At the moment, there are more than 850,000 different podcasts floating around on the Internet. Yes, we’re nearing the 1,000,000 podcasts mark sooner than expected.
Just a few short years ago, most people had no idea what a podcast even was. In 2014, only around 2% of Americans were active listeners. But things have changed drastically for the podcasting industry. You read that correctly – podcasting is now a real industry.
That means you need to take things seriously if you want your podcast to succeed. And today, you can’t succeed on the Internet without using content marketing.
Why Use Content Marketing?
The market is currently oversaturated with podcasts. You need to differentiate yourself as much as possible if you want to be noticed by a fraction of the general public. Podcasting is now going mainstream, so there are plenty of potential listeners out there.
The best way to grab the attention of your listeners is through content marketing. What’s that, you might be asking? It’s exactly what it sounds like, it’s a marketing approach focused on spreading awareness about your business through relevant, consistent, and valuable content.
Nearly all top companies invest in content marketing. Last year, 56% of marketers increased their content spending. A podcast is considered a piece of content, however, you need a lot more than a few episodes to make it big. Let’s see what other types of content you can create.
How to Pick What Content to Create?
News articles, opinion pieces, and online videos are all forms of content. They all have their ins and outs, however, not all of them work for every audience. Before you come up with a winning strategy, you need to find what type of content suits your audience the best.
1. Pick a Format That Goes With Your Niche
You need to find a format that will go well with your subject. For instance, if you’re a pop culture-oriented show, you should use video and target YouTube users, since that’s where they usually spend most of their time. News related shows should write news stories, so on and so forth.
2. See Which Types of Content Your Audience Consumes
Reaching your target audience is much easier when you know what type of content they like. People who listen to business-oriented podcasts spend much of their time on LinkedIn, for instance. Check communities like Reddit, Twitter, and Facebook Groups to find out where your audience hangs out.
3. Know What Your Strengths Are and Use Them
Finally, you should always play to your strengths. For example, if you have good writing abilities, then you should defiantly create written content. You’ve worked as a video editor before? Create short videos to promote your podcast. Pick a format that plays to your strengths perfectly.
Podcasting Content Marketing Tips
While the details of your content strategy are all up to you, there are certain universal tactics every podcaster can use. Here are a few things you should do to spread more awareness about your podcast and maximize your content strategy.
1. Leave Notes for Your Users
First things first, you should always write a blog post containing notes from your show for your listeners. Here’s a list of things every notes page should feature:
- An embedded player with the episode
- Link to the podcast-hosting website
- Cover all of the topics you went through
- Short descriptions in bullet point list form
- A list of guests you had on (if you had any)
- Have links to social profiles of people involved
- Links to the topics on your site you covered
- Additional links to content you referenced
Also, you should make sure that the text is properly optimized and that it contains the keywords your audience might be looking for. Read up on keyword optimization, because you’re going to need if you want to do content marketing properly.
2. Have an Email Subscription List
Email might not be the most modern form of communication, however, as a marketing tool, it still works. For starters, a ton of people still uses it every day. Almost 4 billion people around the globe use email to communicate with their friends, family members, and colleagues on a weekly basis.
When it comes to email marketing, return on investment (ROI) is massive. Research shows that for every dollar invested in email, you can expect a return of $42. And often you don’t need to invest any money at all – you need to invest your time.
Therefore, create an email list to inform your loyal listeners about new episodes. You can pick one day of the week, let’s say Friday, to send out information about your most recent upload. Also, it would be a good idea to include some of the information from the notes page, plus a link to read the full post.
3. Always Use Social Media
The last piece of advice we have is pretty predictable. However, we can’t stress enough just how important social media is to the podcast-listening audience. Most people listen to a podcast while they are doing something. Some listen to them on their way to work, others while cleaning the house, etc.
As it turns out, many people like to scroll through their timeline while they are listening. Studies have shown that almost 2/3 of podcast listeners check their social media profiles numerous times a day, especially while they’re listening to a new episode.
Use your social profiles to communicate with your audience. Create a sense of community there and nurture it. To get the attention of new listeners, consider including video content. Social media videos get 1,200% more likes and shares than posts featuring plain text.
Modern Marketing Doesn’t Work Without Great Content
Unfortunately, with so many podcasts out there, simply having good episodes won’t cut it. You need to put some effort into reaching new listeners if you truly want to succeed. Good content will help you reach the right people, grab their attention, and turn them into loyal listeners.
We hope you found our article helpful. Share your thoughts with us in the comment section below.
