As we all know, digital media providers such as Google, Instagram and Facebook have long been using a lot of data to enrich their own advertising inventory and enable targeting. They pretend - and I use this provocative phrase deliberately - that they have precise information about when and where, for example, women in their 50s from the greater Hamburg area who are currently looking for a hairdresser can be found online. In fact, they only approach this information with a certain degree of accuracy. Nevertheless, targeting works perfectly and fully automated advertising banners for hairdressing salons, hair care products etc. fall on particularly fertile ground. In the digital advertising business, it is no problem to have a seemingly infinite number of suitable banners „in stock“ or to produce and adapt them automatically and in real time. Women and men, Hamburgers and Berliners, children and adults etc. will always see the advertising banner tailored to them.

In the radio sector and when broadcasting classic audio spots, such broad diversification is naturally not possible. However, based on programmatic and data-driven advertising, many different spots and even more individual components will accumulate here too, if one wants to utilise the variety of advertising opportunities, including regionalisation.

So that the audio material can be distributed and played out at precisely the right place and time, it must – precisely because the process is electronic – be correctly „sorted and labelled“ beforehand.

What I mean by that is not that audio publishers can find the required material when needed. Rather, a „robot“ must be immediately capable of identifying which audio material fits which requirement/situation (request). I'm talking about a modern electronic content management system that is available around the clock and reliably identifies and delivers the required material instantly. For example, the convertible advert from car manufacturer XY on a Saturday morning in sunny weather in the Munich metropolitan region just before Oktoberfest, with reference to local car dealership YZ near the Theresienwiese. The recognition is done via tags, i.e. attributes such as product, weather, region, local sales partner, major event, etc.

So, such a system is far more than a broadcaster's archive or „larder“. It's about a comprehensive system with which audio material can be keyworded and catalogued, managed, distributed and even produced. Electronically, cloud-based and across broadcasters, if, for example, several partners join forces and exchange material.

This way, it would be possible, for example, for a dedicated listener of a radio station from Northern Germany, who is travelling on Bavarian roads by car, to continue listening to their favourite station – as a stream, of course – while still receiving traffic news from a Bavarian partner station. The model, with the right technology and content, can be applied 1:1 to the personalisation of audio streams. More on this in one of the next blog posts. 

However, I will now return to the production and process of advertising spots. If one assumes that the number of audio spots to be produced will increase dramatically through programmatic, production times and costs must naturally not explode. Significant time and costs can be saved by not having everyone involved in production gather in one place.

The coronavirus crisis has shown how well online networking can function across the globe. Why not also in the production of audio spots?

Furthermore, if the production workflow – controlled by the same system – is outsourced to a network where people from all over the world can contribute their „production particle“ at any time of day, this also has the advantage that all descriptive data/attributes are already available and stored.

If everything takes place within a single electronic system that covers production, management, and data description, the error rate can be minimised. Furthermore, this system can also be opened up to advertising clients, serving as a portal where they can upload commercials themselves, listen to them, and add or change the appropriate attributes or data.

Benefit for the audio publisher: Less effort and customer retention by the advertiser through the use of their own portal and tools.

In summary From an advertising and business management perspective, there are many good reasons for a modern audio content management system in the cloud, which can be used by various people who can be distributed all over the world.

It opens up new avenues for monetising and reusing one's own content. Not only in the area of advertising, but also in the editorial field. 

Last but not least, a content management system like this can of course also be applied to any other production that a radio station makes.

Whatever editorial contributions and broadcasts are to be produced: it can be done according to the same scheme, namely on the basis of an electronically supported workflow with decentrally distributed technicians, moderators and journalists all over the world.

The content produced in this way can also be exploited through further channels: by partner broadcasters, for podcasts, streaming services, etc. The prerequisite here too is that the audio material is tagged accordingly so that it is electronically recognisable and can be searched for and/or reused by both the „robot“ and authorised users.

Until next time.

You are Nico Aprile

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