6 not so obvious things that are impacting your podcast growth.
Hey Pod Pals!
This newsletter was lovingly curated (without the use of any AI) in real time on Thursday morning at 9:20 am CST.
My morning routine has been fully transitioned into "Summer Mode"...😎
✔️ AM date with the stair-mill machine at the gym.
✔️ Red light therapy.
✔️ Breakfast with the family.
✔️ 15 min walk outside in the sunshine.
✔️ Sipping my cold brew coffee and ready to write!
Today we are going to have a little chat about a few things that you probably haven't thought about as far as how they are impacting your podcast growth.
When I talk about podcast growth strategies, I tend to stick to the "Big Three":
📈 Podcast SEO
📈 Effort Based Marketing
📈 Paid Growth Strategies
But...there are several other factors that can impact your show growth that you need to be aware of.
I've identified SIX of them.
🎯 1). Your content niche.
A small niche show is GREAT for getting clients BUT it is much harder to grow a big audience.
Example:
➡️ A podcast about health tips can have a potentially huge audience.
➡️ A podcast about health tips for real estate professionals is a much smaller potential audience.
This is good for getting clients within that tiny niche but it's harder to grow a HUGE audience.
Now the lesson here is that I think you SHOULD niche down because of the monetization benefits.
You just need to realize that you are limiting your overall audience size.......but who really cares if you are reaching the RIGHT people and getting clients!
🎯 2). How many episodes you have released.
This one is simple:
More episodes = More BINGE-ability for new listeners.
If a new listener finds your show today do they have 12 total potential episodes to binge or hundreds??
🎯 3). The day of the week that you release your episode.
Several studies have shown that episodes that are released on Mon-Thurs do higher numbers than episodes released on Fri-Sun.
Why?
The average podcast listener's schedule is more routine on Mon-Thurs...and the weekend is full of pattern disruptions.
We want that "new episode" push notification to hit their phone on Mon-Thurs!
I've had clients that have switched from a weekend release cadence to Mon-Thurs and it has DOUBLED their downloads.
🎯 4). Your marketing experience level.
When I started podcasting in 2015 I had ZERO followers on social media.
I had to learn how to "do" social media and learn how to be a content creator all at once.
This dramatically slows down the growth process.
If someone has 5,000 followers on a platform and THEN launches a podcast you will notice that growth happens for them much faster.
Again, if you are starting from scratch like I had to, there is nothing you can do about this.....just get started and start learning ASAP!
Just don't compare your growth curve to your Pod Pal that has 10,000 IG followers.
🎯 5). Your budget for coaching and paid ads.
Having the ability to INVEST in speeding up your learning curve really helps....PERIOD.
Having the ability to INVEST in spreading the word about your podcast via paid ads also really helps!
If you don't have the ability to invest in either of these things just realize that your journey will take a little longer....keep grinding!
🎯 6). The yearly podcast growth cycles.
I always try to bring this up around this time of year!
Podcast growth tends to follow the following cycle:
😍 Jan-May: Growth period.
😢 June-August: Maintenance or audience decline.
😍 Sept-Mid November: Growth period.
😢 Mid November-December: Maintenance or audience decline.
What's the deal with this???
👉 It's all about what time of the year has the most pattern disruptions for our listeners.
The growth zones have very few pattern disruptions.
The "not so fun" zones have LOTS of pattern disruptions like:
✔️ School ending/starting
✔️ Vacation season
✔️ Holiday season
So here's a little takeaway from our chat today Pod Pals:
The audience growth journey will be unique for each podcaster.
By knowing the six things we discussed today, I hope it helps you stay out of your own head a bit more effectively.
Many of these things will be improved by simply hitting RECORD and PUBLISH every week and gaining valuable experience as a content creator!
📌 Last thing for today:
This is the last reminder you will get from me about grabbing a 1:1 Coaching BETA roster spot.
The $500 discounted pricing ends on Sunday.
If you are a podcaster that would benefit from working with me to help you develop/optimize your core offer and then create a content campaign to help you sell it to your audience....go grab a spot!
You can purchase your program now and then start anytime before July 31st.
Talk to you next week!
Your Pod Pal,
Adam
⭐️ P.S. Here's the scoop on my podcast episode this week!
🎙️ Podcasting Business School EP 624: Four things podcasters MUST consider when building an offer.
When it comes to offer building and sales... I've made ALL of the mistakes!
This episode is all about focusing in on FOUR key things that will help podcasters optimize their offer and actually sell it to their audience.