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15 Tips to Help You Get More Podcast Subscribers

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The growing popularity of podcasts is similar with blogs in many ways. Blogs are making it big as an avenue for people to create their own magazines, periodicals, newspapers, and now podcasts. It continues to harvest fame as a useful platform for anyone who wants to make their own radio show. In fact, numbers don’t lie as 67 million Americans listen to podcasts every month, the figures are simply astonishing.

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Nowadays, setting up a podcast is a piece of cake with the help of professional broadcasting equipment that is available for a fraction of the price. Anyone can host their own show. But, what is a show with only a few listeners next to nothing? Sure, your family and your friends might tune in, but how do you grow from there? How will you attract more audience?

Worry no more because this article is for podcasters who are in the quest of good strategies to get more subscribers. If you’re ready, let’s get started!

1. Create Compelling Cover Ads

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In the era of information overload, people have high tendency to make hasty decisions. It’s one of the reasons why making engaging and attractive cover art makes a difference between winning a subscriber and a person ignoring you.

Making a professional cover art doesn’t have to be expensive. Your art covert should catch the attention of people even when it’s scaled down to the smallest pixel.

2. Make an Interesting Description For Your Podcasts

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Creating your XML (Extensible Markup Language) feed requires a description of your podcast. After pinning some attention from your cover art, a good podcast description is a key to convince potential listeners to press the subscription button.

Your description must answer the following:

  • What is your podcast all about?
  • How often will you broadcast a new episode?
  • How will you help your listeners?
  • What media format are you going to use?

One good way to write an eyeball-grabbing description is to write like you are speaking. You need to show off your personality so that you can establish a genuine engagement with your listeners.

3. Create a Search-Friendly Descriptions

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Your description is one of the guiding factors for people to locate your podcast. You should use words that people search for when looking for pieces of information in your podcast. It will improve your chances of reaching individuals who are desperate to connect with your podcast through search.

Ask this question to yourself, “What will people search for when they need to access to the information I’m sharing?” Then create a list of words and phrases, and run them through Google’s keyword tool for refinement.

4. Make a Good Title

Creating and selecting a good title takes time but don’t give yourself a hard time by making it overly complicated. Make it simple but timely and relevant.

Your potential listeners must know what exactly they’ll get from your podcast just by reading your title. With that, create a no-nonsense and on-point title. Stop beating around the bush.

5. Take your cue from the following lines below:

  • The Property Podcast
  • Irish History Podcast
  • Baseball America
  • The Self Publishing Podcast
  • Zencast

These titles give you a clear picture right away of what the podcast will be all about.

6. Submit to Other Podcast Directories

When it comes to a podcast, iTunes is the major player. Even so, you need to include your podcast with other directories to reach as many people as possible. These include:

  • Podcast Directory
  • Podnova
  • iPodderX
  • PodBean
  • Podfeed.net
  • Podcast.com
  • Podcast Pickle
  • Podcast Alley

Moreover, you can add your podcast to the directory of Learn Out Loud if you’re teaching your listeners new things.

7. Make a Great Show

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A great show is the backbone of every podcast. Your efforts for advertising, marketing or promotion will just go down the drain if your show is horrible.

No worries here though as you don’t have to be a professional to conjure a good show. All you have to do is follow the two most important cornerstones of a great podcast.

  • An excellent content that is relevant, helpful, compelling and entertaining that make your audience think, laugh, cry or groan.
  • A lively presentation that authoritative, personable, and communicates clearly with the audience.

Promotion, production and profit matter too but the presentation and content issues should always be your top priority. Before you decide to invest in another medium to acquire more audience, make sure you have something that is worth promoting. Otherwise, you’ll just waste your time promoting wrong contents.

8. Make People Talk About You

Word of mouth has always been a powerful marketing tool. Some even say that it’s the most potent marketing method.

Make your podcast so compelling that people want to talk about it even after listening to your show. They’ll tell their family, friends, and coworkers. Make your audience as your ambassadors. It’s as easy as asking your audience to share your show and make it easier with sharing tools and friendly links.

It also helps if you can get the attention of other influencers according to their value and relevance, not their size. Start with building a relationship, even if that means building it while you go.

9. Invest Where Your Audience Is

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Going where your potential audience goes isn’t enough. You need to invest. Investing demands an exchange of value. Before you get an audience, give something valuable.

Join and start conversations or you can participate as a peer. When relevant and appropriate, you might get the chance to link back to your podcast. If you do so after your investing, the returns are substantial.

10. Be Noteworthy

Making your podcast noteworthy doesn’t mean you have to get in ‘New and Noteworthy,’ it’s not the point here. New and Noteworthy is probably the most overhyped and misused parts of podcasting marketing. In fact, a big chunk of what people say about it is false.

Try to be noteworthy instead of depending to some mythical magic. Do something noteworthy if you want to be noteworthy.

11. Ask for Reviews

Everything nowadays gets online reviews, from books to movies to hotels, you name it. Most of us like reviews because we trust other people’s opinion more than our own. In a marketing perspective, a review is a form of social proof. When you see that other people enjoy something, you have this notion that you’ll enjoy it too.

And podcasts are not an exception when it comes to reviews. The more reviews you generate on iTunes, the more audience you can acquire. Don’t be afraid to tell your listeners to leave a review if they enjoy your show on iTunes.

12. Turn Readers into Listeners and Listeners into Readers

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Do you have an email list or blog? If yes, let your readers know about it. In turn, let your listeners in podcast know about your blog or email list too! Your listeners will feel as though they know you as a friend because podcasting is an intimate medium.

It will drive them to hear from you as much as possible including through email. An email subscription also widens your audience base beyond those who subscribe to your RSS feed or who use iTunes. It’s specifically important if your listeners are more mature because they’re more likely show interest with email compared to other mediums.

13. Set up a Website for Your Podcast

You can set up a WordPress site for your podcast for just a few dollars. It will be your platform to interact with readers. Most of all, it gives an opportunity for people to discover and explore your podcast. Also, people who don’t use iTunes can locate your website through Google search.

64 % of people use to listen to a podcast through their mobile devices so make your site interactive and mobile-friendly. One perfect example of how a simple website creates a podcasting community is The Self Publishing Podcast’s website. If you visit the site, you’ll see the sign-up option for email updates, and notice how the hosts gently promote their products. You can take your inspiration from them.

14. Interview Thought Leaders

If you want a simple method to shine a light on your podcast and create remarkable contents, then invite and interview thought leaders in your niche. Choose those who have big followers on social channels.

You’ll obtain exposure and new subscribers if they share with their audience that they make an appearance on your podcast.

15. Encourage Listener Interaction

What makes podcasts ideal for fostering engagement with your fans is that it’s a personal medium and your audience prefer it this way. They like to listen to someone whom they can consider as a friend and this where interaction begins.

You can set up an answering machine for your listeners. Let them ask questions on Facebook and Twitter. Not only will it strengthen your bond together, but it will also render you a better understanding of what your audience needs, wants and expects from your podcast. They will give you an insight on how to make your podcast great.

16. Hang Out – Be the Cool Kid

Podcasting is not just about mixing and recording your broadcast. It’s also about engaging as wide as you can to grow your audience. Create a Facebook and Twitter page for your podcast. Spend time on your social channels and hang out with your followers, as easy as that.

You can reach out to new fans through visiting online forums that relate to your niche. Be helpful and polite. You know, blatant self-promotion is a big no-no when it comes to marketing. So be the cool kid and hang out!

Bonus Tip: Be Real

The more genuine you interact with your listeners, the more they’ll love and respect what you do. But of course, it doesn’t mean that you need to open the curtains on every aspect of your private life. After all, it is private.

However, it also means letting loose your natural humor and charm. Learn to relax when you’re talking, speak in a welcoming voice as you would to your family or close friends. Now that we’re talking about being real here might as well give your listeners a chance to meet you in person face to face.

You become a celebrity to your audience’s minds that it only fits to make them through a meet and greet activities. It doesn’t have to be grand, a simple gathering over good foods and drinks and hearty conversations will do.

Takeaway

There are hundreds of unique strategies and opportunities to promote your podcast, so you must not limit yourself to what you read on the list. Test everything that you know, and if you come up with a new idea, test it too!

Author: Mari Jasmine Smith

Mari Jasmine Smith is a content writer for Nycseoauthority.com by profession whose primary interests lie mainly in digital marketing and search engine optimization NYC and technology as well. Besides writing, she also loves traveling and names Europe as her favorite destination.

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