Membership is now open in the Association for Downloadable Media and I’m joined. I’ll also join the Association of Podcasters & Online Media Producers when it gets ready. I’m hoping to meet some of the people involved in these startup groups out at the Podcast and New Media Expo.
So why join and especially since they haven’t done anything yet? Because it’s a chance to get in at the beginning and have a voice and hopefully access to information that will help us and our clients. One of the things I can already sense is the need in this ADM to address niche topic/audience producers. When I joined they asked me to check a range of how many downloads my podcast gets in a month. The first choice was 1 – 50,000 and then they went higher! I don’t know about you but I don’t see this medium as a mass medium necessarily. In fact, if all they’re going to focus on is podcasting or other downloadable media content that’s just out to see how many downloads they can get then I think they’ll not only be making a mistake but missing out on what most of us are doing.
I produce podcasts for niche audiences. If my program is targeted to 40 people and I’ve got 40 downloads then I might be reaching my total audience. I don’t care about having thousands of downloads. It’s not just the total number of downloads but who those downloads represent.
So, it’s going to be interesting to see how this evolves. The traditional media buyers and agencies are so metric driven that they tend to overlook the quality of the audience. When you’re used to measuring CPM but now have a buy option that is only going to reach the target audience with no waste the numbers get a lot smaller but the message is making a much bigger impact and the cost is probably a lot lower. Of course then you have to ask, “How do I make a living on small buying fees/commissions?” Good question.
