Marketing and communication leaders in the radio and podcast industries, Emma Sweet from YouTube, Jay Nachlis from Coleman Insights and Samuel Tatum from Urban One, plus moderator John Wordock revealed their strategies to boost audience engagement at the NabShow.
John said, “Our current climate is busy and noisy. There are distractions from breaking news alerts, doom-scrolling, attention-grabbers and cute posts. We need winning strategies to grow our audience.”
First we need to understand our audience by using all available data.
Jay said, “The latest research shows that Gen Z mostly consumes podcasts in the same way as other audience segments. Video podcasting is becoming everyone’s hybrid medium. About 75% of consumers alternate between both audio and video.”
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“For the first time the audience has discovered more new podcasts from social media than from friends and family,” said Jay. “The most often used podcast service is YouTube (33%), then Spotify (26%) and finally Apple (14%).”
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“Our research shows that the top three social media platforms used to discover a podcast for the first time are firstly YouTube, secondly Shorts, and thirdly Reels,” said Jay. “TikTok comes in after these.”
“Winning strategies include putting your focus on video (horizontal and vertical), use the Youtube channel for SEO and sharing, plus grow your social media for engagement,” said John Wordock.
Winning tips from the panel are:
“Use the data to help solve the brand awareness problem,” said Jay. “Devise a strategy and work towards this”.
Sam said, “We’re still working things out, but our strategy is to repurpose our on air content for podcasting. We utilise the data from podcasting to guide our digital needs.”
Emma said, “Replace the word algorithm with audience. Your program needs to reflect your passion. You can build discovery by starting small and getting content to the audience incrementally.”
Emma has the following tips for building your YouTube channel:
- Leverage YouTube trends
- Your thumb nail is your emotional hook and the title needs to work with this.
- Program for a mobile audience
- Lead with a content hook at the start, you have 3 seconds to capture interest.
- There’s a misconception about equipment needed as you can just use a smart phone. Good lighting and good sound is important.
- Remember that consumption takes place across computers, smart tvs and phones.
- Short form content has a potential to attract viewers. They may be interested in only short form or they may use it as a means of discovery.
- Audio podcasts are active ways of listening, while video podcasting are more passive.
- Don’t add video if it makes your podcast worse.
- If you’re in an organisation, start your podcast as a stretch project with a passionate staff member, don’t just appoint someone who needs something to do.
For John Wordock’s tips see related article