HSBC UK wanted to use podcast advertising to increase awareness of its partnership with homelessness charity Shelter, as part of its ‘Vicious Circle’ campaign — and to highlight how they are working to break down borders for those who are experiencing financial exclusion.

In a UK media first, Acast, A Million Ads and HSBC UK collaborated to deliver a total of 102 dynamic host reads on three of the UK’s biggest podcasts, reaching listeners with localised messaging across major cities and regions in the UK.

Using Dynamic Sponsorship and Dynamic Sponsorship+ (pioneered by Acast and A Million Ads), the campaign ran geo-targeted and personalised host reads across some of our biggest and most established podcasts — Table Manners, Dan Snow’s History Hit and Football Ramble — and across categories in Sport, Curious Thinkers and Lifestyle verticals.

In an Acast study powered by Attest, HSBC UK’s podcast advertising campaign led to an 18% increase in brand and organisation recall, with listeners exposed to the dynamic ad significantly more likely to know that the campaign was in partnership with Shelter vs those exposed to a non-dynamic ad.

Moreover, users exposed to the dynamic ads were significantly more likely than those exposed to the dynamic ad to say that ‘HSBC UK is a brand I trust’ and ‘HSBC UK is a bank for people like me’ reinforcing that dynamic formats are more effective at driving brand affinity.

The most-agreed-with statement among those served the dynamic ad was that ‘HSBC UK is a bank that believes in building a better, different UK’, suggesting this message was communicated most effectively in the dynamic creative, and achieved HSBC UK’s goal of increasing awareness of this campaign.