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Best Practices For Publishers Starting Off With Podcast

Last updated on Sep 15, 2022

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Best Practices For Publishers Starting Off With Podcast

The audio medium is booming and has already surpassed the wave of videos. Clearly, it’s here to stay. The Podcast market was valued at USD 13,785 Million in 2021 and it is predicted to be worth USD 153,071 Million by 2030. A whopping 78 percent of the US population are aware of podcasts. Around 383.7-million people listen to podcasts globally. And about 80 percent of people listen to the full episode, whereas the average reader spends just 37 seconds reading a blog post! One of the main reasons why publishers are taking podcast marketing seriously.

Find your voice through podcasts

News podcasts might account for a smaller pool as compared to the rest, but when it comes to listenership, it outperforms all other categories. Not every publisher realizes the potential of podcasts. Even if they do, they have not ventured into it. Yet. So, before every publisher starts off with their own podcast, you need to build your empire and gain subscribers.

podcast marketing increase in number of listeners

Many news and media publishers are using podcasts to build brand awareness, build an audience and down the line encouraging donations from their subscribers. Getting startedis a lot easier than you think. Start off now, build a larger audience that tunes into your podcast. Here are the best practices you need to follow: 

Start Building Your Podcast Empire


1. Stick to a frequency and time

Set a frequency so that your audience knows when to expect a new episode. It is advised that you post at least one podcast a week. Tuesdays are considered a good day to publish, also taking into consideration that new music hits iTunes on that day, increasing your chance to be spotted. Stitcher says that the average listener stays tuned for 22 minutes.


2. Build an audience before launch

Create a buzz before you even come out with the first episode. Create a pre-launch plan, build curiosity and spur excitement. Publishers are at an advantage because you already have a massive following. Leverage the readers you already have and encourage them to participate in the promotion by asking quirky questions, running polls, and so on.

podcast marketing  building an audience social promotion by buffer


3. Don’t go overboard with the number of episodes

I know it is exciting times, you are starting something new and want to provide value to the listeners. But don’t jump the gun. Take baby steps, and don’t go live with more than 3-5 episodes in a go, this strips you off from implementing the feedback you will receive.


4. Distribute across different platforms

Apple has been in the arena for a long time and now other tech companies are offering a platform to host podcasts. Google has made podcasts visible on search results and has come up with Google Podcasts for Android devices. Spotify has come up on the radar and continues to invest heavily in original content. It has gained popularity and has even exceeded Apple Podcasts. Hosting your podcast on different platforms helps reach your audience on the platform of their choice.
podcast marketing distributing across platforms


5. Publish Transcripts and Shownotes 

Every time a new format is introduced, it opens up the possibility of repurposeing it. Publish the transcript and a post on the blog, optimize it and distribute it. Creating audio assets on your website also gives you an opportunity to upgrade old content as well.

podcast marketing  example of podcast transcript

6. Take feedback

Make sure you ask for feedback at the end of the episode. Share how your audience can reach you and how they can help improve their experience. This goes a long way. Once you receive feedback, implement changes from your next episode..

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21 Badass Marketing Podcasts You Need To Tune In To
Right Now!

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7. Pump up some SEO juice by adding episodes to YouTube

I know what you are thinking. Audio content on Youtube? Doesn’t make sense. Forrester’s study says “pages with video are 53x more likely to rank on the first page of Google search results.” With podcasts, there is no video, but you can put the audio on YouTube so that people who search for related keywords are presented with your content. Buffer does a great job at this. 

podcast marketing add episodes on youtube

8. Interview guests and leverage their network

Bring in domain experts, authors, influencers as guest speakers. This will not only increase interest among the listeners but also gives you access to their audience.


9. Teasers For Your Social Feed

Feed the social media what they like the most. Teasers, short clips, snippets - whatever is needed to get the hype going. Create short clips from the podcast episode by picking by the meaty stuff and promote it on all your socials. You can also pick up important points shared, or quotes from the episode, create an image out of it and share it with your social audience as well. Make use of the right hashtags as well. We use Headline for this and it works really well.

10. Plan for the iTunes launch

Once you launch your podcast on iTunes, you have got 8 weeks to get to the New and Noteworthy category. Dave Rogenmoser, CEO & founder of the growth marketing podcast Scale or Die, disclosed in one of the podcasts that they had 220 reviews the very first day. They reached out to EVERYONE they knew and asked them to drop a review and that worked for them! Though how to crack the Noteworthy section is not public knowledge, a lot of markets claim that it depends on

  • Downloads/listens within the last 24 hours
  • Subscribers (something that is not exactly possible to track)
  • Ratings & Reviews

11. Double down on rating and reviews

Gather ratings by asking listeners to rate you at the end of the episode. Encourage more downloads and get people to promote and mention you on their socials. Most of the time it's word of mouth that works the best. Focus on reviews and remind listeners to like the episode and share it with their friends.


12. Get yourself on other podcasts

Go as a guest on other podcasts. Take this opportunity to share your insights and in the end also talk about your podcast. Talk about a popular episode, familiarize your podcast with the listeners. Here is something that some brands are trying out on Twitter-

podcast marketing podcast promotion on twitter

13. Cross-promote different podcasts

Reach out to fellow creators that have similar target audiences and cross-promote. You can add relevant snippets from them in your podcast and they can do the same. For better results, try with podcasts who have just started off or out with some episodes.


14. Go Live and voice your view

If Podcasts are recorded albums, Twitter Spaces and Clubhouse are the live concert equivalent. You can host Twitter Spaces with prominent speakers on a topic for your followers. Going live will also allow you to tap into followers of such speakers, helping you grow your audience.  


15. Create a dedicated landing page and optimize it for search

Create different pages for each episode. The topic the guest has spoken about would have keywords that you can rank for. Make sure that your page is optimized for SEO so that you get more people searching for those keywords on your page and increase the chance to get more subscribers. Publish exhaustive show notes with timestamps like these

podcast marketing timestamps for a podcast

16. Add links to your email signature

You send many emails on a daily basis. Take that opportunity to promote your recent episode that went live. You could even promote the page where you have listed down all your podcasts.


17. Send out a newsletter

As a publisher, you might already have a fat list of loyal subscribers who have given you permission to send the occasional email. Share quotes, snippets from the episode and share them with your subscribers. Let them know the meaty stuff that was covered and ask them to tune in for the insights.


18. Put some cash on display ads to create a hype

If you have an episode you are proud of, promote that with the titbits that were shared by the guest. Helps you take off your podcast series and get new eyeballs. Though platforms like Clubhouse don’t offer any form of advertising model as of now, many have predicted it would.


19. Get some influencer to market you 

This is not as easy as it sounds, but getting yourself an influencer to talk about your podcast can do wonders. You basically tap onto their huge audience base, and because the influencer has mentioned you, there would be people who will tune in and for all you know, become your loyal subscriber. You can also get yourself a brand ambassador to really strike through.


20. Giveaways and contests

To build some hype you could hold a contest and give them goodies. This would attract a lot of attention and buzz. You can promote this widely as well, making people curious about the podcast series and encourage them to give the episodes a listen.

podcast marketing contests for promotion

21. Word of mouth

This is one of the best ways of getting your podcast promoted. Once users are impressed by what they listened to, they will tell their peers, friends, and family to give it a hearing. And then it spreads like wildfire. And all of this, without you putting in effort for promotion.

Wait, but how do you know if your distribution is working?

Podcasts metrics are mostly around downloads and you do get a count of the average listen time, which makes it difficult for creators to track who’s listening to your content. We recently had a podcast with Rob Walch for Libsyn and he stressed these 3 KPIs that a publisher should track- 

1. Core Audience 

This might appear textbook 101,  but here’s what you definitely have access to - 

  • How many users downloaded your content 
  • How a specific episode has been downloaded over a period of time - especially within 30 days of release?

Which platform is driving most downloads? Check this episode versus one, five episodes back and check it is going up, down, or staying flat. You don't need the absolute number. Depending on what your podcast is about, 500 listeners may be really successful.

podcast marketing downloads per episode

2. Percentage of aggregator apps versus browsers

Aggregator apps are a more important audience than browser audiences. If you want a heavy marketing push, you should expect some browser numbers to go up, but after you do the marketing push, check if the aggregator numbers go up. Check if listeners like it? Did they stick around?

3. Check the result

When people download the podcast it is safe to assume that they have the intent to listen.

One can go into Apple Podcasts and look at the trends and see what percentage are listening, how far though, and you see where they're dropping in and out. You can see that on Spotify and Google podcasts as well. Those are three places to check first.

When you look at where people are dropping off, don't look at the number that is listening in those services, since it isn’t accurate. They don't report everything, but it does tell you when people listen all the way through and where they drop out. Once people have gone through the episode, check if they like it? Did they stick around? Does your audience find your content compelling?

Good to know

Recently I bumped into an article that spoke about different ways businesses can engage social audios. Here are some points that stood out-

Conduct a network analysis

Look at your connections and network maps to fish out influencers, followers, and the different patterns they interact with. Note down the topics they are interested in and go from there.

Analyze conversations 

Review transcripts, timestamps and predict the next big thing. See what everyone is talking about. How can you contribute to the conversation, what new things can you bring to the table?

Start with focus groups

This is one of the best ways to quickly get insights into what users actually look forward to when it comes to the audio medium. They could even validate the questions that you have planned to ask in the podcast. You could even go ahead and craft questions that users are really looking to hear answers to.

Get episodes translated

If you have an audience across the globe, you might want to take this into consideration. Your content is valuable and you do not want your audience to miss out on it. Have an inclusive plan and make sure you are available in regional languages.

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Listen to Rob speak on Why Podcasting Leads All The Audience Engagement Channels So Far

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Pravya Pravin
Pravya Pravin
Pravya Pravin is a Product Marketer at iZooto. An artist who paints not only with words, but also on canvas. She loves exploring places less traveled and wishes to go on a bike trip to the highest motorable road.

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