How to Get More Podcast Listeners?

Need to know how to get more podcast listeners? You’ve probably spent a lot of time and effort planning and creating your first episodes or creating a solid catalog. Still, you have yet to get a sizeable audience that can represent the quality of your podcast. That’s why you need help to achieve all your goals.

While publishing your podcast is an essential first step, and an outstanding achievement, word of mouth will only take it so far; therefore, for your podcast to be heard by many listeners, you need to take the necessary steps so that you can reach them.

Below, you can find the quickest ways to increase your podcast listeners if you are starting or have had the show for a long time. Follow these fourteen crucial tips so users can find you and listen to everything you say.

14 Expert Tips to Increase Your Podcast Listeners

1. Target a Specific Audience

Before implementing any strategy for growing your podcast, you must narrow down your target audience. Even though you may want to think that your podcast is for everyone, growing your audience is critical to find your niche.

To do this, you need to identify your podcast’s unique value and, therefore, which audience is most likely to listen to and benefit from your content. The more specific the topic of your podcast is, the more quickly you will be able to identify and attract your audience.

For example, the “Growing Up Halal” podcast explicitly targets the community they identify with: young American Muslim women who feel they are not represented on any platform. This topic is crucial to this particular audience, so it will most likely succeed in captivating them.

2. Create an Interesting Podcast

Make sure you invest time and effort in producing unique content that your listeners have not heard before, as this is one of the essential keys to getting more listeners. The reason for this is that by creating content that is different from the rest, you become the novelty and can cause listeners to always be on the lookout for your pitches to hear more.

Below, we’ve compiled the general trends that top-ranked podcasts share so you can apply them to create exciting episodes:

• They have specific topics.
• The presenters establish a connection with their audience.
• They have a complete structure, including a beginning, middle, and end.
• Each podcast episode maintains a common thread and purpose.
• Episodes are short, so topics are not covered in depth so that people are kept lively and attentive throughout the program. Each podcast is approximately 41 minutes and 31 seconds long.
• The podcast hosts are authentic and completely honest.

3. Choose a Podcast Host

Generally, podcasters are made by the creators themselves, but the reality is that you don’t need to be in front of a microphone to become a successful podcaster. So, if you don’t consider yourself a great speaker, you can choose a host to do the broadcasts on your behalf.

This way, you can become the podcast director and manage all aspects, such as program format, script, and audience participation. Having a great host for the episodes is one of the most influential factors in the podcast’s success. This is because, in the case of the podcast, the presenter is responsible for keeping listeners’ attention and attracting new listeners who want to listen to the podcast.

4. Create a Podcast Trailer

The trailer is a simple method of attracting listeners to your show by giving them a preview of what you’ll talk about to pique their interest, like a pin.

People are much more willing to listen to a short trailer to identify if the content is to their liking before investing their time in listening to a complete episode. Creating a trailer is an opportunity for the podcaster to share the unique value of their show and to practice presenting under specific constraints.

For example, you can post a montage of clips in your feed where you narrate an introduction explaining why the listener should be interested in listening to you and even show your guests the most important and exciting sections of your episode to impress them and encourage them to hear more.

5. Write a Compelling Podcast Description

The podcaster usually overlooks the podcast description when creating a new show, and they write anything in that box. But this component is the first information potential listeners see to decide whether they want to listen to the episode, and that is why it is essential to spend time and effort writing a description that captivates people.

When creating a description, we recommend keeping it simple. However, it can be a challenging job; you may need to write several descriptions and test them with people you trust. Also, incorporate keywords that people interested in finding programs like yours would use.

For example, the American Scandal podcast describes each show in-depth and communicates when listeners can expect new content from the podcast.

6. Use Call-to-Action

An effective tactic you can implement to get more podcast listeners is to ask your current audience to promote your podcast, and you can do this by using a CTA (call to action). Depending on your podcast’s genre, you can write something funny, witty, or motivational to make sure listeners click the “listen here” button.

Your CTA can be to check out our podcast, follow us on social media or share your podcast with your friends and family. In addition, you can ask your listeners to share your podcast on social media, and you can also ask them to leave ratings and comments to help others interested in the topics you cover discover your show.

We recommend using only one CTA at the end of each episode to let listeners know what action they should take to support you. In this way, your listeners will become a means of promotion that will generate great results in increasing podcast listeners.

7. Promote Your Podcast

Nowadays, promoting your podcast is one of the most effective ways to increase your listeners, so applying it is crucial to achieving outstanding results. To apply it, you can use various methods and modules provided by the marketing industry, all of which can guarantee a considerable increase in the number of your listeners. Here are some of them:

Cross-Promotion on Social Networks

More than half of the world’s population uses social media platforms, and this is something you can take full advantage of to achieve your goal. You first need to share the link to your podcast where the audience is on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and other channels to get the word out about your content, and you’ll quickly gain new listeners.

When starting a podcast, you must create social media accounts to promote your show, thus providing an option to promote your content and making it easier for people to discover it. Follow the tips below to help you get the most out of podcast marketing on social media:

• Make a post on each new episode for your podcast and your personal social media channels.
• Choose branded hashtags specific to your show so your listeners can join the conversation.
• Incorporate hashtags related to the topics covered and guests, where appropriate.
• Tag the social networks of guests, organizations, TV shows, artists, and anyone mentioned on your show, especially if they have an active social presence.
• Respond to your audience’s comments to make them feel cared for and keep their interest.
• Post to related Facebook and Reddit groups.
• Adapt your video content to a short format for sharing on Instagram Stories, Reels and YouTube Shorts, and TikTok.
• Share footage that includes quotes from episodes, behind-the-scenes photos from filming, and pictures taken with guests.
• Create short audio clips of your shows and post them on the Twitter and Instagram platforms.

Website/Blog

Build a website for your podcast and upload all the updates related to your episodes; also, you can create a blog where you can post articles that go deeper into topics covered in your show or contain information that supports your commentary.

In addition, you can incorporate a follow or move to podcast button on your website to redirect people’s traffic to your podcast. Performing these actions is very useful to increase the organic reach of your content and thus get more listeners.

Email list

An email list is ideal for direct online communication between you and your newsletter subscribers. So, it is another delivery device for your episodes, where you can give previews of upcoming episodes and send them with other content about your podcast.

We recommend you add an email subscription button on your website and promote your social networks to get subscribers to subscribe.

8. Reuse of Content

A tactic you can apply to get more listeners is to leverage podcast episodes that have performed well and have a positive engagement rate. Reuse that content after it stops receiving interactions to restart the engines again, get even more engagement, and get more plays of that show.

You can add new hashtags and advanced subcategories and modify the episode notes to revamp them and get a good return. This way, you will be able to get even more out of your content and present your show in a better way to your potential audience.

However, we recommend making only a few changes to your content, as such actions can hurt your episode’s search engine rankings and lower your engagement rate.

9. Engage with Your Listeners

Focus on maintaining a direct connection with your listeners to increase your credibility and attract more new listeners. After you’ve built a sizeable audience, it’s crucial that you actively interact with them, responding to their emails and comments.

This way, you can get them to engage and feel valued, which helps to increase your reach and exposure. Therefore, we recommend you interact with your listeners and engage with them regularly so that they become fans. Applying this strategy not only helps you get more listeners but also increases your popularity in the music industry.

10. Invite a Guest

A podcast guest can be a great way to grow your audience. You can invite friends, experts, influencers in your niche or people you think have interesting things to say. You can even encourage your guests to promote the podcast episodes they appear on, which will help engage their followers.

Applying this strategy is very useful because by working with other podcasters, you can learn about the techniques they use to attract new audiences and use the ones you consider most effective to incorporate into your program’s format. Therefore, we recommend exposing yourself to new listeners by collaborating with other podcasters from time to time.

11. Collaborate with Other Podcasts

An excellent strategy you can apply is to use your fellow creators as a resource and build a network of mutual support. Connect with like-minded creators who create podcasts that are complementary to yours. Mention your collaborators on social media and introduce them to your listeners, as this will likely get them to return the favor.

You can even go a step further and invite other podcast creators to participate in your podcast. Also, look for opportunities to participate in other podcasts as a guest to attract a new audience. Take the opportunity to interact with other creators online, create a wish list of podcasts you want to participate in, and share your idea with those creators.

12. Buy Podcast Listeners

One of the fastest ways to get listeners for your podcast is to buy them. Doing this, apart from helping you save work time and effort, allows you to achieve several goals in the short term, such as increasing the visibility of your podcast, gaining more credibility, and improving reach, among others.

The more listeners your podcasts have, the more easily you can promote your brand. To expand your reach, buy podcast listeners from GetAFollower and start seeing significant changes. We provide authentic listeners, a guaranteed high retention rate, and secure payment with a money-back guarantee.

13. Organize a Contest or Sweepstakes

Giving away freebies is one of the oldest and most effective tactics to generate enthusiasm in people. This is because people will always like to receive free stuff and are willing to participate in contests or sweepstakes to get it.

But you must be careful because people will interact with you to get the prize and have no intention of staying as listeners. Therefore, ensure you get something lasting out of your offers, such as reviews and comments.

14. Podcast SEO

Search engine optimization (SEO) is a must for people to find you within the podcast directory, websites, and blogs, as it is essential to achieve audience growth. Google search engine shows podcast episodes in search results, so good SEO can ideally attract listeners searching for topics related to your niche.

Incorporate keywords in your episode titles to make it easier for the search engine to display your content. Think about what people might search for related to the subject matter of your podcast and use those words. Write clear and concise episode descriptions incorporating the most relevant keywords for your niche at the beginning.

Conclusion

Building your podcast’s audience requires much effort and determined action over time. But, when you apply these fourteen strategies consistently, you will exponentially increase your chances for success.

Unfortunately, many podcasters try tactics once and then give up. Instead of giving up if you don’t see a significant increase in subscribers, focus on long-term goals and celebrate each new listener. Get your podcast growing now!