Recent research published by dentsu in partnership with Lumen Research,  measured attention in various audio formats and environments across three unique studies in podcasts, radio and music streaming. The podcast study was conducted with participating partners Audacy, Cumulus Media, iHeartMedia, Spotify and SXM Media. The radio study was conducted with Audacy, Cumulus Media and iHeartMedia. Separately, Amazon Ads conducted a study with Amazon Music for advertising on the music streaming service.

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The studies found that audio advertising (including podcasts, radio and music streaming) drove significant attention compared to other ad platforms:  

• Average attentive seconds per (000) APM for audio advertising was 10,126 compared to dentsu norms of 6,501 APM

• On average, 41% of audio ads generated correct brand recall (vs. 38% of dentsu norms)

• Brand choice uplift for audio ads was 10% (vs. 6% for dentsu norms)

The studies also found that each audio destination has its own unique strength in driving attention and brand impact.  

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• Radio (measured across Audacy, Cumulus Media and iHeartMedia) also impressively drove higher attentive seconds per thousand impressions compared to other digital, social and TV benchmarks. Radio shined as the most efficient of the audio formats studied, proving to be 10x more efficient when compared to the average online video ads measured through dentsu’s Attention Economy.

• Podcasts (measured across Audacy, Cumulus Media, iHeartMedia, Spotify and SXM Media) drove the highest attentive seconds per thousand impressions compared to other digital, social and TV benchmarks. In addition, we saw that brand choice uplift was higher for host reads compared to traditional audio ads within podcasts.

• Music Streaming (measured on Amazon Music across voice with Alexa and on mobile or desktop) drove key branding metrics. Brand recall was highest for ad supported streaming music played on Alexa-enabled devices and drove even higher brand choice uplift for :30 ads compared to those same ads listened to through a desktop/mobile device.

”We understand that radio advertising is a cost-efficient way to build reach, that podcast listeners have great affinity not only to the programming but also podcast hosts, and that smart speakers are a compelling new destination for audio ads on streaming services. It’s nice to see each of these unique strengths of different audio formats validated by our audio Attention Economy Study,” said Jennifer Hungerbuhler, EVP, Local and Audio Investment Lead, dentsu Media US.

Expanding dentsu’s Attention Economy research into audio advertising for the first time, the media agency network worked with research partner Lumen to devise a methodology to measure attention in audio that is equivalent with measurement across visual media platforms. To conduct the study, respondents were exposed to listening environments similar to their native audio experiences (e.g., selecting a podcast, radio station or genre of music on a streaming platform). Post-listening, they were administered dentsu's Attention Economy Survey to gauge ad recall and brand choice uplift compared to a similarly recruited control group. Lumen modelled an attention score which is equivalent to that based on visual attention using the factors collected (including passively collected audio listening data, survey results and type of ad exposure).  

The study is the latest to be released by dentsu’s Attention Economy which is celebrating its fifth anniversary this year after launching in 2018. The Attention Economy was the industry’s first attention-focused study and is the world’s largest in scale and scope of its kind.

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