Don’t have enough time or patience to read an article or blog on a topic that you’re interested in?
What if you get it in a capsule form, easy to consume? What if someone could read it for you?
You just need to listen to it, even while driving, cooking or jogging.
Yes, we’re discussing podcasts, their popularity and why businesses should create more informative podcasts, their SEO value, and more.
Podcasts represent a fun and engaging way to connect with new audience segments. Even though podcasts have been around for decades, they are getting more popular now. This calls for dedicated effort on your part to have your own business podcast. Make this process easy with the services provided by an organic SEO company that can get your podcast rank on top podcasting sites and increase engagement.
So, why do you need podcasts? The number of people listening to podcasts all over the world is now increasing. Compared to reading or watching, podcasts kindle mental imagery more powerfully, as a study shows. With podcasts, listeners can find information on whatever topic, whenever and wherever they want it. Whether you’re interested in movies, sports, comedy, food, current affairs or any other, there will be podcasts for the same in SERPs.
“The number of US podcast listeners is increasing 16% in a year”, reports Insider Intelligence.
Podcasting Market Size to Expand in Future Years
According to a report from Research and Markets, the global podcasting market size is estimated to reach USD 94.88 billion by 2028, expanding at an estimated CAGR of 31.1% from 2021 to 2028.
Statistics That Highlight the Popularity of Podcasts
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Types of Podcasts
- Interview/ conversational
In an interview podcast format, the host typically interviews new guests in each episode and the aim is to share the guest’s experience or talent. This podcast begins with a brief guest introduction and then moves on to asking questions to guide the conversation around a specific topic.
Here’s an example –Sharing the podcast episode across social media profiles opens up the opportunity to reach a whole new set of audience.
For any content format you choose, make sure to focus on the experience you want to create for your guests. People will be happier and more willing to share interesting and informative episodes.
- Solo format
This podcast format is mainly used to share one’s expertise in the industry. It helps build a personal brand. While some solo podcasts describe only key points, others may be lengthy with a huge amount of information. Detailed preparation with complete scripts will make solo commentaries more interesting for listeners.
Solo podcasts make it much easier to build a strong connection with the audience, as you’re speaking directly to the listener.
- Nonfiction narrative
Podcasts support different forms of storytelling. Those who like reading stories will definitely love storytelling podcasts. In this format, each storytelling episode is structured as a narrative. In certain cases, multiple episodes are joined together to form an expansive narrative.
Here’s an example from This American life, one of the most popular storytelling podcasts.
- Repurposed content podcasts
Here, the podcast content is repurposed. The content contains the same message, but is delivered in a new and creative way. Repurposing old content helps reach new listeners and thus maximize your podcast content.
Being an experienced digital marketing agency providing services for diverse industries, we create audio podcasts out of our blogs that reflect our expertise in the industry.
Listen to our podcast on Effective Local SEO Strategies for Construction Business
Choosing the right podcast type depends on your audience’s interest. Organize your content in the right format and make it easily accessible to listeners.
Why Podcasts are Popular
Improve knowledge on any topic
Nearly three out of every four podcast consumers in the US say they enjoy tuning in to podcasts to learn new things and do so on a monthly basis (Statista).
Nine out of every ten podcast listeners in the U.S. say they listen to podcasts at home. (Edison Research)
Podcasts are not only a form of entertainment; they are also a source of news and inspiration for listeners. This audio episode helps listeners to learn more about any topics that interest them let that be current events, news, education, movies, automobiles, fashion, IT or any other. Audiences can learn new skills, pick up information related to the industry they work in, and gain valuable insights.
Listeners can get information on any topic of interest.
Allows multitasking
Anyone can listen to podcasts at their convenience and that’s the major reason that more and more businesses as well as individuals are creating podcasts to reach their target audience. People don’t need any dedicated time to listen to podcasts. Instead, they can listen to an audio episode even while cleaning, running or cooking, which means listeners can multitask.
Why should businesses create podcasts?
54 percent of podcast listeners are either somewhat or much more likely to consider buying from a brand after hearing its advertisement on a podcast (eMarketer, 2019).
Business podcasts are getting increasingly popular.
It has been proven that the words on a web page cannot engage an audience as well as a voice can. If your audience likes listening to stories, learn something new, catch up on current events, then podcasts can meet these requirements. A podcast brings the following advantages.
- Faster engagement with audience
- Showcases expertise
- Increases trust
- Improves brand awareness
- Improve search engine rankings
Real-time engagement with your audience
Podcasts provide a great opportunity to reach and connect with a busy audience looking for information or services that are related to your industry. Real-time engagement allows listeners to stay updated and engaged. The internal teams including marketing, sales and leadership teams also collaborate. It provides the option to communicate with your audience on a more personal scale.
Showcase your expertise
Creating educational podcasts helps share your expertise in the niche and thus more and more listeners will trust your brand, which leads to higher conversion rates. Highlighting experience demonstrates your brand as a trustworthy business.
Reach a wider audience
People always look for easily accessible content. Podcasts that appear in search engine results, make it even easier for customers to reach you. As the podcast includes conversation directly to the listener, either as audio or through video, this content format serves as a friendlier way of getting information than reading the whole page or e-mail.
Marketing at low costs
Being an easy-to-access digital format, podcasts eliminate many costs associated with other traditional advertising options including printing and posters, and paper consumption. Easy to archive, podcasts are also easy to update.
Don’t forget
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Focus on using videos and podcasts most effectively for marketing, personal branding, and sales.
How to optimize your podcasts for search engines
Making your podcasts rank well on search engines requires dedicated effort. It was in 2019 that Google announced that podcasts will be indexed.
Technologies such as AI and natural language processing have made it easy for search engines to index keywords within the podcast content and rank them accordingly.
Podcast SEO tips to optimize your episode
- Add the right keywords
- Include accurate transcripts
- Promote your podcast on social media
- Use clear call-to-actions
- Choose the right platform to submit your podcast
- Include video content too
To optimize your podcast for SEO and your targeted audience,
Add keywords to your podcast episodes
Choose a list of keywords that your targeted audience will be using to search for your services of products. Use those keywords in your podcast episode so that it will improve your visibility in search results.
Make sure to choose appropriate, clear, and descriptive titles. Add keywords of high search volume but low competition wherever possible, throughout the podcast. Keywords tell search engines that the podcast is relevant to a user’s search, which increases the chances to feature them in results. Key areas where you can include keywords are podcast title, URL of the post, subheadings, image file names as well as the beginning and end of the page content.
Include the episode’s transcript
Just like keywords, transcripts can greatly improve the discoverability of your podcast. Adding accurate transcripts make this content format more accessible to people, giving a clear, readable guide of everything that was covered in the episode.
Diverse tools are available to transcribe audio and video recordings. Consider adding more keywords, even the ones that weren’t included in the recording.
Use call-to-actions during podcast episodes
Make sure to add call-to-actions (CTAs) that encourage viewers to take further action.
Include direct call-to-actions (CTAs) like “For support, call us at xxxxxxxx” or use phrases that prompt them to write a review or follow your account. For instance, consider asking something like, “Have you experienced such difficulties before?” or “Check out more content on this topic”.
Choose the right podcast platform
Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts and Spotify are some major distribution platforms that allow others to access your podcast episodes and listen to them. Podcast hosting and distribution is now easy with diverse advanced platforms. Podcast hosting platform is necessary to store audio and video files online for distribution and download.
To choose the right hosting platform, consider key factors such as storage, bandwidth limit, analytics reporting, compatibility, ease of use, price, and possibility of monetization.
Include video elements
To expand your reach, consider adding video and/or live streaming into your workflow. Having a video element in your podcast helps you to get your content, keywords, and brand into the YouTube search results.
Monetizing Your Podcast
Podcast ad revenues in the US are expected to continue rising and surpass $2 billion annually by 2023.
(eMarketer, 2021)
Podcasts not only help build relationships and authority, they are also a good source of income for brands. Once you have developed a community of listeners for your podcast, you can consider earning with certain proven podcast monetization strategies.
Sponsorship
Sponsorship deals refer to partnering with relevant sponsors within your niche and advertising their product or service. To meet the podcast equipment and production costs, many brands take on sponsors and do small ad reads to help cover the cost. Podcast advertising helps companies to attract new business from the podcast audience.
Affiliate marketing
With an affiliate marketing program, creators will be referring to other companies, people, products or services in their podcast. When someone makes a purchase or clicks on the affiliate link, you’ll get a commission from the sale.
Companies can benefit from affiliate programs offered by Skill share or Amazon. They can also consider joining a network like ShareASale or use plugins like Lasso that allow creating short links that redirect to a special tracking link.
Courses
Creating courses is another way to make money out of your episodes. Consider creating online courses to teach the content or topic that you usually discuss on your podcasts and that you are experienced with. Also, promote those courses using webinar platforms such as Demio, GoToWebinar, WebinarJam, and Livestorm among others.
Sell premium content
Offer premium content such as additional interviews, Q&A sessions, live recorded show, ad-free RSS feed, and more and sell those content by charging a subscription fee for special or exclusive content. Make sure such content is not available on your regular podcast feed.
Donations
Asking for donations is another simple option. Many audiences will be willing to donate to support their favorite podcast show. Choose a trustworthy platform to accept donations. Be transparent with your audience and provide clear reasons on why you need donation.
Podcast monetization – Tips
- Never promote junk products or services
- Any content you provide must have value for the audience
Each business has a unique set of audience. Start a podcast on what your business does, your services, or principles – it can serve as a powerful digital marketing tactic that is also highly beneficial to the listeners.
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