In a world with seemingly endless content available at your fingertips, marketers are constantly searching for the best way for their message to be heard above the noise. With the average human attention span decreasing year by year, it’s essential to capture the attention of your audience quickly and in an engaging format. Adding podcasts to your content marketing strategy provides a new avenue to reach your audience with an actual, human voice that will help your content be heard above the crowd, literally.
We’ve all heard the stats about how quickly podcasts are gaining popularity—44 percent of the US population has listened to a podcast, 26 percent of Americans listen to podcasts monthly, there are over 525,000 active podcast shows available, and so on. So, there’s no need to defend the growing popularity of podcasts. However, there is a case to be made for how they can help your business grow and connect with your audience.
Here are a few benefits you might see by adding a podcast to your content marketing strategy and creating a comprehensive plan.
1. Establish Trust
Creating audio content literally gives your brand a voice. It provides your listeners the opportunity to hear your passion, authenticity and credibility. When a listener within your target audience hears your voice, it can feel as if they already know you on an individual level, which can establish a level of trust between the host and the listener. Listening to someone’s voice allows you to connect emotions to the content, whether you laugh, gasp, or wonder aloud, you’re establishing a connection to the host—one that you can’t always establish through the written word.
In a study done by Medium surveying over 28,000 podcast listeners, 33 percent found podcasts to be “very trustworthy” and 49 percent claimed them to be “somewhat trustworthy.” This level of trust was nearly tied with the first place medium (national newspapers) and ahead of radio and local newspapers. This trust level shows the enormous amount of trust that listeners place in the hosts.
2. Capture the Attention of Your Audience
In the car, at the gym, walking the dog, whenever people are listening to your content, they are actively choosing to listen to it. You not only have their captive attention, but you know that those listeners are interested in what you’re saying. 49 percent of podcast listeners listen to episodes while at home and 22 percent listen to their favorite podcasts while in the car, making podcasts the perfect medium for living in a multi-tasking society.
3. Grow Your Reach
By publishing your podcast episodes on platforms like iTunes, Stitcher or SoundCloud, thousands of potential listeners will now have access to your content and viewpoints that previously didn’t. Platforms like these are search engines in and of themselves, and allow people to use them to find podcasts that they might be interested in by browsing by genre or topics. Exposure like this will help to increase your reach and grow your audience organically.
4. Bridge the Gaps
In a digital society where access to video and audio is always available, comprehensive content strategies should include many different platforms and tactics. Adding a podcast into the mix provides the opportunity to cover topics or themes audibly that might not translate as well visually in print or digitally.
5. Quick to Market
Episodes can be as long or short as you want them to be, so they are easily recorded and edited. If there’s a breaking news story, event or new product in the market, you can get a group together to record a quick episode on the fly to add your input to the conversation without missing a beat. Podcasting doesn’t have the long turnaround time of tactics like white papers, case studies and blogs, so adding your voice to the conversation can happen quickly.
6. Have Some Fun
Creating a podcast with your co-workers, customers or industry peers gives you the opportunity to have fun and show the personality and tone of your brand or business. There are many ways to portray your content while having a good time—games, Q&A, and more—choose something that feels authentic to your brand while still getting your point across.
7. Establish Thought Leadership
By including podcasts into your content strategy and building trust among your listeners, you are establishing thought leadership and carving out a place within your industry to be seen as a trailblazer. By doing so, you’re setting your business and brand up for continued success and notoriety with your target customers.
Get Your Voice Out There
Podcasting is a relatively inexpensive, fun format with few barriers to entry into the market. This allows you to create an interesting narrative around your brand and connect with your audience, making podcast episodes an ideal addition to your content strategy. Try inviting a variety of industry experts or clients onto your podcast show to cover a broad number of topics and personalities.
Podcasting is a growing medium, but there are still plenty of opportunities for new shows within niche audiences and topics. By including your unique voice to industry topics, you can create a genuine connection with your audience and round out your content marketing strategy to grow your business.
