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Podcasting Goes Targeted with "Nanocasting"

Thursday, September 15th, 2005 at 5:50 PM - by

Jackstreet Media announced the launch of five podcasts today in a category it is calling "Nanocasting." Nanocasting is the company's term for highly targeted podcasting aimed at niche markets. In targeting those niche markets in terms of content, the company is bringing a corporate approach to also delivering equally targeted and niche advertising.

"Nanocasting refers to the programming produced for the most narrowly but clearly defined target audience," said Errol Smith, the founder of Jackstreet Media. "This is the audience that is most interested in the type of programming, and from a marketing standpoint, the audience that is most likely to buy related products."

To that effect, the company has launched five podcasts:

There have been, and continue to be, thousands of corporate-sponsored podcasts to be found through Apple's Podcast Directory, but the idea of finding value in a market of a few thousand, or even a few hundred, is one that turns traditional radio business models on its ears. Jackstreet Media's name for this concept, Nanocasting, could gain traction as the very young industry of podcasting leaves infancy.

You can find more information on the company's approach to this at the Nanocasting Web site.

Dave Hamilton contributed to this article.

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dux5 said:

member since 02 Jul 2002 with 112 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Thu Sep 15, 2005 7:40 pm

This is precisely the area where Podcasting will survive and an area that broadcasting can never compete against. It is also the place that should frighten traditional advertising outlets the most.

If I have a product that is of interest to only a few thousand people, broadcast is not money well spent.

For niche hobbies, sports, and other interests, podcasting, videocasting and websites are the great equalizers.

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Bosco said:

member since 03 Jun 2002 with 1002 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Thu Sep 15, 2005 7:58 pm

Does anyone else get the feeling that if Apple had called the iPod Nano the "iPod Small P*nis" that this company would have jumped on the bandwagon with "SmallP*nisCasting.org"? The levees have broken on things named nano. Thanks Apple!!

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Unplugged68 said:

member since 25 Aug 2005 with 2 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Thu Sep 15, 2005 11:42 pm

Actually, I remember hearing the term nanocasting a few months ago, long before the Nano was released. I also remember people making fun of the name just because they thought all podcasting should be nanocasting. I think the name is now more of a coincedence than anything.

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etchalon said:

member since 29 Jun 2005 with 5 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Fri Sep 16, 2005 12:37 am

hmm

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Steve W said:

member since 22 Nov 2002 with 482 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Fri Sep 16, 2005 9:09 am

Ah, very good, something else for me to avoid. Listen carefully: I don't want to be advertised at. I don't want to be a "niche market." I will find a way to avoid your incessant "buy me" messages.

Thank you.

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Dave said:

member since 11 Jun 2001 with 227 posts, TMO Staff, send him a message or view his profile

Fri Sep 16, 2005 10:47 am

Steve W wrote:
Ah, very good, something else for me to avoid. Listen carefully: I don't want to be advertised at. I don't want to be a "niche market." I will find a way to avoid your incessant "buy me" messages.

Thank you.

Now this is interesting. Are you blocking ads on this site? If so, you are stealing content. The way you *pay* for iPodObserver is by agreeing to view our ads in exchange for reading our content. Rarely is there a free lunch in this world, and we truly feel that we're doing our best to balance the information we wish to deliver with the fact that we're running a business here and need to keep the lights on.

-Dave

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Bryan said:

member since 11 Jun 2001 with 7340 posts, TMO Staff, send him a message or view his profile

Fri Sep 16, 2005 10:59 am

Steve W wrote:
Ah, very good, something else for me to avoid. Listen carefully: I don't want to be advertised at. I don't want to be a "niche market." I will find a way to avoid your incessant "buy me" messages.

Thank you.

Ah, cool, another person who thinks that content appears out of thin air, and that he is therefore entitled to it. It's a good thing that those of us who can create, do create, and it's even more cool that we provide the very tools you use to complain about our price, which is our ads.

I say "our" here, because even if you are complaining only about the commercial podcasters mentioned in this story, you are also talking about everything else on the Internet, including this site.

The reality is that ads pay the bills. If the bills don't get paid, there's nothing for you to consume.

There are always going to be ad-free podcasts (and Web sites), but the addition of sponsored podcasts is not only inevitable, it will also bring new resources to the medium, as well as new levels of quality.

For me, if the ads on a Web site become too annoying, I don't resort to stealing the content (i.e. blocking ads), I avoid the site altogether. That's the only entitlement I have.

Bryan

Editor

iPO

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Steve W said:

member since 22 Nov 2002 with 482 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Fri Sep 16, 2005 3:17 pm

Gentlemen,

The difference between a website and a podcast is the same as the difference between print and commercial TV/radio: With a website, I can choose to ignore the ads that don't interest me. With a podcast that choice is removed. I have to either listen to it or mute it and try to figure out when it's over. It's much more intrusive, IOW, and I have little to no control over it.

FWIW, the only ads I block are pop-ups, and those are so intrusive I not only feel no pangs of conscience about blocking them, I would (and did, before pop-up blocking was possible) contact businesses that use them to tell them I wouldn't consider their products because they used pop-ups.

I'd be careful using the professionalism argument, considering the utter wasteland commercial radio and TV have become. Beautifully rendered crap is still crap. The one saving grace of the web is that it is still what cable TV companies were, when they were first looking for traction, pleased to call "narrowcasting" as opposed to broadcasting. We now have a few hundred cable channels, all trying to get the biggest numbers for their advertisers, and that inevitably leads to lowest-common-denominator programming decisions. I'm hoping the web can avoid that.

Edit: BTW, I did say, "something else for me to avoid." If something is sufficiently annoying, I will avoid it. No harm, no foul.

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Bosco said:

member since 03 Jun 2002 with 1002 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Fri Sep 16, 2005 11:15 pm

Steve,

You're not the target audience, and as such, nobody really cares to please your tastes. Typical people go through that process of evaluating what level of advertising they will accept unconsciously. If it's overdone, they don't come back. If it doesn't bother them, maybe they do or don't. It's all a numbers game. Just like software, when you get someone who is fixated on a particular thing that nobody in their right mind gets fixated on, you discount their opinion a whole bunch. Perhaps you lose that customer or viewer, but if your numbers are still good, the particular thing isn't of much consequence and you can get away with it. Nothing against you, it's just how things work and why you in particular might find a lot of vendors and information sources annoying .

-Brad

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Steve W said:

member since 22 Nov 2002 with 482 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Sat Sep 17, 2005 9:46 am

Bosco wrote:
You're not the target audience, and as such, nobody really cares to please your tastes.

Story of my life...

Quote:
...when you get someone who is fixated on a particular thing that nobody in their right mind gets fixated on

Hey, I resemble that remark! Actually, I tend to tilt at windmills so often I've become accustomed to being marginalized. Not happy, mind you, just accustomed.

Quote:
Nothing against you, it's just how things work and why you in particular might find a lot of vendors and information sources annoying .

Yeah, it's the curse of majority rule. And you're absolutely correct, I do find them annoying, which is why I still haven't replaced the TV that crapped out almost a month ago. My wife watches the box more than I do, which isn't difficult, and got fed up enough with my stalling that she bought one with a built-in VCR and DVD player for the bedroom. Understanding woman that she is, she doesn't watch it when I'm in the room.

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