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On Sunday night, Podcast lost a Founding Father.

Norm Pattiz, the architect of modern Network Radio who launched Westwood One in 1976 and pivoted to create Podcast One in 2013, passed away at 79. 

Like most Founding Fathers, Pattiz’s career was marked by the complexity of great deeds while daring greatly, enjoying the spoils, and of stories of a high-flying media mogul from a bygone era colliding with the values and expectations of our modern world. 

Tributes this week describe Norm as a “Pioneer,” “Innovator,” “Charismatic,” “Imaginative,” “Showman,” “Unstoppable,” “Always trying new things,” “Could see around corners,” “Crazy about his wife, Mary,” “Revolutionary.” 

Beyond his defining contributions to the radio and later podcast industries, Norm was chairman of the board of Lawrence Livermore and on the board of the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism. He was appointed by President Clinton to the United States Broadcasting Board of Governors and reappointed by President Bush in 2002. In 2009 he was inducted into the National Radio Hall of Fame. 

Norm was a staple at Laker Games, always sitting Courtside across from Nicholson wearing something audacious, often attracting nearly as much attention as the players. 

At the time of publication, the author remembers Norm Pattiz as a friend. 

But it didn’t start that way. 

It was 2012, and after six years of poking at the budding universe of on-demand audio, I was looking for a way in. I served as a foot soldier in Clear Channel’s army (now iHeartMedia), selling and managing local radio campaigns. I knew the field was ripe for disruption and believed to my core that Podcast would be the answer, and I couldn’t find a way to make a living at it. 

Then I met Adam Carolla. He was doing a hit on a local radio broadcast to plug his new podcast venture in a studio a stone’s throw away from my desk. He was the first household name to leave traditional media behind and go all in on the new platform. And he was right down the hall at Clear Channel. So I waited until he finished and pitched to get permission to sell sponsors into his show as he walked to his car.

We ran a few tests, and the ads worked like magic for our clients. 

Along with my trusted associates Gary Brown and Miranda Romano (still key leaders at Oxford Road), we began a cold outreach campaign to any podcasters with enough published reviews on apple to suggest a marketable audience. Then I saw the headline that former radio colleague Kit Gray had teamed up with Radio Industry Titan, Norm Pattiz, to launch a new venture organizing an independent network to turn this fledgling forum for audio hobbyists into an entire industry. 

When Norm Pattiz entered the podcast arena, it was a shot across the bow. He locked up Adam Carolla in a representation contract as the cornerstone of his new network. Despite our efforts, there was no getting around Norm Pattiz and PodcastOne.

I had heard stories about Norm, the radio legend, and I instantly believed they were all true the moment we met. He was intimidating. Like the legends of old Hollywood powerbrokers who might say, “You’ll never work in this town again” if you crossed them. His assistant would call you and say she had Norm Pattiz on the line. But when we spoke about the business, he was focused, measured, and saw imaginative paths to a win-win. 

I accepted the new reality without any alternative options, and we started conducting business in good faith. 

Norm always delivered. He and his team worked with us to ensure client objectives were met while adding a pinch of old-fashioned Hollywood razzle-dazzle. The guy had first-class taste and the resources to create experiences that caused bonds to form between Network, Talent, Agency, and Client. The consummate showman, he taught me how we could do serious business and still have some fun. He had a bit of PT Barnum in him and modeled ways to stand out in an industry I’m still trying to digest. He was also funny and enough of a rascal that age wasn’t a burier to the relationship. 

Norm was not for everybody, but he was definitely for me. He has his fingerprints on the success of our agency and supported us as we rose from a struggling startup to the leading independently owned audio agency in the world. Over time, I got to know Norm better. I respected what he was able to achieve in our industry and found him very accessible in giving me advice on what it meant to run a business. 

He made his way into my heart most deeply as a true friend to Oxford Road and me in a time of need. After a few years of meteoric growth at Oxford Road, we entered a season of growing pains that introduced new challenges I had never experienced. Norm ended up on my business 911 list and graciously guided me out of some jams, for which I’ll be eternally grateful. 

Norm Pattiz believed in me. He would invite me to guest on shows and panels. When the pandemic hit, I started a new podcast for marketers to help guide them through uncharted waters. Lke many partners, Norm came on the show as an early guest when we didn’t have the audience to justify his time. Not only did he come on, he also contacted me after and invited us to join his network, knowing full well our niche focus would never be a real money maker. That’s why today Media Roundtable is part of the PodcastOne network. 

Norm was a visionary. Like Cornelius Vanderbilt moving from shipping to rail at 70, he left the industry where he had made his fortune because could see change was in the air. Podcast would disrupt Radio and become the digital beachhead to revitalize the industry, and he saw that years before his radio peers.

Pioneers are generally complex people, and Norm Pattiz was no exception. But if you want a revolution, you need to accept complex people as friends. Hopefully, they’ll accept your complexities too. 

If you work in the podcast industry or even listen to podcasts, you should know that Norm Pattiz was the first true Captain of Industry to step onto the field. In his final act, he rolled up his sleeves and poured the concrete for the roads we’re now walking on.  

Norm positively impacted millions of people, and I will raise my hand and say he made my life better through his generosity, wisdom, and friendship. 

Farewell, my friend. May your voice forever echo.

Dan

By Dan Granger

One of your first jobs as a marketer is to follow the marketer’s version of the Hippocratic oath–to do no harm to your brand. But your other job is to grow, and these directives can easily come into conflict. Advertising on politically-oriented shows or leveraging hosts with strong followings can be a way to capture attention in a crowded space. But that also exposes your brand to the controversies that the hosts and their guests can create.

You don’t have to look far back to have an example of how these controversies go for advertisers. Here’s what you’re likely to expect.

First, the host or guest says something controversial that a specific group wants to call out.

Next, you would receive an email—from a seemingly credible media outlet, blog, or group—seeking comment about your intention to continue your existing relationship with the program. Oftentimes, there’s a deadline for you to make a comment before your brand name is released on a list. That list will be used by a constituency who will contact you and others at your company—accusing you of supporting the beliefs of the offending party. 

Usually, the host’s words are taken somewhat out of context, but it doesn’t matter because the optics are bad and you wish they had made their point differently. You are tempted to respond to the email. However, real customers are rarely involved. Usually you will start to receive pressure from within your company. Questions start flying at you about why you would ever consider affiliating your brand with programs that so clearly do not represent the values your company represents. All the pressure to hit growth and CAC goals are out the window and now you must respond—or so it seems. All of this has happened in a matter of hours. It is at this precise moment that you must ignore your impulses to act and take a moment to pause amidst the immense amount of pressure and judgment surrounding you. 

Instead of following your emotions…Here’s what you need to do:

1. Address Internal Stakeholders 
2. Say Nothing Publicly
3. Immediately “Pause” Your Media Investment 
4. Gather Facts and Think Deeply
5. Lay Out All Your Options
6. DECIDE

One final note. Last year we began working with a company called Barometer to build a tool in order to proactively get ahead of this type of scenario. Powered by AI, Barometer is able to apply a Brand Safety & Suitability score by rating each episode and show using the GARM framework in order to determine the risk level of content. By looking through a host or shows track record you, as a brand marketer, are able to determine if the content they put out is consistent with your brand values and if it’s something you can feel confident sponsoring based on their track record.

As a brand marketer you don’t have hundred of hours in the day to listen to new shows you’re looking to test or to track episodes released by the hosts you’re currently choosing to sponsor. Barometer does this for you, all you have to do is sign up for an account and assign risk levels (no, low, medium, high) you are comfortable with across the 12 Risk adjacent elements GARM warns against. In a matter of second you have full transparency into the content of the show, can see potential issues flagged, and are able to make a data-backed decision as to whether or not you feel confident investing your brand dollars in a show.

Go forth and spend your influence wisely. 

Contact Oxford Road Today

$5K is not enough budget to test into a new media channel. It might be enough to test a single tactic within an existing channel. The effectiveness of this is doubtful unless you have an incredibly high conversion rate from a low AOV, a free offering, or a top-of-funnel vanity metric (which is another topic altogether).

For the rest of the brands with revenue-based measures of success, a $5K budget is like using a drop of paint on a wall to determine its dried shade.

New media channels are a gamble. To balance risk and upside, structuring a test with an outcome in mind and spending as little as possible to understand the viability of a campaign, via both performance and scale is responsible.

Early in my customer acquisition career, I was so excited to test everything emerging under the sun. Back then I had to pass on most deals larger than five figures because my more experienced management did not see the upside of what I thought was a nominal risk. So, I had to stay under that figure or make a compelling case for anything greater.

Why? Because I chose not to focus on pushing what is working in favor of the shiny or grass is greener for further growth.

The greater budget freedom was not available to me because I struggled to put together a strategic rationale that explained why X was a better use of resources than Y.

I was ahead of the curve in quantifying funnels (or customer journey) and measuring performance, but could not explain why the gamble was worth a five-figure bet in a manner that demonstrated upside.

As a result, I spent too much time testing networks and platforms that did not have minimums.  Hoping the immediate performance was close enough to our average performance to increase our investment. When it did, I would graduate the channel from my bench into my core mix. When it didn’t and was more often the case, I’d still consider coming back to the channel when there was a material difference between their product and ours.

Like most MLB batters, tests converted in the typical 25% range, so I would reference the difference between an all-star (.300 batting average) and a failure (the “Mendoza line” of .200).

Today, a round minimum figure to test a media channel is too often used to justify required FTEs in order to make sure the brand is taken seriously.

In a rational world, a minimum test budget is a byproduct of bespoke brand KPIs calculated from a bottoms-up approach. I understand a media channel or agency’s cost of doing business, but it shouldn’t come at the expense of their future growth from the brand.

A publicly traded ad platform prompted this rant. They said $5K was enough to test. And in Q4! The brand’s media agency agreed. I requested their forecasted results and what went into the figure. None were used. Just that $5K is enough to test. I couldn’t resist asking what AOV they used in their forecast. When they shared it was 20% of ours, they assured me that their recommendation remained valid.

A month after the test concluded, a campaign recap was not put together to tell its story and how less than the minimum amount was actually spent. The test was a waste of everyone’s time involved because we have inconclusive results of whether or not this channel could be viable.

Still, it stands to reason that a minimum ought to be brand-specific because if your measurement of success is a purchase with a high AOV and lower conversion rates, your minimum will be more than that of a brand with a greater conversion rate (because of a lower AOV or other reasons).

$5K is not enough, in fact, after years of experience, $50K is really not enough to test something like audio. In fact, audio may be one of the less expensive alternative mediums to test into due to creative production costs.

If I could manage my younger self, I would model forecasted results from the bottom up with comparable, actual conversion metrics. Then, incorporate the media channel’s average CPMs, CTRs, and other metrics, creating a red flag when the outcome likelihood of success is out of whack.