C’mon kids, gather around the old headphones
How The Serial Podcast is re-inventing our old radio listening environment.
In my industry, I’m old. I’m fine admitting that. I’ve been in advertising for 20 years now, which makes me nearly ancient. And while I’ve taken my share of good-natured ribbing about my age, I can’t forget that I’m still relatively young relative to the rest of the population.
However, I do have the benefit of being just old enough that I remember listening to older radio programs, including Jack Benny, Dr. Demento, etc. But by that time the serial radio shows infamous for their ongoing story-telling had faded away long ago, paved over by television. Nevertheless, the images of my parents and grandparents huddled around a radio listening every week to The Lone Ranger, Orson Welles’ The War of the Worlds, Flash Gordon, etc are emblazoned in my mind.
“Cool … so you’re old and remember weird stuff, why is this important?”
Thanks for asking … I’ve been thinking about my age as I’ve spent the last two weeks agonizingly waiting for the next update to the Serial podcast. Admittedly, I was a bit late to the phenomenon, as it was 4–5 weeks in when I listened to my first episode. However, I quickly made up for lost time and got caught up, forcing me to actually (gasp) wait for the next one.
Thursday (12/4/14) the next episode was released and I realized what a rare phenomenon this “wait” was in today’s catch-up-by-binging media world. And with the preponderance of online streaming video, it seemed even odder that I would do this for what is essentially an old radio show format.
So what’s the lesson? Story-telling, people, story-telling. Self-disclosure: I consume a ton of media, I’m on-line all day, reading all kinds of articles on all kinds of subjects from my Twitter feed and now this site. But somewhere in all of that noise, this long-form story stood out. As an ad agency veteran, I can’t forget that lesson. Mediums change, stories will always captivate if done properly.
The beauty of this podcast, and many others out there? A captive audience. Much like with the old radio broadcasts, all you’re doing is listening. Podcasts don’t lend themselves to multi-tasking. You’re unlikely to listen to them while jogging, cleaning house, writing or reading. I listen to it driving in a car, not in front of a browser with 19 tabs open. It’s a singular activity.
So like those bygone times with the family surrounding a fire and devoting their entire attention to the story at hand, Serial and other similar podcasts provide a welcome respite to the crazy bombardment of signal and noise that we’re subjected to daily.
So what is the marketing/branding opportunity? Very few brands will have the story, let alone the credibility, to tell a long-form story just of themselves. It’s not impossible, but just not very likely. However, more brands will have the opportunity to tell stories about their brand’s impact on their customers. Find your advocates, tell their story, or better yet, let them tell your story for you, but in a honest and non-forced way. These likely won’t be long-form stories, but they still might be ways to capture the attention and imagination of your audience.
Lastly, if you’re a brand that has enough self-awareness to realize that you don’t have the credibility or advocacy to tell such a story of your own brand, look to partner. It’s always hard to predict the next zeitgeist, but MailChimp has certainly benefited from attaching themselves early on to Serial, taking a risk and reaping the rewards. As marketeers, we cannot be afraid to take risks on new entities, and if we remember how infectious a good story can be, we can use that as another filter when we’re considering ways to promote our brand or our clients.
Now, gather around the fireplace kiddos, let’s start a fire, put on our headphones and have a listen separately, of course.
