The handful of companies that have been working aggressively in the Podcast Advertising space are wondering why it took the main stream press so long to wake up to the potential of podcast advertising.

What surprises me the most though, is the ongoing per-occupation with auto-insertions of ads as the next hot thing, and concerns on listener measurements. First of all Auto-Insertion is DOA at this point, and valid listener measurement has long been dealt with. I wonder if these people are actually talking to people in the space connecting advertisers to podcasters.

Let me tackle auto-insertion first. A few companies feel they can become successful with auto-interested ads.  At RawVoice, based on our experience with podcasters and audiences, feel this success will be short-lived.  We think podcast listeners respond better to host-spoken ads because their is a “host – audience” relationship that is unlike any other media delivery.

The second you drop in some pre-produced, auto inserted advertisment, this immediately disconnects the podcaster from the audience, and the advertiser message will not have the impact it should..

We all hate in your face advertising, but podcast audiences have been very supportive of podcasters that really get behind a product. Here are a few things in my opinion that make up a good Podcast Advertising Campaign.

• Host Delivered Ad Spot via Talking Points!
• Non Hard Scripted Ad Spot!
• Clear Call to Action
• Promo Codes
• Discounts
• Samples
• Extended Trial Offers
• Tangible Products or Services

Lets look at Audience Measurement, software tools have been in place for well over 18 months that measure, Unique Listeners Per Episode, Repeat Unique Listeners, Total Downloads and total bandwidth delivered and a host of other raw measurements.

The question of how many listens advertisments get, comes up from time to time. But based on a combination of the hard raw data, tied to survey results, then combining the results from what I outlined makes a good Podcast Advertising Campaign. Tracking of response to promotion codes, number of direct links back to advertiser through standard click through tracking, number of trial offers initiated, and in many cases total number of hard sales all “add” to an impressive response rate.

We have a very good data that proves ad penetration is around 90% of the total listening audience we don’t get that many conversions but 90% of the ads are getting to the intended audience.

Try to get those types of impressions in Radio and TV! This goes back to tenants of why podcasting is different, with the active listening of the audience tied to the “host – audience” relationship and highly targeted audiences your see impressive results. No longer do advertisers have to just throw their ads out their. They reach the exact demographic they want to everytime the ad spot runs.

Why do you think companies like GoDaddy, GotoMeeting are in the podcast advertising space. They have learned being in the space long term is highly lucrative. The medium has resulted in significant numbers of new customers that they can measure.

While I have no doubt that executed effectively Google could make a impact on podcast advertising I think they would be better server acting as brokers for companies that have real inventory available today. Business Week