John Tesh Launches TeshMedia Engage For 55+ Consumers.

John Tesh is expanding his advertising offering with a new program designed to give brands a closer look at what consumers 55 and older are asking about before they buy.

TeshMedia Engage uses responses from Tesh’s radio, email and social audiences to connect advertisers with consumer concerns around health, sleep, hearing, brain health, balance and fraud.

The program draws on the audience for “Intelligence for Your Life,” which reaches 24 million monthly listeners on 250 radio stations, along with 1.6 million monthly organic Facebook views and 29,000 fans who open Tesh emails each day. According to TeshMedia, the audience does more than consume content, regularly answering questions, taking assessments and responding directly to Tesh.

The company says the audience also represents significant consumer spending power. Households headed by someone 50 or older spent $10.7 trillion in 2024, accounting for more than half of U.S. consumer spending, according to AARP. Americans 50 and older also spent $2.7 trillion on health care that year.

Sleep is one of the most prominent topics among Tesh’s audience. The company says one in three people who write back to Tesh discuss sleep, while 82% of those who completed his sleep assessment say they wake during the night most nights. Ninety-five percent are 55 or older, and nearly half say their bedrooms are lacking in one or more of the areas of being cool, dark or quiet.

Other audience responses point to interest across several health and safety categories. Nearly four in 10 people who write back have discussed memory and brain health, while one in four have written about balance and falls. One in four have also written about hearing, and 95% of those who completed Tesh’s hearing assessment say they’re ready for a hearing test.

The audience also regularly forwards scam texts and calls it receives, giving fraud-protection brands a look at the types of threats consumers are encountering.

“With TeshMedia Engage, our key brands not only receive the same daily brand awareness we’ve offered for 25 years on the radio, but now we are able to show them the answers: who responded, and about what,” Tesh said. “When 4,200 people on my sleep score app tell me they wake up in the middle of the night, I can place a sleep brand in the middle of that conversation and even provide an endorsement.”

TeshMedia Engage combines consumer interaction with advertising and can include Tesh’s personal endorsement or product demonstration, sponsored email and social content, sponsorship of an assessment or sponsorship of an audio series.

Before committing to the program, category partners receive response counts for their respective categories. Following a campaign, advertisers receive reporting on views, email clicks, assessment sign-ups and audio plays, with purchase tracking also available. TeshMedia says it will work with one partner per product category.

The company is also offering local businesses access to the audience through Tesh Trusted Local, a market-by-market program available through “Intelligence for Your Life” radio affiliates.

Tesh has spent 25 years interviewing physicians and researchers for “Intelligence for Your Life.” A six-time Emmy winner and Radio and Music Hall of Famer, he has also received the National Association of Broadcasters’ Lifetime Achievement Award and an Associated Press award for investigative journalism. His career includes hosting the 1992 and 1996 Olympic Games for NBC Sports and a music career that includes four gold albums and the composition of the NBA anthem “Roundball Rock.”

TeshMedia produces the “Intelligence for Your Life” audio franchise, hosted by Tesh and Gib Gerard, as well as “Intelligence for Your Health,” hosted by Connie Sellecca. The company says its programming has delivered research-backed guidance across radio, email and social media for 25 years.