German study on podcast use

The Hanover-based agency Blue Sky Media has conducted an empirical study on the use of podcast offerings in cooperation with the company Podcast.de. The study provides basic data on the target group of users and proves that podcast offers are already established and a fixed part of the daily routine. It also revealed that users who are hardly reached via classic media accept podcasts as an advertising medium.
According to the survey, podcast recipients are young, fully employed and well educated. They use the Internet every day, for an average of over 3.5 hours. The classic media of television and radio, on the other hand, are switched on for just one hour a day. Podcast advertising is tolerated, writes Blue Sky Media, as long as commercials are presented in an entertaining and interesting way, do not last longer than 20 seconds and are placed at the beginning or end of the podcast episode.
The survey is the prelude to a long-term study that aims to identify annual changes in podcast usage. For the first, available results of the survey, 216 people were interviewed between September 8 and 30, 2008. The next field phase is planned for 2009.