Podcasts used to be the odd ball in a digital maketing expert’s arsenal of tricks. But not anymore.
These short audio episodes that air on podcast hosting platforms like Spotify and iTunes were once created mainly for their educational and entertainment value. In recent years, however, they have become a crucial marketing strategy, particularly for targeting audiences that just never seem to stick around.
If you have a marketing strategy in place yet are noticing that your numbers have steep rises and falls, it may be an indication that you’re failing at keeping your audiences captivated. Follow-throughs are crucial if you want to keep figures up–traffic, leads, and conversion, among many others.
That’s where podcasting can be a game changer for your business.
Why Your Business Needs a Podcast
Whether you have a big brand or a small business, podcasts are great at driving business growth by expanding organic reach, improving brand visibility, and nurturing an existing audience.
Here are top benefits of podcasts to your marketing strategy:
1. Builds credibility in your industry
Podcasts began as an avenue for people to share their opinions and interests. Today, more and more experts are using podcasts to publish educational content that helps people gain new knowledge and insights.
While short video snippets may be a fun source of bite-sized information, podcasts are here for audiences that are interested in not only surface-level information but digging deep and gaining a better grasp of complex topics.
What this means for businesses is that podcasts can also be a great avenue through which to share their expertise and establish themselves as an authority in their industry.
What’s great about that is that since podcast listeners tune into episodes that they are deeply interested in, businesses are reaching audiences that are also ready to interact with their brand and are more likely to want to know more about what they can offer.
Basically, it’s hitting two birds with one stone.
The more episodes you publish, the better your chances of building your credibility, and the more opportunities you have for gaining hot leads.
The only thing that’s arguably even better than that is that unless you’re spending on paid podcast advertising, podcasts can also expand your organic reach at zero cost.
2. Connects with your market on their time
Nothing beats segmented, personalized marketing techniques. And one of the ways you can have one-on-one sessions with your customer base is through educational podcast episodes.
You may not be physically present with your audience for a one-on-one consultation, but you can still have personal, informative, and comprehensive learning sessions with them by publishing podcasts.
This way, you can effectively connect with your audiences on their time, making it an effective strategy for a market that’s perpetually busy and on-the-go.
Your listeners may be driving to work, picking up their child from school, or tackling chores at home–all while tuned into your podcasts. It’s a win-win situation.
3. Ads perform better on podcasts
Because podcast listeners are usually captive audiences, which means they’re busy doing something else while listening to an episode, they are less likely to skip ads that you incorporate into your shows.
Case in point, a study by Edison Research found that 56% of listeners buy a product after hearing about it on a podcast ad.
Moreover, listeners are less likely to perceive podcast ads as irrelevant. They also view their trusted podcaster’s opinions about a brand or product as useful information.
If you have a problem with ads being skipped all the time, you might want to collaborate with a podcaster or expert with niche credibility and have them talk about their unbiased opinion about your brand.
4. Repurposes content and expands reach
Podcasts are also useful in repurposing content into many different forms that can be used to expand organic reach across different channels.
For instance, podcasts can be repurposed into social media snippets, videos, and blog posts. This means one podcast episode can fill up your content schedule–as long as you know how to make it work.
However, repurposing an episode does take time and involves a deep understanding of marketing channels to determine how to format content to generate the most results. So if you don’t have the time or the expertise, you can collaborate with experts at digital marketing services who can do the heavy lifting for you.
5. Nurtures long-term relationships with customers
Remember those chunks of audience that just keep slipping through the cracks of your marketing strategy? You can capture those with a podcast.
Podcasts are effective at nurturing long-term relationships with customers and audiences because it continues to provide value to people who are interested in a specific niche.
Coupled with other marketing techniques, like email marketing, podcasts can help you keep audiences hooked.
Tap Into Existing Podcasts Instead of Building Your Own
Don’t have the time (or the budget) to create a podcast from scratch? You don’t have to!
Tapping into existing podcasts is a great shortcut for those who want the results minus the hundreds of manpower hours it can take to start a brand new one. This also works exceptionally great for advocacy-focused campaigns where you can simply sponsor episodes as needed.
A great example of this is a podcast called Journey with Julienne, with an episode where the host emphasizes that overall wellness begins with physical health.
This episode was produced to boost awareness on diabetes in the Philippines – particularly shedding light on the disease now affecting more younger people and how getting diagnosed with the disease impacts mental health.
Being on a key podcast channel that had themed, long-form episodes and collaborating with a medical expert, the episode effectively covered the disease in a way that was both engaging and compelling.
As a result, the episode garnered a 46% average retention rate, which shows that it resonated with its target audience. But its true impact can be seen outside the numbers. It’s rousing 30-somethings and younger to take a closer look at their health and reach out to a doctor for mental and physical health issues.
How to Create and Promote a Podcast
Starting a podcast doesn’t have to cause a huge dent on your marketing budget. In fact, all you need is a brilliant idea and a microphone. As long as you have something important to share, you’re good.
If you don’t have the time to take care of the nitty-gritty of podcast publishing, you can simply outsource it. All you need to do is share what you know in a compelling, engaging way.
Define Your Podcast’s Intent
The first thing you need to take care of when creating a podcast is defining what your podcast will be centered around.
Establishing a focus will help you define topics more efficiently as well as allow audiences to find your episodes easier.
Create Several Episodes Before Launching
Once you’ve decided on your podcast’s focus, you can proceed to recording.
Make sure to record at least three episodes, so you have the next couple of episodes in line for publishing shortly after your launch.
This will also allow you to create engaging previews that will let audiences know what to look forward to.
Make Your Episodes Shareable
Make it easy for your audience to share your episodes to expand your reach. You can do this by:
- Tweeting quotes from the episode
- Sharing video snippets on social media
- Use click-worthy titles and thumbnails
You can also watch out for podcasting trends that dictate what audiences are most likely to pay attention to. Today, there is a huge focus on niching down or putting out content that’s deeply niche-specific.
Monetize Your Podcasts
Podcasts can also be another source of income.
One of the easiest ways to monetize your podcast is to set up paid subscriptions, where listeners can access the full version of episodes when they pay a fee. You can also monetize by doing sponsorships or incorporating automated ads.
The oft-unspoken technique when it comes to monetizing any type of content, however, is still putting out great content.
Making sure your episodes add value to your audience, use compelling storytelling, and are relevant despite changing trends is a sure-fire strategy that will keep people listening–and willing to pay to tune in.