How our advertising works

iono.fm is a digital audio platform. We provide digital ad insertion (DAI) technology to deliver audio ads into our publisher's podcast or live stream audio. Ad impressions are delivered dynamically by inserting relevant ad audio on a per-user basis.

Ad delivery mechanisms

Ads are delivered to users in two ways:

• Player ads are delivered when listening via our web player inside a browser. Player ads support interactive features like companion banners, click-through links and a "Skip ad" button.

• Stitched ads are delivered by "stitching" the ad into the audio content. This is used when content is consumed in any application outside our web player. Interactive features are not available on stitched ads.

Any audio played inside our web player will automatically use "player ads" instead of "stitched" audio.

Ad slots

We currently support these ad slots:

• Podcast: pre, mid and post-roll ads.
• Stream: pre-roll ads. (icecast streams only).

Campaigns running on podcast content will also deliver ads on back-catalog episodes, not just new episodes.

There are some limitations as to when ad slots are available:

• Ad slots are only available on content whose publishers have opted-in to our ad features.
• Ad slots are never available on podcast episodes of less than 1 minute.
• "Stitched" ad slots are never available on podcast episodes of longer than 90 minutes.

Ad formats

These rules apply to audio creatives used for campaigns on our platform:

• Minimum duration 5 seconds, up to a maximum of 60 seconds.
• The ideal ad duration is dependant on the campaign goals, but even 15 second creatives can be as effective as 30 seconds. This article has a good overview.
• Note that publishers may be hesitant to run ads longer than 30 seconds on their content due to user impact.
• Audio can be provided in any format and will be converted to match the format, quality and volume of our publisher content.

For interactive features we require:

• A 320 x 50 "smartphone" banner image.
• A 300 x 250 "medium rectangle" banner.
• A call-to-action link to allow clicks on the banner.
• A call-to-action message to display alongside the banner. (Maximum 30 characters)

How can ads be targeted?

Our platform does not perform any behavioural targeting that relies on the historical actions of a user on our (or other) platforms. This ensures the highest possible privacy for our listeners as we do not track, store or utilise their personal data.

Campaigns running on our publisher's content uses only contextual targeting. At a high level all campaigns will target:

• One or more podcast channels or live streams. This allows selecting a "business" podcast, or "children" podcast - whichever general audience aligns best to campaign goals.
• Date range - every campaign must specify a start and end time.

In addition to this, ad delivery can be target:

• Country - for nationwide campaigns, prevents ads from being delivered to users in other countries.
• Region - for campaigns specific to a region/province, prevents ads from being delivered to users in other regions.
• Daypart - for campaigns that wish to run only during specific dayparts, for example the "Morning drive". See our Section / Dayparts for a list of dayparts.

Ad delivery speeds

Ad campaigns can choose to run in one of 3 delivery modes:

• Maximum speed - the platform will deliver impressions as fast as possible on all targeted content until campaign budget is reached.
• Evenly over time - the platform will attempt to deliver impressions evenly over the date range of the campaign so that total budget is reached at the end of the campaign. This is dependant on sufficient impressions being available over the date range.
• Background - the platform will only deliver impressions on targeted content when no other campaign is available.

Booking ads

See our Booking audio ad campaigns article if you are interested in booking ad campaigns with us.