Africa Podcast Network Becomes the First Podcast Network in Africa to Launch Affinity Audiences with NumberEight
by on 23rd Jul 2026 in News
Africa Podcast Network (APN), Africa's largest podcast network, reaching more than 60 million monthly listens and views through 40+ leading African creators across 54 countries, today (23rd July, 2026) announced a strategic partnership with NumberEight, the leading ID-less audience intelligence company, to become the first podcast network in Africa to launch Affinity Audiences for podcast advertising.
The partnership marks an important milestone for podcast advertising across Africa, giving advertisers a smarter way to activate relevant podcast audiences at scale while helping unlock new commercial opportunities for creators across one of the world's fastest-growing audio markets.
Africa's podcast industry is entering a new phase of growth. Smartphone adoption, mobile connectivity, and on-demand audio consumption continue to accelerate across the continent, while a new generation of creators is building highly engaged communities around local stories and culture. As one of the world's fastest-growing emerging media markets, Africa has the opportunity to become a global leader in podcast innovation. That requires giving advertisers and publishers access to the same sophisticated audience capabilities available in more established markets. This partnership is built on the belief that the best technology shouldn't be reserved for the world's largest advertising economies. By bringing advanced audience intelligence to Africa Podcast Network, we're helping unlock investment while empowering African creators and publishers to shape the future of podcast advertising.
This partnership helps change that. By bringing NumberEight's audience intelligence to Africa Podcast Network, advertisers can now activate scalable audience segments built from contextual content signals and demographic modelling, enabling more relevant audience targeting without relying on personal identifiers.
The opportunity reflects broader trends highlighted in the Global Podcast Advertising Compass 2025, an industry research report examining podcast advertising, audience behaviour, and brand suitability across global markets. The report found that contextual targeting still accounts for the overwhelming majority of podcast campaigns, highlighting the growing opportunity for audience intelligence to complement contextual planning with richer, more scalable audience activation.
Advertisers will have access to more than 100 ready-made affinity audiences, including business and finance leaders, small business decision makers, retail spenders, music lovers, and football fans, alongside podcast lookalikes built from leading African podcast titles. Rather than planning campaigns around individual podcasts alone, brands can now identify and activate relevant audiences across APN's growing network, increasing both campaign scale and effectiveness.
Leigh Carter, head of sales at Africa Podcast Network, said: "Podcasting has become one of the fastest-growing media channels across Africa, but advertisers have lacked the audience capabilities needed to invest confidently at scale. Partnering with NumberEight allows us to offer a smarter way to connect brands with listeners while creating new commercial opportunities for creators across our network."
Abhishek Sen, CEO and co-Founder of NumberEight, added: "We're excited to enter the African market alongside Africa Podcast Network and AdsWizz. Africa represents one of the most exciting opportunities for podcast advertising, and APN's deep local expertise puts them in a unique position to lead the market with an innovative commercial proposition. Together, we're bringing privacy-first audience intelligence to help advertisers confidently invest in podcasting while creating new monetisation opportunities for creators. We believe Africa has the opportunity to leapfrog more mature markets and set the best practices in audience-driven podcast advertising."
Patrick Roger, VP new markets at AdsWizz, said: "Podcast advertising continues to evolve as advertisers look for more sophisticated ways to reach audiences. Bringing advanced audience capabilities to Africa Podcast Network is an important milestone for the African podcast ecosystem and demonstrates how collaboration across the industry can help unlock new opportunities for publishers, creators and brands alike."
As podcast advertising continues to mature across Africa, the partnership between Africa Podcast Network and NumberEight provides brands with a new way to plan campaigns around audiences rather than individual shows. By combining APN's growing creator network with scalable audience intelligence, the partnership helps unlock the next chapter of podcast advertising across the continent, creating more opportunities for advertisers to invest and for African creators to grow.
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