Ep 37 - Leveraging Podcast Marketing with Molly Laufer, Michael Kropko, Krystina Rubino, Dan Granger

With more than 117 million monthly listeners in the United States alone, podcasting has officially become the next billion-dollar industry. For marketers, this means that podcast marketing has simultaneously become one of the most viable and exciting channels for growth. Last month, with that in mind, we brought together four of the industry leaders who have already established themselves as experts in this rapidly expanding space to discuss the ways businesses can leverage podcast marketing to get in front of their target audience unlike ever before.

In our conversation, we dive into the challenges of podcast marketing. We discuss the consumption curve of podcasts, how results can’t be seen until 21 days of advertising, and that patience is key in a world where marketers want to be instantly gratified. We talk about the nuances of knowing which podcasts are right for you to advertise on and the importance of thorough onboarding. All this and more!   

Here’s What We Discussed: 

• [03:50] The greatest challenges our speakers encountered in podcast marketing 
• [05:36] Krystina and Michael explain the consumption curve of podcasts and how long it takes advertisers to see results 
• [09:14] How do you know which podcast shows to buy? How marketers tackle attribution and false positives
• [16:14] Understanding Pixel-Based tracking and its challenges today 
• [21:46] Michael talks about the value of a post-checkout survey 
• [26:25] What do you look for when partnering with a podcast? 
• [29:50] Krystina dives into buying ad inventory released by networks 
• [34:52] The power of good onboarding; How to get a host engaged and connected to your product 
• [38:36] One of the best advantages of the podcast channel is it gives your product a voice 
• [43:24] Krystina breaks down the operational steps for getting your ad on a podcast
• [48:02] Our experts talk about the challenges of scaling the podcast channel and how many aspects of it are still manual

About Our Speakers

Dan Granger, CEO, and Founder, Oxford Road, Dan is the Founder and CEO of Oxford Road, the leading independent audio agency in the US. Oxford Road has helped hundreds of DTC companies scale their efforts in audio using Podcast, Radio, Streaming, Connected Voice, and more. 

By offering the combined capabilities of Media, Analytics, and Creative Development, Oxford Road guarantees super performance for brands that qualify for their services. Oxford Road was named among Inc 500 Fastest Growing Private Companies and has supported the growth of over 12 Unicorn Companies, (private companies valued over $1Billion) to date.

Krystina Rubino, Head of Offline Marketing, Right Side Up, Krystina has worked in digital and offline media and marketing for 15+ years in NYC and SF, on 70+ brands and products. After investing hundreds of millions in media dollars, she knows how to create campaigns that achieve goals and build businesses.

A digital expert and paid search nerd turned display banner apologist, she’s turned her focus to podcast and offline advertising, and helping companies of all stages to diversify their overall marketing mix and stand up these channels in-house. She started and lead the offline growth marketing function at Right Side Up, the leading collective of growth marketing specialists who have helped more than 300 VC-backed tech companies hit their goals across virtually all paid channels, SEO, CRO, email marketing, analytics, and more. She’s been a featured TechCrunch contributor, conference speaker, and is also an advisor to multiple companies in the ad technology and marketing analytics spaces.

Michael Kropko, Partner & COO, Ad Results Media, Michael is Partner and Co-CEO at Ad Results Media. ARM is a pioneer of the podcast movement and has been leading the broadcast industry for nearly 20 years. As the preeminent performance-based audio advertising agency in the US, they focus on buying media on podcasts, radio, satellite radio, digital audio, and YouTube. Their buying power, industry relations, proprietary grading, monitoring system, and deep analytical skill set have enabled them to transform a once upper-funnel marketing channel.

Molly Laufer, Growth Marketing Consultant, Laufer Direct, Molly is passionate about the inflection point when a company begins to diversify its acquisition portfolio outside of digital channels and is ready to dip its toes into emerging/offline marketing channels to achieve scale without compromising performance metrics. She has a decade of customer acquisition experience from early stage ecomm (first employee at NatureBox.com) to real estate tech (HomeLight.com) and scaling offline performance marketing channels for a range of consumer tech companies and startups in-house, as an agency strategist, and as an independent growth marketing consultant. She has directly managed 7-figure monthly media buys across a diverse set of offline channels with a focus on return on ad spend and marketing profitability. Her channel experience spans linear & connected TV, audio (including podcast, streaming, terrestrial, and satellite – both endorsement and produced audio), direct mail, and OOH with a holistic understanding of media strategy and buying, creative development, and analytics/attribution.

Quotes

 “As marketers, we have to adapt to the medium and the way the medium is consumed in order to see the best performance of it.” – Krystina Rubino

 

“Repetition is key and it does take time. [Podcast] is kind of this weird hybrid of an online and offline channel. People have trouble compartmentalizing it and they want that immediate gratification.” – Michael Kropko

 

“If you are going to use pixel-based attribution, there are a lot of caveats to it. You have to really make sure you're doing everything you can to align it with your digital marketing efforts and with the way that your digital marketing exactly is measuring it, otherwise, it's like apples to oranges.” – Molly Laufer

 

“The myth is that if you just target the right audience with the right people, then you're going to get the best results… Sometimes the thing that you think is perfect for your audience actually is going to perform horribly.” – Dan Granger 

 

“There's a media buying transaction that's occurring, but is the partner engaged? Are they taking the time to understand your brand? Are they able to give a good credible read on the topic?” –  Krystina Rubino 

 

“Everybody wants to buy into that new celebrity that has their own new podcast. Typically, the loyal following of that celebrity is not as strong as that celebrity thinks.” – Michael Kropko

 

“There's no substitute for good onboarding… When you can, and as much as you can, go big on your onboarding.” – Dan Granger 

 

“One of the biggest things that the podcast channel brings is someone putting their voice behind your product.” – Molly Laufer

 

Resources Mentioned 

•  Podcast data and analytics for advertisers, Magellan AI: https://www.magellan.ai 

 

ABOUT RUCKUS

We are growth leaders who recruit your game changers. Visit https://bringruckus.com and connect on LinkedIn. Subscribe and listen to more episodes on Apple Podcasts, Spotify Google Podcasts, Audible, or wherever you get your podcasts!  

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