AutoZone, Indeed and Others Message Hope and Help in Top Audio Ads

Uplifting Tone and Practical Help Resonate with Listeners

Period ending January 31

Which brands’ audio ads scored the highest based on their ability to drive listeners to buy the product being advertised? The below measures the top spots by purchase intent score, calculated by the Veritonic Machine Listening and Learning (M-LAL ™) platform, and where each stands relative to its sector benchmark.

Many of January’s winning audio ads hovered around cultural relevance with messages of hope and help at a practical level.

AutoZone led the pack, driven by their spot that focuses on helping people get ready for the cold weather ahead by ensuring they don’t add battery problems to their list of troubles. The brand punctuates the ad with practical offers — a free battery test, a free charge — to support the message.

AutoZone’s sonic decisions for this ad match the content well. The spot is very upbeat, leveraging music that the brand uses consistently across its ads.

The spot scored 20 points above the benchmark for auto parts ads across the Veritonic platform.

Job search-giant Indeed has a strong message of hope in the market right now, and their winning audio ad in this period was no exception. Focused on a woman who has started her own meal prep business — itself a mark of the moment with so many people getting food delivered — the spot is uplifting despite the heavy context it addresses. The owner has, for example, a waitlist for her services — business is strong.

Jennifer Warren, VP of Indeed’s global brand marketing, said this week in The Drum, “There are people who are hurting so we had to step back and say ‘what is the role of our brand?’ We want to provide hope and inspiration to those out of work.”

On a much more practical level, The Home Depot also hits the nail on the head of cultural relevance. Their top-10 audio ad, which scored 5 points above the benchmark for Home Improvement, focuses on points like “more time at home means more wear and tear” for your appliances. The spot also fittingly calls out home delivery.

Sonically, and similar to AutoZone, The Home Depot ads owe some of their success to the consistent use of a lively, up-tempo music bed.

Curious about where your own audio marketing efforts stand? Contact us to get a look.

Methodology

Veritonic Competitive Intelligence empowers brands to understand how their audio marketing stacks up against competitors. It detects and scores audio advertisements across major verticals by analyzing an ongoing flow of thousands of podcast, radio, and other streams. Powered by Machine Listening and Learning (M-LAL™), the platform gauges the effectiveness of assets by correlating each with thousands like it that have been analyzed across the Veritonic database.