Whether you’re just starting a podcast or have an established podcast that has plateaued when it comes to your listeners, we’ve got 16 tips to help you attract more listeners. More listeners just doesn’t mean fame. It means attracting sponsors, selling exclusive content to your most loyal audience, and finally monetizing your podcast.
Feel free to pick and choose the tips that you think will work for your podcast. Podcasting is a lot of experimentation and seeing what works. So, let’s dive in!
Stick to a Schedule
A smart podcaster has a schedule in mind. For some it is releasing two episodes on the weekend, or dropping one episode on Wednesday. If you have one, great! We suggest sticking to it and not missing the mark.
If you don’t have one, we’ll slightly nudge you to create one. Why? Because we love predictability. When your audience knows when to tune in, they’ll show up and eventually become regular listeners. This will automatically help you compound your listens that you can track in your analytics.
Publish Your Podcast Everywhere
Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. If you only rely on one podcast directory to get you listens, you’re making a major mistake. Spread your podcast far and wide. It increases the chances of people discovering your podcast and becoming regular listeners. Distribute your podcast to as many platforms as possible.
With Hubhopper, you can make this process super easy. One-click distribution enables podcasters like you to publish your podcast on 10+ platforms. Publish your podcast to global platforms like Apple podcasts, Spotify, and Amazon Music, but also to platforms like JioSaavn where listeners are in abundance but not many podcasts. Try Hubhopper today!
Understand Your Audience
If you don’t know your audience how are you going to create episodes that they love? Just like you can’t make great food for people whose preferences you’re blind to, you can’t create content that will resonate with your audience without knowing them. Another advantage of knowing your audience is the ease with which you can market your podcast. The better you know your audience, the better you can serve them.
Keep Improving
This tip is for podcasters who already have a podcast but haven’t seen a significant change in their listens. Stagnant listens indicates that you’re stuck and perhaps you’re unable to figure out what to change. Is it the format? The audio quality? Maybe it is the episode length? Or none of these and something completelty different. The only way to figure it out is to ask. Ask your current listeners for feedback.
If you receive feedback, you can work on it! Change it up and see if it moves the needle. Here, a comprehensive analytics dashboard comes in handy to track the movement in your listens and downloads.
Add Video to Your Podcast
YouTube’s entry into the podcast world has shaken things up. Video podcasts have become a preferred way of consuming content for a part of the podcast audience. If you don’t have a video element yet to your podcast, adding one can help you tap into this audience. Plus, YouTube is an additional platform that can help you find a newer set of audience interested in your content. Video content is also shareable and easy to repurpose into engaging clips.
Host Contests for Reviews
A part of getting more listeners is also not to lose your existing one. Creating a community of your current listeners can also help you tremendously. To galvanize this community, you can host contests in exchange for reviews. Your audience gets something they want in return for reviews that can boost your visibility on platforms like Spotify and Apple Podcasts.
Create a Podcast Trailer
A podcast trailer is like a movie preview—it teases what your show is about and hooks potential listeners. Keep it short, snappy, and intriguing. And don’t forget to share it everywhere! It will draw your target audience and your awesome content will keep them coming back.
Use effective CTAs
Want your audience to subscribe to your show? Just ask them! Many podcasters shy away from using call to actions in their podcasts fearing it will put off listeners. But, you’re missing out if you’re not putting clear and compelling CTAs. A call to action is usually at the end of the episode, where you ask your audience for reviews, subscribing, or following you on social media channels.
Optimize Your Podcast for SEO
Search engine optimization is the practice of making your content search friendly. You can do this by tweaking your podcast titles, descriptions and even your podcast website. But how does one do that? You need to identify terms and phrases your audience uses to search for content like yours.
If you have a fictional horror stories podcast, adding horror stories in your podcast title, episode title, podcast description and episode description will make your show appear when people search for your podcast compared to podcasts that have not done it. While tweaking your titles and descriptions helps podcast platforms and apps to make your podcast reach its audience, optimizing your website will help search engines like Google and Bing show your podcast to your audience.
If you want to know more Podcast SEO strategies here’s a blog that explains it further.
[Podcast SEO blog]
Get Involved in Your Niche Community
Online communities are an underrated growth hack. Communities are bustling hubs of people discussing, and sharing about a particular topic. These can be great to drive more listeners. Find communities in your niche. Some places you can find them are Reddit, Discord, Quora, and even Twitter Communities. Don’t spam people with your podcast, but instead engage and help people. You can direct people to certain episodes when you think it is relevant and helpful. It is a much more natural way to engage without getting kicked out for spammy behaviour.
Submit Your Podcast to Databases
Get your podcast listed in directories and databases. Think of these as the Yellow Pages for podcasts—being listed makes it easier for people to discover your show when they’re searching for something new. Some examples of these are Podcast index and Listen Notes.
Promote on Social Media
Have you seen podcast clips on social media? They work wonders and if even one clip goes viral, it can boost your listeners. Whether you decide to put short video clips or audiograms on social media, try to find patterns in which type of reel resonated with people based on the engagement. It gives you an indication of what works on social media and what doesn’t. Try to put out more video clips since video is what works well on most social media platforms.
Social media is also a great way to have two-way communication with your listeners. You can ask them questions, future episode ideas, and feedback. Engage with your listeners by dropping teasers of future episodes to build anticipation and excitement.
Start a Newsletter
Newsletters are great to share updates, exclusive content, and even sneak peeks of upcoming episodes. Plus, newsletters are not dictated by the algorithm changes of various social media platforms. Your list is your direct line to your most dedicated fans. Start building it. Simply by placing a subscription page in your podcast and episodes descriptions, social media pages, and niche communities you can start collecting emails.
Build a Community with Your Listeners
Since we’ve discussed joining communities, why not create your own too? Whether it is on Reddit, Discord, WhatsApp, Telegram, or Instagram, having your own community can do wonders to increase word of mouth marketing.
Use this community to share more knowledge and resources. Make them feel how exclusive this community is and how grateful you are to be connected with your listeners. You can also encourage your listeners to network, or talk to each other. It doesn’t matter if your community is big or small, what matters is the interaction and discussions within the community.
Collaborate with Other Podcasters
Do you have podcasters in your niche that you admire? Think about collaborating with them. Many podcasters hesitate to reach out because the size of their audience is small. But, you should reach out regardless. You leverage your great content.
When emailing your guests, highlight the topics you’ve covered and the research you did to present it to your audience. The guest will appreciate the effort and work you’ve put in, and maybe even accept the invitation. Once on your show, ask them if they’re willing to promote your episode. Since your audiences are similar you can expect new listeners who stick around.
Be a Guest on Other Podcasts
Similarly, you might also receive podcast invitations. If their niche is similar to yours, you should try to make it. It is a great way to be exposed to new listeners, and since the niches are similar, you can ask the audience to check your podcast out too.
Conclusion
Growing your podcast can seem impossible especially when you are working so hard on your content. It can be demotivating and you might be feeling that you should stop creating more. But, with these tips, you can see new listeners dropping in and loving your content.
