The radio buyer’s guide to Spotify ads

For years, radio ads have been an effective way for national and local businesses to drive awareness at scale and reach their customers. But, as more and more people turn to digital content experiences, their attention and time are fragmented across multiple channels, devices, and content sources. As a result, accurate targeting, delivery, and measurement across different platforms are critical for advertisers to avoid wasting their media budgets.

But the chance to connect with audiences during their top listening moments doesn't just exist through traditional radio advertising anymore. There's a whole new opportunity for audio advertisers to get to know their audience, target them more precisely, and understand an ad’s impact.

Say hello to digital audio ads on Spotify.

Audio ads on Spotify still give you the incredible reach and scalability of traditional radio, but with the accurate performance and optimization opportunities that come with digital media.

Audio is everywhere. And the U.S. is streaming.

We’ve said it before, but we’re in a new, golden age of audio, with the world’s music, podcasts, and audiobooks in the palm of our hands. Right now, there are over 70 million songs, 4 billion playlists, and over 2.9 million podcasts on Spotify.¹

And there are more ways than ever to discover and listen to this content. Innovation continues to push audio streaming forward—and creates more moments for advertisers to connect with listeners. Over the last year, we’ve observed an increase in listening through connected home devices ​​including gaming consoles (+31%), desktop computers (+25%), smart speakers (+30%), and TVs (+82%).² We’ve even seen a 124% increase in in-car listening on Spotify over the last year, as drivers take their social pods on the road.³

People ages 13+ in the U.S. are leaning into these digitized listening behaviors.⁴ While usage is strongest among Gen Z (90%) and millennial listeners (86%), over half of adults ages 35+ also access audio content by streaming.⁵

With this in mind, it’s no surprise that time spent with digital audio services is 30% higher than that of broadcast radio.⁶

Enhance your audio spend with Spotify.

Spotify is the world’s most popular audio streaming platform.⁷ And we can help you fill in the gaps left by your traditional media plans. We reach nearly half (43%) of the U.S. online population and can provide unique, added weekly reach to radio ads.⁸

Smarter targeting drives more valuable audience connections

With Spotify, you can reach millions of listeners worldwide—or just the folks in your local area—with precise audience targeting tools powered by Spotify’s first-party listener data (a.k.a., our Streaming Intelligence). But our targeting capabilities go beyond traditional radio’s demographic estimates and location targeting. Spotify’s Streaming Intelligence enables advertisers to target listeners across interests, devices, formats, and moments.

Get actionable and precise campaign metrics

With ads on Spotify, you can be confident that your intended audience heard your message. Get insights into ad delivery, engagement, and learn more about your listeners with every campaign. We provide transparent campaign reporting and unique audience insights from listener streaming habits that can help you understand an audience’s preferences, behaviors, and contexts in a way that radio ads can’t.

Easily create audio ads to run on Spotify

Creating compelling audio ads is something every advertiser can do, even on a budget. If you’ve never made a digital audio ad before, no worries. We’ll give you tools and suggestions to get started. Check out our tips for working with voice actors, selecting background music, and our quick start guide to creating digital audio ads. And if you need a hand with recording and mixing your ad, we’ll help with that, too. In as little as 24 hours, you can build a custom, professional audio ad for free right in Spotify Ad Studio, our self-serve ad channel.

But don’t forget – your story is unique, so your audio ad should be too. You can take a look at these resources to get some inspiration and ideas for creative ads that get the message across, and then put your own spin on it. Make sure your audio ad is your own and meets applicable legal requirements.

There’s more to this story

Are you ready to learn how Spotify’s data-driven targeting tools can help you reach your target audience, forge connections with listeners, and enhance audio strategies?