Before committing to a growth plan, it is essential to have a firm understanding of the kind of people you want to reach with your message. Because your podcast can’t appeal to everyone, selecting a specific audience for it is essential to growing your listenership.

1. Know Your Audience

Determine the audience that is most likely to listen to your podcast and think about the value that your podcast offers to the table in its own unique way. It’s possible that your format, hosts, guests, or subject emphasis are what give you an edge over the competition. Whatever it is, you should gather your team together and construct a perfect listener profile for the kind of people that will be listening to you. When it comes to getting to know your audience, research is essential since it will help you understand where your audience may be found online. Are there certain forms of media that they seem to favor? Which platforms do they utilize to communicate through social media? I was wondering whether they follow any particular hashtags or subreddits. It will be easier for you to understand where and how to reach your audience if you first figure out where they currently interact.

2. Create a Podcast Trailer

It is essential to produce a podcast trailer, regardless of whether your podcast is already well-known or you are just getting it started. A trailer enables you to begin cultivating an audience prior to the official launch of the first episode of your podcast by providing you with this opportunity.

Make use of the trailer as a promotional tool not just inside your company but also throughout all of the current marketing channels such as social media, newsletters, communities, and your website. In this manner, you will be able to generate anticipation for the debut of the podcast, and you may even choose to hold a contest in order to boost early involvement.

When you finally get around to publishing your trailer on the site you’re using to host it, make sure to pin it to the top of your feed and identify it as your trailer. The following are some examples of excellent practice:

• Please begin by introducing yourself and your business.
• Give your listeners a concise summary of the subjects that will be discussed in your podcast.
• Inform the audience about the benefits that they might anticipate receiving from the podcast.
• Include excerpts from upcoming episodes, assuming that you will be producing them.
• Include a call-to-action at the end of your post that encourages people to subscribe to your podcast.
• Keep in mind that it should be brief; anything from a few seconds to one minute is more than plenty.

3. Use Calls to Action

Including a call-to-action, also known as a CTA, at the conclusion of each episode of your podcast is an efficient way to urge your audience members to carry out an activity that contributes to the accomplishment of your objectives. In order to expand your audience on listening platforms, you will typically require people to accomplish the following four things:

• Subscribe/follow your show
• Rate your show—ideally with five stars
• Review your show
• Share your podcast with family and friends 

It helps to promote discoverability and increases your chances of ranking on popular podcast charts if someone accomplishes one of these four things. If someone subscribes to your podcast, they will be notified whenever you publish a new episode via their feed. This improves the probability that they will listen to the show. Everyone who is contemplating watching your program will have an additional incentive to do so after reading ratings and reviews. Sharing it with one’s circle of friends and family is of the utmost importance, since word-of-mouth recommendations are very effective.

However, the most important thing to remember is to utilize just one CTA at the conclusion of each episode. This will prevent listeners from being confused about what action they should take.

When taken collectively, these four activities have a significant impact on the way that prominent listening applications like Apple rank podcasts in the new and noteworthy areas of their respective platforms. If you’re just starting out or making an appearance, there is a certain method to attract new listeners to your show or podcast.

4. Promote Your Podcast on Social Media

You need to give some thought to an active social media strategy since social media is one of the most accessible methods to advertise your podcast. Because of this, you need to give some consideration to developing a social media plan.

Your organization has two choices available: either create social media profiles that are solely devoted to advertising your podcast, or promote it using the accounts that are already established for your business. Both choices are useful. However, the one you choose will often depend on the resources you have available, such as your time and money. People will have an easier time finding your program if you maintain a presence on social media sites, and you will have a continuous avenue to advertise your material with which you may do so.

Be sure to post about every new episode, include hashtags that are relevant to the conversation (and strategic! ), tag your guests, and don’t forget to respond to comments and postings. Also, use your imagination! People are always interested in seeing photos and videos from “behind the scenes.” Therefore, have someone videotape you and a visitor doing something, and publish the video on social media.

One amusing piece of advice is to think about making audiograms. These are social postings that feature a caption, a picture or video, and a little audio clip from one of your podcasts.

5. Leverage SEO to Boost Visibility

Because Google now displays podcast episodes in search results, having effective search engine optimization will attract listeners who are looking for your specific niche or subject. When it comes to search engine optimization for podcasts, you need to focus your attention on keywords, formatting, and meta tags (for web pages).

Create episode descriptions that are comprehensive but succinct, making sure to include your most relevant keywords first. Being concise is essential due to the fact that search results for podcast applications only have roughly 120 visible characters available.

Show notes are an additional way to improve the search engine optimization of your podcast. Every time you publish a new episode of your podcast, you should come up with show notes that are informative, well-organized, and easy to scan. The show notes that accompany your podcast episode need to include links to all of the call-to-action buttons and other resources that you mention over the course of the program (like we mentioned above).

6. Measure your Success 

If you are unable to monitor the success of your podcast, it will be impossible for you to make adjustments or progress.

Take some time to reflect and ask yourself the following questions: 

• In your opinion, what constitutes a successful podcast?
• What kinds of measurements are most significant to you?

Quantitative metrics, such as the total number of episodes seen or the number of subscribers, are also a possibility. Or, maybe they are qualitative in nature, such as the percentage of active listeners or the number of five-star reviews on various podcasting sites.

At the outset, determine what your definition of success is, expand your audience with it in mind, and make sure you are aware of the main podcast metrics businesses should concentrate on.