August 22, 2025 • 19 mins
This year's Podcast Movement in Dallas featured a fresh format with silent disco-style headphones and a dramatic shift in podcasting trends. Jordan tracked down some of the top speakers at Podcast Movement to give their podcasting advice and big takeaways from their session.
- Dave Jackson revealed Marc Maron made $215,000 monthly from subscribers paying for his back catalog
- James Cridland shared that Goalhanger generates one-third of their revenue from audience memberships
- Alex Sanfilippo emphasized proactively connecting with listeners through personal conversations
- Courtney Elmer identified podcast SEO as "lowest hanging fruit" for show discovery
- Daniel J Lewis encouraged podcasters to use publishing platforms that support Podcasting 2.0 features
- Tom Rossi highlighted the importance of comparing engagement metrics (90% podcast consumption vs 5% YouTube)
- Krystal Proffitt shared her PREPM method (Plan-Record-Edit-Publish-Market) to create content without burnout
Don't forget, next week we're discussing how to cut down on editing time, so if you have any tips or questions about that, be sure to tap the text show link to send it in.
Contact Buzzcast
- Send us a text message
- Tweet us at @buzzcastpodcast, @albanbrooke, @kfinn, and @JordanPods
Thanks for listening and Keep Podcasting!
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Jordan (00:00):
This week, Kevin, Alban and I were at Podcast Movement
in Dallas, Texas.
If you weren't able to attendPodcast Movement this year, let
me tell you it was quitedifferent from previous years.
All the session stages andtracks were in the expo hall in
an open space format and theattendees all wore headphones
with different colored LEDlights for each stage.
(00:21):
Basically, if you've ever seena silent disco, it was that, but
for podcasters.
And, to be honest, I wasn'tsure how it would work with an
open concept silent discoconference.
But I loved it.
The cool thing was you couldsee what the most popular talks
were by glancing around the roomand we were able to listen to
(00:41):
talks from the Buzzsprout boothjust by tuning in on the
wireless headphones.
It was pretty nice.
Actually, we saw some Buzzcastlisteners at the conference, but
if you weren't one of them, Itracked down some of my favorite
speakers to ask them if ourBuzzcast listeners had a seat in
your session.
What do you think would havebeen the biggest takeaway for
them?
And before we start, I'd liketo note that most of these
(01:03):
conversations were recordedusing an ATR2100X plugged into
my laptop or my iPhone's voicememo app, often in the expo hall
or outside a party.
So big shout out to MagicMastering for making this
episode sound incredible,despite recording in noisy
environments with equipment thatI, honestly, have never used
before.
(01:23):
A big topic at Podcast Movementwas podcast monetization, but
there was a noticeable shift infavorite monetization methods of
top podcasters.
While the industry tends tofocus on programmatic
advertising, there's a new frontrunner in sustainable income
for podcasters, big and small.
I had a session on choosing theright monetization strategy for
your podcast.
You know, like if you should gowith sponsorships,
(01:44):
subscriptions or support, and tome, listener support tips and
donations was the best choice,regardless of experience or even
audience size, and thankfullyother experts backed me up on
this.
On Tuesday morning, daveJackson from School of
Podcasting, who you mightremember from last week's
episode, took the stage with asession titled so Many Ways to
(02:06):
Monetize which One's Best foryou.
In it he talked about incomestreams for your podcast that
goes beyond running ads.
So I caught up with him in theexpo hall and he felt there was
a really compelling bit ofinformation in the session that
everyone should hear.
Dave (02:22):
Probably the slide that I added that I had totally
forgotten about is one way youcan monetize your show is to
sell your back catalog, and Iasked Rob from Libsyn I go, what
were the peak number ofsubscribers when Mark Maron was
on their host and he wascharging $5 a month and he had
43,000 subscribers at $5 amonth, which, if you want to do
(02:45):
the math, is $215,000 a month,and that is passive income
because he I believe Mark had itto where the last 50 episodes
were free and everything elsewas you had to pay for it, and
when you would go to click onit, it would say you need to pay
for this.
And, of course, one of theeasiest ways to do that is via
Buzzsprout, and so that might besomething, especially if you're
(03:08):
like well, I have a lot of youknow episodes and I don't know
what to do with these and youwant to make money.
You know it's one of thosethings where, if people want it,
you know they can always payfor it once, binge your whole
back catalog and turn it off,but most people won't do that.
So you know that was when I waslike oh yeah, we never talk
about, we always talk about adsand selling this and courses and
blah, blah, blah, or becausemost of the time you don't make
(03:30):
money from the actual podcast,but he had evergreen content.
So it's like oh wait, I want tohear the the Robin Williams
interview and I want to hearlike the early days when he
started that show he was kind ofalmost doing like steps through
therapy and he's he's havingthese really awkward
conversations with people thathe kind of had a beef with and
he kind of used his podcast toto, like you know, iron out the
(03:52):
wrinkles.
So his early episodes were notthat the latest episodes weren't
great, but there's only ones,especially like what the heck am
I listening to?
Jordan (04:10):
So that was one that I was like all right, that's.
That's a kind of a new it's nota new strategy, but I think
it's one that a lot of peopleforgot about.
So that was one slide that gotadded to the presentation Later
that day during the keynotetalk.
The rest is podcasting.
James Cridland from Pod Newsinterviewed Jack Davenport of
Goalhanger and if you needfurther convincing that you
should be monetizing yourpodcast with listener
subscriptions, here's what Jameshad to say when we sat down in
the phone charging booth outsidePodcaster Stage 2.
James (04:29):
Goldhanger is one of the largest independent podcast
companies in the world I saidlargest outside of the US and
Jack, who I was interviewing,said well, I think you might
find that we're the largest inthe world and so, okay, well,
that's good, but they make loadsof really big shows, and he was
talking about where he gets hismoney from, and part of that is
(04:50):
from the audience.
So he uses a membership planasking people to give you money
every month, and that is a thirdof the money that that company
makes.
So it's a lot of money, and soone of the things that I sort of
left with was just asking youraudience for money going to.
(05:11):
You know, whether you use theBuzzsprout tool for your
measurement or whatever it is,just asking your audience for
money is a great thing.
Don't be embarrassed aboutdoing that.
Jordan (05:20):
He also added a funny anecdote about connecting with
listeners.
James (05:23):
The other thing that he told this wonderful story right
at the end about something thathe was quite proud of he has a
website for his podcastsobviously because he's quite a
large company and that websitehas an email address on it of
how to get in touch.
And he looked at the incomingemail and there was an email
(05:44):
from a disneycom email addressand he looked at it and he went
what?
It's the CEO of Disney, bobIger, who is a real fan of one
of his shows, and literally justsent it in and said you know,
I'm a real fan of the Rest IsHistory.
I'd love to meet.
The rest is history.
(06:05):
You know people.
How can you make that happen?
The CEO of Disney and that'smoving on to other things you
know as well.
So I think the learning that Igot from that is make sure your
podcast has a website, make sureit has your contact details on
that website and the third mostimportant thing is make sure you
(06:25):
check your email.
Jordan (06:27):
Another popular theme at this year's podcast movement
was podcast growth.
A lot of the growth strategiestypically talked about at
conferences has something to dowith promo swaps, feed drops or
running ads for your podcast,but this year, marketing experts
had other opinions about whatcan move the needle when it
comes to growing your show.
Wednesday morning, alexSanfilippo, the founder of
(06:48):
Podmatch, gave a talk on fivethings that only top-rated
podcasters do.
There was one point in hissession that had everyone
talking, because it's somethingwe all can do.
Alex (06:59):
I found that top-rated podcasters are really good about
formulating community amongtheir listeners but also talking
to their listeners.
So not just having a communityfor them, but actually being in
that community and actuallytalking to their listeners.
And I'm seeing more and morethat top rate podcasters they
have that connection because Ithink that's where fans come
from, and so every podcast islike okay, great, alex, that
sounds like what a top ratepodcaster does, because I
(07:20):
already have a ton of fans.
I'm like no, I think they gotthe fans because they started
proactively doing this.
And so what I want to leavewith everybody here is that you
have to be proactive about this,and everyone's question is the
same thing Okay, alex, how do Imeet my listeners?
It's always the question I get.
First and foremost, find wherethey're engaging with your
content.
Sometimes that's easy.
It might be comments on some ofthese player apps now, it might
(07:40):
be social media comments.
It might be they message you.
It could be you see themsharing it, talking about it in
forums like Reddit, anythinglike that.
Where is it coming up?
Anywhere you see somebodyengaging with your podcast in
any extent, reach out to them asthe host directly and don't let
it be like hello, so-and-so,I'm the host of this podcast,
thank you so much for listening.
Like, not like that, but say,hey, I noticed that you shared
(08:01):
this episode, thank you so much.
Would you have me have fiveminutes where we could just get
like oh yeah, absolutely.
I'd love the chance to meet thehost of this show.
And so when you get on thatcall which I do encourage people
to make it, make it a call itcan be a little uncomfortable at
first, but the reality is thisperson already likes you.
(08:23):
They've enjoyed something.
You've added value to theirlife.
They're happy to talk to you.
I ask four questions.
Number one is how'd you findout about the show?
And the reason that's importantto me is like what if I find
out that Jordan, they're allfinding my show through you now
and maybe I don't know you, I'mlike, okay, who's this Jordan
person?
I need to meet Jordan, cause,clearly my listeners like
Jordan.
So who is this?
Right?
So that's like one way you wantto find out where are they all
(08:43):
coming from?
The second them what they enjoyabout the show.
This can really help youunderstand the elements of your
show, like the it factor quote,unquote, right Like it's what
makes your show unique?
Because it makes it special,and you might not realize it
because you're not one of yourlisteners, right?
And I tell you, oh, I love itwhen you do this.
If you're only doing that 30% ofthe time, like me, at one point
(09:06):
you want that to become 100% ofthe thing.
You want to ask it in a reallyspecific way, though, because if
you just say, hey, what can Ido better, how can I improve,
you're not going to get a realanswer.
I always called.
There's a friend of mine whowrote a book called the Mom
Test, and so I'll give you areal example of this.
(09:27):
If I ask my mom so, alex, therain, what do you think, mom?
My mom would say Alex, you're agenius, you're brilliant, baby,
you're going to do so good, doit today.
If I go to my mom and say, hey,mom, what would you think of an
idea?
If someone said they want tomake an umbrella that doesn't
block out the sun and rain, whatwould you think of that?
She'd say our listeners askingthem hey, what can we do better
about the show?
You can't say those words.
(09:48):
What you want to say is what canwe do better together for
future listeners, and so youposition a way where you now
allow them to break your heartmore or less right, without
making it feel like they'redoing that, because if they like
your show, they're not going togive you an honest answer.
You want to bring them into,say, hey, listening to your
podcast, and you talk to 10different people and they all
(10:12):
say they're struggling with thesame thing.
Maybe that's an episode, maybethat's a community that you can
build around it, maybe that'ssomething you can help solve
together.
Like what does that look like?
I think that's what reallyopens up our creativity as
podcasters.
So that's the main point I wantto leave everybody with.
I think that was a bigtakeaway.
Even during the live session, Igot a lot of conversation and
feedback about that,specifically afterwards.
Jordan (10:32):
Another often untapped growth opportunity was uncovered
at Courtney Elmer's masterclasson podcast SEO to rank at the
top of Apple and Spotify search.
It was one of the busiest talksI witnessed at the conference,
so, seeing the attendeesspilling into the expo hall
walkway as they listened to hersession, I knew I had to find
out what she had to say aboutthe importance of podcast SEO.
Courtney (11:01):
First and foremost, that podcast SEO is one of the
lowest hanging fruitopportunities that we have right
now as podcasters to get ourshows seen.
It is a strategy that's beenaround for a while, but until
about a year ago we didn't havea way to track to see if it was
working, to measure its impacton our show's visibility.
But now that we have toolsavailable to us that can
actually show us how listenersare searching inside of Apple
and Spotify and how you can getyour podcast discovered when you
(11:22):
know what your listener issearching for, it's essentially
just like laying out a map forApple and Spotify and saying
like, hey, it's essentially justlike laying out a map for Apple
and Spotify and saying like,hey, we want you to connect
these type of listeners with myshow and when you know how to do
that, it's going to put you inthe 1% of podcasters right now,
because 99% of people are notdoing this.
But that's going to change.
(11:42):
It's going to change and Iimagine that over the next year
we will see a lot more peopletalking about podcast SEO.
We will see it as an emergingnew trend or strategy that
people are putting out as far asorganic marketing goes for
their shows.
A lot of people know aboutpodcast guesting.
We've been doing that foryears.
People know about sharing onsocial media or whatever it
might be putting short formclips and all these things
(12:04):
repurposing your stuff into ablog.
But podcast SEO even thoughit's been around for a while,
it's new enough now, with thetools and things that we have
available to see how it'sworking, to say, okay, this is
something that I can actuallyutilize to get traction.
And you don't have to have atech background.
You don't have to know anythingabout SEO, you just have to
understand what are my listenerssearching for, what are those
(12:26):
keywords and how can I match myshow with those listeners and
communicate that to Apple andSpotify.
Jordan (12:32):
We also got some great practical advice this year, from
tools and resources you shouldbe taking advantage of to tips
that will prevent you from podfade and podcast burnout.
On Wednesday, daniel J Lewis ofthe Audacity to Podcast and
Podgagement stepped onto theindustry expert stage to talk
about what you need to knowabout podcasting 2.0.
In it, he spoke on therevolutionary development
(12:55):
happening in the podcastingecosystem thanks to Podcasting
2.0, from monetization,distribution and engagement,
among many other evolutions inthe podcasting industry.
I talked with him outsidePatreon's off-the-air party
later that night and when Iasked him what he'd like you to
take away from a session, hesaid so full disclosure here for
you listening.
Daniel (13:16):
Jordan does not know what my answer is going to be.
I'm not being paid to give thisanswer, but the biggest thing I
told the podcasters to do, andso this is the takeaway check
with your publishing tool tomake sure they support
Podcasting 2.0.
If they don't switch andBuzzsprout supports so many of
the Podcasting 2.0 tags you guyshave been supporting that from
(13:38):
the beginning.
So I was able to say Buzzsproutone of the exhibitors here
supports a lot of these tags, soyou would be great going to
Buzzsprout.
I did also mention some others,but that's the big thing.
Is that, of all of these thingsit really comes down to?
Does your publishing toolsupport it?
If so, take advantage of it andif not, ask them why don't you
support it?
If so, take advantage of it,and if not, ask them.
Why don't you support this?
(13:58):
Yeah, ask kindly, but takeadvantage of the features, and
if you don't have thosefeatures, switch.
Jordan (14:05):
Tom Rossi, the co-founder of Buzzsprout and
honorary co-host of thispodcast, got on Podcaster Stage
2 Wednesday afternoon to unpackhow to turn overwhelming podcast
statistics into actionableinsights.
It was a 30-minute talk packedwith great tips, but Tom had an
important takeaway whencomparing video to audio
statistics.
Tom (14:24):
One of the points that I made was about the engagement
Looking at your engagementstatistics that you get from
Spotify and from Apple.
The talk was about statistics,and one of the statistics that
we looked at was thoseengagement metrics that you can
get by logging into your Appleand Spotify.
And one of the points that Iwas really trying to drive
because I think it contrasts somuch with a lot of what people
(14:47):
are talking about right nowrelated to video is comparing
that engagement to theengagement you're getting on
YouTube.
Right, a lot of times peopleare comparing, well, how many
views are you getting in YouTubeto how many downloads you're
getting in your podcast, butthey're not looking at the fact
that they might only be getting,you know, 5% consumption on
YouTube, but they're getting 90%consumption on Apple, and I
feel like I hope that thatreally resonated with people,
(15:10):
that it stuck with them.
Jordan (15:12):
And finally, crystal Prophet of Prophet Media had a
super relatable session onWednesday.
As she stood in the centerstage of the expo hall, she
shared how she manages to stayconsistent with her podcast
while keeping up with herbusiness, family and life's
to-dos.
Crystal is, as I mentioned, avery busy lady, so I reached out
after the conference to ask fora key takeaway from her session
(15:34):
If I were to give you one keytakeaway from my talk.
Krystal (15:39):
It would be the one content system.
It's actually the only contentsystem that you would need, and
I broke down my five-step PREPMmethod.
That's P-R-E-P-M and thatstands for plan, record, edit,
publish and market.
I know right, like it's notrocket science.
(16:00):
However, it is the contentsystem that I've used to create
over 1500 podcast episodes since2018.
And the reason why this talkwas so important was I got on
stage and I told the audiencethese are things that you're
already doing, but what you maynot realize is that each step of
(16:25):
the prep process or, for you,creating a piece of content, has
a specific type of creativeenergy.
So, when you're planning, you'rein like a great headspace to
think about ideas or think aboutwhat you want to talk about,
who you want to interview, whatare some of those outlines that
you want to create.
And then, when you'rerecording, you're obviously
(16:47):
sitting down at your chair torecord your podcast episode or
do an interview.
And then, when you're editing,you're in a totally different
mindset because you're listeningfor mistakes or how you can
make your content that muchbetter.
And then, whenever you arepublishing, you're looking at
(17:07):
okay, when is this episode goingto air.
What kind of SEO do I want todo?
Which platforms do I want toput this on?
And then marketing is the onethat people often, so often,
tell me I don't have time formarketing and that's usually
because they haven't left spaceto sit down and create Canva
(17:28):
graphics or create those videoclips that they can share on
social media.
So when you think about thedifferent stages of the prep and
process, just know that settingaside some time in your week
just to record a podcast isn'tenough anymore.
You need to have some space forplanning.
(17:49):
You need to have some space forrecording, editing, publishing
and marketing, publishing andmarketing.
So, whenever you look at yourweek this is my challenge that I
gave to the audience is, if youwant to implement this, you
have to look at how can you giveyourself some time back, if you
will, to allow for somebreathing room to do all of
(18:11):
these things in stages and notjust sit down at your computer
and plan and record and edit andpublish and market all in one
fell swoop, because that'sexhausting and it is the thing
that I have seen lead to so muchcreator burnout over the years.
So those are my tips.
I hope that you go and createsome space in your calendar to
(18:35):
plan, record, edit, publish andmarket your content next week
and look at how you can continueto create without burnout.
And I'll leave you with this,because I always tell everyone
this Keep it up.
We all have to start somewhere.
Jordan (18:52):
Thanks to all the experts that took time out of
their busy schedules to sharetheir tips and advice with our
listeners, and I hope thisinspires you to attend a podcast
conference soon, because Iwould love to see you there.
Don't forget, next week we'rediscussing how to cut down on
editing time, so if you have anytips or questions about that,
be sure to tap the text showlink in the show notes to send
(19:12):
it in.
And, as always, thanks forlistening and keep podcasting.
This week, Kevin, Alban and I were at Podcast Movement
in Dallas, Texas.
If you weren't able to attendPodcast Movement this year, let
me tell you it was quitedifferent from previous years.
All the session stages andtracks were in the expo hall in
an open space format and theattendees all wore headphones
with different colored LEDlights for each stage.
(00:21):
Basically, if you've ever seena silent disco, it was that, but
for podcasters.
And, to be honest, I wasn'tsure how it would work with an
open concept silent discoconference.
But I loved it.
The cool thing was you couldsee what the most popular talks
were by glancing around the roomand we were able to listen to
(00:41):
talks from the Buzzsprout boothjust by tuning in on the
wireless headphones.
It was pretty nice.
Actually, we saw some Buzzcastlisteners at the conference, but
if you weren't one of them, Itracked down some of my favorite
speakers to ask them if ourBuzzcast listeners had a seat in
your session.
What do you think would havebeen the biggest takeaway for
them?
And before we start, I'd liketo note that most of these
(01:03):
conversations were recordedusing an ATR2100X plugged into
my laptop or my iPhone's voicememo app, often in the expo hall
or outside a party.
So big shout out to MagicMastering for making this
episode sound incredible,despite recording in noisy
environments with equipment thatI, honestly, have never used
before.
(01:23):
A big topic at Podcast Movementwas podcast monetization, but
there was a noticeable shift infavorite monetization methods of
top podcasters.
While the industry tends tofocus on programmatic
advertising, there's a new frontrunner in sustainable income
for podcasters, big and small.
I had a session on choosing theright monetization strategy for
your podcast.
You know, like if you should gowith sponsorships,
(01:44):
subscriptions or support, and tome, listener support tips and
donations was the best choice,regardless of experience or even
audience size, and thankfullyother experts backed me up on
this.
On Tuesday morning, daveJackson from School of
Podcasting, who you mightremember from last week's
episode, took the stage with asession titled so Many Ways to
(02:06):
Monetize which One's Best foryou.
In it he talked about incomestreams for your podcast that
goes beyond running ads.
So I caught up with him in theexpo hall and he felt there was
a really compelling bit ofinformation in the session that
everyone should hear.
Dave (02:22):
Probably the slide that I added that I had totally
forgotten about is one way youcan monetize your show is to
sell your back catalog, and Iasked Rob from Libsyn I go, what
were the peak number ofsubscribers when Mark Maron was
on their host and he wascharging $5 a month and he had
43,000 subscribers at $5 amonth, which, if you want to do
(02:45):
the math, is $215,000 a month,and that is passive income
because he I believe Mark had itto where the last 50 episodes
were free and everything elsewas you had to pay for it, and
when you would go to click onit, it would say you need to pay
for this.
And, of course, one of theeasiest ways to do that is via
Buzzsprout, and so that might besomething, especially if you're
(03:08):
like well, I have a lot of youknow episodes and I don't know
what to do with these and youwant to make money.
You know it's one of thosethings where, if people want it,
you know they can always payfor it once, binge your whole
back catalog and turn it off,but most people won't do that.
So you know that was when I waslike oh yeah, we never talk
about, we always talk about adsand selling this and courses and
blah, blah, blah, or becausemost of the time you don't make
(03:30):
money from the actual podcast,but he had evergreen content.
So it's like oh wait, I want tohear the the Robin Williams
interview and I want to hearlike the early days when he
started that show he was kind ofalmost doing like steps through
therapy and he's he's havingthese really awkward
conversations with people thathe kind of had a beef with and
he kind of used his podcast toto, like you know, iron out the
(03:52):
wrinkles.
So his early episodes were notthat the latest episodes weren't
great, but there's only ones,especially like what the heck am
I listening to?
Jordan (04:10):
So that was one that I was like all right, that's.
That's a kind of a new it's nota new strategy, but I think
it's one that a lot of peopleforgot about.
So that was one slide that gotadded to the presentation Later
that day during the keynotetalk.
The rest is podcasting.
James Cridland from Pod Newsinterviewed Jack Davenport of
Goalhanger and if you needfurther convincing that you
should be monetizing yourpodcast with listener
subscriptions, here's what Jameshad to say when we sat down in
the phone charging booth outsidePodcaster Stage 2.
James (04:29):
Goldhanger is one of the largest independent podcast
companies in the world I saidlargest outside of the US and
Jack, who I was interviewing,said well, I think you might
find that we're the largest inthe world and so, okay, well,
that's good, but they make loadsof really big shows, and he was
talking about where he gets hismoney from, and part of that is
(04:50):
from the audience.
So he uses a membership planasking people to give you money
every month, and that is a thirdof the money that that company
makes.
So it's a lot of money, and soone of the things that I sort of
left with was just asking youraudience for money going to.
(05:11):
You know, whether you use theBuzzsprout tool for your
measurement or whatever it is,just asking your audience for
money is a great thing.
Don't be embarrassed aboutdoing that.
Jordan (05:20):
He also added a funny anecdote about connecting with
listeners.
James (05:23):
The other thing that he told this wonderful story right
at the end about something thathe was quite proud of he has a
website for his podcastsobviously because he's quite a
large company and that websitehas an email address on it of
how to get in touch.
And he looked at the incomingemail and there was an email
(05:44):
from a disneycom email addressand he looked at it and he went
what?
It's the CEO of Disney, bobIger, who is a real fan of one
of his shows, and literally justsent it in and said you know,
I'm a real fan of the Rest IsHistory.
I'd love to meet.
The rest is history.
(06:05):
You know people.
How can you make that happen?
The CEO of Disney and that'smoving on to other things you
know as well.
So I think the learning that Igot from that is make sure your
podcast has a website, make sureit has your contact details on
that website and the third mostimportant thing is make sure you
(06:25):
check your email.
Jordan (06:27):
Another popular theme at this year's podcast movement
was podcast growth.
A lot of the growth strategiestypically talked about at
conferences has something to dowith promo swaps, feed drops or
running ads for your podcast,but this year, marketing experts
had other opinions about whatcan move the needle when it
comes to growing your show.
Wednesday morning, alexSanfilippo, the founder of
(06:48):
Podmatch, gave a talk on fivethings that only top-rated
podcasters do.
There was one point in hissession that had everyone
talking, because it's somethingwe all can do.
Alex (06:59):
I found that top-rated podcasters are really good about
formulating community amongtheir listeners but also talking
to their listeners.
So not just having a communityfor them, but actually being in
that community and actuallytalking to their listeners.
And I'm seeing more and morethat top rate podcasters they
have that connection because Ithink that's where fans come
from, and so every podcast islike okay, great, alex, that
sounds like what a top ratepodcaster does, because I
(07:20):
already have a ton of fans.
I'm like no, I think they gotthe fans because they started
proactively doing this.
And so what I want to leavewith everybody here is that you
have to be proactive about this,and everyone's question is the
same thing Okay, alex, how do Imeet my listeners?
It's always the question I get.
First and foremost, find wherethey're engaging with your
content.
Sometimes that's easy.
It might be comments on some ofthese player apps now, it might
(07:40):
be social media comments.
It might be they message you.
It could be you see themsharing it, talking about it in
forums like Reddit, anythinglike that.
Where is it coming up?
Anywhere you see somebodyengaging with your podcast in
any extent, reach out to them asthe host directly and don't let
it be like hello, so-and-so,I'm the host of this podcast,
thank you so much for listening.
Like, not like that, but say,hey, I noticed that you shared
(08:01):
this episode, thank you so much.
Would you have me have fiveminutes where we could just get
like oh yeah, absolutely.
I'd love the chance to meet thehost of this show.
And so when you get on thatcall which I do encourage people
to make it, make it a call itcan be a little uncomfortable at
first, but the reality is thisperson already likes you.
(08:23):
They've enjoyed something.
You've added value to theirlife.
They're happy to talk to you.
I ask four questions.
Number one is how'd you findout about the show?
And the reason that's importantto me is like what if I find
out that Jordan, they're allfinding my show through you now
and maybe I don't know you, I'mlike, okay, who's this Jordan
person?
I need to meet Jordan, cause,clearly my listeners like
Jordan.
So who is this?
Right?
So that's like one way you wantto find out where are they all
(08:43):
coming from?
The second them what they enjoyabout the show.
This can really help youunderstand the elements of your
show, like the it factor quote,unquote, right Like it's what
makes your show unique?
Because it makes it special,and you might not realize it
because you're not one of yourlisteners, right?
And I tell you, oh, I love itwhen you do this.
If you're only doing that 30% ofthe time, like me, at one point
(09:06):
you want that to become 100% ofthe thing.
You want to ask it in a reallyspecific way, though, because if
you just say, hey, what can Ido better, how can I improve,
you're not going to get a realanswer.
I always called.
There's a friend of mine whowrote a book called the Mom
Test, and so I'll give you areal example of this.
(09:27):
If I ask my mom so, alex, therain, what do you think, mom?
My mom would say Alex, you're agenius, you're brilliant, baby,
you're going to do so good, doit today.
If I go to my mom and say, hey,mom, what would you think of an
idea?
If someone said they want tomake an umbrella that doesn't
block out the sun and rain, whatwould you think of that?
She'd say our listeners askingthem hey, what can we do better
about the show?
You can't say those words.
(09:48):
What you want to say is what canwe do better together for
future listeners, and so youposition a way where you now
allow them to break your heartmore or less right, without
making it feel like they'redoing that, because if they like
your show, they're not going togive you an honest answer.
You want to bring them into,say, hey, listening to your
podcast, and you talk to 10different people and they all
(10:12):
say they're struggling with thesame thing.
Maybe that's an episode, maybethat's a community that you can
build around it, maybe that'ssomething you can help solve
together.
Like what does that look like?
I think that's what reallyopens up our creativity as
podcasters.
So that's the main point I wantto leave everybody with.
I think that was a bigtakeaway.
Even during the live session, Igot a lot of conversation and
feedback about that,specifically afterwards.
Jordan (10:32):
Another often untapped growth opportunity was uncovered
at Courtney Elmer's masterclasson podcast SEO to rank at the
top of Apple and Spotify search.
It was one of the busiest talksI witnessed at the conference,
so, seeing the attendeesspilling into the expo hall
walkway as they listened to hersession, I knew I had to find
out what she had to say aboutthe importance of podcast SEO.
Courtney (11:01):
First and foremost, that podcast SEO is one of the
lowest hanging fruitopportunities that we have right
now as podcasters to get ourshows seen.
It is a strategy that's beenaround for a while, but until
about a year ago we didn't havea way to track to see if it was
working, to measure its impacton our show's visibility.
But now that we have toolsavailable to us that can
actually show us how listenersare searching inside of Apple
and Spotify and how you can getyour podcast discovered when you
(11:22):
know what your listener issearching for, it's essentially
just like laying out a map forApple and Spotify and saying
like, hey, it's essentially justlike laying out a map for Apple
and Spotify and saying like,hey, we want you to connect
these type of listeners with myshow and when you know how to do
that, it's going to put you inthe 1% of podcasters right now,
because 99% of people are notdoing this.
But that's going to change.
(11:42):
It's going to change and Iimagine that over the next year
we will see a lot more peopletalking about podcast SEO.
We will see it as an emergingnew trend or strategy that
people are putting out as far asorganic marketing goes for
their shows.
A lot of people know aboutpodcast guesting.
We've been doing that foryears.
People know about sharing onsocial media or whatever it
might be putting short formclips and all these things
(12:04):
repurposing your stuff into ablog.
But podcast SEO even thoughit's been around for a while,
it's new enough now, with thetools and things that we have
available to see how it'sworking, to say, okay, this is
something that I can actuallyutilize to get traction.
And you don't have to have atech background.
You don't have to know anythingabout SEO, you just have to
understand what are my listenerssearching for, what are those
(12:26):
keywords and how can I match myshow with those listeners and
communicate that to Apple andSpotify.
Jordan (12:32):
We also got some great practical advice this year, from
tools and resources you shouldbe taking advantage of to tips
that will prevent you from podfade and podcast burnout.
On Wednesday, daniel J Lewis ofthe Audacity to Podcast and
Podgagement stepped onto theindustry expert stage to talk
about what you need to knowabout podcasting 2.0.
In it, he spoke on therevolutionary development
(12:55):
happening in the podcastingecosystem thanks to Podcasting
2.0, from monetization,distribution and engagement,
among many other evolutions inthe podcasting industry.
I talked with him outsidePatreon's off-the-air party
later that night and when Iasked him what he'd like you to
take away from a session, hesaid so full disclosure here for
you listening.
Daniel (13:16):
Jordan does not know what my answer is going to be.
I'm not being paid to give thisanswer, but the biggest thing I
told the podcasters to do, andso this is the takeaway check
with your publishing tool tomake sure they support
Podcasting 2.0.
If they don't switch andBuzzsprout supports so many of
the Podcasting 2.0 tags you guyshave been supporting that from
(13:38):
the beginning.
So I was able to say Buzzsproutone of the exhibitors here
supports a lot of these tags, soyou would be great going to
Buzzsprout.
I did also mention some others,but that's the big thing.
Is that, of all of these thingsit really comes down to?
Does your publishing toolsupport it?
If so, take advantage of it andif not, ask them why don't you
support it?
If so, take advantage of it,and if not, ask them.
Why don't you support this?
(13:58):
Yeah, ask kindly, but takeadvantage of the features, and
if you don't have thosefeatures, switch.
Jordan (14:05):
Tom Rossi, the co-founder of Buzzsprout and
honorary co-host of thispodcast, got on Podcaster Stage
2 Wednesday afternoon to unpackhow to turn overwhelming podcast
statistics into actionableinsights.
It was a 30-minute talk packedwith great tips, but Tom had an
important takeaway whencomparing video to audio
statistics.
Tom (14:24):
One of the points that I made was about the engagement
Looking at your engagementstatistics that you get from
Spotify and from Apple.
The talk was about statistics,and one of the statistics that
we looked at was thoseengagement metrics that you can
get by logging into your Appleand Spotify.
And one of the points that Iwas really trying to drive
because I think it contrasts somuch with a lot of what people
(14:47):
are talking about right nowrelated to video is comparing
that engagement to theengagement you're getting on
YouTube.
Right, a lot of times peopleare comparing, well, how many
views are you getting in YouTubeto how many downloads you're
getting in your podcast, butthey're not looking at the fact
that they might only be getting,you know, 5% consumption on
YouTube, but they're getting 90%consumption on Apple, and I
feel like I hope that thatreally resonated with people,
(15:10):
that it stuck with them.
Jordan (15:12):
And finally, crystal Prophet of Prophet Media had a
super relatable session onWednesday.
As she stood in the centerstage of the expo hall, she
shared how she manages to stayconsistent with her podcast
while keeping up with herbusiness, family and life's
to-dos.
Crystal is, as I mentioned, avery busy lady, so I reached out
after the conference to ask fora key takeaway from her session
(15:34):
If I were to give you one keytakeaway from my talk.
Krystal (15:39):
It would be the one content system.
It's actually the only contentsystem that you would need, and
I broke down my five-step PREPMmethod.
That's P-R-E-P-M and thatstands for plan, record, edit,
publish and market.
I know right, like it's notrocket science.
(16:00):
However, it is the contentsystem that I've used to create
over 1500 podcast episodes since2018.
And the reason why this talkwas so important was I got on
stage and I told the audiencethese are things that you're
already doing, but what you maynot realize is that each step of
(16:25):
the prep process or, for you,creating a piece of content, has
a specific type of creativeenergy.
So, when you're planning, you'rein like a great headspace to
think about ideas or think aboutwhat you want to talk about,
who you want to interview, whatare some of those outlines that
you want to create.
And then, when you'rerecording, you're obviously
(16:47):
sitting down at your chair torecord your podcast episode or
do an interview.
And then, when you're editing,you're in a totally different
mindset because you're listeningfor mistakes or how you can
make your content that muchbetter.
And then, whenever you arepublishing, you're looking at
(17:07):
okay, when is this episode goingto air.
What kind of SEO do I want todo?
Which platforms do I want toput this on?
And then marketing is the onethat people often, so often,
tell me I don't have time formarketing and that's usually
because they haven't left spaceto sit down and create Canva
(17:28):
graphics or create those videoclips that they can share on
social media.
So when you think about thedifferent stages of the prep and
process, just know that settingaside some time in your week
just to record a podcast isn'tenough anymore.
You need to have some space forplanning.
(17:49):
You need to have some space forrecording, editing, publishing
and marketing, publishing andmarketing.
So, whenever you look at yourweek this is my challenge that I
gave to the audience is, if youwant to implement this, you
have to look at how can you giveyourself some time back, if you
will, to allow for somebreathing room to do all of
(18:11):
these things in stages and notjust sit down at your computer
and plan and record and edit andpublish and market all in one
fell swoop, because that'sexhausting and it is the thing
that I have seen lead to so muchcreator burnout over the years.
So those are my tips.
I hope that you go and createsome space in your calendar to
(18:35):
plan, record, edit, publish andmarket your content next week
and look at how you can continueto create without burnout.
And I'll leave you with this,because I always tell everyone
this Keep it up.
We all have to start somewhere.
Jordan (18:52):
Thanks to all the experts that took time out of
their busy schedules to sharetheir tips and advice with our
listeners, and I hope thisinspires you to attend a podcast
conference soon, because Iwould love to see you there.
Don't forget, next week we'rediscussing how to cut down on
editing time, so if you have anytips or questions about that,
be sure to tap the text showlink in the show notes to send
(19:12):
it in.
And, as always, thanks forlistening and keep podcasting.
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