Mission Media Launches Podcast Quality Score

RADIO ONLINE | Monday, September 14, 2026 | 2:54pm CT

Mission Media

Mission Media has launched the Mission Media Quality Score, a new methodology within its proprietary Content Hub designed to help advertisers and agencies evaluate and curate podcast inventory.

The Quality Score evaluates podcasts using a range of factors measured over time, including total audience size, downloads, available advertising inventory, requested ad impressions, Apple listener ratings, listener reviews and the recency of published content.

Each show also undergoes Mission Media's ongoing invalid traffic verification process to confirm that the podcast is legitimate and reaching actual listeners. The combined measurements are used to classify inventory as Premium, Long-Tail or Unverified.

"For too long, terms like 'premium' and 'long tail' have been defined by perception, scale or who owns the inventory," said Mission Media CEO David Krulewich. "What's been missing is an objective measure of how audiences actually engage and how publishers protect those trusted relationships through finite ad allotments."

Krulewich said the scoring system is intended to identify quality programming regardless of publisher size, giving buyers a consistent way to compare podcasts across the broader marketplace.

The Quality Score expands Mission Media Content Hub's existing tools for evaluating podcast inventory, audiences, pricing, contextual relevance and campaign performance. The platform provides access to more than 500,000 podcast feeds, 400 audience segments and 600 content categories.

"We verify the inventory and evaluate the signals that tell us whether a show is active, legitimate and demonstrating meaningful audience engagement," said Alex Ham, Director of Ad Operations and Applied AI at Mission Media. He said combining those measurements into a consistent score should provide advertisers with greater confidence in the impressions they purchase.

David Feman, SVP of Global Media and Transformation at B&H Photo, said combining multiple quality signals with inventory verification provides advertisers with a clearer way to evaluate podcasting and make investment decisions.

The Mission Media Quality Score is available now through the company's Content Hub.