How to increase podcast engagement
As a podcast strategist, I often find myself chatting with clients who are worried about their podcast's engagement.
The first thing I do is dig a little deeper to understand what they mean by "engagement'“.
Many people think of podcast engagement as getting more likes, comments, shares on social media, and positive ratings or reviews for their podcast. These forms of feedback are certainly important and can be very encouraging.
However, when I talk about podcast engagement, I'm usually referring to something a bit deeper. I'm interested in how invested your audience is in your content, which we can gauge through analytics like consumption rates and retention statistics. This tells us how much of your episodes people are actually listening to and coming back for more.
It’s important to recognize that these two types of engagement—social interaction and content investment—are different and require unique approaches to improve.
In this article, let's dive into ways to create content that truly resonates with your audience. We’ll also explore how to build a vibrant community around your podcast that naturally leads to more likes, comments, and reviews.
How to increase podcast engagement with content that resonates
Research by Acast and Nielsen revealed that 63% of respondents consider podcast hosts to be trustworthy, and a significant 80% trust the recommendations made by these hosts.
This high level of trust is comparable to that placed in family and friends, with 85% and 84% respectively, underscoring the authentic relationships that podcast hosts develop with their audiences over time through regular, engaging episodes. In 2023, podcasters surpassed social media influencers with hosts being considered by audiences 2x more influential than social media influencers.
Another study revealed that the one-sided relationships podcast listeners form with hosts significantly impact their psychological well-being.
These studies show the importance of building trust and creating an emotional connection with your audience. Podcasting isn't just about putting out content; it's about forming a genuine bond with your listeners.
If you want to boost your audience's engagement, it's essential to ensure that your message resonates deeply and that your listeners feel connected to you.
So here are five practical strategies to help you foster a stronger connection with your audience and boost your podcast's engagement:
1. Be An Authentic Podcast Host
Your authenticity is your unique selling point.
Listeners can detect when you’re being insincere or trying to emulate someone else. Besides, it's exhausting to maintain a facade, and it’s not sustainable in the long run.
Authenticity allows your true personality to shine, making you more relatable and trustworthy. In business, people choose to work with those they like and trust; the same principle applies in podcasting.
What Being Authentic Looks Like:
Embrace Your Voice: If you’re self-conscious about your voice, practice speaking naturally and confidently. Episode six of our podcast, featuring voice coach Nic Redman, offers excellent tips on how to sound more like the real you. She breaks down practices you can incorporate in your recording or even before you hit record to ensure you're presenting your true self.
Share Personal Stories: Incorporate anecdotes from your life and business. This makes you relatable and helps listeners see you as a real person. For instance, sharing a story about a challenge you overcame in your business can resonate deeply with listeners facing similar issues.
Avoid Comparison: Stop comparing yourself to more successful podcasters. Focus on your journey and growth. Your listeners are drawn to your unique perspective and experiences.
Avoid:
Mimicking the style or persona of other podcasters. It can come off as inauthentic and forced.
Overly polished and scripted episodes that lack spontaneity. Authenticity often shines through imperfections and genuine reactions.
2. Speak to One Person
About 90% of podcast listeners consume content alone, often while multitasking at home or in their car. This creates a unique opportunity for one-on-one communication. When you speak directly to a single listener, you foster a sense of intimacy and connection that group addresses can't achieve.
What Speaking to One Person Looks Like:
Use Singular Pronouns: Address your listener as "you" instead of "y’all" or "everyone." This makes the conversation feel personal. Imagine you are having a coffee chat with a friend and speak directly to them.
Imagine a Specific Listener: When recording, visualize speaking to one specific person who represents your target audience. Picture their challenges, interests, and the value they seek from your podcast.
Personalize Your Content: Tailor your content to address the individual listener’s needs and interests. For example, if your audience primarily consists of small business owners, provide tips that cater specifically to their struggles and aspirations.
Direct Engagement: Use phrases like "I want to share this with you" instead of "everyone should know this." This makes the listener feel like you're speaking directly to them.
Avoid:
General greetings like "Hi, everyone!" which can feel impersonal.
Broad, generic content that doesn’t speak directly to individual concerns or interests. Focus on niche topics that resonate deeply with your specific listener.
3. Be Vulnerable
Showing vulnerability helps build a deeper connection with your audience. It’s important to share both your successes and your struggles. Vulnerability demonstrates that you’re human and relatable, making it easier for listeners to trust and connect with you.
What Being Vulnerable Looks Like:
Share Hardships and Successes: Talk about your challenges and how you overcame them. This can make you more relatable and trustworthy. For instance, discussing a failed business venture and what you learned from it can provide valuable lessons to your audience, while showing that you aren’t a Mr/Mrs Know-it-All.
Celebrate Small Wins: Don’t shy away from celebrating milestones, no matter how small. It shows gratitude and progress. For example, celebrating reaching 1,000 downloads before 90 days shows growth and encourages your audience to join in your success.
Invite Listener Interaction: Encourage your audience to share their own stories and experiences with you. This creates a two-way dialogue and fosters community.
Avoid:
Only sharing successes without acknowledging the effort and struggles behind them. Balanced storytelling is key.
Being overly negative or pessimistic without offering hope or solutions. Share hardships as part of a larger journey towards success.
4. Offer Value
To build trust, consistently deliver value in your content. Show that you’re knowledgeable and that your advice is practical and actionable. This establishes you as a go-to expert in your niche that people can connect with.
What Offering Value Looks Like:
Deep Dives into Topics: Offer comprehensive insights and detailed information on relevant subjects. Don’t just scratch the surface; provide in-depth analysis and actionable steps.
Share Expertise Freely: Don’t hold back on valuable information. This establishes you as an authority in your niche. For instance, if you have a unique strategy that’s worked for you, explain it in detail rather than keeping it vague.
Interactive Content: Create content that requires listener participation, such as Q&A sessions or live discussions. This not only provides value but also engages your audience directly.
Engage with Experts: Invite guest experts to share their knowledge, providing additional value to your listeners. Collaborations can bring fresh perspectives and new insights to your audience.
Encourage Questions: Prompt your audience to ask questions and participate in discussions. Address their queries in your episodes. This not only adds value but also shows that you care about their specific needs and concerns.
Avoid:
Being too vague or general in your advice. Specificity is key to providing actionable value.
Withholding information out of fear of giving away too much for free, ie scarcity mindset. Generosity with your knowledge can build trust and loyalty.
5. Highlight Your Community
Your listeners want to feel seen and appreciated. Highlighting your community can turn passive listeners into active advocates for your podcast. This not only strengthens your relationship with existing listeners but also attracts new ones through word-of-mouth.
What Highlighting Your Community Looks Like:
Feature Listener Stories: Share experiences and feedback from your listeners in your episodes. For example, highlight a listener's success story that relates to your podcast’s theme.
Community Spotlights: Dedicate segments to discussing listener questions, comments, or successes, to show that you value their input and are engaged with your audience. Also let your audience members know when you’ve mentioned them to further engagement.
Encourage Interaction: Prompt your audience to reach out to you via social media or email with their thoughts and questions and incorporate their ideas into your episodes to make them feel valued and heard.
Monitor Feedback: Regularly review listener comments, emails, and social media interactions to find content ideas and opportunities for engagement. Keep track of common questions and topics that generate a lot of interest.
Showcase Listener Achievements: Share stories of listeners' successes and how your podcast has helped them. This not only highlights their achievements but also shows the impact of your content as social proof.
Avoid:
Ignoring listener feedback or interactions. Engagement is crucial for building a loyal community.
Creating content in a vacuum without acknowledging your audience’s contributions. Listener input can provide valuable content ideas and foster a sense of community.
Now that you have built an engaged community that truly loves and resonates with your content, you might be wondering how to encourage them to interact more with likes, shares, comments, and podcast reviews. To achieve this, you need to incorporate strategic calls to action in your content and social media.
Simply put, if you want interactions, just ask for them!
Building an active podcast community that interacts with your content
How to get more podcast reviews?
If you want to receive more reviews, it's essential to let your community know. Here are four effective ways to engage with your audience and encourage them to leave reviews.
Ask in Your Intro: Make it a habit to ask for reviews at the beginning of each episode. This is crucial because many listeners might not make it to the end. Explain how easy it is and why it’s important for you. A simple, heartfelt request like, “I’d love it if you could take a moment to leave us a review on [platform]. Your feedback means the world to us and really helps us grow!” can be very effective.
Personal Appeals: Reach out to your most engaged listeners through direct messages on social media or via email. Let them know how much their review would mean to you and how it helps the podcast grow. Personal touches like these can encourage loyal listeners to support you.
Host Giveaways: This method can be incredibly effective if you’re willing to invest in a relevant prize for your community, such as podcast equipment, consulting time, or fitness gear, depending on your niche. Provide clear instructions on how your audience can leave a review and enter the giveaway to win the prize.
How to get more social media engagement for my podcast - follows, likes, shares and comments
Engage promptly
One key strategy to boost interactions on social media is to actively engage with your audience. It's crucial to reply to comments and messages promptly. When your listeners take the time to reach out, responding to them makes them feel valued and heard, encouraging more frequent interactions.
Your social media presence is an extension of your podcast. Just as you would interact with a guest or co-host during an episode, engage with your audience in the same dynamic way. Revisit your main social media analytics to understand when most of your audience is live, so you can maximize the impact.
Remember, engagement is a two-way street. If you want your audience to stay engaged with your content, you must lead by example and be an active participant in the conversation. Block 20 minutes a day to engage with your audience to avoid logging on the platform multiple times a day, which leads to burnout.
Also make sure to ask for feedback and engaging questions in your posts’ descriptions to encourage your audience to participate in the conversation.
Host giveaways
Running successful giveaways can significantly boost your audience engagement, but it's essential to avoid common pitfalls.
Make sure to keep the process simple and aligned with your audience's behavior. Avoid asking for overly complicated actions that create friction, such as multiple steps involving different platforms.
For example, a straightforward task like writing a review and sending a screenshot can be effective if the instructions are clear and easy to follow. Moreover, ensure the prize is something your audience genuinely values and that it aligns with their interests.
Pro tip: If you include a giveaway in the main content of your podcast episode and set a specific timeframe for participation (e.g., one week), listeners who discover your episode later will hear about the giveaway but won’t be able to participate.
To avoid this issue, it’s better to use dynamic ads for your giveaways. Dynamic ads are segments that can be easily updated or removed after the giveaway period ends. By using platforms that support dynamic ad insertion, you can ensure that only current and relevant giveaways are promoted to your audience. This approach keeps your content evergreen and prevents any confusion or disappointment among latecomers.
Encourage interactions by offering free exclusive content
Create exclusive content or offer additional value for those who comment, like or share. Make sure to include a clear call to action on how your audience should interact with your content to receive your freebies.
Leverage your show notes
Your show notes are a powerful tool for connecting with your listeners. They’re often the first place your audience gets an in-depth look at your podcast episodes, find valuable resources, and engage with your calls to action. Having well-structured show notes is essential for reinforcing your podcast's branding and helping you stand out.
Thanks to advancements in AI, turning your podcast audio into detailed show notes is now simpler than ever. When creating your show notes template, be sure to include a section for a call to action and links to your social media and don’t forget to ask your listeners to follow and subscribe.
Conclusion
Engaging your podcast audience is more than just getting likes, comments, and reviews. It's about forming genuine connections and making your listeners feel valued and understood.
When you're authentic and speak directly to your audience, sharing both your successes and struggles, you create a deeper bond. Providing real value and highlighting your community helps to build loyalty and trust.
Don’t forget to actively invite interactions. Whether it's through calls to action in your episodes, social media posts, or well-structured show notes, make it easy for your audience to engage.
Share Your Thoughts
If this article gave you new ideas for boosting your podcast engagement, feel free to connect with us on Instagram @thepodcastspace or reach out to Ana Xavier on LinkedIn. We'd love to hear your thoughts and continue the conversation!
ANA XAVIER
Multilingual award-winning podcast marketing and content strategist specialized in generating online visibility for women, multilingual, and minority impact-driven business owners.