2023 Bronze Voice or Audio

Agency: OLIVER

Client: Guardian News and Media

Entry Title: Today in Focus

Executive Summary

Today in Focus is The Guardian’s flagship daily news podcast. A deep dive into the audience identified an opportunity to increase listenership among younger people at a key moment when they were most likely to make resolutions and cement new behaviours.

Strategy

8 million podcasts reach 25% of people in the UK every month on Spotify. Despite this, only 11% of listens to Today in Focus podcast came via the platform.

The campaign was single-minded, consolidating budget into one channel and targeting younger audiences already aligned to the demographic of the podcast. The team worked closely with Spotify to utilise its hero audio formats to speak to listeners in relevant contextual moments; developing scripts and recording them into audio trailers with hosts Michael Safi and Nosheen Iqbal that leveraged different interests: climate, investigations, news, and pop culture.

The campaign drove credibility through association by using popular Spotify podcast, Parenting Hell, to hero Today in Focus as the ‘must listen’ daily news podcast for stories and perspectives listeners couldn’t find elsewhere.

Creativity

This hinged on contextual relevance, audience interest targeting and authenticity. The creative hook, ‘You won't believe what we've found out’, acted as a powerful draw, igniting curiosity and compelling potential listeners to explore Today in Focus.

Audio trailers formed the central point of the creative execution. Speaking directly to listeners during key contextual moments, the team crafted six unique trailers, each tailored to resonate with specific segments of the audience.

By offering distinct content—such as commuting trailers for those on the go, news and investigation trailers for news enthusiasts, a pop culture trailer for a more uplifting audio experience, and a climate-specific trailer for green living enthusiasts—the campaign catered to a range of interests and lifestyles.

Results

For Judges eyes only

The Team

Guardian News and Media - Monica Zen, Senior Marketing Manager - Rebecca Pizzey, Brand Manager - Joel Midgley, Head of Marketing - Nosheen Iqbal, Host of Today in Focus - Michael Safi, Host of Today in Focus - Robbie George, Senior Marketing Manager The Telegraph (ex-Guardian)

OLIVER - Rebecca Andrews, Account Director - Mary Ogbewele, Business Director

Spotify - Jason Padam, Client Partner - Jianfei Bu, Automation Lead

PHD - Larry Bigley, AV Associate Director

Contributors

Spotify and PHD