Ad Manager is the ideal solution for podcast creators seeking to harness the full potential of their content. Whether you're a seasoned podcaster or just starting out, if you're looking to maximize your reach, enhance audience engagement, and boost revenue through strategic ad placements, Ad Manager is designed with you in mind. Here are some examples on how you can use a dynamic ad insertion tool:
✔ You want to announce a cool event or live stream you’re hosting on a certain date
✔ You’re new to the Zencastr Ambassador program and want to optimize your host-read ads based on conversion performance
✔ You’d like to boost performance or meet impression thresholds for a brand sponsorship
In this Article:
What is Ad Manager
Ad Manager is an innovative dynamic ad insertion tool designed exclusively for creators like you. With this powerful addition, you gain complete control over your podcast's advertising potential. Seamlessly run ads across your entire content library, enhancing your reach and boosting conversions like never before.
With Ad Manager, you can convert your audio uploads and Zencastr recordings into new ad flights effortlessly. Remember those old baked-in ads that are no longer generating any income, you can now repurpose those ad spots, more information on this feature here. Notably, Ad Manager goes beyond conventional ad placements solely in new episodes. It allows you to strategically insert ads into older episodes, ensuring no content goes untapped.
Before You Start – Requirements to Enable Ad Manager
Hosted on Zencastr.
Ad Slots Created, reference this support article here.
On Growth, Thought Leader, Network, or Enterprise plans.
Navigating Through Ad Manager
Flight Manager: Manage and set up ad flights by campaign and show.
Legacy users: If you login and see flights pre-populated, you can go ahead and archive and edit any existing flights. More details here.
Ad Pool: A collection of audio ads from current and previously flighted ads.
To flight ads, make edits, or play the audio clip from this module, find the episode and hover to locate the context menu (3 vertical dots). A menu will appear with the following options: Play Ad, Edit Ad, New Flight, or Edit Flight.
Reporting: Gain instant access to a comprehensive array of real-time metrics - filter by show, date range, and track impressions to fine-tune your ad flights for maximum impact.
How to Create a Flight
Log in to your Zencastr account
On the left-hand sidebar, click Ad Manager
Click “Create Flight”
Fill out the field with the correct information
Flight name - For example, Zencastr Campaign August - September 2023
Show - Select your show from the dropdown
Ad Content - Ads ready to be strategically placed within your content. You can choose the most relevant and engaging ads to seamlessly integrate into your episodes. Within the Ad Content are two selection types:
Search Postproductions: uploaded audio or a produced recording via Zencastr's recording tool.
Search Ads: extracted audio, previously marked ads from past/current campaigns.
Tip: You may select more than one audio clip per flight. If you’d like to rotate different creatives per the campaign, select all the clips that apply. Please note there is no ability for you to weigh each creative, the system will choose based on the ad server algorithms.
Ad position - Select your preferred ad position (pre-roll / mid-roll / post-roll). This field is multi-select, you may select more than one. Please note, opening multiple slots is ideal, as it creates opportunities for the ad to play based on how many campaigns are live at a time, or if you’re also opted into the Programmatic Ads Program. This does not mean the same ad will play back to back.
Offer - Select the offer associated with this flight. Only accepted offers will appear on the drop down.
Tip: If you have more than one show, toggle the corresponding show on the drop down to see the offers.
Note: Selecting an offer is optional. Please leave this blank if the ad you are flighting is for a brand outside of Zencastr.
To preview the ad/s flighted, follow these steps:
Click on the Ad Pool tab to see your available ads.
Hover over an ad and click on the play button on the ad you wish to preview. A new window will open and play the ad you have selected.
Advanced Settings
Fulfillment Goal: Use this setting to set your campaign’s goal. There are two methods available when flighting your fulfillment goal.
Percentage: Use the percentage when you don’t have a set goal, but want to control the hierarchy of which campaign you would like to prioritize. Some levers include performance or duration of the campaign. For example, you’d like to prioritize brand A since it’s it’s a limited time promotion ending at the end of the month, you’d set the following:
Brand A: 60%
Brand B: 20%
Brand C: 20%
Impression: If you have a contracted goal amount you’re aiming to fulfill, enter the impression amount.
Flight Date Range: Enter the campaign’s flight date range. This sets the date ranges you’d like to run each flight.
Target Episodes: Search and select specific episodes you’d like to target. If you are looking to target all episodes in your catalog, leave this field blank.
Frequency Capping: Frequency capping is a term in advertising that means restricting the number of times an advertisement is played for a particular advertisement.
On: If you select to enable a frequency cap, we recommend the default of 1 per 2 hours. This means 1 ad will play in the duration of 2 hours of a listener tuning into your show.
Off: Leave this off if you want the ad server to pull in ads based on algorithms.
Note: Flighting your ad goals through Ad Manager is not a guarantee your goal will be delivered in full – many factors can impact your performance such as the frequency cap, how many campaigns you have active, the popularity of each episode and overall seasonal traffic. To track your campaign flight, reference the Reporting tab to see the progress. If you have reached your goal and you’d like to turn it off, pause or archive your flight.
Flight Status
To make changes to flighted ads, click on the line item and an Edit Flight menu will appear.
Active: Current flights serving ads via dynamic ad insertion across your show.
Paused: Inactive flights.
Pause Flight: Select Pause Flight if you’d like to pause and eventually resume the flight at a later date.
To Reactivate: Select Activate Flight to change the flight from paused to active.
Archive Flight: Select Archive Flight if you’d like to end this campaign. To unarchive a campaign go to the drop down menu under Flight Manager and select Archived. To unarchive, select the line item and select Unarchive Flight.
Uploading Your Pre-Recorded Ads
If you want to flight ads that were not recorded on Zencastr, follow these steps:
Create a new room by clicking +New, and then click Room
Fill out the fields with the correct information, and then, click “Create”
Room Name - please use a name that is related to your creative or campaign to make it easy to remember for you.
Language
Show - please select a show on the drop-down menu.
Room type (Audio/Video)
You will be taken to the recording page. You may skip the recording process if your ad has been recorded beforehand.
Click on Produce at the top part of your screen
Upload your ad in MP3 format.
Once the upload is complete, click Finalize and Publish
You will be taken to the publish page to wait for the Postproduction to be completed.
Click on the Produce tab to go back, and then click on the “Postproductions” icon on the right-hand side of the page.
On the Postproductions page you will have the ability to rename your file to stay organized. Click on the name to edit. Once done, click Save to finalize the name change. Please do not publish the episode. You can exit the upload flow once done by clicking on the ‘x’ button on the upper left hand corner.
You should now be able to find your newly uploaded ad by going to Ad Manager > Create Flight > and on Ad Content > Search Postproductions.
Recording An Ad on Zencastr
If you want to record an ad on Zencastr, follow these steps:
Create a new room by clicking +New, and then click Room
Fill out the fields with the correct information, and then, click Create
Room Name - please use a name that is related to your creative or campaign to make it easy to remember for you.
Language
Show - please select a show on the drop-down menu.
Room type (Audio/Video)
You will be taken to the recording page to complete your recording. Please follow the steps here if you are new to recording on Zencastr.
When you’re done recording, click on Create your podcast at the top part of your screen to run the audio recording through Automatic PostProduction.
Click Produce. Once complete, you will see a green pop-up saying “Your post-production is complete.”
You will have the ability to listen to your post-produced ad. You can also rename your file to stay organized. Click on the name to edit. Once done, hit Save.
Please do not publish the episode. You can exit the upload flow once done by clicking on the ‘x’ button on the upper left hand corner.
You should now be able to find your newly uploaded ad by going to Ad Manager > Create Flight > and on Ad Content > Search Postproductions.
Extracting An Ad for Flight from A Published Episode
If you have previously inserted an ad on a published episode, extracting that ad to flight would be fairly straightforward. Please follow the steps to Mark Existing Ads: Campaign Participation.
Once an ad is marked, this will appear under the Flight Manager tab. You can now create a flight for this extracted add.