Google Audio Ads and Bid4Spots: The Radio Ads Marketplace War

A few months ago, Google announced a new tool for advertisers; it is called Google Audio Ads. It is an extension of AdWords, and connects radio stations to advertisers.

Earlier this month eBay said it had closed a partnership deal with Voice123’s fellow company, Bid4Spots, to start selling radio advertising as a marketplace on the Internet, eBay Media Marketplace.

In similar ways, both marketplaces allow advertisers to place budgets on radio spots through an automated system. Advertisers can choose from hundreds of stations in different regions and cities country-wide. Stations are classified by the kind of programs they broadcast and advertisers can target their campaigns to specific geographic areas, type of listeners, date and time of the day. On the other side are the stations who do the actual bidding like a reverse auction, and the lowest CPM wins the auction.

This makes it so easy for small and medium sized businesses to start advertising on radio, and for advertisers to reach new markets in such an easy way that you can find a voice talent and producer via Voice123, have your radio spot ready in a matter of hours, and then use any of these services to broadcast your radio spot to the desired audience, and all this without stepping away from your desk!

Both say they are currently testing their systems, and although Google started in December, Bid4Spots’ platform is more mature, since they were the pioneers as the first online radio ads marketplace. They just now partnered with eBay.

The war is just starting, and both systems are gearing up to compete for advertisers’ money. Time will tell who will come out victorious, or if there is space for both, as the differences between them attract different customers.