Should You Jump on the Podcast Bandwagon?

Heard of podcasts? They’re like a radio show — free content but you can download and listen at your leisure. According to podcast host Libsyn, total podcast downloads grew from 1.9 billion to 2.6 billion from 2013to 2014; that’s huge growth upside. Not to be outdone, there was incredible growth again in 2015, with at least 21% of the US population — nearly 57 million individuals — downloading a show at least once per month. To put it in perspective, 15% of the population listens to Spotify, the top music streaming service which added podcasts last month, in the same interval.

Podcast listeners are highly mobile, with 64% of users listening on a smart phone or tablet. Being that the average commute in America is 25 minutes, there is an audience just waiting for your content. With all this, it totally makes sense that 4 times as many audio podcasts are downloaded as video podcasts.

We’re not going to lie to you — there are challenges that exist in creating a show.  These include creating content at least once every week, editing and creating a final file (done right, it’s time-consuming) not to mention having to promote something brand new. But there is still a lot of value to be had. In comparison to blogging, significantly less people are podcasting due to the time commitment it takes not only to execute, but to do in a professional manner. This means less competition in the space, giving you a greater opportunity to be found and heard.

Some reasons why you should consider a podcast:

1. Creating a Opinion Leader (OL) Status

Marketing guru, Seth Godin, has often referred to the idea of creating a tribe, a group of people that follow and digest everything you create, and audio is perfect for creating this effect. Audio creates a relationship which blogging and the written word cannot duplicate. Listeners know your voice, they know how you communicate on topics, and it also helps to position you as an opinion leader. Media expert, Kevin Kelly, has expanded on this idea in his article “1,000 True Fans,” in which he talks about creating not just listeners but raving fans or “evangelists” for your brand. True fans will share your message with others, and create a larger sphere of influence for your brand.  Being that audio content is easily digestible its ripe for the creation of opinion leader status.

2. Audio Content is Easier for Your Audience to Assimilate

Podcast listeners are often doing something else while consuming content — be it working out, commuting or drudging through paperwork. The medium allows for your content to be consumed in places that its just not possible to consume the written word. When it comes down to it, listening takes less effort on the part of the consumer, and producing a podcast takes your company to where consumers are going.

3. You can get 8 Free Weeks of Promotion

If you have done a good enough job in promoting the launch of your show, then iTunes will promote you in a section of their catalog called “New and Noteworthy.”  What this means is free advertising for your show, in front of the perfect audience for it. To give you an idea of the numbers, John Lee Dumas of Entrepreneur on Fire Podcast, received 2,700 (81,000 per month) downloads per day during promotion and 900 per day after — showing the true value in iTunes free promotion. Dumas’ show has continued to grow and currently receives 1.5 million downloads per month, or about 50,000 per day. Free promotion was enough to get John his 1,000 true fans to keep his platform growing.

4. Re-purposing of Content Allows a Wider Audience to be Reached

A podcast allows you to create content that can be shared in several places, not just as audio but also in the written word and as video as well. Most podcasters use their audio episodes to create a blog post called “Show Notes,” — these are either a transcript or the most important points and links from the episode, and will even go as far as to make the audio interview into a video to reach an even wider YouTube audience.  By re-purposing you can create one piece of content and feature it different ways to reach a wider audience.

5. It Can be a Valuable Networking Tool

The great majority of podcasts are conducted as interviews, and this plays a few vital roles in the episodes’ promotion. First off it’s a valuable networking tool for the interviewer, it allows him to connect with opinion leaders in their space and use the opinion leader’s name as positioning to make the interviewer and brand appear even stronger and more prominent. And if you’re good, in many cases your OL will want to promote it to their email list as well, growing your listener and fan base wider by virtue of offering valuable content to more new people not already on your list.

Podcasting a medium is quickly becoming crowded, with almost 13,000 podcasts added from 2015 to 2016.  But getting your voice in now will allow your company to hold a valuable piece of internet real estate, and allow you to build a platform in the ever-changing future of media. The question really is not if your company should start a podcast, but rather when. Though it can be a bit of a an unknown to get started, many companies, such as this one, are offering the ability to help entrepreneurs get their voices literally heard on the road to omnipresence.