Keeping audio advertising’s pants up – The Short Stack

Friends, 

It’s both hard to believe and really amazing that I’m celebrating 15 years here at SoundStack. Thanks again to partners, friends, and Stackers for continuing to make this such a rewarding experience. It’s equally amazing to think about how much has changed over the last decade and a half for delivering and monetizing audio streams at scale. 

With that, a quick analogy.

Ever go on a trip and realize you forgot to bring a belt? Then you’re getting ready to go out, and you put on those new pants you’ve been dying to wear, and you realize they won’t stay up without a belt? Everyone has their own way of solving the problem – rolling at the waist, keeping your hands in your pockets all night, maybe just running out to buy a different pair of pants. 

Sometimes, I use a shoelace. There’s always one around, they’re often long enough to wrap around your waist, etc. Is it the perfect tool for the job? Of course not. It loses tension easily so your pants could still fall down. It likely doesn’t match your outfit. Depending on the occasion, it could carry the shame of the underdressed. It works to some degree, but it really wasn’t meant to play the belt role.

A lot of people use advertising technology in a similar way. Both server-side and client-side methods of ad insertion ensure that an audio ad gets served properly into a live stream. The question of which of those two methods is more effective is an age-old debate. But ultimately, both are imperfect. Why? Because they attempt to cover other functions they really weren’t built to do.

Audio ads need to fit neatly into a defined space within the main audio content for a seamless listening experience. They need to be customized per listener. Everything from ad plays to listening time needs to be accurately reported, so publishers earn revenue and advertisers know they’re getting what they paid for. That list goes on, and none of it was ever really meant to be tackled by traditional server and client-side insertion.

HLS interstitial, on the other hand, is a way more versatile, efficient, and effective protocol to ensure audio ads are delivered seamlessly and measured accurately. That’s what it was built for.

SoundStack CTO Mihai Ciurea explains in our latest blog post. Have a look, and as always, please reach out to discuss how this and other innovations are making it way easier to grow your audio business.

Best,