July 31, 2025

Customized Creative: Pushing Personalization to the Limits in Audio

By Audacy Insights Team

Why flexible, fast, and tailored messaging drives better results

When an ad feels like it was made just for you, it stops being noise and starts driving impact. That’s the power of personalized Audio, where brand messages are tailored to a consumer’s passions, location, or needs. No other media channel matches that creative versatility — or results.

Audio is the only mass reach medium that lets you scale your message and stay nimble — customizing your ads quickly by audience, location, or even real-time events. Want to launch a versioned campaign tomorrow? You can. Want to update creative across markets? Done.

Savvy marketers appreciate Audio’s creative agility: A recent ANA study revealed brand marketers rank Audio no. 1 in creative flexibility across all paid media channels, above digital video, social media, and TV.

What’s the secret sauce? These three factors reveal the power of personalized Audio:

Creative flexibility: Today’s marketers need advertising that responds to dynamic market conditions, and only Audio can keep up. With affordable and nimble production, most spots go from studio to air within 24 – 48 hours.

That gives Audio a clear advantage. While Digital video and TV are hampered by time-consuming, expensive production and editing, Audio is efficient and agile.

Context Matters: Local radio, digital streaming, and podcasts pack a punch by delivering personalized ads to the most interested audiences. Marketers can target ads by interests, demographics, location, and even mood, boosting impact and reducing waste.

Trusted Voices: Who delivers your messages matters. Audiences are fiercely loyal to their favorite hosts, and their recommendations can influence brand consideration, purchase intent, and conversion.

And when you look at how brands are using Audio today, it’s clear that customization is more than a tactic — it’s a performance driver.

Case Study: Creative Agility Turbocharges Radio Campaign

Aiming to increase app downloads, a sportsbook client turned to Audacy for a bespoke radio campaign with an ambitious plan: A massive, customized campaign with ads tailored by sport, event, location, demographics, and fandom.

The 13-week radio campaign featured 2,000 creative variations, each crafted in real-time to respond to results, headlines, and current games and events.

By tapping into timely, real-life moments, like a blockbuster NBA trade or the night’s marquee MLB matchup between division rivals, ads stayed fresh and relevant. No other media can deliver that hyper-personalization with efficiency and scale. Fans heard timely, authentic messaging that matched the energy of the games they loved — and they responded – with thousands of new customer installs.

This is creative agility at its best. No other channel can pivot this fast, with this much authenticity, at this scale.

Case Study: Hyper-Localized Campaign Drives Measurable Results

A leading telecom brand was looking to drive foot traffic to its retail stores. The goal was simple: increase visits. But the execution was anything but ordinary.

Partnering with Audacy, the brand ran a massive audio campaign, including host endorsements and ads tailored to nearly 300 individual store locations. Each digital audio ad was localized — featuring the specific address and city, and even name-dropping store managers for their neighborhood location.

By quickly producing dozens of creative variations and equipping hosts with dynamic, real-time copy, the campaign was relevant, timely, and intimate. No mass media delivers that personal connection at scale like Audio.

Even better, the personal touch paid off: With some stores reporting as much as a 20 percent increase in foot traffic. The client responded by expanding the campaign to new markets. This kind of hyper-local customization is only possible in Audio — where you can run hundreds of variations without the production burdens of video or TV. It’s fast, affordable, and scalable.

What This Means for Advertisers

In a world where consumers are bombarded with thousands of ads daily, customized Audio cuts through the clutter and commands attention.

Audio’s creative flexibility is more than a production perk — it’s a growth strategy. And when brands tailor their message, they see stronger results. Here’s why it works:

You can run dozens (or hundreds) of ad variations without steep production timelines
You boost relevance by tailoring creative to listener context in real-time
You keep audiences engaged — because they hear what matters to them

Radio doesn’t just offer reach and trust — it delivers radical creative flexibility at scale, speed, and efficiency that no other media channel can match. As brands embrace performance and agility, radio is well-positioned to drive share of market for brands.