The Canadian Podcast Awards, which are backed by the folks behind Podcamp Toronto and voted on by approved member podcasters from across the country, has unveiled its 2020 winners. Corus Entertainment’s Curiouscast podcast network came away with multiple wins, including two awards for Dark Poutine, which claimed the honours for Outstanding True Crime Series and Outstanding Documentary. Curiouscast’s History of the 90s, hosted by Kathy Kenzora, also won in two categories – Outstanding Debut for a Series and Outstanding Production for a Series. The network’s Super Awesome Science Show also won for Outstanding Education Series. Rogers’ Frequency network took home two awards with The Coup winning Best Business Series and Rob Ford deep dive The Gravy Train claiming Outstanding Artwork for a Series. Independent, Toronto-based series The Bed Post Podcast, a frank exploration of sex and sexuality hosted by Erin Pim, won both the People’s Choice Award and Outstanding Main Title Theme. Read more here.
JAZZ.FM91 (CJRT-FM) Toronto is celebrating Black History Month with a series of short radio features that are now available as a podcast. Narrated by John Devenish, host of weekday evening program Dinner Jazz, the podcast spotlights influential figures throughout jazz history, including Theo Crocker, Sarah Vaughan, Robert Glasper, Oscar Peterson, Nina Simone, Nat King Cole, Louis Armstrong, Kamasi Washington, Ella Fitzgerald, and Billie Holiday. The podcast series was produced by Glenn Crosse and features introductions by JAZZ.FM91 music director and host Brad Barker.
iHeartRadio is rebranding its 19-year partnership with Halifax’s IWK Foundation. Its annual radiothon will go forward as 100 Hours for the Kids at the IWK and transition from a one-day broadcast to a four-day event spanning 100 hours on Bell Media Radio stations across Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. This year’s radiothon will kick of Tuesday, Mar. 24 at 9 a.m. AT on C100 (CIOO-FM), 101.3 Virgin Radio (CJCH-FM), and partnering stations, including Big Dog 100.9 (CKTO-FM) and Pure Country 99.5 (CKTY-FM) Truro; 106.9 Capital FM (CIBX-FM), Pure Country 103.5 (CKHJ-FM) and 103.5 The FOX (CFXY-FM) Fredericton; K93 Grand Falls (CIKX-FM); Max 104.9 (CKBC-FM) Bathurst; and CJ104 (CJCJ-FM) Woodstock. It will conclude with a grand finale live broadcast on Saturday, Mar. 28 from 10 a.m. – 3 p.m. AT at Mic Mac Mall in Dartmouth, NS to thank participants and listeners for their support. C100 and 101.3 Virgin Radio’s fundraising efforts have generated more than $6 million to date in support of the children’s hospital.
The Temiskaming Hospital Foundation’s 6th Annual Valentine’s Day Radiothon, heard on CJTT 104.5 FM Temiskaming Shores, ON, raised $30,589. Broadcast on Feb. 8, funds raised during the five-hour broadcast, will go toward the purchase of two new ECG Machines for Temiskaming Hospital.
Call for a Cause Radiothon hosted by BIG 105 (CHUB-FM), 106.7 The Drive (CFDV-FM) and rdnewsNOW in Red Deer, raised $16,448 for the Red Deer Regional Health Foundation on Feb. 21. Money raised will go toward the purchase of cardiac monitors for the hospital’s pediatrics unit.
CHOM 97.7 Montreal will mark International Women’s Day on Mar. 8 by hosting a special concert in its Rock Room featuring three all-female bands from 6 to 8 p.m. Hosted by Sharon Hyland, the event will see The Beaches, Les Shirley and The Anti-Queens take the stage. The 18+ show will raise money and non-perishable food items for Montreal women’s shelter Chez Doris.
Global Warranty, an independent warranty program provider, has announced a new partnership with SiriusXM that will provide all of the company’s new customers with a three-month SiriusXM All Access trial free with qualifying products – even if the vehicles purchased don’t have satellite radio. The offer is currently valid now on all of Global’s vehicle warranties. For those not equipped with satellite radio, the trial is being offered via connected devices.
Claritas has published a white paper attributing a 34% listener conversion rate to podcast channel advertising. That compares to an average 2.6% lift across non-podcast channels like digital display (1.1%), print (2.4%), and linear TV (3.1%). Claritas also looked at whether podcasting and streaming audio cannibalize each other when integrated into the same advertising campaign. Their analysis concluded that households exposed via podcast were converting at a rate 2.5 times that of streaming audio, however both channels provided a positive lift. Download the white paper, here.
Edison Research has released its first Top Ten Podcast ranker. A new feature of the company’s subscription product, the Podcast Consumer Tracker (PCT), the current Top Ten reflects the third and fourth quarters of 2019, as ranked by the percentage of weekly podcast consumers 18+ who have listened to them. The Joe Rogan Experience takes top spot, followed by This American Life, The Daily, My Favorite Murder, Crime Junkie, Stuff You Should Know, Wait Wait…Don’t Tell Me!, Serial, Pod Save America, and Radiolab. Initiated in Summer 2019, the PCT is now in its third quarter of fielding and claims to be the only study that measures the entire podcast space continuously, compared to other download rankers which only measure participants/customers of those rankers, or users of a specific platform.
Cision has expanded its partnership with TVEyes to make it possible for Cision clients to monitor podcast mentions of their brands, competitors, products, and people. Podcast monitoring powered by TVEyes is available as part of Cision’s Broadcast Monitoring and will allow customers to pinpoint brand mentions across 25,000+ top ranking podcasts. The service has been available for clients in the U.S. and Canada since early February, and will soon be available globally.
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