Want to know how to promote a podcast? Using social media to promote your podcast is the best way to attract regular listeners. Seeing as more than 3.8 billion people have been on social media platforms since the start of 2020 alone, finding your niche audience via the use of a professional social media page is a podcast’s best chance at success.
Posting your podcast on social media means you’re making use of the most powerful and accessible tool currently on the digital market; social media doesn’t cost to use, and that’s precisely why you need to leverage its power in favor of your podcast. With this in mind, here are 11 ways to promote your podcast on social media in 2024.
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Know Where The Listeners Are (Pssst. It’s iTunes)
iTunes is one of the biggest podcast platforms in the world – with over 800,000 different podcasts currently hosted on it, and over a billion downloads of these podcasts month by month.
Image courtesy of Apple
They beat Youtube, Google, and Spotify out of the water entirely. Make sure you’re on iTunes, as well as on Spotify or as videos on Youtube, which is a very useful form of social media. Being accessible ensures people can listen to you – almost 80% of podcast listeners tune in while commuting.
Tailor Your Posts for Different Platforms
Why? Different social media platforms are going to require different kinds of promotions since your audience will vary from platform to platform. Your podcast is in an audio format, of course, but you can write some copy for it, as well as come up with logos and/or brand friendly images to make it more visually appealing to your listeners.
Instagram, for example, is very much a visual platform with lots of video content, and will need good graphics and interesting angles to draw a user’s attention. Facebook likes content that’s easy to share, so make your posts bold and bright with snappy headlines. And on LinkedIn, blog posts and in depth news sources always rank highest.
Image courtesy of Instagram
Invite Guests
Having guest speakers and/or hosts on your podcasts means you can leverage their name to promote your podcast.
In 2024, there are more podcasts than ever before, and you’re going to be spoilt for choice when it comes to well-known names.
Don’t worry, your podcast has something to offer here. With the right promotion, your guests will bring their audience over to you, and you’ll be able to do the same for them, so it’s very much a relationship of give and take.
Release as Much as You Can
If you’re just about to release your first podcast episode, it’d be better to have the second or third episode ready to go at the same time. This allows listeners to really get into the swing of things, and settle in to enjoy what you say during your episodes.
Plus, the more content you can post within a 24-hour timeframe, the better your podcast is going to rank based on activity algorithms.
Try to aim for 3 episodes at once, and then release 1 episode at a time on a weekly basis after that. This has been shown to rank best based on research, as podcasts are on demand by nature, and your new audience will expect that of you.
It’s Best To Share Alongside a Blog Post
Why? Blog posts are the main course to the tasty dessert option that is a podcast,
Releasing a blog post with a podcast attached (or the other way around) can increase the number of hashtags you’re able to use, as well as the substantial amount of content your brand has put out there.
A blog post can allow a listener to go behind the scenes with the podcast. It allows for a greater sense of interaction and also ensures there’s a better click-through rate to your own website or podcast platform.
You Need To Share Teasers
Teasers are a good way to draw the eye, when it comes to promoting on social media platforms.
In a world inundated with different forms of media, all notifying a user at once, having something to pull them in organically is best for retaining their attention. Plus, the more teasers of your content on social media, and the more posts you can share surrounding all these episodes, the better your podcast is going to rank.
So, if you can share teasers of your work, you’ll draw people in via the simple nature of curiosity. If they like what they hear, they’ll be far more likely to click a link to listen to the whole podcast. Just make sure you’re using interesting and/or funny snippets of your podcast that you know people will get enjoyment out of, even in their 30-second format.
Ask for Feedback
Directly reaching out to your audience, as it stands, could garner you a lot of attention in terms of promotion.
When you ask the people who listen to your podcast to give their thoughts and opinions, you’re guaranteed to get your community engagement rates through the roof. The more people get involved, the more of a digital storm you create, and that’s very good for these platforms, as it attracts more and more regular users.
This is because of the algorithms social media websites use. The algorithm for all kinds of platforms, such as Instagram, Facebook, and Youtube take notice of this and could end up pushing your podcast to the ‘recommended’ or ‘featured’ section of their front pages.
Running a Giveaway Boosts Your Interaction
Why? Running a giveaway attracts attention from both your current followers and users who haven’t come across you before.
It ensures community engagement, which boosts your standing with the platform’s algorithm, and it usually means you’ll ask for a listener to tag someone else (who’d enjoy your content) in the profile. This could lead to many new listeners if your podcast is relevant to them.
Running a giveaway also leads to better brand awareness – your podcast is your brand, and you want people to recognise it, and what draws the attention more than the chance for free things? People will see your brand as something exciting to hit their feed, and click the follow button to keep up with you.
Turn Your Podcast Into a Youtube Channel
Youtube is a big part of the social media world; it’s where we find the most recognisable influencers, and it’s where more than 5 billion videos are watched per day by its users.
Putting your podcasts on Youtube makes them extremely accessible, and you open up your podcast to millions of users simultaneously.
It’s very easy to convert this audio format to video. Plenty of apps exist, but you could also edit the audio to fit the video format by adding backgrounds, or visual aids. Indeed, the latter option will attract a lot more attention.
Get Your Links Out to Relevant Influencers
Why? You want them to see your podcast link, instead of missing it in the comments or ignoring it entirely as just another brand trying to self promote – there are about 2 million active podcasts out there, and you need to separate yourself from them.
You could reach out directly, but to one person at a time, rather than your community at large. If you follow people who inspire you, such as fellow podcast hosts in a similar niche, or to influencers on social media like LinkedIn who are experts in your field, send them a message.
You could directly message them, or use email, rather than simply commenting on a post they’ve made. Go behind the scenes here, as it’s much easier to promote a podcast on social media when someone the community at large trusts gives you an endorsement.
Know Your Hashtags
Why? With about 9 different types of hashtags you can use to promote your podcast, such as location-based, content-based, or phrase-based, you can promote your podcast to various different groups of people.
Hashtags are a big part of promoting your podcast on social media, especially in 2024. Indeed, you could also come up with your own branded hashtag, for people to follow and get used to.
Make sure you’re making good use of the hashtag limit on sites such as Instagram, which allows 30 hashtags per post. Popping at least 11 onto your post, or as a top comment later on, has been found to work best in ensuring your posts reach the top spots.
How to promote your podcast in 2024
Promoting your podcast on social media in 2024 makes a lot of sense, doesn’t it? It’s a wide platform, with a lot of various media for you to make use of, and it’s free to use and will always be accessible to billions of people around the world.
It’s up to you now. It’s time to learn how to leverage the power of social media in favor of your podcast, and with the methods listed above, you’ll certainly be off to a good start. In the world of podcasting on social media in 2024, users consume about 7 podcasts per week. Will you ensure your podcast is rubbing shoulders with those other 6?
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