Some of the best podcast makers in the world were at RadioDays Europe to discuss their craft and share tips. Here is a selection of some of the insights from various podcast conference sessions.
Goalhanger co-founder Tony Pastor’s big take aways were about audio and video podcasts. His company started out with just audio, being sceptical of video because it might take away from the power of the rapport they had built for successful podcast series The Rest is …
They were also concerned because Youtube did not pay nearly as much as the audio podcast platforms and they thought that they would undersell their value if they went to Youtube. They were also worried about not being able to “control their own ecosystem” and address their audience with direct marketing.
The company also didn’t want to get into an adversarial style of presentation that is often a characteristic of Youtube podcasts. “Civility is important to us, if we disagree we do so without getting angry, our audience prefers that… we listen to each other and agree to disagree if we have to.”
Eventually they did experiment with video. What did they find?
“We were surprised, we found a new audience that only consumed podcasts on Youtube. It didn’t cannibalise our audio audience. The audio podcast platform still pays more than Youtube, but since the audiences are different we are ok with that,” he said.
Another advantage of using Youtube was that it helped them build a stronger audience in America, where the possibility to earn revenue is greater than in the UK because the American audience is larger and the advertising opportunities are greater.
Goalhanger is the UK’s largest independent podcast producer, and the biggest outside the US, specialising in content across history, politics, sport, current affairs and entertainment. The company now also has huge presence on social media, Youtube, and live events, reaching millions of global listeners each month.
The company was started by content creators who saw selling as secondary to the sound of the shows. Now that the company is large enough to monetise its large audience they have finally hired a specialist sales person. “We knew the time would come when had to put more effort into sales, now it’s here. We are making a good profit,” said Pastor.
The company also puts a lot of effort into building the listener community for each of its shows and has hired a ‘community manager’ to engage with fans and the audiences who attend their live shows.
In another session, Podcast and Media Strategist Norma Jean Belenky spoke about building and retaining a loyal podcast following.
What drives growth? What is the magic secret?
“There is not one secret, it is all of these things at the same time,” she said, listing:
- Content: make sure you have quality content and that you really understand your analytics. Analytics are the way your audience communicated with you.
- Guests: Make sure they are relevant and have good reach
- PR: Visibility and authority within podcast listings and more generally in overall PR.
- Partnerships: Opportunities for cross promotion
- Industry Relationships: Start making friends in the industry
- Social & Marketing: Success comes from consistency in campaigns and SEO. Keywords and descriptions affect your visibility
- Branding: Have a consistent brand identity
“Give your audience a strong emotional connection to you and your content… drive emotion through storytelling and audio texture.
“Sit in the seat of your audience, not your seat. Are they driving, going for a walk, on the bus… it is a very personal way of consuming audio, on the same device and then same headphones as they use to talk to their mum, it’s very personal,” said Belenky.
Creating successful branded content was also on the agenda in several sessions.
CEO/Founder of branded podcast company 18Sixty , Gareth Evans talked about how he finds advertisers and sponsors.
“Cold outreach doesn’t work very well, it’s hard work. Each branded podcast requires individual work, so mass cold calling is often not right. If you cold call someone, you first need to convince them of the value of branded podcasts.”
Evans thinks it is better to get referrals from satisfied customers or referrals to people who are ready to do a podcast than to cold call.
Online advertising also works, as does Google search, according to Evans. His company ran a search and social campaign themed ‘we can help you grow your podcast.’
When people contacted the company in response to that campaign they usually asked ‘can you help us grow our listeners.’ Evans’ team didn’t initially respond to that request, first they listened and recommended some improvements to the podcast sound. Usually that led to confidence from the potential customer and many of them came over to work with 18Sixty.
He gave one example of where his company recommended that the podcast not be about the client, but about the client’s satisfied customers. “We told them the best people to talk about your products are the people who use them, not you.” That company now considers this podcast a customer relationship tool that gives the customers ‘the spotlight they deserve.’
“I’m proud of the podcasts that we make. If you make really great content that is your greatest calling card,” he said.
Harry Morton, the CEO and Founder of Lower Street podcast productions agrees with Evans about using online advertising to identify customers.
He is also a fan of content marketing, such as posting articles about podcasting trends on LinkedIn and offering Information Papers about podcasting.
Part of selling is story telling. Helping a potential customer understand what podcasting is really great at is important. Not everything needs to be about big numbers according to Morton. “We tell clients that their podcast may not reach big numbers, but it reaches people who really care about the topic or the brand.”
They are now suggesting more podcasts with different themes to address other segments of a client’s market, which is good for the client and also good for the company because it gets “more revenue out of a successful satisfied customer.”
Mads Møller Lauritsen from Denmark’s Beam Audio Agency made the point that podcasting is more cost effective on a cost per minute basis than socials such as TikTok.
“A TikTok video may have got 10,000 viewers in a week while the podcast may only get 2,000, but compare the ROI on a per minute basis.
“2,000 people listening to a 40 minute podcast is 80,000 minutes the brand spends with their listener. 10,000 viewers watching a 1 minute TikTok is 10,000 minutes.
“Podcasting is more effective for ROI, brand building and engagement with your target audience.”
He gave the example of The Construction Site podcast (Byggepladsen in Swedish) for Airtox. Airtox sells safety shoes for construction workers and people in similar industries. It is not a natural subject for a podcast series, but Lauritsen’s company thought beyond making it a podcast that was only about construction safety.
The Construction Site podcast is co-hosted by a radio presenter and a comedian who is also a carpenter.
“We tried for a year to get the business from the head of the company. The company spends lots of money, they sell safety shoes. It was an unlikely product for a podcast, but our concept interested him and he commissioned the podcast.
“To promote the podcast we personally looked for people wearing safety shoes and talked to them directly about the podcast. After 3 months we had built up enough listeners to the point where they began to suggest content. Every content idea in the podcast is now created by the target audience.”
Reporting: Steve Ahern at RadioDays Europe.
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