3 Things To Master Before Promoting Your Podcast

After 16 years, the amount of misinformation - some intentional, some misguided - around podcast promotion continues to grow. Before you spend any money or effort promoting your podcast, make sure your house is in order.

April 21, 2020

Article

I turn down podcast promotion work a few times a month. Yes, my firm does help our clients to promote their shows. And yes, my background is in running advertising and marketing agencies, so it’s clearly work we’re skilled in.

Yet still, every time someone requests a proposal to help promote and or market their podcast, I always politely decline.

I turn down those jobs because I know the only predictable way to make a podcast successful is to nail the basics first. I know that spending money on promotion before the basics are in place is a waste of money. And I don’t like wasting anyone’s money.

But you’ll notice I said, “politely decline”. That’s because along with my “no, thanks” message, I always tell them my firm’s approach to podcast promotion. Because it’s not a secret. It’s just often overlooked, probably because it’s not an easy answer. And you know how much I like not-easy-answers.

Before you spend any marketing/advertising/promotional dollars on your show, you have to get these three things nailed down. Ready?

Thing One: Foundational Fundamentals

There are actually four parts of Thing One, and they are equally important. No corner-cutting:

1. A web presence for your podcast.

I mean a real and functioning website for your podcast. I do not mean an automatically generated website that is powered by your podcast’s RSS feed. Your RSS feed is designed to distribute episodes of your podcast to directories and apps. It is not designed to propagate a website.

Yes, there are some very nice looking services that will give you a very pretty website using your podcasts RSS feed and a little bit of new information from you.

They don't work.

At least they don't work as well as having a dedicated website. They will not get you the “juice” you need. The RSS feed for your show just doesn’t contain the right content for a website. Not a website that actually helps with discovery. And for all of the attention given to hacks and tricks to get a podcast into some special location on various podcast apps, search engines remain the best place for discovery. Yes, even for podcasts. And that still requires a website. (I’m working on a case study with this show as the subject that I hope to share next month).

When you’re building that website, make sure it's optimized for conversion. No, strike that. Make sure people can actually listen to your podcast on that website! I’m constantly amazed at and dismayed by the number of websites for podcasts that make it so, so hard to listen. For many, it’s difficult to understand the website has a podcast component at all.

Why drive traffic to a site that is designed to not let people listen?

2. Complete distribution of your podcast

The right way to use your podcast’s RSS feed is to send out your episode to various apps and directories. Yes, that means Apple Podcasts. It also means Spotify and Google Podcasts. But it also means a dozen or so other directories and apps that maintain their own list of podcasts. You don’t get to control where people find your show. You don’t get to control what apps they use to listen. All you can control is ensuring that your show is everywhere someone might find it and on every app they might use to listen.

This is exceedingly easy. It’s largely a one-time effort because once you’ve submitted your RSS feed, you never have to update it. That’s what your RSS feed does! Every few months, I suggest you check to see if any new directories have popped up (which happens) and submit your feed there as well. Again, it’s exceedingly easy.

But it gets skipped, which is why far too many shows in Apple Podcasts aren’t also available in Spotify, Spreaker, or other locations that matter to someone. Don’t make that mistake.

3. Don’t forget listenability!

Quality matters. So before you throw money at getting people to sample your audio, make sure the sound quality doesn’t drive them away. No, “good enough” probably isn’t. Not when you’re talking about investing ad dollars. Listenable audio files are table stakes, and I’m a little ticked that I have to keep saying that.

4. Rinse & repeat

So everything thus far requires some effort. Perhaps more effort than you thought. Perhaps more effort than you can commit to on a regular basis.

Tough.

You have to be able to repeat your processes with every episode. You have to be able to do that and meet your self-imposed release schedule. And if you can’t, then you need to make an adjustment.

Thing Two: Remarkable Content

“Advertising is a tax paid by the unremarkable.” Everything I just said above is moot if the contents of your episodes aren’t remarkable. You can have the best-looking and most-optimized website in the world distributing pristine audio files to every single platform on tight schedule… and still fall flat if the content is “meh”.

Make remarkable content. Make the kind of content that makes people say, “Wow! I had no idea I could get this information in a podcast!” Because if you’re just another voice putting out the same content as a bunch of other people… why should anyone choose your content? More to the point, why should they tell anyone else about your average-at-best show?

Thing Three: Leverage Your Network

Before you try to bring in people from the outside (ala advertising), you have to start at home. Notice I didn’t say leverage “a” network. I said leverage “your” network.

There’s a good chance you’re saying “But Evo… I don’t have a network!” when you read that. You probably do. You’re just not thinking about it as a network. Or it may not yet be fully-formed.

I’m not talking about your bridge club. Nor am I talking about your friends and family. But unless you’re really a social recluse, you probably engage with other humans somewhere. Maybe an online group? Maybe a local community? Maybe you’re only peripherally involved in one of these? Maybe it’s time to get more active?

In the unlikely event that you honestly have no network: start building one! No, not with other podcasters. I mean start building a network that relates to the contents of your podcast. Are there opportunities for you to write for publications in your area of interest? Can you start small by crafting a newsletter that’s relevant and meaningful? Once we can go to events again, start looking for opportunities to speak or facilitate conversations. Networks come in all shapes and sizes. Start building yours now.

And if you can't build your network, then you borrow one. No, don't pay to access one. At least not yet. But you borrow someone else's network when you ask them to be a part of your show. You can (and should) also become a part of someone else’s show.

No, There Isn’t A Better Way To Promote Your Podcast

You have to do all three of those things before you spend a dime marketing your podcast. But here's the cool thing: If you do all three of these things really well, you probably won't need to spend any money advertising or promoting your podcast.

You may still want to spend money to grow your show even more, and that’s fine. Especially if you can draw a straight line from more listeners to more income.

But don’t do that before you have all three of these things nailed down.

Things To Do During Lockdown

I know you’re probably busy with things, but if you could spare a minute or two telling me about your experiences as podcast living through the novel coronavirus pandemic, I’d love to feature you on Thursday’s episode of the show. Put a minute or so worth of audio on Dropbox and then send the link to evo@podcastlaunch.pro, please?

And if you have one more minute for me, please use that minute to tell one friend about Podcast Pontifications. It really makes a difference when you personally reach out to someone and tell them why you think they should listen. It's great when you retweet me and you share my content on Facebook, of course. But nothing beats an individual outreach to one person.

I shall be back tomorrow with yet another Podcast Pontifications.

Cheers!

Transcript

PP298 3 Things To Master Before Promoting Your Podcast

Evo Terra: [00:00:00] After 16 years, the amount of misinformation, some intentional, some just misguided around podcast promotion continues to grow. Now, before you spend any money or effort promoting your podcast, make sure your house is in order.

[00:00:22] Hello and welcome to another podcast. Pontifications with me, Evo. Tara. Listen, I turn down work at least two or three times a month, at least two or three times a month. People, podcasters reaching out to me in one form or another and say, will you help me promote and or market my podcast? Happens all of the time.

[00:00:49] Well, as I said several times a month, and I always, always, always turn those jobs down. I turned those jobs down because I know flat out know that in order to make a podcast successful, you need to get some basic elements done first before you go start a big promotional effort. Promotional efforts are really good at giving you good numbers as far as engagement and as far as clicks and impressions and all that, but none of it actually often really results into what you want, which is more people listening to your show.

[00:01:31] So. I tell those people when I say no, I just don't say no. I always tell them, look, you need to do these three things. This is my approach to promoting and marketing podcast, and I only do this in conjunction with the other services that my firm offers, but I don't do it as a one off because before we do any sort of marketing dollars, we got to get these things nailed down first.

[00:01:55] Ready? Break out your pens and papers, go to the website. Where I listed these things out in detailed, this is one time you're going to want to look at the episode details, either in your app for some information or on the full webpage for another. There's a link inside of your app. Whatever you're using glistened to that should have a link to get more details.

[00:02:15] That's where you're going to want to go because this is dense stuff. Ready? Here we go. Number one, you got to have the foundational fundamentals nailed down. You gotta have these four things inside of these three things. Is it just, there's one thing, one, but there's four parts of the thing. One part, one of thing.

[00:02:40] One is a web presence, and that means a real website. That does not mean an automatically generated website. That comes straight from your RSS feed. Your RSS feed is designed to distribute your podcast episodes to directories and apps, not a website. Yeah. There's some very pretty ones. They look nice. They don't work.

[00:03:05] They don't do the things you need them to do. It's not enough information. You need a solid web presence. You need that so that you get discovery. You know that thing. We're always harping about podcasters. The best place for discovery, search based discovery is through search engines. Which requires a website.

[00:03:22] You really have to do it. Take it from me. I'll have a case study to share on this where I am the subject probably next month. All right, number two, out of that web presence, fundamentals is the other thing. It's good for his conversions. When somebody finds out about a show, you want to send him to a website so they can actually do something, but make sure it's optimized for conversions.

[00:03:44] You know how many websites I go to where I can't listen. Let alone subscribe. It's hard. Go look at your website. Is it easy for somebody once they've discovered you to actually become a listener? That's part one of thing. One part two distribution. You've got to make sure your distribution is nailed down.

[00:04:02] That means your RSS feed, that thing that's not powering your website, that's sending your show out to all the directories. Yes. Apple podcast. Yes. Google podcast. Yes. Spotify, but also about 15 other places where you should be able to submit your show. You want to make sure that your show is everywhere.

[00:04:19] People are listening, and I'm stunned. There aren't more shows in Spotify or Spreaker or some of the other apps that are out there. Make sure you're distributed everywhere. Part three if thing, one, listen, ability. This is back to foundational fundamentals again. Listen, inability is your show listenable.

[00:04:40] Does it encourage people to keep listening? It's all about the quality. Yes. It's all about the quality. Yes. Is it sound good? Is it worthy of them listening to it? Thing number four, part four of thing. Number one is make sure this is all repeatable process. Can you do this week after week or month after month or whatever your timeframe is?

[00:05:02] Can you do it? Can you keep going? Because if you can't. If you find that it takes a lot of work to build that website or money, it takes a lot of work to make shows that are actually listened to, well then that's going to be hard for you to keep going. Is it a repeatable process? That's one. One thing, foundational fundamentals thing too.

[00:05:22] You've got to make remarkable content. You have to make remarkable content. Advertising is a tax paid by the unremarkable. If the content you make, which you've already made sure it was listened to, will, if it's not something that is remarkable, if it's just a, that sounded good, but it didn't really do anything for me.

[00:05:44] It really wasn't a remarkable thing, and people aren't going to remark about it. Make remarkable content, make the kind of content that makes people say, wow, I had no idea this information was out there. That's what you're looking for, not just another voice thing. Number three, leverage your network before you go outside of your network to try and bring people in.

[00:06:11] You've got to talk to the people who you already talked to. Leverage your network. Once you've got the foundational fundamentals done, once you've got remarkable content done, leverage your network. What if you don't have a network, you say to me, you probably do. You probably have a network. You're just not thinking about that network.

[00:06:35] Where do you engage with people who are not your friends and family? Just regular engagement. Who are you talking to? What groups do you have access to on a regular basis? And if you don't have that, if you really, really, truly, honestly don't have a network. Two things. One, start building one. Now I don't mean inside of podcasting.

[00:06:58] I mean start building a network outside with whatever it is that you do. Maybe you start writing publications for someone else. Maybe you start putting out a newsletter that starts grabbing and gathering information. Maybe you reach out a network with events. Once we can go to events once again, or other people who need to hear expertise, build that network first.

[00:07:18] And if all else fails and you can't build your network, then you go borrow one. Don't pay to be on one yet. Borrow someone else's network. That means getting good guests. If in fact you're going to have guests or that means you being a guest, getting out there, your name and the things that you do to somebody else's network.

[00:07:36] Somehow networking and interfacing with people who can help elevate your show because people might want to listen to your content. You have to do all three of those things. Before you spend a dime marketing your podcast. And here's the cool thing. If you do all three of these things really well, foundational fundamentals all done, you're making a remarkable content and you're working inside of an existing network.

[00:08:04] Here's the secret. You probably won't need to spend any money on podcast advertising. Yeah. Because you're doing things the right way out of the gate. Now while you ponder doing that, because you've got nothing else to do, right? Except, you know, watch your kids and hope things don't go down. But nonetheless, in those free, that's magical free time that you might actually have.

[00:08:27] I want your lockdown stories. I still want to share these with the people who listened to podcast pontifications like yourself. So please sit down, record me a minute or two of audio, put it on Dropbox, and then send the link to evo@podcastlaunched.pro and I'll share it with the world. And before I go, tell one friend.

[00:08:47] I know you'll have to do it remotely now and that's fine. Please tell one friend about podcast pontifications. Really, really means a lot when you personally reach out to someone and say, Hey, you, you should listen to podcast. Pontifications I mean, it's great when you retweet me and you share my content on Facebook and all those things.

[00:09:05] Wonderful. But nothing beats an individual outreach to one person. You to them saying them some they should listen to. That really works really well. All right. Enjoy the rest of your day. I shall be back tomorrow. We did another podcast. Pontifications cheers.

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