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January 20, 2025 β€’ 15 mins

If you want to grow your podcast, you need to understand your listeners.

What makes a listener a fan? What makes a fan a customer? In this episode we'll talk about the lifecycle of our audience and how to better speak to listeners at every stage of listening.

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Transcript

Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Morgan Franklin (00:00):
When you sit down to record a podcast
episode, who are you thinkingabout? Are you thinking about
the listener that's casuallylistening to an episode on the
way to work while they'rethinking about 30 other things
that they need to get done? Orwhat about the listener who just
came across your podcast onLinkedIn and thinks that you'd
be a great consultant to workwith, but they figured that they
should listen to a few of yourepisodes before they send you a

(00:22):
message. Or what about thelistener that is patiently
waiting for your new episodesevery single time they drop?
These are three very differentlisteners, and if you want to
get the most out of yourpodcast, you'll need to
understand all three. Hello andwelcome to podcast for profit.

(00:42):
My name is Morgan Franklin. I'ma Podcast Producer, strategist
and educator. This podcast willhelp you create and grow a
podcast that cuts through thenoise of social media and speaks
directly to your targetaudience. If you're ready to
create a podcast that will alignyou with the experts in your
industry, position yourself as atrusted leader and create

(01:05):
another source of revenue foryour business. You're in the
right place. So often we'recreating our podcast without
really having an end goal inmind. Now why do we do that? Why
would we do that? Why would werecord a whole podcast episode
without knowing what we want tocome from it. Now there are a
few different reasons. The firstand most consistent I see is we

(01:29):
like it. We're interested inthis topic. We think it's funny
or interesting or cool, and wewant to share it with our
audience. And you know what?That's okay. There are chart
topping podcast made from thecontent of what the host thinks
is cool, and everyone followsalong. However, for most of us,
we don't have the time andenergy and money to make a

(01:54):
podcast about things we justlike or interested in, and hang
around long enough to see ifother people like it too. But
it's funny, because so manypeople that I talk to think this
is how podcasts are made. So ifwe're not creating a podcast
from the things that we thinkare cool and that we like, what
are other reasons that we mightbe making it? Usually it's to

(02:17):
promote our brand, and whetherthat's a personal brand
ourselves or a business orindustry, it has something to do
with promoting a larger visionof ourselves, and I think that
that's one of the best uses of apodcast. What better way to
build a relationship with peopleand earn credibility in a field

(02:37):
or subject than talking about itevery week, and sharing your
thoughts and where thisinevitably will go wrong is not
understanding why the audienceis listening. We talk about this
all the time, but that's what weneed to figure out. Are our
audience members? Casuallisteners? Are they die hard
fans, or are they customers? Whoare we serving and how are we

(03:03):
serving them? Let's talk aboutcasual listeners. I think most
of us underestimate the power ofa casual listener, the person
that just stumbled across ourpodcast from a friend
recommendation, or anotherpodcast that we guessed it on,
or even just knowing the hostoutside of their podcast. Weak
connections make the world goround, and I think that we all
have to pay a little bit moreattention to the person that

(03:25):
randomly listened to one of ourepisodes from three months ago.
You have to have casuallisteners before you can have
fans, and that's something thatwe tend to overlook as
podcasters. This is arelationship like any other, and
listeners have to get to knowyou. They have to trust you,
make sure that you're givingthem that opportunity. A few

(03:47):
ways that you can speak moredirectly to casual listeners is
having episodes that aren'tbuilt on each other, and what do
I mean by that? I mean whenyou're recording an episode,
you're recording it as if thislistener has never heard an
episode before. This can bereally easy. Things like, let's
say that you bring up your wifeCarla in every episode. So

(04:08):
instead of saying somethinglike, Carla loves baby carrots,
you should see her scarf down abag of baby carrots. Instead
maybe say, my wife Carla lovesbaby carrots, you should see her
scarf down a bag of babycarrots. You don't have to go
way out of your way to makesmall changes like that. They
have a huge impact on someonethat is listening to your

(04:31):
podcast for the first time, theyfeel part of the conversation.
Instead of wondering, who isCarla? Who is Carla eating these
carrots? Another thing is havingsome kind of introduction for
yourself and the host of thisshow. So I do this in a pre
recorded bit in my intro. Butyou can also do this just at the
beginning of your show, in thefirst three minutes. Listeners

(04:53):
should have some idea of who youare and who is coming on this
episode, and what is going on.And again, this doesn't have to
be. Super formal, but have amoment to explain. Hey, I'm
Morgan. I'm a Podcast Producer.I'm going to help you grow your
podcast. Let's get into theepisode of XYZ, just setting up
so people know who you are andwhat this episode is going to be
about. The last thing is to haveeverything listed in the episode

(05:17):
description. Now, what do I meanby everything? I mean all the
links that you talked about inthe episode number one,
obviously, that should be inyour episode description, but
all your social links, ways toget a hold of you, ways to find
out more any relevantinformation for a first time
listener or a casual listenerwho might want to find out more
about you in the show, I seesome podcasters do something

(05:40):
like they'll have a link thatsays, Did you like this episode?
Here are two other episodes thatyou might like. And I think that
is genius, and it keepslisteners listening at the
least. Make sure people know howto learn more about you and how
they can follow you on otherplatforms and ask them to
subscribe to the podcast, andthat sounds so Elementary, there

(06:03):
needs to be something in yoursign off, or in your pre
recorded sign off, that says,make sure you subscribe to the
podcast. For more episodes likethis, we need to remind our
audience what we want them todo, and think about how much
more likely you are to listen toa podcast that you subscribe to.
So make sure that you'reencouraging your audience to

(06:25):
subscribe to your podcast. Beingaware of new listeners and
casual listeners is the best wayto turn someone that would have
just listened to one episode ora couple episodes of your show
into a fan of your podcast.Speaking of fans, what about
fans? I'm talking about theaudience members that are
listening to every singleepisode of your podcast the day

(06:46):
that it comes out. How are youmaking content with these
listeners in mind? Because whilewe need casual listeners to turn
into fans, 80% of your listensare normally coming from 20% of
your listeners. So how do wecultivate that 20% the first
thing is understanding whythey're coming to your podcast.

(07:09):
I feel like I say this on everyepisode, but you don't have to
remake the wheel. Someone isnormally a fan of something
because they know what toexpect. Think about your
favorite restaurant, I bet it'syour favorite, because you know
what to expect, whether you'rethinking about it or not. They
do an amazing job. The food isconsistently delicious. You love

(07:30):
what they do, and they do itconsistently. We have to be more
like our listeners favoriterestaurants, meaning we have to
be consistent. If you areputting out a variety of the
same content over and over andover and people are loving it,
that is not a sign that they arebored or that you need to change
something up. It is a sign thatyou are doing something right.

(07:53):
And again, this is why it is soimportant to have your eyes on
the analytics of your podcast.What are your download numbers?
What is your episode retentionrate? Are you consistently
getting new followers on Spotifyand Apple podcast and the other
platforms that you track? Whatdo people like to hear from you

(08:15):
don't be afraid of thesenumbers. I know so many
podcasters that are terrified tolook at their downloads. The
numbers are your friend. Becausethink about this. Let's say that
you had an episode that only got100 downloads when you normally
get 1000 downloads on newepisodes. Well, what was that
episode title? What did you talkabout? What do those episodes

(08:36):
that normally get 1000 downloadshave in common? These are all
things that we can find out fromthe analytics. And it is so
important for you to know thisinformation when you are turning
a casual listener into a fan andkeeping them a fan. If you need
help figuring this out, I have aone hour strategy call that is

(08:57):
perfect for this. Theinformation for booking will be
in the episode description, andsomething else to consider is
how you are cultivating yourcommunity outside of this
podcast, I'm working on a fullepisode on building a community
around your podcast so make surethat you're subscribed. But how
are you creating a place wherepeople can talk about your

(09:19):
podcast and get excited aboutyour podcast. Are you connecting
people with the podcast and witheach other? Because that is
where the real magic is. You canhave fans, you can have people
that love your podcast, but thetrue magic will come when the
people who love your podcast areable to find each other. Any

(09:41):
good brand strategist will tellyou that the magic isn't in the
brand or the company or thepodcast. It's in how you create
a community that identifies withyour podcast. Listening to your
favorite podcast is a statussymbol. It's something that we
talk about with other people.It's a. Connection point, and
that's why I say that is wherethe real magic happens. You need

(10:04):
to know how you are creating acommunity around your podcast to
have fans of your podcast. Sowe've talked about casual
listeners and we talked aboutfans, and that leaves us with
one group of our audience totalk about, and that is our
customers. So working withpodcasters, this is probably the

(10:24):
most forgotten group oflisteners, and although most of
my clients, this is their numberone priority, is to get in touch
with these customers, it's kindof out of reach. So that's why I
go back to the beginning of thisepisode where I say most of us
are not making episodes andpodcast content for the true
intention of our podcast. And Iknow it's scary, I know it is

(10:49):
not the easy road out, but ifyou're creating a podcast for
the intention of growing yourcustomer base or reaching new
clients or making money of anykind, you need to make a podcast
that fulfills that mission. Sohow can we do this more
effectively? First of all,making content that positions
you as the authority on asubject. That's what I do every

(11:14):
week with this podcast. I comein here to position myself as an
authority in podcasting. I knowfor some of us, this is going to
take some internal belief inourselves, maybe even lying to
ourselves. Well, let's just callit a fit, maybe even fibbing to
ourselves. We've all heard aboutimposter syndrome, and you might
be patient one of impostersyndrome, but you have to get

(11:36):
out there and start showing upas the person that you want your
clients to see you as becausehaving a podcast is such an
outstanding tool in business andmarketing and personal branding,
but you have to use itcorrectly. So step one is show
up as your authentic self andbelieve in that self. Step two

(11:57):
is know what your audience wantsto learn about and how you can
effectively help them learnthat. So let's say that you're a
leadership strategist, and youhelp mid to high level managers
improve in their role. What dothese executives need? What is
already being provided frompodcasts in your market. How can

(12:19):
you answer questions that theydidn't even know to ask. How do
you position yourself as theleader in the industry and the
go to resource in this niche,especially that second part, how
are you positioning yourself asthe go to resource in this
niche? Step three is have anoffer. That's what so many of us

(12:43):
are missing. If you want to turna listener into a customer, you
need to have an offer, andpreferably three offers, one at
a low introductory price point,one at a mid price point and one
at a high price point. Theseoffers should be a natural
extension of what you talk abouton your podcast and what
listeners are coming for. Soexplain a problem in an episode

(13:05):
and then pitch your service asthe solution no matter what you
do have an offer, andconsistently pitch it on every
episode and put it in everyepisode description. Our
customers need to know what theycan buy, where they can buy it,
and why they should buy it. Andyou as a podcast host, you have

(13:27):
so many opportunities. All threeof these points can be easily
covered in every single podcastepisode. So the next time that
you sit down to record a podcastepisode, I want you to take a
moment to think about thesethree listeners, the first being
the casual or first timelistener, how do we capture

(13:47):
their attention and turn theminto a fan? For our fans, how do
we consistently provide themwith the podcast content and
community to keep them engaged?And then finally, what about our
customers? How can weeffectively position ourselves
as the industry leaders andcreate offers that are an

(14:09):
extension of our podcast? If youhave questions about how to
better reach and convert thesethree segments of your audience,
I have a one hour strategy callthat would be absolutely perfect
for you. The information forbooking is linked in the episode
description, and as always, Ican't wait to listen to your
podcast. Hey, thank you so muchfor joining me on this episode.

(14:33):
If you enjoyed the podcast andyou'd like to hear more episodes
like this one, go ahead andsubscribe to the show. New
Episodes air every Mondaymorning. And if you found this
episode valuable and you want tohelp other business owners and
podcasters, will you leave me afive star review. It helps the
show rank higher in the chartsand brings more entrepreneurs
the information they need tostart making money on their

(14:54):
podcast.
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