How Do People Find Podcasts?
Don’t assume that everyone finds podcasts the same way you find podcasts.
Growing your podcast audience means knowing exactly who your audience is and then using reliable data to make sure your podcast is available everywhere they find and listen to podcasts.
The podcasting world is blessed to have trustworthy data from sources like Nielsen along with excellent consumer researchers and evangelists (like the crew at Sounds Profitable) who generously share what they learn. Based on these sources, here are the 5 most popular ways people discover podcasts:
1/ Word-of-mouth
Most people find new podcasts through recommendations from friends, family, and work colleagues. Lucky for you, most aesthetic practices already have an audience. Tell them in the office, on social media, on your website, and by email. Then make it easy for them to share it with their friends & family.
2/ Google
The second most popular way in which people find new podcasts is by searching the internet. This can be through simply Googling podcasts within their theme of interest, searching on their podcast listening app of choice, asking communities on social media for recommendations, and more. Being discoverable to this part of the audience requires a dedicated microsite for your podcast and being fully integrated with your practice website.
3/ YouTube
Many people use Youtube like a search engine and nearly one in five people (18%) say YouTube is the service they most often use to listen to podcasts. It’s easy to use, easy to find things, and amazing at recommending content based on videos you have watched. If YouTube can detect what your podcast is about, it will automatically recommend it to people watching or listening to similar content.
4/ Social media
Social media is best for keeping your current audience engaged. You don’t want to repeatedly post “go listen to my podcast,” rather, you’ll create clips and highlights that drive engagement and simplify content creation for social media.
5/ Partnering with other podcasts
Once you have a few good episodes out, partnering with other podcasters and being a guest on other shows introduces you and your podcast to new audiences.
Keep in mind that podcasting is not centralized and people find podcasts in a variety of ways.
As long as you proactively submit your show to all platforms and consistently create engaging, informative episodes with high-quality written descriptions, you have the best chances of reaching your target audience.
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