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(By Scott Carson) This past weekend I spent three days with twenty podcasters doing an amazing job promoting and monetizing their podcasts through different marketing tactics that set their shows apart from the competition while helping them to market or monetize their efforts. It was difficult to identify the best three solutions that were offered up, but I think that you’ll find these solutions simple enough to implement.
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Start a Newsletter. This might seem old fashioned, but Joe Fier and Matt Wolfe from The Hustle & Flowchart Podcast are doing this exact thing with their podcast subscribers. Their monthly newsletter provides their listener base an opportunity to grab the Cliff Notes version of their episodes for the month (eight), while providing an opportunity for their sponsors and affiliates to advertise directly to their eager and dedicated listener base. They have a dedicated assistant who listens to each episode and provides a list of all the strategies, tactics, resources, tips, and behind-the-scenes info from their business. Each month includes ideas from them as well as tactics from their guests. They physically send out a hard copy each month to their monthly subscribers and at $15 a month, it turned into an easy way to monetize while increasing the value add to their show.
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Become Nationally Syndicated. This tip might be easier than what you expect. Jim Beach from The School for Startups Radio is on a mission to help podcasters grow their audience by turning the term “nationally syndicated” into the next “Amazon best-seller” by helping podcasters add their shows to different radio stations across the country. Jim shares that many AM or FM radio stations are looking for content to fill the airwaves at very cheap pricing (depending on the station) at different times of the day. And by adding a radio to your distribution model you are bound to find new listeners to your show and content that might not know how to download your podcast. With only 26% of Americans listening to podcasts monthly, but with 93% listening to radio, you are bound to increase your audience by adding the extra distribution network. We’ve seen radio and television personalities adding a podcast to their marketing channels, so it makes sense to reverse the trend. It can also make for a great way to attract new sponsors to your show that might be more likely to advertise or sponsor your radio show versus a podcast.
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Taking Care of The Simple Things. With so many new podcasters launching their new shows on their own, its lead to many podcasters trying to do the bare minimum to get by. Tracy Hazzard from the Feed Your Brand Podcast shared some of the most common things that she sees new podcasters making that is affecting their discoverability. The first being that iTunes gives you 4,000 characters to describe your podcast and that most podcasters aren’t taking advantage of this real estate to help potentially listeners find their shows. Adding in specific key words or searchable terms to your description can help you get organically boosted in the searchability of your podcast. Having inferior podcast artwork with your face plastered all over it is another mistake. You want to maximize that one square inch of space that most people are looking at on their phone by having your show title and artwork make it easy for new listeners to select and download. You can add your headshot to your artwork once you’ve become a big name. Otherwise, leave it off your show art.
Over the next few weeks I’ll be interviewing more of these podcast and marketing experts. I will be sharing what helps to make their marketing and podcasts truly binge-able.
Scott Carson is the host of the Note Closers Show Podcast. He can be reached at scott@weclosenotes.com