BAYSIDE, CALIFORNIA, April 8, 2026 – StreamGuys has joined forces with American Public Media (APM) in developing a private underwriting and sponsorship marketplace purpose-built for public media, providing local radio stations with a national sales network to drive digital underwriting revenue. The network currently includes over 30 public media organizations, representing more than 55 million monthly impressions reaching over 6 million unique listeners across podcast and livestream inventory.
Announced this week, Inform Media Network:
- Helps local public radio broadcasters fill unsold digital inventory with compliant, public radio-quality underwriting through APM’s centralized national sales reach, providing a coordinated, seller-led approach to the market
- Provides deep audience insights to stations that join the network, supporting the local sales process
- Allows public radio stations a mechanism to sell local underwriting to their market’s listeners of APM’s widely heard national podcasts, including podcasts from Marketplace, This Old House Radio Hour and The Slowdown
Stations can participate regardless of size or prior network experience, with onboarding and technical support provided to minimize operational lift. StreamGuys will manage the network’s technical infrastructure and deliver onboarding services and payment processing for publishers, while full-funnel measurement from listening to conversion is powered by the comprehensive intelligence platform Magellan AI—all provided to stations at no cost.
An Audio Network Developed for Station Needs
As the largest station-based public radio organization in the country, American Public Media developed Inform Media Network based on first-hand knowledge of the challenges of maximizing underwriting revenue for both local and national organizations. Inform Media Network offers a solution to these challenges—to the benefit of the larger public radio ecosystem. The network is designed to simplify participation for stations while presenting advertisers with a single trusted point of entry into public media digital audio.
With dozens of stations already participating, Inform Media Network is quickly establishing itself as a coordinated national approach to public media digital audio underwriting.
“We’re a national organization that operates local stations so we know that for a station like Minnesota Public Radio (MPR), the impressions represented by the listeners who live outside the broadcast market aren’t particularly applicable to local sponsors,” said Justin Hach, Director Digital Sales Operations and Products at MPR | APM. “But those out-of-state or out-of-market listeners are a fantastic potential audience for national advertisers—they become quite valuable if we can connect those audiences across the entire public radio system. And that’s exactly what we’re doing with Inform Media Network.”
Quality Creative to Suit Public Media
Enterprising local radio stations have often relied on programmatic ad networks to find national underwriting revenue, but those present their own challenges, including concerns about the sponsor messages themselves.
“Programmatic ad networks sometimes come with creative that’s less suited to public radio audiences, but this is not an automated, algorithm-driven programmatic ad network,” said Tyler Huggins, Director of Advertising at StreamGuys. “Inform Media Network underwriting will be FCC compliant and sound just like local underwriting sold by public radio stations.”
Those creative guardrails made all the difference for WHYY, an early adopter of Inform Media Network. “We’d tried other ad-networks. Even with category blocking, the creative didn’t resonate with our audience. Inform Media Network’s creative guidelines will match our current on-air sound,” said Nancy Stuski, WHYY Senior Vice President, Institutional Advancement.
Additional Digital Inventory for Local Sales Teams
Inform Media Network will also give local stations the opportunity to sell APM’s popular national podcasts in their local region. This podcast content brings additional impressions — and additional value — to public radio stations seeking to boost digital revenue beyond their own podcast libraries.
“We know the opportunities and challenges in a local underwriting market,” Hach said. “Now, network partners can sell their local sponsors not just on their own content, but also with the added value of local folks listening to Marketplace on their digital devices. It’s a collaboration that really lifts all boats.”
Low Lift for Stations to Participate
Inform Media Network was built to give public radio stations a clear, coordinated way to participate in the digital audio marketplace at scale,” said Thomas De Napoli, Vice President, Head of Sales and Underwriting, American Public Media. “By combining trusted public media environments with a centralized national sales approach and proven technological infrastructure, we’re making it easier for stations to extend the value of the work they’re already doing—without adding complexity or compromising standards.”
StreamGuys played an integral role in the development of the initial concept, leveraging its experience in the programmatic advertising business and the public media space. “Making the process easy was always important to APM and StreamGuys,” said Tyler Huggins, Director of Advertising, StreamGuys. “For most of our customers, they just need to say ‘Yes.’”
Join Dozens of Stations That Have Already Signed On
33 public radio organizations representing an array of programming formats—including news-talk, AAA, classical music and jazz—have already joined the network, including KBEM, American Public Media, WSHU, KVCR, LAist, KQED, KERA, WHYY, Minnesota Public Radio, KALW, Baltimore Public Media, WBUR, WOSU, Cincinnati Public Radio, KSMU, West Virginia Public Radio, WVIK, Alaska Public Media, KAZU, WKAR, WLRN, WBEZ, KUER, WETA, Houston Public, WGBH, KEXP, and more.
To learn more and join Inform Media Network, visit https://www.americanpublicmedia.org/inform-media-network-stations.