New Oxford Road Study Reveals 18%+ Lift in Search—Just by Investing in Audio; Radio’s 2025 Rollercoaster; Audacy & Claritas Solve Radio Attribution?

The Media Roundtable is back! This week, we’re bringing you a deep dive into our new case study, “The Sound of Growth: How Audio Fuels Branded Search.” Giles Martin (EVP of Strategy & Insights, Oxford Road) hosts fellow audiophiles James Ingrassia (EVP, Head of Client Services, Oxford Road) and Tucker Peleuses (VP, Strategy, Oxford Road) to break down takeaways of $400m in audio spend over 30 years.

Audio attribution is challenging, but looking at the impact of audio on branded search is an effective way to cut through the noise. We’re covering; Delayed Effects, Consistency, Diminishing Returns, and More. Let’s dive in.

“ Audio investment is driving almost 20 percent of clients’ branded search traffic.” – Giles Martin (EVP of Strategy & Insights, Oxford Road)

Now & Later – Audio results aren’t instant, but they have staying power. The study showed increases in search volume within a week of increasing audio spend. Even better, the search volume also correlated with audio spend weeks after airing. Especially for the study’s B2B and longer-consideration cycle clients, search remained elevated longer. For audio success, it helps to know that initial impact is just the beginning.

Consistency Wins – And it’s not even a close race. Brands with a sustained history of audio spend showed stronger relationships between spend and search volume. When you go dark, you restart. The greatest correlation came with brands that had amassed 3 years of audio campaigns. Remember: your customers aren’t always in-market, so they need to have you top of mind whenever they shift to buyers.

Optimize Spend – For one brand in the case study, diminishing returns really kicked in after 1m in monthly spend. Keep in mind, your brand’s curve will be different, and the curves might be different for each of your key metrics (search volume vs performance). TL;DR: it pays to work out your specific curve for diminishing returns (and we’re happy to help with the analysis).

For more actionable insights to optimize your strategy and maximize ROIs, check out the full case study HERE and tune into the full episode below.

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Download “The Sound of Growth” Report

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The Classifieds

The Best UX from a CMGR

Network: Independent / Monthly Downloads: 10k

The mantra “New Year, New Me” would not be complete without some solid audio to accompany it. Luckily, several new podcasts have premiered to help transition us into 2025. Our first is hosted by social media agency founder Samantha Feher, an up-and-comer who pairs the relevancy of social media and everyone’s desire to do and be better. While she’s a consummate professional in her field, Samantha also brings a big sister energy to her podcast that resonates well with her listeners. In the first 6 episodes, Feher covered extremely personal topics like; sobriety, anxiety reduction, toxic relationships, doomscrolling, and career growth. Though the show is still in its infancy, CAPS LOCK has already seen substantial growth as an independently produced podcast. Advertisers looking to reach a demo of young female professionals are best suited for this opportunity. Grab your keyboard and mouse to click the link below for more.

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YouTube Chef’s Podcast Recipe for Success

Network: QCode Media / Monthly Downloads: 200k

For those still trying to hold onto the peace and joy of the holiday season, Comedy podcasts continue to entertain. One of the more exciting new shows recently premiered with QCode Media, featuring Rosanna Pansino, a thriving YouTuber with a healthy 14.6m followers. Best known for her culinary creations and how-to videos, Pansino consistently branches out into commentary, music, and celebrity gossip. In her newest venture, Pansino chats with other influencers, creators, YouTubers and podcasters to get unbiased, raw reflections on their careers, related industries, and their secret lives. Recent guests include; Teala Dunn, Sam Tsui, and everyone’s favorite internet baker, sweet JonnyCakes. Advertisers already seeing success on YouTube should surely test this opportunity in Q1. Many Gen Z focused clients have already performed well in just the show’s first several episodes. Follow the recipe by indulging the link below.

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In Case You Missed It

The Ups and Downs of Radio

What’s shaping radio in 2025? Audacy, Inc. exits bankruptcy; iHeart restructures $4.8b debt; and new Nielsen audio measurement methodology could boost radio ratings by ~20%. Audacy and iHeartMedia enter 2025 on seemingly firmer financial footing compared to a year ago. But radio’s still a mixed bag: Cumulus Media faces potential delisting from NASDAQ, highlighting ongoing challenges in the world of radio. With audience behaviors shifting and radio ad spend projected to decline, traditional broadcasters will continue to face challenges. CAOs, you can leverage a soft radio market and capitalize on its efficiency at an even greater value.

Gen Z’s Take on Video in Podcasting

Spotify’s pivot to video faces challenges, according to Gen Z students in NYU’s Business of Podcasting class. While Spotify aims to compete with YouTube, students prefer audio for multitasking and find video unnecessary for many podcasts. They highlight a disconnect between Spotify’s focus on big-name creators and the smaller podcasters who form its core audience. Students also note Spotify’s user interface is clunky compared to YouTube’s simplicity. To succeed, Spotify must leverage its audio strength rather than mimic YouTube. There’s plenty of angst about Spotify’s video push and video’s impact on podcasting—and it’s not going away anytime soon in 2025. A focus group with Steven Goldstein’s NYU students offers a clue: audio-first is still (mostly) the best bet for creators and marketers alike.

Have Audacy and Claritas Cracked the Code on Radio Attribution?

Audacy and Claritas have partnered to launch a new performance metrics tool for audio advertising. The solution integrates broadcast and digital audio data, offering advertisers insights into campaign performance, including audience engagement and conversions. By combining radio spot logs with website activity and analyzing it through advanced data science, the tool tracks incremental website visits, purchases, and form fills. CAOs, we’re all for cracking the code on radio attribution for performance marketers, so we hope the hype is real. That said, Claritas’ “secret sauce” for matching radio spot times with website activity better be extra saucy—because this isn’t exactly new, and let’s just say… our past experiences with it have left an unpleasant aftertaste.

Looking and Feeling Your ProLon Best in 2025

Happy New Year! AND Happy Trails in the rear-view mirror to anything that doesn’t involve taking good care of ourselves in 2025! Weekly Dose of BS podcast and reality TV star hosts, Stephanie Hollman and Trey Stewart are already way ahead of the trend as they talk about gearing up for the new year with ProLon: L-Nutra. Trey shares his enlightening weight loss experience with ProLon’s science-backed soup detox, as Stephanie cheers him on. This dynamic duo combines their real-life friendship with sassy fun on-brand substantiation. This entertainingly insightful partnership keeps listeners coming back for more. The host’s personal endorsements for ProLon are believable because the proof is truly in the pudding, with no BS topping.

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OXFORd In The News

Balancing Technology with a Human Touch

It’s always exciting for us to see Oxford Road pop up in the industry trade publications we often reference in this newsletter. We’re thrilled to see Radio Ink mention our most recent Media Roundtable podcast episode in their end-of-year edition. Our ‘A Look Forward to 2025 – Trends That Will Shape Audio’ episode reveals how AI will revolutionize audio advertising while keeping authenticity at the forefront. From navigating ad overload in podcasts to unlocking radio’s profit potential, the discussion is jam-packed with actionable takeaways. If you want your campaigns to thrive in 2025, use this article as your blueprint.

The Sound of Growth” Echos Across the Industry

In case you read this newsletter from the bottom up, and ICYDK, Oxford Road just released a case study on audio’s impact on branded web search for advertisers. The industry is already posting articles about it. In fact, as we simultaneously publish this week’s edition of the Influencer, 8 industry publications are already sharing the news about this intuitive groundbreaking study. Our thanks go out to Sounds Profitable, MediaPost, RadioToday, Inside Radio, Radio Online, Roastbrief, Ads of Brands, and iHeart’s Keith Hotchkiss for getting the word out about the ancillary benefits of advertising in audio—our favorite medium.

If you’ve read this far, thank you!

The Influencer is a production from the team at Oxford Road.
If you like our sometimes sassy, mostly informed POVs on the wonderful world of audio advertising, you should see what we do for our clients.

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Contact us at influencer@oxfordroad.com!