Accurate statistics have always been a strong focus of the Podbean podcasting platform. Over the past few years, we’ve worked hard to use stringent filtering criteria and monitor technology changes to provide the best podcast statistics.
To further this and join with our peers in standardized measurement practices, we have updated our stats system according to the IAB Podcast Measurement Guidelines. Many of you have asked us about this so we are happy to be able to make this announcement. Fortunately, due to our team’s continuing work over the years this required only minimal change. As of April 3rd, we will release the completely updated system to fulfill all the guidelines.
IAB Podcast Measurement Guidelines: What are they and why does it matter?
“The IAB Podcast Measurement Technical Guidelines 2.0* are the result of the Podcast Technical Working Group’s efforts to provide clarity in the marketplace by developing a common language around measurement. In addition to defining standard metrics for both podcast content and podcast ads, this document also provides guidance on some of the technical details such as request filtering, in order to reduce the discrepancies currently seen across podcast publishers and tech vendors.” –IAB Tech Lab
As the accepted industry standard, advertisers and other interested parties seek statistics that meet these guidelines. Podcasters can confidently provide data knowing there are standard metrics.
What does this mean to me?
With the release of the new stats system, podcasters may see some changes in statistics after April 3rd. Our testing indicates download #s may be reduced by about 10-20%. The reduced number reflects a change in the time period for filtering to get the unique download statistic. In all other ways, the statistics system and data provided will remain the same.
You can contact Support online or via live chat if you have questions about your statistics (or anything else!). We know change, especially when it comes to numbers, can be unsettling. But, we understand the importance of ensuring our metrics are fully comparable. And, we know how valuable this is to our podcasters.
“The reduced number reflects a change in the time period for filtering to get the unique download statistic.”
The quoted sentence makes absolutely no sense to me. Is there a layperson’s way to phrase it?
Exactly my thoughts. This should make no difference
I am guessing this means that if the same IP address downloads the same podcast multiple times within a certain time period, it only gets counted as one download. But I agree it would be helpful if Podbean would clarify.
Glad to clarify. Yes, multiple downloads from the same IP for the same file are filtered to get you the unique downloads #. We’ve done this for several years but previously used a shorter time frame for this filtering, but the IAB guidelines set the filtering as a 24-hour window.
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Do you mean 24 hour?
Hi – does podbean now support third party measurement prefixes – for services like Podtrac for instance?
We currently don’t offer that service. However, you can ask Support/log a request. We keep track of what customers are asking for when figuring out what makes sense to implement.
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