0:06

Alright , today I'm here with Ariel Nissenbaw

0:08

. Ariel is the head of community and

0:10

contest squadcast . She's the founder

0:12

of Earbuds podcast network and

0:14

she hosts the Sounds Profitable podcast

0:16

, and Radio Prague once called her a

0:19

podcast marketing expert . Ariel , welcome

0:21

to the podcast .

0:22

I love that you pulled that . Thank you for having me .

0:25

So today we're going to talk a lot about podcast

0:27

marketing and how people should be growing

0:29

their shows . But before we get into that , how did

0:31

you get started in podcasts ?

0:34

I was a listener first . I started listening

0:36

in 2014

0:38

and by 2016 I

0:40

wanted to listen to more podcasts , but didn't know how

0:42

to find more podcasts because I

0:44

was listening to the same five or six every week . I

0:47

was commuting , I was living in Los Angeles and

0:49

my whole thing was I feel like I'm missing out

0:51

on content . I feel like I'm missing out on

0:53

beautiful podcasts that could blow my mind , change

0:56

my point of view , introduce me to new people . How

0:58

do I possibly find those new shows

1:00

? So I said what if I started a podcast

1:02

recommendation newsletter that had a theme

1:04

and each week is curated by a different person

1:06

, and that person could bring their five favorite

1:08

podcasts from anywhere in the world , any sorts

1:11

of podcasts ? And so I started that newsletter

1:13

, and that newsletter first of all

1:15

introduced me to new podcasts , introduced me

1:17

to creators , introduced me to

1:19

podcast lovers and then , over time , introduced

1:21

me to the podcast industry and got

1:24

me jobs .

1:25

That's awesome . So 2014

1:27

was your first podcast listening to Serial .

1:29

It was right . Before Serial it was like Radio

1:32

Lab , the Memory Palace 99%

1:34

Invisible . This American Life , and then

1:36

Serial .

1:37

I think we all have the same gateway drugs . Those are

1:39

a lot of my first podcasts too . That's great . So

1:42

one of the things I always watch from a distance and

1:44

always see you doing is you do these funny

1:46

experiments where you're like I'm going to

1:48

see if I can grow a podcast in this different way

1:50

, and so we can kind of go through all

1:53

sorts of these different experiments . But one thing

1:55

I thought would be good to kind of set the tone

1:57

is why is marketing even

1:59

important ? To begin with , I think that

2:01

, like you have this whole thing you talk to people about

2:04

, you can start creating a show . But there's also

2:06

this second component .

2:07

Yeah , a lot of people forget that you actually

2:09

do have to do a little bit of self promotion . And

2:12

there's a fine line between self promotion

2:14

, getting you know , being an advocate for your own work , and

2:16

then dropping random links on the internet

2:19

, being like , listen to my show now , that

2:21

doesn't do anything . You have to have , you have to make a concerted

2:23

effort to find out why your show

2:26

is going to be impactful for

2:28

a certain segment of the population and then

2:30

figure out how to get it to that segment of the population

2:32

. And a lot of people focus on the creative

2:34

, which is very important . It's really really important to

2:36

make high quality content , but then it is , I

2:39

think , equally as important to spend

2:41

time getting that high quality content to

2:43

the right people . And once it gets to the right people and

2:45

if it is indeed high quality content

2:47

, it will grow . It will . It will continue

2:50

to find an audience . I mean , not every show

2:52

is meant to reach tens of thousands of people . It

2:54

is okay for your show to reach 5,000

2:56

people . It's okay for your show to reach 500 people . It's

2:58

okay for your show to reach 100 of the perfect people

3:01

to listen to your show , but you need to spend the time

3:03

doing some audience research and figuring out who those

3:05

people are .

3:06

Yeah , there's this spectrum from . I think

3:08

a lot of people start out in this group very uncomfortable

3:10

with promoting your show at all . It all

3:13

feels like self promotion . And then there's

3:15

the people who truly just drop links on

3:17

any like Instagram post

3:19

they can find and they say listen to this podcast

3:21

. But there is actually a healthy medium

3:24

which for most people , is

3:26

uncomfortable because it does feel like

3:28

self promotion when in reality it's

3:30

just marketing .

3:31

A lot of people , and this is okay . A

3:33

lot of people come up with an idea and

3:35

they want to make that show , and that's okay . But

3:37

if you want to make a show that has an audience , you

3:40

have to think about who that audience is and then gear

3:42

your content around what that audience

3:44

actually wants . And after you make

3:46

your show for some time , you identify your audience . You can

3:48

actually ask questions of that audience . You can say

3:50

how long should my episodes be ? What

3:52

episodes do you really love ? Which guests do you

3:54

love hearing from ? Who should I have on the

3:56

show ? You can ask these questions of them and make the show

3:58

for them . And of course , there's a balance . You want to make

4:00

sure that you're making the show that you want to make , but also

4:02

the show that your listeners , who might

4:05

be the ones bringing in the money that's

4:07

important to you . Then you got to consider all of those

4:09

things . Tom Webster had a really great article in

4:11

Sounds Profitable a few weeks ago about

4:14

five questions that you should ask your audience specific

4:16

questions , and it's not just like what do you like about my show

4:18

, it is five specific questions that

4:20

I have been sharing with the world and I don't remember

4:23

all of them off the top of my head , but one of them is

4:25

what specific element of my show

4:28

do you love so much so that , if this

4:30

show were to go away , if it were to

4:32

never be produced again . What would you miss , If

4:34

anything ? I think that's a really important thing , because if

4:37

you hear of something specific , if people answer you and they

4:39

tell you something specific , that's great . If they have nothing to

4:41

say , you have your answer .

4:42

A lot of businesses and you definitely

4:45

see this in digital marketing . We have something called

4:47

a net promoter score where you say , on a score

4:49

of zero to 10 , how much do you love this thing

4:51

? And only if something's a nine or 10 does

4:53

it count as a positive . Anything below that

4:55

is neutral or negative . That question

4:58

is often what you use to kind

5:00

of gauge net promoter score . If this thing went away

5:02

, how upset would you be ? Because

5:04

it's not people who are like this

5:06

is fine , who are going to drive

5:09

a show or make a business succeed

5:11

. You know there's lots of restaurants that you're fine with , but

5:14

you don't pick to go to them . It's

5:16

the restaurants , it's the products , it's the podcasts

5:18

, it's the shows that you're like I want

5:20

this , this is my favorite thing , and

5:22

you have to find at least some people that will say

5:24

this is one of my favorite things .

5:26

Yes , yeah , and that person needs to

5:28

then go tell people about it . I sort of alluded

5:30

to this before . Once your show is

5:32

, once the content is solid and

5:35

you've found a few listeners who love you

5:37

and your show offers them something unique , they

5:39

are going to tell other people about it . And

5:41

once your show gets to the point where it can be recommended word of mouth

5:43

to other people , you're golden . What makes your

5:45

show recommendable ? I think that's a good question to ask yourself

5:47

.

5:48

There needs to be like a specific

5:50

thing that somebody could say when

5:52

they were recommending your show and these

5:54

general shows , that kind of talk about

5:56

anything and everything . And I get around with my

5:58

buddies and we have a beer , we talk about

6:00

what's popular . Well , that show

6:03

doesn't have like a definitive . You

6:05

must listen to the show because and

6:07

there needs to be a completion to that

6:09

sentence oh , I know that you're

6:11

really into new fashion

6:14

in this , of this type . There's a show about

6:16

that . I know that you love sci-fi

6:18

movies . There's this podcast . All

6:20

they do is they talk about the new sci-fi movies and

6:23

then they go back to the best ones that you

6:25

probably missed , and they talk about this too . It

6:27

would be perfect for you . It's like

6:29

things are only recommendable when they're

6:31

specific . When they're general

6:33

, it becomes like so hard to even

6:35

imagine what .

6:36

The end of that sentence would be oh

6:38

, you'd love this podcast about stories about humanity

6:40

. It's like what I or could .

6:42

I just read a book about it .

6:43

Or could I just read a one-off story ? Or

6:46

what's interesting is ? It also depends

6:48

on if you're recommending a podcast to somebody

6:51

who has never listened to podcasts before , or if

6:53

they are a seasoned podcast listener and they're looking for something

6:55

specific . If you want somebody to become a podcast

6:57

listener , tom Webster again gonna bring him up

6:59

. He says , don't be cute about it . If

7:02

your aunt really loves knitting and you really want

7:04

your aunt to become a podcast listener even

7:06

though she really loves knitting , I would not recommend for

7:08

her a knitting podcast , because it's not gonna

7:10

be the cream of the crop . It's a specific podcast . I

7:12

would recommend to her the moth . I would recommend

7:14

to her a show that she can listen to while

7:16

she's knitting . I think it's important to think about

7:18

the activity that somebody is

7:21

partaking in as they're listening , and making

7:23

sure that when they're listening , they're doing something that they love

7:25

, so that they associate podcasts with this thing that they

7:27

love .

7:27

So another thing that we should be thinking about when

7:30

we start talking about marketing for podcasts is

7:32

this idea of retention

7:34

and being able to hook listeners . If you're

7:36

bringing in new listeners , how do we make sure

7:38

that the people actually get hooked

7:41

and then stick around ?

7:42

You probably make your show , whether it's week after week or

7:44

month after month , or however often you're putting out your episodes

7:46

, you probably get stuck in the sauce a little bit

7:48

. So I think every once in a while , it's important to have somebody

7:50

listen to it , who you're close with , who will give you

7:52

genuine feedback on whether or not this

7:54

show is accessible to a new person . So

7:57

, are you using inside jokes

7:59

that you don't explain ? Are you , do you have

8:01

segments that you don't explain ? Do you

8:04

maybe back up and say

8:06

for the folks who are new here , I think it's

8:08

important to have some of those phrases thrown

8:10

in every once in a while . I also think it is important

8:12

to acknowledge your new listeners . So , for example

8:14

, I always recommend that if you do a campaign on

8:16

Cast Box , if you pay to be featured on Cast Box

8:19

, you're going to get a whole bunch of new listeners from Cast Box

8:21

. Something that I would recommend is calling them out specifically

8:23

hello to my new listeners from Cast Box . So

8:25

think about things like that . If you know that you have

8:28

gotten a bunch of traffic from a newsletter that you

8:30

were just featured in , shout out that newsletter . Not

8:32

only is it a way to acknowledge those people who have

8:34

come to you from that , but it's also a way to acknowledge the

8:36

newsletter and to say thank you . Another thing

8:38

you can do is you probably have your long

8:40

episodes . Maybe your episodes are 45 minutes

8:43

, maybe they're 30 minutes , maybe they're even 15 minutes

8:45

. I would also have short episodes every once in a while

8:47

that give people a taste of who you

8:49

are as a host , the types of guests that you have on

8:51

. Maybe that means just having a trailer marked

8:53

so that when you're listening on Apple

8:55

or Pocket Cast or Spotify or wherever

8:58

there is a trailer to listen to that's

9:00

short , that people can sort of

9:02

test the waters before they go in and listen to a full

9:04

45 minute episode .

9:05

I've seen this a few places . Substack

9:08

has a really nice thing where you can pin a couple

9:10

of your stories that you've written to

9:12

the top . So if somebody came in and they're

9:14

like I want to learn about this author

9:16

, it's like hey , start with these hits . Jordan

9:19

Harbinger I've seen on his podcast . He

9:21

on his website is like here's where you should

9:23

start . If you never listened , here are some

9:25

celebrities that you probably know

9:28

, but I'm going to tell you a different story when I interview

9:30

them . So there needs to be some

9:32

kind of on ramp to the podcast

9:34

, because a lot of times you're right . Lots

9:37

of inside jokes , lots of kind of assumed knowledge .

9:39

It's the same reason people pin posts on Twitter

9:41

. It's the same reason people pin videos

9:44

on TikTok . So that here is the best representation

9:46

of me , or here's at least a representation of me

9:48

. Here is how I am choosing for you

9:50

to see me , if you decide to check

9:52

me out .

9:53

Jordan Harbinger . Yeah , I think that's a great way of putting it , now

9:55

that we've thought about all right , we can get them , we can retain

9:58

them . We're making good content . We know who

10:00

our audience is . How do we find them ?

10:02

Jordan Harbinger . Ah , the question , I

10:05

don't know , it's so hard . Growing

10:07

podcast is really , really hard .

10:08

Jordan Harbinger . I think that is kind of like the first point

10:10

for a lot of people . I think we imagine when

10:12

we start a show , the editing is going to be the hard

10:15

part , picking up the mic is the hard part , and

10:17

now , okay , recording , now it's all done

10:19

, but now the people are just going to flood

10:21

in .

10:22

The number one question I get is I work so hard on my show

10:25

, I promote it , I spend

10:27

money on it . Why am I not growing ? I

10:29

really think it's great , I really think the content is there . Why

10:31

am I not growing ? Why am I not finding new audiences ? And

10:34

it is so understandable that you would

10:36

be pissed off about that or that you would be

10:38

disheartened about that . I do a

10:40

lot of consulting with people

10:42

on their shows and I do it with Lauren Pacell

10:44

and we call it podcast therapy , because often

10:46

it turns into a therapy session because

10:48

we're like your show is really great , you deserve

10:50

listeners , and sometimes people cry

10:53

and that's okay because they deserve listeners

10:55

and so some of the tactics that we

10:57

tell them about . Of course , getting

10:59

featured in a podcast listening app is really great . Getting

11:02

interviewed on other shows is really great . Getting editorial

11:04

coverage is really great , whether it's in podcast newsletters

11:07

or in newsletters in your general topic area

11:09

. But the thing that we recommend to

11:11

everybody that I think can benefit everybody

11:13

to a certain extent is collaborating meaningfully

11:16

with other podcasts in your topic area

11:18

, because the way podcasts grow is borrowing

11:20

audiences from each other . Let's get my

11:22

show in front of your audience , your existing

11:25

audience and let's get your show in front

11:27

of my audience . That might be

11:29

very small at this point , but it will grow

11:31

if I'm able to get

11:33

my show in front of the right people . So , establishing

11:36

these connections , finding the podcast that makes sense

11:38

for you to be collaborating with , and then figuring out

11:40

what types of collaborations you should be doing , whether

11:42

that is something like cross promos or

11:44

being a guest on each other's show , or having

11:47

like a dedicated monthly segment where

11:49

I come and be a correspondent on your show and

11:51

vice versa . There are lots of ways to trade

11:53

back and forth to figure out how to get

11:55

me in front of your people , how to get you in front

11:57

of my people .

11:58

Yeah , that reminds me of listening to ads

12:01

inside of podcasts . The ones that are really powerful

12:03

are where the host is actually giving like a genuine

12:05

recommendation for a product . They

12:07

actually received it . It's maybe something they're

12:09

actually using and so they know the talking

12:12

points , but they're not just

12:14

saying , like this soap is 40%

12:17

more going to get a grease out

12:19

. It's just like , yeah , this is what I use . It

12:21

works really well . I really like it , you'll

12:23

like it too . The

12:25

marketing language is actually toned down

12:28

, but because it's genuine , it's

12:30

much more effective .

12:31

But I'll also say that If the product

12:34

is perfect and they're reading the talking

12:36

points , it kind of doesn't matter . Crooked

12:39

Media has a show called Hysteria . I

12:42

find that every single product

12:44

that they recommend or that they advertise

12:46

for I'm like yep would buy , yep would buy

12:48

. I go to the website every time , because they just

12:50

really hit the nail on the head with me . Whoever

12:53

is doing their ad sourcing is doing just a really

12:55

great job . They know me , they know

12:57

the demographic that they're serving and they're doing

12:59

pretty typical reading

13:01

from the script and it kind of doesn't matter to me because

13:04

the ad is so perfect and I think there's

13:06

a balance there , right ? Yes , you want

13:08

a personal endorsement to a certain extent when it comes

13:10

to , maybe , a podcast recommendation or a cross

13:12

promo , but if it is the perfect podcast recommendation

13:14

for you , at that time I'm probably going to

13:16

listen , no matter what .

13:17

Earlier you said one of the things you

13:19

can do is get featured inside

13:22

of podcasting apps . How do you get featured

13:24

in podcasting apps ? We all know that Apple podcasts

13:26

and Spotify are the two largest apps

13:28

and they've got these sections where

13:30

those podcasts have to be getting a ton of clicks

13:32

. How do we get our shows featured there ?

13:34

Yeah , not everybody's going to get featured but you can try

13:37

. So Apple and Spotify and Stitcher

13:39

have forms that you can

13:41

fill out to try to get featured and if your

13:43

podcast hits at the right time and

13:45

the right person on the receiving end of that

13:47

form reads it and they're genuinely

13:50

very intrigued by what you've written , then

13:52

they might just say let me give

13:54

this podcast a chance and that could be a really

13:56

big break for you . I got my podcast

13:59

featured in July of 2020

14:01

. I had a podcast with my friend Shira , hosted

14:03

on Buzzsprout , called Counter Programming , and

14:06

we got featured in July of 2020 . We went from

14:09

2,000 downloads per episode to 18,000

14:11

downloads per episode .

14:12

It was a spike though .

14:14

You know it was a spike that came down . So if

14:16

you look at our analytics on Buzzsprout , it was like boom

14:18

, boom and you can see that visual

14:20

people . But for the folks who can't see that , I just

14:22

drew an arrow up to the ceiling and I drew

14:25

it back down . Yeah

14:27

, there are benefits and disadvantages

14:29

of getting featured . So we

14:31

did meet some new listeners

14:33

who stuck with us , who still love us , who have

14:36

even followed us to Instagram , have even emailed us , but

14:38

then we also met some people who hated us so much that our

14:41

rating went down to a 3.6 . So there

14:43

are lots of reasons

14:45

to get featured and then reasons that you know you might

14:47

not want to get featured .

14:48

Is there anything you can do when you're trying

14:51

to fill out these forms ? And we can link to all these forms

14:53

in the description and in the show notes , but

14:55

if you're trying to do it , is

14:58

there anything more than just like it's a lottery

15:00

ticket and I'm hoping that I land at the

15:02

right moment ?

15:03

Yeah , I mean think about why your show

15:05

should be featured . Now that's a big question Is

15:07

all of these podcast listening apps are they

15:10

want to be the podcast listening app ? Apple Podcasts

15:12

wants people to listen on Apple Podcasts . Spotify

15:15

wants people to listen on Spotify . Stitcher wants

15:17

people to listen on Stitcher . How do we make those

15:19

home pages Apple , spotify and Stitcher the

15:21

best curated lists on the Internet

15:23

? They need to be timely , they need

15:25

to be diverse , they need to be exciting . So

15:28

what about your show is timely ? What about your show is

15:30

diverse ? What about your show is exciting ? Do you have an episode

15:32

coming up that is that has that

15:34

features , a guess that you really worked hard to get

15:36

? That is telling a story that is relevant now

15:39

. So I think that's the question to ask yourself . It's not

15:41

to apply constantly . It's to apply

15:43

when you have something to share , when

15:45

you have , when you have something really exciting to share with

15:47

these editorial curators at

15:50

Apple , spotify and Stitcher and this

15:52

I'm mentioning Apple , spotify and Stitcher , but there's

15:54

also Cast Box , pocket Cast , there's good

15:56

pods . There's a lot of different places where you could potentially

15:59

get featured . That might bring you new audience

16:01

. They might not bring you new audience , they might just be a

16:03

great way for you to say check us out , we got featured . You

16:05

know Amazon , for example . You know there's

16:07

, there's so many places that you could get featured and

16:09

it really is a crapshoot whether or not

16:12

you're going to find the right listeners who are

16:14

going to see your cover art and say you know what that cover art

16:16

speaks to me ? Let me click play . And then they click play

16:18

and then they listen to your trailer and then they like the trailers , then

16:20

they listen to the first episode and then they can't

16:22

wait for the next episode and then they keep going . But

16:24

all there's so many places where they could potentially drop

16:26

off .

16:27

One of the examples that I'm remembering

16:29

I think this came from the submission

16:32

guidelines for Apple podcasts is

16:34

if you have a track and field podcast and you

16:36

just throw that out there , it's not really timely

16:38

. But then if the summer Olympic games

16:40

are coming up , that's timely and that makes a lot

16:43

of sense to be featured . Or

16:45

we're having the Olympic games and you actually

16:47

had interviewed somebody who was

16:49

an Olympian . Now that's timely . And

16:51

if they're all going to be creating these custom

16:54

like categories or collections of

16:56

podcasts , now you fit into a collection

16:58

. That kind of makes sense .

17:00

Yeah , and think about what collections

17:02

could exist and if they don't exist

17:04

but they should exist , maybe that's something that you can pitch

17:06

. So check out , for example

17:08

, good pods . Check out , for example , cast Box has

17:11

unique sounding collections . Apple

17:13

also has a lot of unique sounding collections , but it's much

17:15

harder to get to them . So what I would do for them

17:18

is they tend

17:20

to . For

17:22

Native American and Indigenous

17:24

Heritage Month , they'll do a collection . So

17:26

does your podcast fit into that ? For

17:29

Asian American and Pacific Islander

17:31

Month , they'll do something . So

17:33

think about these calendar events

17:36

that take place and how does your content

17:38

fit into them . Earth Day , for example , is coming

17:40

up . Should that be something that

17:42

you can either submit an existing

17:44

episode for , or can you think about

17:46

maybe making content specifically for it

17:48

for the sake of potentially being featured ? That's

17:51

a lot to ask of yourself , but it could be a gamble that you might be

17:53

willing to take .

17:54

One of the things you've talked about multiple times you

17:56

mentioned it are trailers

17:58

, and so there's the benefit of having a trailer

18:01

. That's like kind of the onboarding sequence

18:03

. So if somebody listens for the first time and

18:05

they like the cover art , the title

18:07

is somewhat intriguing . Maybe they read that description

18:10

and then they click the trailer and they listen to

18:12

that . What are the benefits of a trailer

18:14

? And then I've got to ask you about your project trailer

18:16

park .

18:18

I love trailers . Trailers allow you

18:20

as the creator . They force

18:22

you to distill your content down into

18:25

30 seconds , 60 seconds , 90 seconds

18:27

, hopefully , not much longer than that . They force you to

18:29

say here's what my show is about and here's what you're going to

18:31

get out of it if you listen to it . It allows the listener

18:33

a chance to get a sense of who you are and

18:36

you have an advantage for creating

18:38

one , because Apple and Spotify

18:40

and a few of the other podcast listening apps have

18:42

dedicated space on your quote unquote

18:44

landing page on those apps for

18:46

your trailer to be placed . So it

18:48

gives listeners who are scrolling if they

18:51

make it to your landing page and they see play trailer

18:53

they're going to you're probably going to get a lot more

18:55

listens to your trailer than to any of your other episodes

18:57

, because people are going to try you out .

18:59

Yeah , it makes sense , like that trailer is never

19:01

going to be the one that has inside

19:03

jokes in it and it doesn't kind of assume

19:05

you've listened to the last 400 episodes

19:08

and you're referencing old stuff because you kind of

19:10

go through that process of what is the

19:12

show about , who's it for ? Let me explain

19:14

it , and you know it's a very intentional

19:16

process .

19:17

It forces you . It forces you to say

19:19

why is my show good and why

19:21

should you listen to it ?

19:22

So why should people listen to trailer park

19:24

? And what is it ?

19:25

I Started a podcast in February

19:28

with my friend , tim Vegas called trailer

19:30

park , the podcast , trailer podcast , and

19:32

the goal was I love

19:34

podcast trailers , but it was more so . There are

19:36

probably so many trailers out there that either

19:39

never got made into full shows

19:41

or represent larger bodies of work

19:43

, or were made just for creative purposes

19:45

, and they're just such

19:47

fun snippets of audio that

19:49

I think more people could use to discover

19:51

new podcasts or to learn more about the creative Craft

19:54

of an audio teaser . So we started

19:56

taking submissions for trailer park in

19:58

about October . We've had 200 people

20:00

submit trailers and thank you to holy cow the buzz

20:02

sprout newsletter for facilitating

20:05

a whole bunch of those submissions we

20:08

got like 50 , I think , from being

20:10

featured in your newsletter , thank you . And

20:13

so people submit trailers to us . They tell

20:15

us about their project , whether the show exists

20:17

or maybe it was just made for a proof

20:19

of concept , or Maybe it is

20:22

still being made or whatever it is . And we

20:24

chose eight trailers for season one and

20:26

what we do on the show is we play those trailers

20:28

and then we critique it a little bit , share what we

20:30

liked about it , share what we think could have been better . But

20:32

we're really not too critical and the goal

20:34

really is help people find new shows and

20:36

help creators learn how to

20:39

make really great short audio content

20:41

any tips from having gone through

20:43

200 trailers .

20:44

What are some common things you see in the ones

20:47

that succeed , or at least the ones you like , and what

20:49

are some Common like mistakes people make ?

20:51

I happen to be a big fan of , in the trailer

20:53

, at least spelling it out for people , letting me

20:55

know what I'm gonna get out of the show who is the

20:57

host , what is the name of the show . Some people forget

21:00

that and I think

21:02

the most part is what is the unique value proposition

21:04

of this show ? There are so many people who make

21:06

a show and they think it's the most unique thing in the world . I'm

21:08

sorry to say , but you had this idea and so did

21:10

50 other people and I really should

21:12

probably write down like recurring themes within

21:14

some of the trailers . But , yeah , make sure your

21:17

show is unique and make sure you really spell it out

21:19

for people why this show is unique . What are you doing differently

21:21

in your show ? And let people know in the trailer

21:23

what not to . What I really

21:25

did enjoy that somebody did is at the end

21:28

of the trailer . They said please consider

21:30

checking this out , and it sounded a little bit beggy

21:32

. I .

21:36

Have listened to some that do not mention

21:38

the name of the podcast and then somebody

21:41

will pay to promote it using Busprout

21:43

ads and doing paid promotions and they're

21:45

like you know , I didn't get many listens from

21:47

it and I always feel like you know

21:50

the jerk who goes . Oh you know , like we missed the

21:52

name here . Like I rec , like say

21:54

, say to the beginning , say it at the end . You

21:56

want to make sure people know for sure

21:58

what your podcast is , who is for

22:01

, what it's about and what the name is , because Some

22:03

people will click the links in the show notes . A

22:05

lot of people will just open up their podcast

22:08

app and search for it . Yes , and if

22:10

they don't hear the name , they're not gonna

22:12

. It's unlikely that they're gonna be able to

22:14

search for your podcast . Another thing

22:17

that's kind of coming up into my mind are

22:19

ratings and reviews . Talked about . Getting

22:21

listed in . These directories

22:23

are at least getting promoted and we've talked about

22:25

you got a bunch of negative ratings and reviews

22:27

. But I feel like one thing we have in common

22:30

that we both have kind of been shouting for a long time

22:32

is like it's really valuable To get

22:34

ratings to reviews , both as the listener

22:37

and as the creator . Why does that resonate

22:39

so much for you ?

22:39

It's all about social proof . It's all about what

22:42

somebody here before me . You know , when you like , go to

22:44

the top of a mountain and

22:46

maybe there's like a book that you can sign in

22:48

a cabin . That's like Ariel was here . It's

22:50

literally that . It's . Was somebody here before

22:52

me and did it . Did they enjoy their experience ? It's

22:54

. It means that people have been to your profile

22:57

, people have been to your podcast , people have listened . It

22:59

shows a potential listener , that other

23:01

people have been here and that they enjoyed

23:04

their . They enjoyed their time with you . You know so

23:06

. Podcast ratings and reviews won't

23:08

do anything for the algorithm . This has been debunked

23:11

. Apple has a whole thing on it on their website

23:13

, and yet I still hear Multiple

23:15

times a day when I'm listening to shows . Hey

23:17

, would you , would you help us out by leaving us a rating and review

23:19

? It really helps us ride the algorithm . They

23:21

like say it means nothing . It means nothing

23:24

. That is not what helps us ride the algorithm . What helps ride

23:26

the algorithm is a lot of subscribers over

23:28

a short period of time .

23:29

I think it's like so powerful , especially

23:32

on the listener side . When you listen

23:34

to a podcast , there's something it always feels

23:36

like the show I'm listening to is massive

23:38

, like they're probably getting millions of

23:40

downloads per episode . They would

23:43

have want nothing to do with me they would

23:45

. They probably wouldn't even read the email I send

23:47

. And yet I run across these constantly

23:49

where pretty big shows are

23:51

saying things like I do have some ratings for reviews

23:54

, but I only get you know one new one

23:56

a month . I don't have many people who reach

23:58

out to my email , even though it is in the show notes

24:00

and I hope people are listening and

24:03

every once in a while they get an email and they're like

24:05

this is so powerful

24:07

For me that , like I'm now making

24:09

the connection with a human who's saying

24:11

actually I listen to this when I'm driving

24:13

to work and I like Wednesday mornings

24:15

because I know your podcast will always be there on Wednesday

24:18

mornings .

24:18

Yeah , that's beautiful . There are so many reasons to leave a rating

24:20

and review and you know I

24:23

feel like on this podcast a lot of times . I'm speaking

24:25

to creators , but you're hopefully

24:27

our listeners too . You know , you whoever's

24:29

listening to this right now . Hopefully you also listen to some podcasts

24:32

, and not just because you know you

24:34

want to become better at your craft , but

24:36

also because you genuinely enjoy

24:38

listening to these shows and hopefully you take the

24:40

time to let those creators know that

24:42

you love what they're doing . You know , because sometimes they're

24:44

not getting paid for it and they're working really hard on it

24:46

and they think they're doing something unique .

24:48

And maybe they are doing something unique and if

24:50

you can call them out for that , they'll be super grateful

24:52

another thing that , at least in my mind , you're associated

24:54

with a lot our podcast newsletters

24:57

and I see a lot

24:59

of synergy between podcasts

25:01

and written content , whether it be blogs

25:04

on a website or Newsletters

25:06

. What , what gets you excited about

25:08

newsletters ?

25:09

I love bullet points , I love reading

25:11

in short bursts and I think that

25:14

what's really important for that's me

25:16

as a consumer . I like to read podcast

25:18

newsletters . I like to read newsletters about the podcast

25:20

space , newsletters that tell me about podcast

25:23

recommendations , newsletters that help me meet new creators

25:25

or introduce me to new software and services

25:27

. So that's me as somebody who just like

25:30

loves to be plugged into the podcast space . From

25:32

the creator perspective , I'll touch on in a second , but I

25:34

really do recommend that , if you are watching this , if you're

25:36

listening to this and you're not subscribed to pod

25:38

news , to sounds profitable , to the buzz sprout newsletter

25:41

, to my newsletter ear buds podcast collective , to

25:43

a bunch of other newsletters that I think are really

25:45

worthwhile and people spend a lot of time on them , it

25:47

is worth subscribing to those because they're

25:49

just a really great way to stay plugged into what's

25:52

going on in this space that you are now a part of and

25:54

that maybe you have been part of for a long time but you just haven't

25:56

taken the time to subscribe . You're going to get weekly

25:58

updates on what's going on in the podcast space . You're

26:00

going to get trending episodes . You're going

26:02

to hear from . You might see a podcast

26:05

be featured in a bunch of different newsletters and therefore

26:07

you'll know that they're doing a pr push . Maybe

26:09

you'll be introduced to shows that you should be collaborating

26:12

with in some way . I am just such a big

26:14

advocate for plugging into the podcast space

26:16

by way of newsletters . And then , as a creator

26:18

, I think it's really important to have

26:20

a place where you can Correspond

26:23

with your listeners . For people who have opted

26:25

in to receive correspondence from you , when people subscribe

26:27

to your show on Spotify or

26:29

follow you on apple or , you know

26:31

, hit the plus button wherever it is they're listening

26:34

to shows , maybe even on youtube , whatever

26:36

you don't have their email addresses , you don't have

26:38

permission to contact them . If they don't

26:40

hit play on your episode , you will not be Speaking

26:43

to them . So if you can get them to opt

26:45

in to receive an email from you whether that's weekly

26:48

, monthly , whatever it is or even if you just take

26:50

their email address and don't necessarily have

26:52

a newsletter that you're going to be putting out regularly

26:54

, but you can use it if you need to , that

26:57

is a really great way . That's a , that's a failsafe . That means

26:59

that if your podcast gets removed from the airwaves

27:02

or if you know there's a big data

27:04

breach at wherever , and and

27:06

your podcast is gone , you can still be like hi , friends

27:08

, I'm glad I have your email because

27:10

my podcast is gone , but I'd still love to stay in touch with

27:12

you . So I just recommend making an easy

27:15

landing page for yourself Maybe

27:17

it's your website dot com slash

27:19

newsletter and then giving

27:21

people a way to sign up , and then you can have their email addresses

27:23

and you won't spam them . You will be very careful

27:26

with this newfound avenue

27:28

for communication that you have and you're

27:30

going to use it very wisely .

27:32

I feel like people are starting to wake up to something

27:34

I call platform risk a bit more

27:36

. You know , you invest so much in

27:38

trying to grow a Twitter following

27:40

and then Elon Musk comes

27:42

in and starts to like change you the way Twitter works

27:44

and maybe you end up realizing , oh , this isn't where

27:47

I want to spend all my time . Or the same thing

27:49

happens on Facebook or YouTube or any

27:51

platform . Podcasting is nice because

27:53

it's not run by a platform . It's a

27:55

direct connection between you and your audience

27:58

. Newsletters are one of the only other ways

28:00

that , as soon as they give you permission

28:02

, you get to contact them . Where on

28:04

Twitter , if somebody follows you , if

28:06

it's not a good tweet in the eyes

28:08

of the Twitter algorithm , which can shift , it's

28:11

not going to show up to your listeners or

28:13

, excuse me , to your followers .

28:15

You know , the Twitter algorithm is now public

28:17

to do you . Do you see all these

28:19

things ?

28:19

I've seen a bunch of people reading

28:22

little bits of code and then surmising

28:24

what it means .

28:25

So I've seen some nice breakdowns . I'll share

28:27

them in the show notes of this episode . It's sort of

28:29

like A like boost

28:31

it X percentage and then a comment boost it

28:33

X more percentage and then whatever it is linking

28:35

in your first tweet is not a good idea , but we knew

28:37

all of these things . But to have it backed up by

28:39

the code is very helpful .

28:41

I guess what I'm trying to say is like these things change

28:43

over time and there

28:45

was a point where Facebook

28:47

all they did was they'd say hey , if you have a business

28:49

and you get on Facebook , you're going to go a lot of reach

28:52

. It was true . There was a period where you got a ton

28:54

of reach and then Facebook started saying , okay

28:56

, this is getting annoying for all the people

28:58

who've liked their favorite ice cream shop

29:01

that they're constantly getting bombarded with ice

29:03

cream posts , and so they start like tamping

29:05

down on that kind of content a bit . Well then businesses

29:08

realized like wait , we invested so much

29:10

in this platform , it became really big for us

29:12

and now we're looking around and the only way

29:14

for us to even get in front of anybody is to boost

29:16

our own posts . And people have seen

29:18

it on , you know , instagram

29:21

, where it used to be all about images and

29:23

then it was about stories . Now it's about the short form

29:25

content and you need to kind of be

29:27

following what the platform does podcasting

29:29

. If somebody subscribes , they are going to get

29:31

your podcast , or if they follow you , they're going

29:33

to get their pod , your podcast . Until

29:35

they make the decision , I don't want to

29:37

get these on my phone anymore .

29:39

Right , yeah , so podcaster

29:41

. Great , but they could choose . The reason

29:44

newsletters are important is because they could choose to not listen

29:46

, right ? So if you have a newsletter and you really

29:48

want people to read it , of course , then you need to deal

29:50

with open rate and click rate and your podcast , you

29:52

know sorry , your open rate and click rate . And

29:54

then your subject

29:56

line needs to be really hooky and

29:58

all the metadata surrounding that needs to be

30:00

on point . But you have much more of a chance

30:03

of landing in their inbox then if

30:05

you were just to just put a social post out there and hope .

30:07

Yeah , exactly , exactly you

30:09

look you like it when I affirm your comments , thank

30:12

you . One thing I feel

30:14

like we've skipped past it

30:16

has been social media . I think we should

30:18

skip back a little bit to social . A

30:20

lot of podcasts do find success

30:23

in building a little bit of a community on

30:25

social media . This isn't like one post

30:27

a week that's like hey , my new

30:29

podcast is out , listen with a link

30:31

. Those don't get any engagement . But

30:33

there are ways to actually build a podcast on social . What have you got ? What

30:36

have you seen work ?

30:37

I think it depends what your show is about . Not every

30:39

podcast lends itself to a beautiful

30:42

, robust community of people who appreciate

30:44

the content that you put out there . So if you

30:46

have a podcast , that this

30:48

is where knowing your audience's

30:50

user behavior is important . So

30:52

if you know that your podcast is like a quote

30:55

unquote commute podcast and you're asking

30:57

people to do tons of calls to action and they're

30:59

driving , then you're probably never going to hear from these people

31:01

.

31:02

Hopefully they're not taking action driving .

31:06

Hopefully we don't advocate for that . But if your podcast is about mental health

31:08

and you are inviting connections and you're

31:11

saying you know , I want my listeners to

31:13

get together and I want people to have these

31:15

conversations and I'm breaking down the stigma and

31:17

all that kind of stuff , you are inviting people to

31:19

chat with each other and if you can make it , if you

31:21

can make your social media and inviting place , if

31:23

you can make it so that your social media is a

31:26

place where you source ideas or you source guests , you are providing value right

31:28

. And it could be that a lot of people who love social media are don't

31:33

listen to your podcast , or a lot of people who

31:35

love your podcast don't love your social media presence

31:37

. But it's a compounding factor . It's , you

31:39

know , if I were to search for you on social and

31:41

what I saw on social was giving me

31:43

something , it was teaching me something , it was entertaining

31:45

me , it was sustaining me , it was introducing me to other

31:48

creators , it was introducing me to other community

31:50

members , that's awesome . You know , as long as there

31:52

is some sort of reason that you are

31:54

on social , I think that's an important thing to keep in mind .

31:56

Yeah , social media is one of these things . If you do it well

31:59

and you're really invested , it can have

32:01

really positive results . But just

32:03

the hey , make sure you post something . Yeah

32:06

, almost never works , yeah , and so

32:08

I know it can be disheartening . I see this with businesses

32:10

a lot and you can see it with creators

32:13

, where they feel the need to

32:15

be on LinkedIn and Instagram and

32:17

Twitter and Facebook and tiktok

32:19

and snapchat and by the time they've

32:22

done all that , they're just totally burned out and none of the content

32:24

is on social media and none of the content they

32:26

put out was valuable at all and

32:28

the net result is well , no

32:30

one really took action on any of it and

32:32

yet I put a ton of work in . The return

32:34

is really low .

32:35

What I'll say is I do recommend grabbing

32:38

handles on all of the social platforms so

32:40

that nobody else can have your handle and then pin

32:43

a post or post something that says

32:45

I'm not really active here , I'm active here

32:47

, and then post the place where you are active . And

32:49

it could be that you are not active on any of them except

32:52

for one , and that is okay . Do , first

32:54

of all , be active where you like

32:56

to be active . It is most important for you

32:58

to make content on the places that you like

33:00

to make content and to steer clear of the places where you

33:02

are miserable . So if TikTok sucks

33:05

your time and energy , do not go there . And

33:07

if you are making awkward videos that

33:09

make you feel terrible about yourself because you think

33:11

that you are not capable of doing the trends

33:14

, don't do the trends . It will not be good

33:16

. Do what you

33:18

are comfortable with . And then the second question to ask

33:20

yourself is where is my audience , where

33:22

is my existing audience ? And then the third question to

33:24

ask yourself is where is the audience that I want

33:27

to reach ? And those are the considerations

33:29

you should . Those are the things that you should consider

33:31

when figuring out where to spend time on social yeah

33:33

, where do you want to hang out ?

33:34

Where are your people ? These are important because

33:37

if you succeed , you want it to

33:39

still be a success . For

33:41

me , if I built a big following

33:43

on LinkedIn , that would not be a success

33:45

, because I might put a lot of work

33:47

into it and you may look like success somebody

33:49

else . I don't want to live on LinkedIn

33:51

, and so I

33:54

think I don't want to live online anymore .

33:57

You've been saying that for years , though .

33:59

I know and I think that I just need to finally

34:01

follow through . I'll just have like a blog

34:03

like the old days and write one

34:06

post every few months , but

34:08

for you to build something , just because

34:10

you hear , linkedin is the new

34:12

thing . It's getting really big , or TikTok

34:15

dances .

34:15

You said that before . With Instagram

34:18

, it's like you constantly have to keep up with the new

34:20

algorithm changes . That is exhausting

34:22

. Spend time where you like to spend time .

34:24

Unless you enjoy it . Yeah , as soon as you enjoy it

34:26

. And it's your community , well , now you can

34:28

be part of it and people will be super

34:30

excited about your podcast because , hey

34:33

, this is our person and they're making a podcast

34:35

for our community . It's really cool

34:37

versus somebody who just drops

34:39

in , says hey

34:42

, I made another post , throws

34:44

out the link and moves on with their life

34:47

. No community is really going to appreciate

34:49

that or get excited .

34:51

Everything is also a case by case basis , though . It's

34:53

very hard to give advice for general

34:56

populations , because you could find

34:58

luck person listening to this . You could post

35:00

something random and the algorithm gods might like

35:02

you and just decide to boost that post and then you

35:05

get tons of listeners and you'll be like Alvin and Ariel

35:07

are idiots . But for the majority

35:09

of you , I

35:11

would choose a place where you like spending time

35:13

. Choose a few minutes

35:15

every day to spend on social . I

35:17

think a lot of advice that you'll hear is like

35:19

if social is overwhelming for you , spend

35:22

one day a week , and if you do that , I

35:24

always say this don't post in ghosts . If you post something

35:26

and then don't show up for another week , a

35:28

lot of discourse is going to have happened without you there

35:30

and then you come back in and you respond to something . It's

35:33

gone . The moment is past . You

35:35

need to , unfortunately

35:37

or fortunately , depending on how you see it , how

35:39

the opportunity presents itself to you spend

35:42

a little bit of time every day interacting with people

35:44

. Interacting with not just

35:46

the people who are interacting with your posts , but interacting

35:48

with people in your general topic area and

35:50

giving value , sometimes agreeing with people

35:53

, sometimes disagreeing with people sometimes offering a counterpoint

35:55

, but spending time there .

35:57

Ariel , thank you so much for talking to us about podcast

35:59

growth and just getting your podcasts out to

36:01

the world . Are there any closing remarks you'd

36:03

like to give us or places people can follow you online

36:05

?

36:05

Definitely I have a closing remark . My closing remark

36:07

is April is Adopt

36:10

a Listener Month . I am working

36:12

with Tink Media to try to encourage people

36:14

to find somebody in their lives who doesn't

36:16

yet listen to a podcast , and find the perfect

36:18

podcast for them so that they listen to one podcast

36:20

, so that they then become obsessed , so that they then listen

36:22

to another podcast , so that we can just grow listenership

36:25

overall and get more creators paid . So

36:28

if you want to learn more about Adopt a Listener Month

36:30

, go to tinkmediaco . You

36:33

can find a bunch of different resources to help you

36:35

introduce podcasts to people . And if you want to find

36:37

me online , I'm on Twitter , at Ari

36:39

this and that you can reach me on email at arielle

36:42

, at earbudsaudio , and if you

36:44

Google my name , I am the only one who comes

36:46

up , because I'm the only one in the world as far as I know

36:48

, but would love to be proven wrong .

36:50

Thank you so much for being here , Ari .

36:52

Thank you , Alvin .