It’s not just that more people than ever are listening to podcasts. It’s that 40% of those listeners use podcasts to help them make financial decisions. This means that nearly half of the podcast audience isn’t just tuning in for entertainment—they’re actively seeking financial advice and guidance.
This highlights a significant level of trust and engagement with podcast content. Listeners are relying on these shows to shape their financial choices, from investment strategies to savings plans and economic insights. Moreover, they’re purchasing products and services based on the ads they hear, showing the powerful influence of podcast advertising.
Since such a large section of society is using podcasts to educate themselves financially, it makes sense for financial services to meet customers on air. Podcasts offer financial entities a way to reach a highly-targeted, hyper-engaged audience and leverage their favorite experts to build trust and connections.
In this guide, you’ll learn how podcast ads help financial institutions boost brand awareness and conversions, and how to optimize your podcast advertising strategy in 2024.
Understanding the podcast advertising landscape for financial services
Imagine you’re launching an investment app aimed at young people and you’re looking for more effective ways to reach your demographic. . Social media is too crowded, and younger generations aren’t as engaged with blogs or conventional ads.
Nearly six in ten Gen Zers (58%) dislike ads that interrupt the content they’re viewing, showing their aversion to intrusive, conventional ad formats. And 62% of younger audiences follow brands on social media primarily to get updates on products and services, not to consume blog-style content. They crave authentic content, not overly polished marketing materials or low-value blog posts.
This is where podcast advertising shines as a powerful platform for financial services. It offers a unique way to reach your target audience and capture their full attention with genuine, resonant content.
Targeted audience reach
Podcasts have become a key advertising channel for financial services that want to connect directly with specific audiences.
As Edison Research confirmed, podcast listenership has rocketed across all age groups. Financial brands of all kinds can now tap into a diverse range of audiences through specialized podcasts.
Podcasts are the perfect way to target your ads because listeners self-select shows based on their niche interests and habits. Whether you’re offering financial advice to retirees or fintech innovations to B2B companies, there are thousands or millions of listeners following shows that relate to your brand.
For instance, if your company teaches corporate investment strategies, you could sponsor episodes in a popular financial education podcast. This helps you reach relevant listeners who are motivated to achieve their financial goals and most likely to resonate with your financial services.
High engagement rates
Podcasts don’t just reach the right audience. They reach engaged buyers. 63% of listeners say they pay more attention to podcast ads than ads they experience elsewhere. And, two-thirds of people interact with a brand they’ve heard about on a podcast.
This means increased brand awareness and more customer action—whether that’s downloading an app, seeking financial advice, or exploring new financial tools.
With high engagement rates established, it’s crucial to consider how these interactions can translate into trust and deeper connections with potential customers.
Trust and personal connections with listeners
Financial decisions are so often influenced by trust and familiarity. The impact of a listener hearing your brand on their favorite podcast can boost your credibility.
In fact, 68% of podcast listeners feel they have a deep connection with their favorite hosts. They trust the information provided more than social media outlets or other information sources.
Host-read ads perform well for this very reason. Imagine the host of a popular financial planning podcast explaining your new budgeting tool. This lends credibility to your service and fosters a deeper connection with potential customers.
Listeners value the host’s opinions and recommendations. When you advertise alongside their trusted content, this confidence transfers to your financial brand.
Importance of brand safety and suitability in financial services advertising
When you’re considering your approach to financial services marketing, brand safety and suitability are non-negotiable. Your ads must appear within content that aligns with your brand’s values and messaging. Otherwise, you risk harming your credibility and customer trust.
Brand safety refers to the mechanisms you put in place to ensure your financial ads don’t appear next to harmful content. For example, a financial wellness ad won’t appear next to a pyramid scheme.
Brand suitability aims to serve ads alongside the right content to amplify your message and highlight your brand values. For example, a sustainability-focused investment company might serve its ads alongside green tech podcasts or impact investing shows.
But it’s not always easy to manage brand safety and suitability manually. Podcast conversations can take sharp detours into unsavory or controversial topics that might not align with your brand.
Let’s say your micro investing platform advertises on a podcast about side hustles. One episode might steer into conversations around illegitimate ways to make money. While the podcast usually covers safe topics, it could harm your financial platform’s credibility to advertise in the middle of this discussion.
This is where brand safety and suitability tools like SeekrAlign come in. SeekrAlign is a powerful AI content analysis tool that evaluates podcasts for civility and brand safety at the episode level to ensure every conversation is safe and suitable for your brand.
This strategic alignment is key to maximizing the impact of your podcast advertising efforts. It makes sure all ad placements contribute positively to your brand’s image and advertising goals.
Beyond the use of advanced tools like SeekrAlign, a podcast inherently becomes safe and suitable for advertising through careful editorial oversight and consistent thematic content that aligns with your brand’s values. Selecting podcasts with a professional approach to content creation and a clear target audience can help mitigate the risks of unsuitable content.
Having ensured that your ad placements are both safe and suitable, the next step is to identify the right platforms to maximize your reach and impact.
Identifying the right platforms for your financial services advertisements
You’re ready to start advertising on podcasts, but how do you choose the right platforms to place your ads?
Here are the best features of the top five podcast platforms:
Spotify:
- Large, diverse, global audience for high ad visibility
- Targeted advertising options
- Dynamic ads
- Performance tracking
- Podcast partnerships
Apple Podcasts:
- Loyal, subscription-paying audience
- Embedded ads
- Targeted ad categories
- Long-form storytelling ads
- Deep audience insights
Google Podcasts:
- Ads placement in relevant podcast search results
- Performance-based advertising
- Search-driven discovery
- Local targeting capabilities
- Cross-platform reach (YouTube and other Google platforms)
Podbean:
- Direct podcast sponsorship
- Dynamic ads
- CTA buttons
- Niche audience targeting
- Personalized podcast partnerships and endorsements
Buzzsprout:
- Self-serve advertising platform
- Flexible ad formats
- Podcast discovery tools
- Ad testing
- Transparent pricing and reporting
Once you decide which platforms to advertise with you need to choose podcasts that cater to your specific financial category. There are financial, technology, and lifestyle podcasts that appeal to a diverse range of hyper-focused audiences.
Consider podcasts about:
- Fintech and startup innovation
- Commercial banking
- Investment law
- Cryptocurrency and blockchain technology
- Real estate investing
- Small business finances
- Targeted wealth management
- Personal finance
As Acast Commercial Insights Manager, Bianca Bush, puts it, “The potential here should not be underestimated: Every niche, engaged target audience that a brand can think of can be found in the podcast realm.”
However, the key to finding the right podcasts lies in understanding the demographics, interests, needs, and habits of your target buyer. Ultimately, who needs your financial services, and which podcasts do they turn to for help on the topic?
To find podcasts whose audiences closely match your ideal demographic, try these approaches:
- Check out their social media following
- Look for industry reports with statistics on platform usage
- Analyze audience comments, questions, and reviews
- Find out their advertising partners to see if they’re similar to your company
- Use a paid podcast analytics service
Key considerations for financial services advertisers
When advertising financial services on podcasts, you must be transparent and trustworthy. Your messages must be clear, compliant, and still catch people’s attention.
Keep these things in mind when crafting your podcast ad:
- Speak your audience’s language: Explain complicated financial concepts in simple language that appeals to your ideal customers. This helps everyone understand and trust your message. Try RAG-powered generative AI to create targeted ad copy in your target group’s voice.
- Tell stories: Use real-life examples to show how your brand helps like-minded people reach their financial dreams. These stories are memorable, and they make you seem relatable.
- Be honest about risks: Most financial companies come with risks. Talking about them in an open way helps to build trust through transparency.
- Highlight your strengths: Focus on how your service can make people’s financial lives better. This positive spin helps listeners visualize results.
- Choose host-read ads: Brands get more sales when podcast hosts read their ads. They have a more intimate, personal feel that builds trust with listeners. As Jason Hoch, Former Chief Content Officer at HowStuffWorks puts it, “Listeners feel like they are being shouted at with third-party ads.”
- Use trackable CTAs: Like Ad Results Media CMO, Kurt Kaufer says, “Measurement is the key to determining success in a podcast advertising campaign.” Use special codes, website links, and post-checkout surveys to see which ads do best. Then, pour more dollars into strategies that help you get more conversions.
What’s next for financial services advertisers
Podcast advertising is evolving, with innovations paving the way for more precise and impactful ad placements. This gives financial marketers new opportunities to reach their niche audiences in dynamic ways.
Here are some podcast advertising advancements to look forward to:
- Dynamic ad insertion and contextual targeting: Seamlessly mesh ads with listener interests and deliver in a way that doesn’t disrupt the user experience.
- Interactive ads: Encourage users to engage with quizzes, polls, and gamified ads.
- Branded podcast sponsorships: Position your brand as an expert by sponsoring an authoritative podcast or episode that appeals to your demographic.
- AI-powered brand safety and suitability: Pick perfectly aligned podcast ad placements at scale with SeekrAlign.
Financial brands can achieve new levels of engagement and brand loyalty by leveraging the trust listeners place in their favorite podcasts and utilizing sophisticated targeting and safety tools.
The right message, at the right time, in the right podcast, can transform listener engagement into lasting customer relationships.
