If anybody knows anything about advertising and podcasting I do. I don’t claim to be a expert but I have probably signed more deals for podcasters than anyone in the industry at this point. Having a advertiser on a podcast is a lot of work and making sure that the right advertiser is partnered with the podcaster is a challenge as well. When I heard about Fruitcast last night I went over and looked at their site. Everything looked good till I found one item that projected that podcasters would earn .25 cents per listener it made me pause.
I know the detailed information you have to provide to advertisers to get a deal and they want assurances that you are going to reach the demographic they are looking for, they want ad placements that are typically 30 seconds, very few will buy a spot unless it is at least 30 seconds and they want that placement in a strategic portion of the show. This also includes banner ads on the site, text announcements on the page and a mention in the show notes. Oh and the most important thing they want to track the ROI, thus you have to be creative with promotion codes or specific URL’s or mediaplex codes to track everything. Once they are sure you have that in place you can likely sign deals. But you better be able to deliver a ROI or they will drop you like a hot potato.
What this boils down to is this, if Fruitcast can deliver .25 cents per 1000 listeners I will give them everything in my inventory today. I have sent them a note and told them I can deliver now 1.2 million listens a month on the shows that I have signing power for. But they will have to make a few modifications to their program to not alienate the audience. I will be asking if they have done polling to determine what podcasts listeners want, and I will also demand that we get to choose which advertisers are aligned with those we represent. [FruitCast]
I have seen some positive reviews of their site but lets see some deals signed and some testimonials that they can hit that magic number they have come out with.
Todd
Podcast Connect