Rob said: I don’t think that Todd was addressing his reservations on dynamically inserted ads at the level of the individual podcaster.

Todd doesn’t make it clear if that is the case. I may have misunderstood him. But to me it sounds like he makes a blanket statement saying that dynamic/auto insertion is worthless.

Rob said: Anyone who tries to apply a Google Adsense model for podcast advertising will not get nearly the same results as those who let podcasters produce ads that they can seamlessly integrate with their shows.

I 100% agree with that. I’ve pointed out the shortcomings with Google Adsense for audio here on this blog. This would be a poor use of dynamic insertion. However, if dynamic insertion is used by or in conjunction with the host, I still maintain that it can be very effective.

Todd said: The article I wrote was in response to the Business Week article talking about Google possible getting into the podcast ad business along with their discussion on ad insertion in podcast.

In that context, the article makes more sense. I understand your position better now. Maybe this is just a matter of semantics, because the truth of the matter is that I agree with the majority of the points you make in the article.

But I still think that your point should not be against “auto insertion”.

Auto insertion does not equal prefabbed annoying ads that disrupt the flow of the show and the relationship with the podcaster.

Whether or not the ad is auto inserted is not the point. It’s the method of production and presentation of that matters, not the tech used to put the ad in the audio.

Todd said: My article Ground Truth in Podcast Advertising is based upon 24 months of experience in putting dollars in podcasters pockets…

I have no doubt that you know what you are doing and talking about. It’s just in your blanket use of the word “auto insertion” that I disagree.

Todd said: I encourage you to poll your own listeners and ask them what they think about auto insertion of ads you may be surprised what you find out.

That’s the wrong question to ask. I doubt most of Paul’s audience realizes he is auto inserting ads let alone having an opinion on it because he reads them himself and inserts them in an unobtrusive manner. Sure, if I asked my audience what they thought of prefabbed ads that were not geared towards them, then they would say they hate it. But auto insertion is not the enemy here.

Again, auto insertion does not equal annoying your audience. Poorly produced ads, not letting the host read the ads, etc….these are the things that annoy the listener. That is the point that I wanted to make clear.

Over the past 24 months I have accumulated a wide variety of survey data across multiple show categories to back up all of my claims in the above article.

One of the facts that has emerged is from listener sampling of shows that use auto insertion and those that don’t. Those survey results across the board show that Listeners hate auto-inserted advertising. They can smell them a mile away.

This survey data is conclusive in that listeners automatically discount the context of the ads. No longer is the podcaster listener relationship existent.

The same goes for ad penetration, no real mechanism expect for listener surveys and sampling of listeners can measure the penetration but being both podtrac and us have used post campaign surveys to determine ad penetration we know the message is reaching a very high percentage of the listening audience.

While at the same time I have nearly 500 podcasters earning money through advertising in because of my and my companies efforts to build long term relationships with sponsors.

Little history lesson is in order my personal show brought GoDaddy into the space quickly followed by other companies in which I was the first to sign a group of podcasters to a single contract in 2005 when everyone else was still talking about it.

It should be noted that the majority of the advertisers I have under contract have been under contract a very long time and they continue to renew every quarter. Their are very few companies that have advertisers renewing contracts for more than 18 months.

Is it because we do dynamic insertion aka the paul harvey model which is a host read ad that is more story and relationship than an actual in your face ad.

My article Ground Truth in Podcast Advertising is based upon 24 months of experience in putting dollars in podcasters pockets, delivering outstanding ROI and giving value most importantly to the listener.

I encourage you to poll your own listeners and ask them what they think about auto insertion of ads you may be surprised what you find out.

For those podcasters that want to maintain editorial control of their podcast come over and join the blubrry community we will help you monetize your show and not annoy your listnership.

The issue is with mass dynamic insertions where the ads are not spoken by the podcaster and the tone of the ads might not match the show. Anyone who tries to apply a Google Adsense model for podcast advertising will not get nearly the same results as those who let podcasters produce ads that they can seamlessly integrate with their shows.

Some podcasters may just want to eliminate the ‘hassle’ of having to produce an ad for each show. I have a feeling that those folks will also be making fewer dollars and maintaining weaker relationships with their sponsors than their counterparts who naturally convey their association with a product or service.

People need to remember that the greatest modern innovation with audio advertising did not result from some new technology. It came about when Howard Stern decided to take a more casual, conversational approach to promoting products. It would be a shame to see people ignore the wisdom of that approach in favor of one that values convenience over passion and connection.

That said, dynamic ad insertion is probably only going to be used by a small number of podcasters.

Dynamic insertion definitely has some challenges like the one you brought up. It can cause a lot of problems if the length (and hence size) of the mp3 file is always changing.

There’s some responsibility that falls on the publisher to mitigate these problems. One way to do this is to always make sure that they ads are the same length.