Buzzcast

Did Spotify Fix Podcasting's Findability Problem? + The Curse of Knowledge

November 22, 2019 Buzzsprout Episode 13
Buzzcast
Did Spotify Fix Podcasting's Findability Problem? + The Curse of Knowledge
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Show Notes Transcript Chapter Markers

This week we cover some new updates from Apple Podcasts and Spotify (hint: one could be a pretty big deal), talk about the "curse of knowledge" and its impact on your podcast, and share some uncommon podcast growth strategies.

Check out our epic marketing blog where 50 podcasters share the tactics they use to grow their shows.

Have an idea for something we should talk about? Submit a topic in our Listener Suggestions form or post it in the Buzzsprout Podcast Community on Facebook.

Have a question? Shoot us an email at support@buzzsprout.com

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Thanks for listening & keep podcasting!

Travis:   0:00
if you don't use ah, male chimp, I imagine there's probably Sum's a peer connections. Yes, with all the other, because I don't have connections. Happier, happier Xavier. Um, tomato. Tomato. I actually don't know anyone who calls it a tomato. That's true. I don't think I've ever heard that. Otto Yes, pecan or pecan? That's more contextual. Depends on if it's a pie or not.

Alban:   0:22
If I can go off the

Travis:   0:24
rails. Hey, guys, welcome back to another episode of Buzz cast. We've got our usual suspects this week myself, Kevin Alban and some fun podcast directory news to jump into fund for some of us. We'll see. We'll see where Kevin Lands will

Alban:   0:41
jump into from the Grumpy Car, too. I don't like any of these changes that's not remembered. Podcast. He was only for iPods. I am

Kevin:   0:53
not cynical. I I hope I'm not cynical. I

Alban:   0:57
we haven't even enough the way talking about, so the first thing

Travis:   1:02
I want to talk about was an email that it's it's a better news that could be helpful for people that are getting started podcasting or are thinking about launching a new show. I want to do some kind of pre marketing and build up anticipation and also do their due diligence and get their podcast listed everywhere before they launch. Apple Podcast said that Now there's a feature inside a podcast. Connect where you can hide your podcast so you could submit your R s s feed and get approval from Apple. And they typically take longer than most the other directories. And so we encourage people submit a trailer upside 12 apple podcasts as quickly as possible so you can get in there. So when you actually launch, you're already everywhere, right? Well, so now apple will let you submit and hide your podcast. So if you wanted to launch with, like, three episodes, you don't want those episodes showing up. You can hide your podcast and then unhygienic when you're ready. Tow watch. Which I thought was a cool, cool little feature.

Alban:   1:58
Yeah, I think it's ah. I mean, this isn't like a game changer for the industry, but I do think it's a good thing to have, because Apple, in a smart way, has always said, you're not we're not gonna sub like approve your show until you have at least a episode and So what ended up happening was we kind of did these fake these little trailers And they often we're not a real trailer. Like with a real audience. They were just like a Hey, this show is gonna come out next week so that you could basically pick your launch date. That was the main point of those trailers. It's why we told people to make trailers. And now you can just record your podcast, put it in there, put it on hold and get the other directors pretty quickly and take it off and you're ready to go on launch day.

Kevin:   2:44
Yeah, I think I'm gonna ask some questions about it. I don't really fully understand the feature and maybe Travis or album you do a little bit better. So I saw the part that when you can hide a podcast, I saw that. And then it says, If you hide, it takes up to 24 hours to hide. So I'm assuming unhygienic. Also take about 24 hours, which is great because typically, submitting a new podcast can take up to two weeks. And so I'm assuming they're doing this because I like having a launch day in building sort of event around your podcast launch is becoming more and more of a thing and a smart strategy. So I think they're trying to accommodate that, which is really cool. My question is, is when you first submit your show, do they have an option to, like, get this approved and keep it hidden?

Travis:   3:27
Well, so once you submit your podcast through podcast, connect, then once you finish the submission process, you can see, like, waiting for approval or like in processing. So instead of a green dot saying that it's live, you'll have a yellow dot and so you can go in and edit it with that yellow dot and say, Hide the podcast. Okay, so it's not like it'll show up and then disappear. You can in the process of getting it approved after you complete the submission, you say I want to hide this podcast.

Kevin:   3:54
That sounds cool. We should update our maybe our submit guides or instructions to make people aware of that. Yeah,

Travis:   4:00
yeah, so we'll definitely make sure that people know about that. That doesn't necessarily mean don't record a trailer because of the second piece of news that we're gonna dive into, which is that Spotify just released a new We'll call it a feature. We call it a feature inside of their app where they are promising that they're gonna promote podcast that you haven't listened to yet that you're not subscribe to that they think you will like listening to. So this is kind of like a Pandora thing. Um, Spotify does this with their own curated playlists. Right? So my wife listens to a playlist where it's like nineties pop.

Kevin:   4:36
She listens that on Spotify,

Travis:   4:37
right? Kevin, give me

Alban:   4:39
the glare that actually,

Kevin:   4:41
that's against company Policy

Travis:   4:42
way. Should I have disclosed that in thy entrance interview? By the way, I have a Spotify account.

Alban:   4:49
Everyone here as a spot. I guess that may excited. I haven't even apple. I'm apple music. But Tom and John are big Spotify villians.

Travis:   4:57
So So they do. They do a pretty good job of, like, curating these playlists. And you're like, Oh, yeah, I totally forgot about that song. And then, yeah, I used to listen to that band, but I didn't actually look for them somehow spot if I just knew that that's something that I would like listening to you. So they're gonna start doing that with podcasts.

Kevin:   5:12
Fun? How much Spotify knows about you?

Travis:   5:15
Like like I

Alban:   5:16
t used. We'll see how Kevin feels about anyone who's listening to this for the first time. Kevin is getting more more apprehensive about Spotify Big data.

Kevin:   5:27
Yeah, I'm I'm I'm, uh Cut that out online.

Alban:   5:31
I don't get it out.

Kevin:   5:34
I'm an online privacy advocate, I guess. Maybe not like and and as much as some people like, I'm not out there like, you know, picketing on the streets. But I believe in on my privacy. And so the Maur that these tech companies know about me, I'm not excited about it. Even if they spend the use of my private data for my benefit, I still I'm very weary. I ask, you know, I'm hesitant to get excited about features like that. Now, that's not to say that's what Spotify is doing here. I think it's very easy to make podcast associations and recommendations based on your listening habit without them having to invade my personal privacy to do that. Yeah, right. Like there's a good chance if I listen to this show, I would also like this show like audience crossover, similar genres, whatever. I'm not saying Spotify is getting into my personal information. Do it. But at the same time, I am where you have stuff like that and so I'll keep an eye on it. And if we see anything that you should know about as listeners or what, I would be happy to report it and give you our take. And you can formulate your intake.

Alban:   6:36
Yeah, I remember I listened to, um when Pandora came out with their new podcast recommendations, I was super pumped because remember, college, like when Pandora was new, listening to tons of songs and like, ranking them all religiously because then I was finding all this new cool music. And so I was like, Yes, we're going to stay with podcasts. The difference was I'm listening to these podcasts Upsets there 45 minutes long, and I'm, like, up vote. And then it's like, OK only got through one episode today, whereas with Pandora, I'd listen to 30 new songs in a day. And so I think the algorithm was taking a little bit longer to catch on, so it was a little bit slower. Um, would be interested to see how Spotify is able to do e guess. You probably have to have all your listening habits inside of Spotify for them to really have good data to be able to figure out how you're gonna love this new show.

Travis:   7:30
Yeah, well, since I'm a heretic in the office and I have Spotify, I decided to go ahead and try it out. Um,

Alban:   7:35
some poor person responded. Guys, listen to this Going why do they hate

Kevin:   7:39
Travis Doesn't hate, you

Travis:   7:40
know. And so So essentially, what happened? Or the way the new feature rolled out is when you go to your home page. If you scroll down to your top podcasts, which are the podcast that you subscribe to, there's gonna be a new, uh, option called your daily podcasts. And then in your daily podcast that has, like, Okay, these are the podcast that you're subscribed to hear some new episodes from this podcast. And if you scroll down, you'll see this little. It's like a like a semi episode with the Spotify logo that says, Try a new show and the below that has podcast episodes from podcasts that you're not subscribe to, Um, and the way that they say that they use the data is they look atyour listening habits from the previous 90 days and curate a play a play list based on that. So if you listen to a lot of podcasts on Spotify, then their suggestions are gonna be better tailored for you than if you listen to, like, four. In the last three months, Um and so I don't I don't use Spotify is my daily driver for podcast listening. So I just went in and clicked on a bunch of their from random podcast to get the featured open up for me. And so I'm getting kind of a lot of the bigger podcast. The ones that you would see on the Apple 200 charts could spot if I was like, Hey, these air safe bets like everybody, sort of armchair expert, whether you like it or not, it's a different story, but they're gonna promote that one serial killers they're gonna see if I like true crime podcasts. The trailer for the Oprah podcast is on here. An episode of the daily is on here, and so So what Spotify is trying to dio is they're trying to introduce you to more podcasts. So you listen to your podcasts so you keep using the Spotify at more right like that's their goal is to keep you in the app. And so it's in their best interest to make. This is great as possible. Um, and so hopefully what? This does my my dream for it. I'm a little more may be optimistic, um, is that this allows people that are more casual listeners that maybe on Lee looked through like the top charts are going to get exposed to more independent podcasts, the march charting but align with their listening habits. Really? Well, that's that's what I hope happens kind of the jury's out. This literally just launched today. Um, so very early in the process of seeing kind of wear. Spotify goes with this, but ah, you know, find ability has always been an uphill battle for podcasters. And so I think

Kevin:   9:59
so. I don't want to sound

Travis:   10:00
pessimistic. Consider all things being considered, this could be a net

Alban:   10:03
positive. I don't want

Kevin:   10:04
to sound pessimistic. Let me push back a little bit because read me the list of recommendations again. Now again. This was a three minute test case, but our first test case. They're recommending what?

Travis:   10:13
So I have the trailer for armchair expert, which is Ah, podcast by Dex Sheppard. Right. Celebrity. I've got the trailer for serial killers, which is a Ah, that's right. I've got it. Ah, full episode from my favorite murder. Super popular true crime podcast. Yep. I've got a full episode for lore.

Kevin:   10:33
Super popular. That's wondering network, Right?

Travis:   10:36
Uh, I believe so. I've got an episode for and that's why we drink.

Kevin:   10:40
I don't know that one. Is that Indy?

Travis:   10:42
I said I have never seen it before. Apparently, they think that I like to drink a lot. I've got an episode for the daily Super popular, and then I've gotta try,

Alban:   10:51
Downloaded of popular.

Travis:   10:53
And I've got a trailer for Oprah's Super Soul conversation. Oprah I'm not familiar with, um she doesn't have a pretty big podcasts,

Alban:   11:01
and that's why we drink. I pulled it up on charitable. Um, it's it's a top 200 show, but it's not. Maybe not the top. I mean stitcher. It's the 70. If most shared podcast, it's 28. Ah, society and culture.

Kevin:   11:18
Okay, so that's pretty hopeful. I mean, it's obvious that that a lot of these hugely popular shows are going to make smart recommendations, right? But if we could get one or two Indy shows in the list of recommendations, I think that's a win,

Travis:   11:31
right? Well, especially let's say that you listen to a lot of business niche podcasts, for instance. Right. And so you're already subscribed to the popular ones. What are they going to show you? Well, first, we're going to show you if Spotify has any of their podcast that they think fit you, then they're gonna show you those, right, cause they're paying money to make those. But then they're gonna They're gonna think what the other business podcast this person might like. And that's where those can really bubble up to the surface. Um, so I do think it has some potential for fine ability. And just in this kind of first experience with it, noticing that half of them are trailers makes sense. It makes sense to me if I'm gonna try a new podcast. I don't necessarily want to listen to an hour and 1/2 episode, but I'll listen to to a three minute trailer to see if it's something I might be interested in,

Kevin:   12:18
this is a smarter implementation Apple podcast early does this If you're listening to a podcast episode Napa podcast and then you scroll down below, like the show notes and all that stuff at the very bottom that have a section called you might also like and they're making associations between podcast. So you're listening to this, and people who have subscribed to this show also subscribe to these shows. Um, but this is a smarter way to do it by featuring, um, doing as a playlist. First of all is a smart way to do it. So we already know that you want to listen to some podcast episodes here, some that you already subscribed to and then just going right after that. Here's some new podcast that you haven't listened to that you might like. And then doing playing the trailers instead of like full episodes is a great way to people. Get people engaged in the show to see if they want to listen to more. So I like it. I hope that other podcasts APS learn from this and build upon it like there was an app years ago called Swoop. I think it was one of the first articles. That was one of the first articles that you wrote for our blawg. Did you do a review of sweet? At one point, we had a review of sweet but sweet was this app that played short snippets of podcasts. And so you would just load up suit. You would choose a couple categories that you like and you hit play, and we didn't have trailers at the time, But it would just play like the 1st 2 or three minutes of a podcast like random segments. And if you liked it, you and you could just hit subscribe. It would just describe that show. But it was kind of like like, um, listening to the radio in your car and you're on What's that mode called? Bird just goes through different stations when you're scanning. Scanning? Yeah, it was like a podcast scanner. Apple bought it, and I thought that they were gonna do something cool with the technology, like build into the podcast up or something. But they never did her haven't yet. Um, but something like this would be really helpful with podcast discovery. So I like that Spotify is trying to innovate in this area and maybe this is a huge win. Maybe it's not. But any progress in this area is helpful for podcasters, especially independent podcasters.

Alban:   14:10
Um, I pulled up the apple pie cast preview just to see s so I went to buzz cast. So if you're listening to this show, you probably also like these podcasts. Five minute Monday with Travis Albritton, Podcasting in real life, retired, but also a Traves Albritton. How to start a podcast with Travis and I build a big podcast the podcaster lab Podcasting Coach pot news How to start a podcast, step by step podcasting fied. If you listen to the show, apparently you just listen to a time of podcasts about podcasting, um, the top 15 or all other podcasts about podcasting shows and this kind of maybe leads into one of things that has never felt super excited me about almost any, um, recommendation engines is like you think of YouTube. The whole goal is to actually make you a little bit more boring and predictable. And so if you're the type of person who I mean, isn't this a little boring? if someone said to me, Listen, a bus cast, Why don't you listen to the same people talking about podcasting in a different format? Well, there's a good likelihood you'll enjoy that. But do you want to become someone who on Lee? Not. I mean, some people probably listen to a bunch of these, but they're not boring. But if you listen to, like, Onley podcasts about podcasting, you're missing out on a lot of other good stuff. You're missing out on the cool, true crime, and you're missing out on the cool sports podcast and the one about your hobby. It reminds

Kevin:   15:41
me of, you know, the first time I launch Apple music. I'm sure Spotify does some something similar. I know Pandora does. When you first load the app, it asked you what your interests, and it tries to then recommend content based on your interest, not necessarily what you're listening to. Because if I'm just typing in my favorite artists, then they're just going to show me more artists that are similar or more music by those same artists, right? But if my primary music genre is rock, but I also open to the idea that I might like some country songs, you know, I might. Click Country is a genre of music that I'm interested in, even though I'm not naturally searching out those artists. But I'm totally fine with them, throwing country song in my mix once in a while, and I think that's what we need in podcasting. We need APS that help stretch us a little bit and show us Hey, there's Maurine this space than what you would just search for because if I can search for I don't need your recommendation engine, right?

Alban:   16:30
Yeah, I think that's what I get on YouTube That totally bummed me out. It's like I watch one show about I don't anything, anything you'd watch one show. I watch something about some football highlights, and then it's like, Do you want too much like entire games from 2014 of football games that are in the past and then watch, like 12 or football? It's I'm like, No, no, I'm like a casual football fan like it's cool this season highlights. Now I wanna move on to other stuff in my life and it feels like you tubes like No, I know you, man. Super football fan, you've got to come back for more amore, Amore or like Apple podcast is like You are obsessed with Kanye West and I was like, I think I just told you a point. Like I like his music. I'm not a super fan just yet.

Travis:   17:12
Yep. So to be interesting how all this plays out as faras practical advice. Just at first glance, it seems like Spotify is testing whether people are more likely to click on a trailer or a podcast episode, because again, it's very early on. So if you don't have a trailer, you can very easily record a 2 to 3 minute trailer back dated before Episode one and then publish it.

Kevin:   17:34
Yep, just make sure you mark it as a trailer on your episode list.

Travis:   17:37
Yeah, so when you go into when you're setting up your episode and you have all the field, you're filling out your episode description. The subtitle. That kind of stuff. And we have the season field, the episode field, and there's a drop down where you could put I think it's full episode, bonus and trailer. Yep, are the options. So you just want to make sure you label it is Trailer because then all the directories No. Hey, this is the trailer. Throw this up at the top.

Alban:   18:02
All right, So one thing Travis has got here on the list is talking about the curse of knowledge. And the curse of knowledge is whenever someone's an expert in the field, it's really, really hard for that person to remember what it was like to not know about that thing. And so you actually often have this weird dynamic where, um, the best person to teach a subject is often not the ultimate expert. It's somebody who's only one or two steps ahead of you. So you see this in schools where teachers actually use students who are headed to help teach students or maybe a little bit behind. Um, learning from people are just a little bit ahead of you. And one reason I like this, I topic is I was talking to Tom of what pods, and he's doing this like podcasting community. We're talking today and we're talking about communities, and I realized I was like, we totally see this in the podcasting community. Um, you see someone come in, they're like, Hey, what's the best microphone and, like the 1st 3 comments, will almost always be like, Are you kidding me? Used a search function like. And it's always people who are like That's the most basic question.

Travis:   19:12
Not in our Facebook group shortly,

Alban:   19:14
right? No, this is it. Yeah, this isn't really ours. Were a bit more strict on it, but I used to see it, and it's a bummer issue like you guys. This is the first person. This is his person. First question ever, and all they're getting is don't you know how to search? Which? It's like the curse of knowledge to the expert. That's the question I get asked all the time. What's the best host was the best microphone. How do I record? What's audacity? You know, these air pretty early questions, but everyone has him. And so it's almost like you've forgotten what it was like to enter this world. And thus you've lost empathy for it.

Travis:   19:53
Yeah, and we create. I don't know if you've noticed as ah, as a bus sprout content consumer. Um, I'm assuming you consume our contacts. You're listening to this episode? Uh, we do. We do have a lot of kind of entry level, just getting into podcasting content. And we're always coming up with new content. So even though we have, like, you know, this epic miniature e book on how to start a podcast on our website, we were still like, Well, let's also create a podcast. And then this week, we actually launched our howto start a podcast video Siris on YouTube. Video one is up right now, which you can go there. Really? Yes. Oh, yes. Only when we release this episode on Friday at this episode one of how to start a podcast on you see will be life. Okay, um and so So yes. So we're always going back to the well of how can we help people that are just getting started? And but it's not just for, you know, people like us companies like us that air serving people that are just getting started. But even as a podcaster, when you have an expertise, when you have a niche, it's very easy to talk above the people in your audience, right to assume that they know things that maybe they don't. And so one of the reasons I wanted to bring this up was really just a brainstorm and just kind of collect the wisdom that we've all gained over the last several years of ways to stay connected to the people that are following you. Right, because that's really the best way to not fall into the curse of knowledge, right to consistently be having conversations with the people you're helping with the people you're serving with your podcast to make sure that your episodes air relevance, right? Because the worst thing that can happen is you're making episodes. You don't know what your audience really needs, and then eventually they're like, You know what? This podcast isn't for me anymore, even though there's an opportunity there to really help them. So So I don't know. Is there anything that you guys have picked up over the years or conversations you've had or interactions you've had, where you've identified or been taught some different strategies or techniques for kind of staying in touch with your people?

Alban:   21:48
I think you've got to remember the majority of people are in that beginning stage, and they always always a majority of your audience will be in the beginning stage because people will drop out or they will move on to more advanced content or they'll be in a stage where they can train themselves. And if you want to be a service to a community, then I do think you always have to make yourself accessible to people who are kind of knew. Two things said Makes sense.

Travis:   22:20
Yeah, so one thing that Pat Flynn does that Flynn from the podcast is every every single month he will, like contact 10 to 15 new email subscribers and say, Hey, let's jump on a call just to see where they're coming from, what kind of problems we're facing to make sure that the content he's creating and the project he's working on are actually going to help and serve the people that are coming into his space. Um,

Kevin:   22:47
I love that. That's fantastic. I think what happens is it's, you know, in podcasting, specifically you you get to choose your audience. Um, and I think what we're talking about Tell me if I'm wrong, guys. But you might be thinking you have an audience that is these beginners, right? Whatever the topic is, but you're you think I'm attracting the beginners. But then you might be you know, talking above them or something like that. And there's nothing necessarily wrong with niche ing down and getting more specific or more technical on the topic that you are choosing. The problem is when there's a misalignment between the message sending and the audience that you think you have. Yeah, and also we want to make sure that you continually recognize that the more detailed arm or technical, more specific, more of an expert you become, the more niche your audience is going to be. So, um, you know, Travis is just talking about Pat Flynn. Pat Flynn is teaching, um, smart passive income techniques, and he's teaching ways to do that and get your message out in various mediums. And he's teaching it to beginners. But if he wanted to teach, like, um, leveling up so you already have an online marketing business, and how do we level that up? Well, now he just took his potential audience size from, say, 10 million down to two or three million, because there's a lot more people who are interested in starting that are exploring the idea. Then there are people who are already somewhat successful in, and now want to take it to the next level,

Alban:   24:10
kind of going back to my example about how people talk in the Facebook communities. I think that it the confusion is that if you've been in a community for five years, which some of the people there have been, you all must assume that everybody else has been there about as long as you. And so you're baffled when someone says, What's the best microphone you're like? Come on, man, we've been here forever. We've been at this party for a long time. Well, you have to remember the guy. Most of the people asking questions are brand new, and so their perspective is I just entered a new group and I have a great question to ask them, because I finally found people who understand this question, whereas you're on the opposite side going. I've been here for five years and I feel that 500 of the same the same question. Um, and the community is not built. Communities, I don't think should really be built for the 5 10 year veteran communities should really be built for the new people who need a little bit of understanding and help in the beginning. That's when you really need it. And so maybe that's one lesson I can take away from. This is, um, if you're going to be soon, serve a community. It's often people who are beginners and never lose sight of the fact that they probably have not listed every one of your episodes. They haven't been on this journey as long as you and if you're going to serve them. Probably the way to do that is to make sure you're not using like technical lingo. Getting frustrated at basic questions, et cetera, like most year audience, are going to be new

Kevin:   25:48
entrance. Well, I think there's certainly an opportunity to mature. You're content and mature your offerings to your audience as you start progressing. Or maybe I don't want to get bored because that's that's not the right connotation. But I feel like there will become a depth to your knowledge that will allow you to expand your offerings to your audience so as some of your audience will join you right from the beginning and they'll be on that same journey with you and then at a certain point you would say I'm kind of tired of talking about this stuff in a super high level, like an intro level, and I want to go deeper. I want to go next level. Um, and there will be, Let's say you had a couple 100 listeners who were with you. Initially, they'll be ready to go with you as well. Um, but maybe break that off into a separate offering. So maybe start another podcast or have bonus episodes where we do more in depth stuff or start an email newsletter. Um, maybe start private Facebook groups maybe do offer private coaching or mastermind groups like there's ways to expand your offerings for people who started your journey with you and are ready for the next level of the next level. The next level. But there might always be an opportunity like Tony Robbins or Gary Vaynerchuk, like they're getting up in giving motivational speeches. But if you look like the talk that Tony Robbins gave to 10,000 people at the seminar 10 years ago isn't super different than the one he's giving today. But 10 years ago, he might not have been running dozens of mastermind classes that he's running today as well So

Alban:   27:11
So you're saying maybe there's a time where you launch another community. If you're like, Hey, I'm ready to start doing something a bit more in depth here. Maybe it's incumbent on you. Tow. Launch something separate and say, Hey, anyone in community one Who's ready to graduate? Come with me over here community ones always gonna exist for the thousands of people who are just discovering this now,

Kevin:   27:34
right? And that's just being mindful and and aware that we don't want our content to be a mismatch for the audience that were attracting. So if we're doing a good job of attracting new people into let's just a funnel analogy into the top of this funnel, we don't want abandon the top of that funnel. If it's working well, just to be able to go to the next level deep, we want to keep that offering what it is and make sure the content they were putting out continues to speak to those people. And we have a new offering somewhere else. That is, You invite those people who came into the top of your funnel a new place to move and get a different level of content

Travis:   28:05
I think those are Those are all really great stuff, E. I wasn't I wasn't expecting the conversation to go that way, but I was very happy with where it went. Um, yeah, No. So I think especially the point that you made Kevin about being mindful of your audience, I think goes back to I think it's very easy as a podcast. You're to be selfish with your podcast and be like, Well, this is my podcast. And to a certain element of that is true, right, I can do creatively what I would like to do with my podcast. But the wise thing to do would be how do I continue to invest in the people that have rewarded me with their subscription and are continuing to listen to episodes? How do I make sure that I reinforced that that was a good decision and continue to build loyalty with them? Um, I think the point that you made about, you know, not even necessarily limiting yourself to one podcast or one way to connect with your audience, I think is a great perspective. And that's something I mean, we fragment are but our content as well, right? So we have different podcasts, which are totally different shows that serve different kinds of people, right? So, like how to start a podcast that Alvin United last year. That was for someone who's never started a podcast before, ever. And then we have five minute Mondays, which is kind of like a continuing education for people that are in podcasting. We're always learning new techniques and things like that, right? And so those serve two different kinds of people, even though they're kind of all under the podcaster umbrella. Um and so I think that's definitely a smart way to approach it. And then kind of going back to what are some ways to stay connected to your audience? Some things that I thought about as we're talking here was, uh, too. If you have an email list like reach out to people on your email list and say, Hey, this, wanna connect with you, see how things are going to see how I can help you if you have any ideas for the show. I think in all of our podcasts we have a link to a Google form, every single podcast that we have five minute Monday podcasts and buzz casts episodes. Every single show notes has a link to a former U can submit topics. You can submit questions and ideas. And I did that because I wanted to. I wanted to make sure that these episodes actually serve the people that listen to them, right? And so I don't want us to miss something really obvious because we just weren't thinking about it. But half of our audience is right and so giving people opportunities to give you ideas. Um, talking to your audience, I've found, is the best way to find ideas for podcasts episodes. Sometimes you can kind of get stuck, and you're like, I don't really know what else to talk about. The easiest way to figure out new topics is to talk to people who listen to your podcasts and be like, What would you like to listen to, right? What would you like me to talk about? And then let them come up with those ideas for you and then just execute them? And now not only have you gotten a free idea that makes your podcast better, but now they feel even more loyal to you as a listener, because they feel like they're a part of making the show into something that really serves them.

Alban:   30:53
Right. So were any of our topics today taken from that Google sheet?

Travis:   30:56
Not today, not today. Because today is more of a news heavy day. Okay, it's ah, In the past, I would say probably 10 to 20% of our topics Air coming coming from those forms. All

Alban:   31:05
right, So if you have ah topic you want us to talk about or you want to be a part of check out the description and there's a link to a Google form there.

Travis:   31:13
Yes, there is absolutely so earlier in the episode, we talked about apple podcasts and them helping you launch your show more effectively being able to hide your feed from their app. We talked about how Spotify is now kind of curating and serving up new podcast episodes. And so to close out this episode, I thought would be cool to kind of share some tips. Just some practical things that you can d'oh to grow your podcast audience. That's something that we're all trying to do, whether it's because you want to make more money so you can leave your 9 to 5 job or you really are passionate about what you're sharing. I mean, you want to help more people. So, Kevin, why don't we start with you? What are some practical things that we can do? Tow help, grow our podcasts?

Kevin:   31:53
Okay, I don't have some, but I have one new one that we haven't

Alban:   31:56
talked about before. Kevin is, by the way, decided to go first in case Kevin's of my one that we have each of the same. He's like, I'm getting my neighbor

Travis:   32:05
pulling that seniority, pulling that rank.

Kevin:   32:07
Yeah, they're probably not the same. But just in case s o what I stumbled upon this week with somebody who was in our Facebook community group and they were talking about Is there a way to email sent out an email every time a new episode drops? And the use case for when this makes sense is if you're launching ah show and it's targeted towards people who aren't necessarily podcast heavy listeners. And you're having to do a lot of marketing in the non podcast traditional podcast marketing ways to reach listeners who aren't already listening to a bunch of podcasts. Then this could be really helpful. So, like my wife, for example, she does not load up her podcast app every single day and check for new episodes and figure out what she's gonna listen to it. She's driving around. So for her, it would be really helpful if there is a show that she liked, where she could just pop in her email address and get email every time a new episode drop. Because she does check her email every day. And so were I was trying to figure out how we could solve this problem, and somebody else recommended that male chimp has a solution for this built in. And male Chimp has a free plan that has, like, a huge number of subscribers, you

Travis:   33:11
can have 2000 email subscribers on their free plan.

Kevin:   33:14
Yeah, wow. And so it's it's completely free, and you can go into male chimp and they've got some sort of RS s tool or something. But you can drop in your R s s feed that you get from bus brow, and then you can create an email template. And then every time male chimps sees a new item appear in your RCs feed, It will automatically send that out to all you for your subscribers. And so I thought, That's fantastic for people who don't, you know, check their podcast APS regularly or you're attracting a nontechnical audience who isn't into podcasting is a great way to make sure that they know that you have new episodes dropping.

Travis:   33:45
Yeah, especially if you were building your podcast is like an additional piece to something you already been working on. You have any mail list, you have a customer list and you wanna clued them in to this podcast that you've started, then that's a great tool to continue toe kind of keep it top of mind like, Hey, I'm glad you do. You're using these products are offerings that I have. Go ahead and check out. My free podcast is well, and so when you can automate that process because you can also customized the email. So it's not just a bunch of, you know garbage. You can actually make it Look. How you want to win on Brand right on the

Kevin:   34:15
mail trip will give you a link so you can say, Hey, if you listen to this episode and you're enjoying it, and you want to make sure you get notified of future episodes. Click the link and my show notes to sign up, and we'll email you every time a new episode drops

Travis:   34:27
right so that I'll goto a form that they could put their email information in. And they subscribe to your list. Yep, yeah, so and then, if you don't use if you don't use ah, male chimp, I imagine there's probably some Xavier connections. Yes, with all the other, because I don't have connections. Happier, happier. Xavier. Um, tomato, Tomato. I actually don't know anyone who calls it a tomato. That's true. I don't think I've ever heard that. Otto Yes, pecan or pecan? That's more contextual. Depends on if it's a pie or not.

Alban:   34:56
If I can go off the

Travis:   34:58
rails, TSF used like,

Alban:   35:00
isn't it a pyre? Not by use

Travis:   35:06
infusion, softer, however, for convert kit, Then you can create the zaps and zap. You're essentially just says, Hey, you have these two separate pieces of software and you want to talk to each other. We'll make that connection happen and so you can connect it with an R S s feed to all these different email providers and do different things with it. So if you don't use male chimp, you can also check out Zap here to see if they have some features for you.

Alban:   35:28
All right, so we've got our tip from Travis Albritton, head of content. It's a pier. Um, mine is, uh, try to find some blog's that would really push new listeners and then try to get listed on him. So if you got a comedy podcast going to Google in search best comedy podcasts and open up a couple of those pages and

Travis:   35:53
you mean comedy blocks No,

Alban:   35:56
it's a search best comedy podcast. Okay, and then open up. The blog's that air up there because they'll be like the 10 best comedy podcasts of 2019 and then you open it and then reach out to the people who run it. And I think many of them are not willing to rewrite their whole block post for you, but they might be willing to do is I kind of thought of this idea, talking to some symbol who write this, have a block. So, like you know that words and you don't make a lot of money It was like Well, what have you had podcasters who could sponsor the page with their podcast for a couple 100 bucks a month, and they would be getting hundreds of clicks to their podcast. So imagine if it said, like, What are the bet? What's the best podcast? You know, best comedy podcast at the top, it said, sponsored by the Kevin Comedy Hour And you Could Go Cool and you could click it and listen to that. These are people who are looking for comedy, even though they know this one wasn't like one of the top 10. It is in front of someone who really would matter for, and I haven't seen anyone do this yet. I haven't seen blog's really pushing to let people sponsor, and I haven't seen podcasters asking to sponsor it. So if I had a podcast that was trying to grow and add a little bit of money, um, even it was just a nominal amount, you know? Hey, I'll give you 50 bucks a month. I thought you could get some serious traction by reaching out to Bloggin, saying, Head like this, sponsor that one page. Is that available?

Kevin:   37:26
Yeah, a lot of times. They'll also say, You know, Hey, let us know your favorite comedy podcast in the comments And so there is an opportunity for you to drop a link to your show. You might want to say, Hey, it's actually my show but I think it's pretty good. I like it. Yeah, it might be an opportunity to do that. And there's also an opportunity to reach out to the author. Whoever wrote the Post and say, Hey, great list, Fantastic. Here's a link to my show Would love to be considered for next year. Next time you do a post like this or if you ever needed it. Like Alvin said, they might be reluctant. Most most. The times they're not initially gonna rewrite that post that they just pushed live has been performing well for them. But keep me in mind for the future is a great way. And if you start building that network, then over time that will pay off

Travis:   38:05
well and absolutely another example that you've I know that we've brought up. I can't remember all the context. So this is probably knew for bus cast was the Supreme Court example you gave her there was like a blogger podcast, elaboration. And that's advice I'd given to podcasters as well, where it's like, you know, one person was like, I have this really niche podcast about random sports that you didn't know existed in the world, and I'm trying to figure out ways to grow that. And there's this website, um, where people go and they just find interesting tidbits about the places they're visiting. And so I was like, Why don't you reach out to them and say, Hey, you have guest contributors to your website? What if I had my podcast episodes, as you know, featuring events that happened in these cities that you could highlight. And so that was a collaboration that she was able to make a connection with. And this is a website that gets hundreds of thousands of visits, and now she is the only podcast content on that website with people that would be interested in what her podcast up soldier about, right. So finding unique ways to collaborate with other creators that are looking for content outside of what they're creating is another great way to get your podcast in front of people.

Alban:   39:11
You can do that in any format. I mean, go into YouTube and find people. They're doing really hilarious comedy the year into and say, Hey, would you like to come on to my podcast and do like you and you'll be on my podcast for five episodes in a row? And the only thing I would ask is that we filmed them and you put him on your YouTube channel and those collaborations create a lot of cross over and they go. I've always wanted to do a podcast. Niven entryway. And you say, Well, I've always wanted to get in front of YouTube viewers. So now I've got entry and you, maybe this is Ah, maybe ties back to the curse of knowledge. Purity. Podcasting. You don't remember probably how difficult it was to start, and you definitely don't remember back when you had no clue what to do. You're like, I know there's a microphone involved, but I don't know beyond that well, lots of YouTubers we tell any time we talk to someone on YouTube there, like what do I do for a podcast? I'm like, What you're doing is so much more difficult at least to meet us, and I forgot what it might be like for them looking at podcasting going. I don't know. The first thing about that will share your expertise and podcasting with somebody in another space, and they're probably super excited to get a podcast into their workflow and maybe get their audience listening to your show as well.

Travis:   40:29
Yep. And if you're looking for more growth strategies, we have a blogger with 50 of them 50 marketing tips from fellow podcasters things that people are actually doing in real life and are working for them. So I'll make sure to leave a link to that block post in the show notes as well, so you can go and check that out. But that about wraps it up for us today. If you're not a part of our Facebook group, our bus brought podcast community. Definitely make sure that you jump in there. We just started a new kind of post where were kind of facilitating Seymour guest interview connections. So every single Wednesday at 10 a.m. Eastern time, we're dropping a post where you can say, Hey, this is my podcast is what it's about and this is the guest that I'm looking for. And then anyone in the community can see that and say, Hey, I would actually be a great fit for your podcast in the first Post that we did have over 400 comments in the in a week and so a great opportunity for you If you're trying to get some guests for your show or you wanna connect with other podcasters that Aaron similar genres or similar categories, that could be a great resource for you. And again, that's in our Facebook group. So go to the just click the link of the shows and join our Facebook group if you're not there yet. And, like Alvin mentioned, if you have something you want to talk about on a future episode of Buzz cast, there's a a link in the show notes where you can fill out a short Google form and give us some ideas for topics that you want us to talk about. Ah, but that's it, guys, thanks for sticking with us, and we'll catch in the Net

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