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Founded in 2015, Megaphone is headquartered in DC with offices in Brooklyn, Chicago, San Francisco, and Los Angeles. The company helps publishers and advertisers make the most out of podcasting with its suite of tools, whilst also enabling brand advertisers to connect with thousands of premium, niche audience segments. WNIP caught up with Andy Bowers, Chief Innovation Officer of Megaphone, to find out more…
What business problem is your company addressing?
As more large companies and networks move into podcasting, they need robust publishing and ad-tech tools to match what they’re used to on the digital print and video side. Podcast hosting companies have largely focused on entry-level publishers, and the technology has not kept up with that in other digital media.
We recognized this gap and created Megaphone to give enterprise publishers simple, intuitive tools to monetize their shows while staying focused on creating great content for their listeners.
What is your core solution?
Megaphone focuses on the business of podcasting and is tailored to publishers who produce large shows or are managing complex networks of shows and big teams. It’s an all-in-one platform that provides everything from publishing and content management to monetization and measurement tools.
- Publishing & CMS – Megaphone provides simple, intuitive workflows that save producers time every day. Within the podcast library, they can easily create a new podcast, upload episodes, add categories and tags, then schedule or publish to all major podcast listening apps and smart speakers.
- Monetization – Advanced dynamic ad insertion and monetization tools give publishers the flexibility to control when, where, and in what order appear in their show. It includes campaign management, geotargeting, mobile device targeting, frequency capping, and impression pacing.
- Megaphone Targeted Marketplace (MTM) – The first and most sophisticated audience targeting technology in the industry. Working with exclusive data from Nielsen Marketing Cloud, MTM can target 60,000 demographic and psychographic segments across hundreds of millions of monthly ad impressions. MTM supplements our clients’ direct ad sales by filling unsold inventory and maximizing revenue.
- Measurement – Megaphone provides our clients with industry-leading inventory forecasting, and provides detailed analytics on how their podcasts and ad campaigns have performed.
Can you give some examples of publishers successfully using Megaphone?
Megaphone powers some of the biggest publishers in podcasting including iHeartMedia, HowStuffWorks, Gimlet Media, the Wall Street Journal, Slate, NBC News, and Vox Media. In addition to the big players, our platform also powers other types of publishers from local news and radio stations to online magazines and podcast production companies.
Pricing Model?
Our pricing is customized based on the unique needs of our customers, and the scale of their networks. Our main services–including hosting, ad-insertion, CMS, ad-trafficking tools, and analytics–are all included in our base price, which is calculated as a cost per thousand downloads.
What are other people doing in the space and why?
Most hosting services focus on the needs of individual podcasters, who comprise the vast majority of publishers in the space. These services range from free to a modest monthly fee, and they generally don’t include sophisticated ad tools because their clients don’t need them. We chose to focus exclusively on the publishers with the most complex needs, because the tools they require didn’t exist or were woefully inadequate.
How do you view the future?
The future of podcasting is extremely bright. It’s attracting millions of new listeners every year and waves of new talent every month. The barrier to entry is still very low, so anyone can launch a show and enjoy the connection with an audience. However, we see the real growth potential at the professional end of the market. There isn’t a major media company or content producer in the world that isn’t at least considering a move into audio. And Megaphone stands ready to support their creativity with products that make their jobs easier while bringing in more revenue.
Thank you.
Download WNIP’s comprehensive new report—The Publisher’s Guide to Podcasting—designed to help publishers start a podcast, as well as providing a comprehensive set of tools, tips and advice on how to make your podcast a success. It also explores monetisation opportunities, with examples of publishers who are making significant revenue from podcasting. The report is free and can be downloaded here.
