The Power and Potential of Podcasting
Hello and welcome to Seismic Podcasting. Hope you have arrived here after having heard the intro episode so you know what to expect, but just in case, I'm going to quickly recap. This is the podcast where I'll be showing you, trailblazers, visionaries, and change-makers, how you can help drive forward the change you seek in this world with your own podcast. Not only that, but I hope to equip you with everything you need to go ahead and make that podcast.
You might be wondering whether or not you have a good reason to podcast. Well, as we're going to explore, if you stand for something and want to speak up about it, if you have a story that your people will benefit from hearing, then your own podcast is a fantastic way to do that.
This week, to get us started, we're going to be taking a big picture look at podcasting. Not getting too lost in the nitty gritty just yet, but a holistic look at why you might want to consider a podcast as part of your ongoing marketing strategy. And if you're already considering it, then maybe you'll see just how powerful it could really be for your mission.
So why would you want to make a podcast? What use is that to your change-making business? There are loads of things you could be doing in your marketing strategy. So where does a podcast fit in?
To answer that, we need to consider some of the features of podcasting and why they might benefit you.
Five Unique Features of Podcasting
1. Long Format
How many other platforms are you using where you get to speak to your audience for an extended period of time? Think about when you listen to a podcast. Maybe it's a half-hour, 45 minutes, an hour, or maybe even more. How many other platforms allow you to engage with your community for that period of time?
2. Intimate and Personal
Podcasts are intimate and personal, conversational, and depending on the format you choose, they're usually not heavily edited. That means your audience has a chance to hear the real you—not the super polished version that appears in your social media or maybe your web copy, but the real you, the faces behind your mission.
3. Frequency and Trust
Podcasts have frequency built in and the market has learned to trust frequency. Now, imagine your target audience choosing to listen to your messaging, hearing about your impact, absorbing the stories you tell. They have opted into that. They have subscribed. That is incredibly powerful. And once they have opted in, they are likely to tune in and consume more of your episodes. Over time, you bring them deeper and deeper into your tribe. And providing that you're generously serving that tribe and bringing them more and more value, now you're building a movement—a community of people who carry your message forward for you.
4. Master Content
You're not just making a podcast. You're creating the first part of your content machine. Now, the content machine concept has been widely spoken about by many social marketers for some time, so I'm not going to cover that in too much detail. But if you do want to know more about it, have a quick Google of "content machine." You're going to find loads about it. In essence, and for today's purpose, it's a way of leveraging your single piece of content into many smaller pieces that can be distributed to platforms where short snippets are appropriate. That's things like Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, those kinds of platforms. And as a quick aside, if you're looking for an alternative to traditional social media, then I recommend checking out something called Curv (C U R V). They're doing social media a little bit differently.
5. Voice of Authority
The last point is to become the voice of authority in your niche. When you embrace the practice of showing up regularly to deliver insight and tackle the big questions and educate within your area of expertise, you start to establish yourself as a trusted source of information. Now, it does take time, but there are some quick wins along the way. You can start to build up that authority almost immediately. The moment that someone who has never heard of you stumbles across one of your videos, in that brief moment, you have become more of a voice of authority than you were before. It doesn't stop there—you are going to have to continue to deliver on that promise and that message, but that's exactly what your podcast is built to do. The connection you forge there leads to organic growth. Your listeners become your ambassadors. They share your message because they believe in it, not because you asked them to.
If you're trying to change a culture, trying to make a new set of norms, you need trust. Your message and story need to be told to the right people, over time, so they can elevate their status by telling their friends and peers. Take Shopify, for example. In their journey to becoming the dominant provider of e-commerce platforms, they released a podcast centered around the stories of successful e-commerce businesses and entrepreneurs with the aim to educate and inspire other entrepreneurs. When those stories are not just told but experienced by the kind of people who are thinking about starting an e-commerce business and seeking help, who do you think they're going to trust?
Addressing Common Concerns
Let's just consider the other side of this for a moment. Why shouldn't you make a podcast, or why wouldn't you? Maybe you think there's too many. You know what? I agree. There are too many. For a long time now, podcasting has been a platform for perhaps three lads to gather around a table and chat nonsense and come away from it thinking they've made gold.
There are about 3 million podcasts out there, but compare that to YouTube's 114 million channels. I think we're only just getting started, and to me, the platform is starting to mature and reward valuable content.
Let's also consider an older medium of content: books. There are countless books on just about everything you can imagine. Now take the very, very best sellers—the most successful of all books. How many people do you think they reach? Well, if we take the U.S., for example, I can tell you that the best-case scenario is those books will reach 2 percent of the population. 2 percent. 98 percent won't ever buy it, read it, or even know it exists. And yet, they are wildly successful. So you don't need to cut through the noise with the aim to find mass market appeal. The real opportunity lies in finding the first 1,000 people who would genuinely miss you if you stopped making your show.
You'll probably never reach Joe Rogan levels of fame, but that's fine. That's a good thing. You don't need to. You're not solely becoming a podcaster here. You only need a small number of the right people to start talking about you to more of the right people. That is how a podcast can support your existing work. The world is abundant with plenty of ears for everyone.
Return on Investment (ROI)
The second problem that you might struggle with is ROI, return on investment, or in other words, what's the business case for this. So we think it's important to understand the difference between direct marketing versus brand marketing. This is something that was first spoken about by Lester Wunderman.
Direct marketing is things like ad spend. It has clear, measurable metrics that you can and should follow to assess how well that piece of advertising is doing. Is it achieving clicks? Are those clicks converting to sales? That sort of thing. Brand marketing, on the other hand, is far less easy to measure. You should avoid doing so to make sure that you don't cut it off early because it's seemingly not working. It takes time. A billboard is a good example. It's almost impossible to measure whether or not someone saw your billboard and then later went on to buy something from you. They might, but it's unlikely. And even if they did, how would you possibly know? Podcasts are more like a billboard than ad spend.
There are, in fact, a number of metrics that you can track with ease, such as downloads and followers. But be careful, because what can easily be measured can easily be won by your competitors in a race to the bottom. When we make seismic podcasts, we're less concerned with these kinds of metrics and instead focus on making sure that the content is consistently in line with inspiring, empowering, and educating the community it was built for. That community probably isn't built up of people who click on ads.
Summary
To summarise today's episode, the reasons that you might want to consider a podcast as part of your marketing strategy are as follows:
- It's a chance to connect with your audience for long periods of time.
- It's an opportunity for them to get to know the real you.
- It's a way to build trust.
- It's a content machine goldmine.
- It's a road to becoming a voice of authority in your industry.
And why are those things important? Because they are what you're going to need if you're hoping to create a movement so powerful that real change starts to happen.
So, ask yourself this: What about us do we want our customers, clients, or community to hear and to believe because it's true? What do we stand for and want to speak about? If you have a good answer for that, then you have a very good reason to start a podcast.
Podcasts as a Platform for Movements