertainment, creativity, culture, and community both on- and off-platform, with even more opportunities for Black creators. In addition to on-platform hubs and playlists, we hosted The Free Studio, a four-day residency that brought together nine Black musicians and creators. Spotify’s popular playlist Ripple Effect continued the Frequency Sunday Dinner series in Houston, as well as cities across California.

Helping diversify the voices of podcasting

Programs like Sound Up, the Creator Equity Fund, and RADAR for Podcasters help underrepresented voices and emerging talent in the audio space. From education and workshops to on-platform amplification, these initiatives give creators the tools they need to tell their story. In October, we introduced the Africa Podcast Fund, a first-of-its-kind initiative to support burgeoning podcasters through financial grants, workshops, and networking opportunities. In December, we launched Elevate for Podcasters in partnership with the Inevitable Foundation. The program empowers professional podcasters with disabilities, providing the funding, mentorship, equipment, and accommodations they need to level up their careers.

Introducing User Choice Billing with Google

Our multi-year agreement with Google represents a first-of-its-kind option in payment choice with opportunities for both consumers and developers. Users who’ve downloaded Spotify from the Google Play Store are presented with the choice to pay with either Spotify’s payment system or Google Play Billing. These two options living side-by-side in the app give users the freedom to subscribe and make purchases, using the payment option of their choice. With this announcement and our partnership, Google is allowing more choice and competition—decisive steps that demonstrate how platforms should work.

Blend it up

Blend combines the best of Spotify’s personalization capabilities and collaborative playlist functionality into a single shared playlist. In 2022, we took Blend to a whole new level. Users can now Blend with up to 10 people or they can Blend with artists like Lizzo, Post Malone, and Charli XCX. Fans also have the opportunity to shop artist merch from the Blend experience. Blend represents another way we can give artists a new oportunity to interact with fans, and to bring added personalization to a listener’s music experience.

Playing with video

In 2022 we expanded video podcasting to Anchor creators in over 180 global markets. Podcasters love having the option to accompany their audio with visual components, and fans get the opportunity to deeply connect with the content. We also introduced Spotify Podcast Subscriptions for video podcasts, an integration with Riverside (the go-to platform for remote recording), embeddable video, video bulk-replace, video-specific analytics, and interactive podcast features, such as polls and Q&A.

Celebrating EQUAL’s first anniversary

Since its launch, EQUAL has spotlighted women artists through global partnerships, activations, new content experiences, and on- and off-platform support. April marked the program’s one year anniversary. Among EQUAL’s major accomplishments: listeners streamed more than 13 million hours of program artists in the first month of joining.

Reimagining with Roblox

We entered the virtual universe Roblox to create Spotify Island, an audio paradise where fans and artists from all over the world can connect and explore exclusive sounds, quests, and merch. We enhanced the experience during the year with K-Park and Planet Hip-Hop.

Spotify and FC Barcelona team up on the field

In July, we kicked off a partnership with FC Barcelona, becoming the Main Partner of the Club as well as the Official Audio Streaming Partner. We joined the team in Miami during the club’s preseason tour and brought artists like Ovy on the Drums, Piso 21, and Mau y Ricky along for the fun. Through the in-stadium LEDs and our other marketing channels, we promoted artists of all sizes from around the world including BLACKPINK, Fireboy DML, Megan Thee Stallion, Aitch, Pomme, Feid, and Rigoberta Bandini. For FC Barcelona’s October El Clásico showdown—one of the most iconic events in all of sport—we celebrated Drake’s 50 billion streams by creating a limited-edition kit. Get more details on this multiyear partnership on our Spotify: For the Record podcast.

Upping the ante with audiobooks

This fall, we introduced audiobooks to listeners in the U.S., the UK, Ireland, Australia, and New Zealand. With more than 300,000 titles on the platform, we are giving book lovers a new way to enjoy storytelling on Spotify.

Time to play fair

We believe everyone benefits when competition is fair. Unfortunately, Apple does not, and they’ve consistently abused their dominant position to favor their own services, stifle innovation and hurt consumers. This year, we continued to urge policymakers to take significant action to protect competition and consumers from Apple’s anticompetitive behavior. For more on this fight, listen to Spotify: For the Record, where entrepreneurs, U.S. senators, and Spotify CEO Daniel Ek discuss the importance of consumer choice.

Rak Patel, Head of Enterprise Sales, Europe, Shares Why Podsights Marks a New Opportunity for European Advertisers

October 18, 2022

Earlier this year, Spotify Advertising continued our focus on delivering innovation in audio advertising with the acquisition of Podsights, a leading podcast advertising measurement service that helps advertisers better measure and scale their podcast advertising. With Podsights, we’re bringing greater transparency to podcast ads around the world. Advertisers will now be able to apply key analytics and measurement solutions, enabling them to easily track the success of campaigns or specific placements. And since podcasts are growing in popularity and are slated to become a €1.5B ads business in Europe by the end of 2023, we’ve been investing to grow digital audio advertising across the region.

So earlier this month, we launched Podsights for podcast advertisers in the U.K., France, Germany, Spain, and Italy. This means advertisers in these markets can now easily access real-time insights about their podcast investments and understand how podcast ads drive actions that matter to their business campaigns. In the U.K. in particular, we’re testing these tools for ads in our Free music experience with media agency Omnicom Media Group. Over time, we plan to extend these measurement capabilities beyond podcasts to the full scope of the Spotify platform, including audio ads within music, video ads, and display ads.

And no one is more excited for these advancements than our Head of Enterprise Sales in Europe, Rak Patel.

“We’ve been working hard to create major demand outside of the U.S.,” he explained to For the Record. “We’ve done it through investments on the international side, investments on building a team and set of resources to truly capitalize on the opportunity, and investments on the podcast advertising side for international. All of these components are steps to make Spotify even more attractive as we go on our amazing journey.”

Podsights is now available for all podcast advertisers in the U.K., France, Germany, Spain, and Italy. What was the road to getting here like?

About a year or so ago, our advertising business started building out further capabilities in the EMEA region and in particular the major markets—the EU5 (Including U.K.!)—putting investment not only into the team, but into expanding our offerings as well. And that’s a really important milestone for us because it meant that we were starting to maximize our opportunity with advertisers and agencies outside of the U.S. And a big part of being ready to do that was through really maturing our product offering: advertising via podcasts.

Now, clearly, podcasts are a big thing at Spotify, so what’s really important to us is being able to maximize the opportunity of podcasts on our platform for our advertiser partners, whether that’s through the content that we have on the Owned and Exclusive side or through building our ability to have an audience buy on our platform with the Spotify Audience Network. And then what advertisers still need is to be able to measure the effectiveness of the activity on their site.

And that’s where Podsights comes into play. Rolling this out now across the EU5 is another important step for us to be able to go to advertisers with the full suite of capabilities, which means that they’re able to both reach their audience and measure the effectiveness of that activity on our platform.

Is there a market you’re particularly excited to watch on the podcast advertising front?

This is like asking if I have a favorite child. (I do, but I’m not going to share that here.) So what I’ll say is: I’m massively excited about all five. Simply because each market is at a different stage, but we have a readiness to really do more within each of the markets. Now, Germany and the U.K. are more progressive at the moment in terms of the marketplace. And there’s fantastic content that we have there, and opportunities to match. But equally important for us is France, Spain, and Italy too. So I’m excited for all of my country-children.

In the U.K., we’re testing Podsights with music ads for the first time. What does this mean for advertisers?

First off, I’m delighted that we’re starting this test in Europe. Secondly, what’s really important here is being able to offer our measurement tools to our advertisers at scale across our whole portfolio, whether it’s podcasts or music. The music side of our business is something that we’ve been obviously very focused on for many years now. So the opportunity for us to really scale our new tool, Podsights, in a really fast way across advertisers who already know us really well on the music side, I think that’s a great move.

What are some tips for brands who want to get started with audio advertising?

Our efforts here are making the whole landscape of podcast advertising incredibly attractive because we’re enabling an advertiser to reach their audience at scale—while still offering them ways to sponsor individual shows—and then also to be able to do that on a repeatable basis. The key desires for an advertiser are to be able to share their story, to share their product, and to engage with the audience. There’s three things I would say are going to be really important for advertisers who want to do that through audio:

Be brave. The podcast advertising landscape is one that’s going to evolve very quickly over the next several years. Come with us as we learn and go on this journey.
Think about what our platform can offer from a personalization perspective that other brands can’t do—and then think about how you can really engage with your fans in that way. With unique tech like Streaming Ad Insertion, you know your ad is being heard by the audience you’re aiming to reach. That’s a game changer for podcasts. And not to mention, it’s quite cool.
Think about how you can include podcast ads in your full media plans on a regular basis. Don’t just come try it out and then move on. Make it something that’s evergreen. We see the most impactful, most memorable campaigns from advertisers who continually engage. And this is where Podsights really helps, because it gives those proof points. Don’t stop the conversation.

To learn more about Spotify Advertising, head to Ads.Spotfy.

Spotify rapporterar intäkter för första kvartalet 2022

April 27, 2022

Idag publicerar Spotify sina finansiella resultat för första kvartalet 2022. Klicka här för att ta del av hela den finansiella pressreleasen och kolla in höjdpunkterna nedan:

Vill du höra mer? Lyssna gärna på vår Q&A-webcast på IR-sajten här.

Klicka nedan för att kolla in trailers från några av våra senaste original och exklusiva podcasts.

Spotify Reports First Quarter 2022 Earnings

April 27, 2022

Spotify Q1 2022 earnings results showing growing users and subscribers. we have reached 422 million monthly active users, up 19% year over year. We have reached 182 million subscribers, up 15% year over year.

Today, Spotify announced our first quarter 2022 financial performance. Click here to review the full earnings release, and take a look at the highlights below:

Interested in hearing more? You can listen to the webcast Q&A on the IR site here.

Click below to check out a sizzle reel of audio trailers from a few of our recent original and exclusive podcasts.

Spotify Acquires Podsights and Chartable To Advance Podcast Measurement for Advertisers and Insights for Publishers

February 16, 2022

In 2020, Spotify set out to modernize podcast advertising with the launch of Streaming Ad Insertion. Then, we built on this game-changing innovation with the introduction of our audio-first ad marketplace, the Spotify Audience Network. Just last month, we expanded even more through an interactive ad experience called call-to-action cards. With these investments, we’re delivering impact for advertisers and growth for podcast publishers like the Wall Street Journal, ViacomCBS, and AdLarge.

According to eMarketer, annual U.S. digital audio advertising revenue is poised to grow to nearly $8 billion—and of that, $2.7 billion for podcast advertising alone—by 2025. We believe the next step to unlocking this growth is demonstrating audio advertising’s impact through innovations in measurement and attribution for advertisers and audience insights for publishers.

That’s why today we’re excited to announce our acquisitions of two podcast technology companies, Podsights and Chartable.

Podsights is a leading podcast advertising measurement service that helps advertisers better measure and scale their podcast advertising. Chartable is a podcast analytics platform that enables publishers to know and grow their podcast audiences through promotional attribution and audience insight tools.

Here’s what these acquisitions mean for advertisers and publishers.

Upleveling Measurement for Podcast Advertising

Advertisers come to Spotify to reach our engaged and immersed audience. But, according to a recent Advertiser Perceptions survey, measurement and attribution remain the two biggest unsolved challenges for podcast advertisers. Spotify plans to solve this pain point through the acquisition of Podsights. As part of Spotify, Podsights will be able to utilize Spotify’s technology and intelligence to bring more accurate measurement and actionable insights to podcast advertisers around the world.

In short, with the acquisition of Podsights, Spotify will be able to help advertisers understand how podcast ads drive actions that matter to their businesses. Over time, we plan to extend these measurement capabilities beyond podcasts to the full scope of the Spotify platform, including audio ads within music, video ads, and display ads.

Helping Publishers Grow Their Businesses With Robust Insights & Promotional Tools

Over the past year, we’ve been strengthening Megaphone’s already robust offering—most recently with the acquisition of Whooshkaa and its broadcast-to-podcast technology—to ensure it’s the best place for podcast publishers to create, monetize, and measure their podcast businesses. And now with the acquisition of Chartable, we will be further enhancing Megaphone’s suite of tools with the integration of Chartable’s audience insights and cutting-edge promotional tools, SmartLinks and SmartPromos. These tools will make it easier for publishers to turn audience insights into action and expand their listenership while ultimately growing their businesses.

The Future of Digital Audio

We believe the opportunity for digital audio and podcast remains significant. With these acquisitions, we’re taking a big step in upleveling digital audio measurement and insights to help the entire industry scale to new heights.

Check out a Q&A with Podsights Founder Sean Creeley and Khurrum Malik, Head of Advertising Business Marketing on Ads.Spotify.com. For a deep dive on Chartable, head to Megaphone.fm.

Stream On 2023

Time to Play Fair

Spotify Loud & Clear

Spotify x FC Barcelona