More people are engaging with mobile and television time is declining

For the first time ever eMarketer has stated that more people are engaging on mobile devices as their television time declines.  Now more than ever, fans are using mobile for movies, tv, audio, and games.  

Check out the article here.

If you don't have an audio strategy in place, we can help.  From Podcasting to Social Media we give you the tools to drive more fan engagement.  Your brand is more than just streaming music, news, or talk.  Use everything piece of content you can to win.

More importantly, set up KPI's to measure and track your progress through your dashboard analytics.

Email clientsupport@airkast.com for more help.

Hey Siri...Open MY app! (Google does it too!)

VOICE ACTIVATION AND YOUR MOBILE APPS

Apple released a series of announcements at their recent developer conference one that included access to local radio stations using Siri.

As an AirKast client did you know that you can already launch your local mobile apps by voice on your phone?  It works beautifully with Siri and Google Assistant on your phone.  All you have to do is ask them.

Voice activation is everywhere, that's why AirKast builds Alexa Smart Speaker skills for free as a companion to your mobile app, we're about audio everywhere!

We're also working with some companies right now to test voice-ads for Podcasters and new ways to share snackable audio in your mobile apps.  If you're interested in learning more email clientsupport@airkast.com

Smart Speakers: Top Ranked Clients January 2019

AirKast Network Top Ranking Smart Speaker Clients!

Congratulations to NRG Media, Mid-West Family and Now! Media

January 2019

Froggy 98.1, Magic 98 and Bob & Sheri round out the top 3 positions in our AirKast national smart speaker network.  This is the first time we've seen a morning show podcast app crack the top 3 showing the incredible power of talent on a national scale!

Well done!

Breaking News: AirKast Engagement Factor Rankings

Who are America's top mobile performers?

At the beginning of 2019, we unveiled your new AirKast dashboard.  We introduced a new KPI to keep track of your mobile success, The Engagement Factor tracks how interactive your fans are by channel so you can create best practices and maximize sales opportunities.

Here's a snapshot of our AirKast Network.  Congratulations to our top performers!

Congratulations to 93X and CBS News Radio

Congratulations to KNBR and Bob and Sheri

Great content and hard work drive listener engagement and these radio stations are the top performers across our national network....well done!

If you want to know how to grow engagement or schedule a training session email us a clientsupport@airkast.com

Happy New Year! New Dashboard and Live Analytics including Social Media!

New Year...New Dashboard! Throughout 2018 we have been listening to you about the need for new analytics that truly gives you the information you need to drive monetization and engagement.  Thanks for your input, we listened and you're going to love what we've done! Your new dashboard has a new look, live analytics at a glance both the Corporate and local level help you identify wins and losses.  Plus, new social media metrics, listener heat maps, and affinity categories help you make more informed decisions for Sales and Programming.  No more guessing and a faster path to revenue and more quarter hour listening. Your proprietary AirKast "Engagement Factor" helps you compare your monthly performance by giving you a common metric to measure your growth by looking at engagement across all aspect of your audience usage including podcasting, smart speakers, mobile streaming and social media channels.  Make decisions faster and more accurately with big data!

What's New!   "Engagement Ring" creates new mobile measurement performance standards New Dashboard layout with real-time analytics Social Media performance metrics Peer to peer performance comparisons Secure admin group analytics for Corporate management New "Affinity Categories" reveal new mobile sales opportunities CMS Integration - web promos go mobile with one-touch publishing See your current and previous month Engagement Factors along with Monthly Sessions at a glance! New interactive charts at both the corporate and local station level help you identify new mobile opportunities for sales and programming! New Age, Gender and Affinity category data that keeps you and your team informed as your mobile strategy and engagement grow!

Social Media Engagement Ever wonder how your mobile audience engages with your social media posts?  Track which posts get the most click-throughs and see the content that grabs the attention of your audience! Affinity Categories Turn mobile big data into Sales Now you can see what product categories your mobile listeners are most interested and target new clients with data! One Touch Promotional Scheduling  Now every time you add a piece of content to your website promotion slider it automatically appears on the homepage of your mobile app! Get the performance metrics and upsell your clients! Contact clientsupport@airkast.com to get it turned on!

Need training for Programming and Sales departments? Contact: michael.fischer@airkast.com

It's Official! AirKast and Cortana: Streaming quality radio content using the Cortana Skills Kit

All of us at AirKast are thrilled to announce our official partnership with Microsoft and Cortana Skills!

With the launch of the new Harman Kardon Invoke speaker, consumers now have access to a home speaker that combines premium Harman Kardon audio with Cortana’s intelligence. The speaker comes with first-party music integrations to Spotify, iHeartRadio, and TuneIn, but there are a number of 3rd party skills that utilize the audio streaming functionality of the Cortana Skills Kit to provide premium audio content to consumers. AirKast, one of our partners, worked closely with the team to build on these features to ship a number of radio skills for Cortana.

AirKast is a category leader in audio streaming that works with over 60 media companies -- including CBS Radio News, Fox Radio News, and Cumulus Media. AirKast uses it's proprietary technology to create applications that are used for listening and interacting with radio station streams and advertisings.

Working closely with the Cortana team, AirKast was able to publish multiple skills in a short duration using the Microsoft Bot Framework and the audio streaming capability of the Cortana Skills Kit. One of their Cortana Skills, for CBS News Radio, helps you listen to live CBS news feed on Cortana from anywhere - just say "Hey Cortana, Open CBS News Radio".

Larry Leung, CEO of AirKast Inc., says "We are just getting started and wanted to show the world what is possible with Cortana and IoT. We at AirKast are thrilled about the engagement so far and its potential to further advance our customers’ presence; it’s just the beginning."

Visit http://www.airkast.com for more information about AirKast

To learn more and discover the currently available skills, visit: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/cortana/cortana-skills/

Microsoft's Cortana and AirKast: A Match Made In Heaven.

It's nearly impossible to turn on a television, open a magazine, walk into a retail store, shop online or turn on the radio without hearing about a new smart speaker.  The world is rapidly changing to a 'screen-less' world and your voice, now more than ever is in control.

This holiday season, smart speakers will be the hottest gift item due to their low cost and infinite power as a digital assistant.  Simple tasks such as finding time and weather, recipes, sports scores and news headlines become as easy as saying "start" or "play".

AirKast is proud to have been asked to be a beta partner in the development of Cortana smart speaker skills for Microsoft.   The newly released "Invoke" speaker from Harman-Kardon is the newest entry into the home entertainment world.  It's sleek design, numerous speakers for high fidelity playback and tap pad for shortcuts are just part of this amazing new product. Inside the Invoke are three woofers, three tweeters, two passive radiators, and a 40 - watt amplifier that creates a 360 degree sound that can fill a room and seven microphones so it can hear you from anywhere. Check out the full capabilities here.

What also differentiates the Cortana is that it not only works with smart speakers, it's compatible and/or pre-installed on all Windows 10 personal computers and Xbox and even your Android and Apple phones; opening up a whole new world beyond its competitors.  This ubiquitous distribution across multiple platforms is the first step in voice activation, anywhere, anytime and on any device.  It integrates with Skype, Linkedin, Outlook and Office 365 to name a few creating seamless integration into your daily personal and business life.  Another difference is that Cortana works with "AI or Artificial Intelligence" Bot's, little pieces of code that control your voice commands.  No more need to install skills or say "Alexa play" all you have to do is tap Cortana say "Start" and your audio session begins.

The world of AI in 2017 will be everywhere from personal assistants and smart speakers to industrial automation, the power of the human voice is changing the world at lightning speed and AirKast will continue to build smart speaker skills on all platforms for our clients as they emerge.