The media industry has experienced exciting technological advances in recent years that have resulted in increased media delivery and consumption. However, despite the increase in consumption, measuring response and return on ad campaigns remains a challenge. As broad reach platforms like Audio – including traditional radio, streaming and podcasting – are being called to deliver similar conversion results as digital marketing, marketers need the do’s and don’ts.

Audio is ripe with opportunities for enhanced attribution delivery, from the top of the brand funnel, to purchase points. Data-driven brands looking to show the prowess of their Audio campaigns, should take these five essential steps:

Vanity URLs and promo codes are easy to implement and have served as the go-to tactic when more complete measurements are not available. These tactics can be misleading – they typically account for less than 20% of actual campaign impact.[1] Be sure to look into additional attribution tools in audio’s arsenal that cover all touch points and conversions.

The biggest misconception in the marketplace is that Audio is used to drive awareness, not conversions. Radio, streaming audio and podcasts can now deliver over the air and digital campaign results built on a large-scale, reliable identity graph– a data system that captures how listeners get exposed to advertisements online and offline, across devices. The graph should connect the dots across a consumer’s journey and count conversions. This approach greatly reduces reliance on click-based measurement or cookies and ensures marketers will get full credit for all types of exposures that lead to conversions.

The essence of campaign measurement is to determine the impact of marketing tactics on conversions. When measuring impact on brand metrics, consider the complete customer journey. Focusing solely on the end of a buyer’s conversion journey will lead marketers astray, missing early and mid-funnel marketing tactics that drive real impact on conversions. Audio is highly active across all stages of the conversion funnel – the awareness, intent and desire. It’s critical to capture and credit that impact when assessing how well the campaign served brand goals.

Many marketers shy away from measuring offline conversions. The prospect of bringing in different metrics from online and offline platforms may seem daunting, but it can be done and it’s worth it. With the right geo-location partners in place and a strong first-party dataset rich with mobile phone information to help measure offline movement, in-store visits and offline sales conversions can be measured to deliver data needed to truly evaluate campaign effectiveness.

Once marketers outline goals and identify a partner or publisher that will deliver audio-specific measurement, they can initiate a test in local markets to gauge their tactics’ efficiency. These learnings can be scaled and applied to national campaigns to ensure success.

With publishers who embrace 1st party data and build out strong identity graphs, Audio has become a trusted medium for brand building and driving conversion. Both over the air and streaming audio conversions can be measured against key advertiser goals such as web site visitations, app downloads, brand lift, in-store visits and sales conversion. Leading publishers like Entercom have invested in attribution methodologies and key partnerships to close this critical loop for advertising partners. Marketers should push publishers and partners to deliver measurement tailored to audio, while planners and strategists should seize the full Audio effect, acknowledging the breadth of the medium and measuring its impact on every point of the purchase cycle.