Those of you who are familiar with Pandora, the interactive radio service, will not be surprised to read that they are growing in popularity. Naturally, as listenership increases so does advertising and the effectiveness of those ads. Today Pandora confirmed that over 400 local marketing campaigns have been secured on the platform.

Chief Revenue Officer at Pandora, John Trimble comments on the growth in advertising popularity:

“Our cutting-edge advertising solutions are rapidly becoming a top choice among local marketers eager to combine the power of targeting with digital, mobile, audio and video advertising solutions to get their campaigns seen and heard by exactly the right group of people. Not only do we have more than 400 local advertising campaigns kicking off in the first quarter, but we’re seeing more and more local advertisers recognizing that Pandora has innovative solutions, leadership, expertise, and an audience of more than 125 million registered users.”

Here are some examples of local advertising Pandora provides:

* Planet Honda in New Jersey: One of the largest Honda dealerships in the nation, Planet Honda, was looking to increase inbound leads to help generate sales and decided to run a campaign on Pandora to attract more clientele. For three months, the New Jersey dealership ran audio ads, targeting adults ages 22 and up in specific New Jersey counties. The results of the campaign, according to Planet Honda President William Feinstein, exceeded expectations saying, “In today’s changing media market it is really hard to determine where to invest your marketing dollars. Pandora provides the best of both worlds – the reach and top of mind awareness of traditional media with the metrics and accountability we expect from digital media. Pandora has an incredibly strong and loyal customer base that responds well to advertisers and is constantly growing. From driving traffic to our website to brand recognition, Pandora has become a major media partner for Planet Honda.”

* Wayne State University in Detroit: In an effort to provide information on admissions to their target audience with no wasted impressions, Wayne State University leveraged Pandora to connect with their target audience of teens ages 13-17 and young adults ages 18-24 in the Detroit, Grand Rapids, and Toledo regions. The campaign, which is currently running, consists of rich media creative and audio ads, and is helping the university attract new students.

Here are the metric Pandora released for the past month of March. They reached a new milestone with listenership:

* Listener hours for Pandora during the month of March 2012 crossed the 1 billion mark, an increase of 88% from 567 million during the same time period last year.

* Share of total U.S. radio listening for Pandora in March 2012 was 5.79%, an increase from 3.04% at the same time last year.

* Active listeners reached 51 million at the end of March 2012, an increase of 59% from 32 million during the same time period last year.

As the advertising continues to increase and reach more and more local markets we can expect to see innovation in the way they do business. Hopefully this will mean good things for their faithful listeners. We can look forward to regular updates from Pandora.