The Danger of Rising PodLoad: How Increasing Clutter Erodes Podcast Advertising Value

For every podcast ad you’ve bought, there’s a hidden variable that swings performance in double-digit percentages. It’s time to talk about that.

This week, in a ground-breaking episode of the Media Roundtable, we reveal our newest report, The Danger of Rising PodLoad: How Increasing Clutter Erodes Podcast Advertising Value. This industry-first case study on ad loads and performance answers the question that every CAO wants to know:

“What’s the right amount of ads for a podcast?”

Giles Martin (EVP, Strategy & Insights, Oxford Road) joins Pete Birsinger (CEO & Founder, Podscribe) onstage at our recent CAO Summit to present the PodLoad Report. Oxford Road partners with Podscribe to analyze 1.7 Billion podcast impressions across 1800+ shows, tying ad loads to real performance for 159 brands.
Here’s what we found:

“If the ad load of an episode goes from 5% to 15%, you can reasonably expect a 30-40% drop-off in conversion rate.”

• Pete Birsinger, CEO & Founder, Podscribe

Ad Load Matters ⚖️- Ad load: the percentage of ads in every podcast. 10 minutes of ads in a 100 minute podcast? Ad load is 10%. When shows go past 6% ad load, performance starts to dip. Your Cost Per Purchase will be around 12% worse when ad loads hit 10%. When ad loads hit 15%? It’s 31% worse.

What’s At Stake – Compared to other channels, podcast ads are well tolerated, for now, anyway. Nearly half of listeners enjoy or don’t mind podcast ads. Less than 10% of listeners find ads intolerable. Plus 28% of listeners watch/listen to all of the ads, the high mark for all media surveyed. This is the secret sauce of podcasting. But increasing ad loads can erode podcasting trust–and effectiveness.

Starting the Oxford Clock ⏳– Ad load for shows and publishers vary widely. That’s why we propose a standard breakdown of an optimized podcasting hour. Presenting the Oxford Clock. It features a 10% ad load, emphasizing live reads and balancing listener, host, network, and brand needs. Have a show going beyond 10% ad load? Time to start asking for a discount.

For insights that’ll change the way you buy podcast ads, check out the full episode and click here to dive into the PodLoad Report.

Watch Here

Listen Here: Spotify

Listen Here: Apple