Amit Monheit on Revolutionizing In-Game Audio Ads and Digital Advertising

1. How is your organization adapting your products to capitalize on the growth of gaming as a primary channel for reaching digitally native consumers?

We believe that non-interruptive ad formats are the critical next step in the evolution of in-game advertising. When an ad delays or breaks gameplay, it takes away from everyone’s experience. That’s why we developed an in-game audio ad unit that can initiate alongside gameplay, giving advertisers the opportunity to reach players without harming their gameplay experience. As we look to the future, finding non-interruptive formats is our north star.

2. What role does in-game advertising—particularly non-intrusive formats like audio—play in your clients’ broader customer engagement and brand storytelling strategy?

More than ever, advertisers want to reach people where they know their ads have an opportunity to be seen and heard. In-game ads, especially non-interruptive units, maximize this opportunity for brands. For in-game audio, many brands who have already embraced streaming and podcasting are adding in-game as a way to maximize their reach and improve performance of the audio format.

3. How are your clients leveraging gaming environments to reach hard-to-access or ad-fatigued audience segments, such as Gen Z and millennial consumers? 

Mobile gaming is one of the broadest categories for reach, with almost 3 billion players worldwide. We have clients approach us for all of their target demos, whether it’s age, ethnicity, gender, or other behavioral segments. The beauty of mobile gaming is that no matter what kind of audience you’re looking for, you can find them within the gaming ecosystem.

4. How are your clients balancing innovation in ad formats with brand safety and user experience, especially in unmoderated or decentralized content environments like gaming?

There’s a big misconception that buying into gaming means operating in unmoderated environments. We have a multi-step process to ensure brand safety, and we don’t operate in UGC environments – we’re fully focused on mobile games from marquee global publishers in the casual and hyper-casual space. And we give our clients full visibility into our title list and the option to exclude any titles they feel are misaligned with their brands.

5. What performance benchmarks (e.g., listen-through rate, brand recall, engagement time) are most critical when evaluating emerging formats like in-game audio? 

We encourage our clients to focus on their key business results, especially since we’ve seen a lot of success with both top-of-funnel and lower-funnel campaigns. For brand advertisers we suggest running brand lift studies to see how powerful in-game audio can be for their brand health metrics. With performance advertisers, we encourage them to work with attribution partners to see how adding in-game audio can positively impact ROAS and acquisition costs.

6. What role do you see for in-game audio ads in clients’ long-term advertising strategy, particularly as gaming becomes an dominant form of digital entertainment?  

We’re optimistic that in-game audio will be as essential as podcasting or streaming audio for advertisers. We know the power of gaming from our experience in other formats, and we know that gaming is one of the few environments where ads really benefit the whole ecosystem. Early adopters are already seeing the benefits, and as programmatic audio becomes more widely adopted, we’re excited to see more advertisers embrace in-game audio.