In this guide I am going to walk you step by step to be a great podcast host and increase your podcast downloads.
There are both general and specific strategies that work.
- Publish more episodes
The obvious thing is as you publish more and more episodes the base traffic on your site increases and that means the number of podcast viewers and subscribers goes up.
More episodes mean more downloads from the same extant audience.
Each episode is a new opportunity to engage with more people.
Publishing more has other benefits as well. Each new episode is another opportunity to engage your current fans and attract new listeners. New episodes are also more SEO value for your website.
Get feedback from your most loyal bunch
Your most loyal listeners are teeming with feedback. They’re those who comment on your podcasts, reply to emails and drag in their best friends to your show. They are the ones behind the rapid growth you’re experiencing.
You get these people and you get them to talk.
Ask them for their honest feedback on what you can do to make your podcast better.
As to what you should do.
Ask them to be honest with no bars attached.
Tease upcoming episodes
If people are already in love with your show, what better way to get more of their love than to tease up and coming episodes.
This way you can build the necessary hype that will propel the growth and viewership of your upcoming content. You will give your audience a reason to love and like you.
If you get a guest who the readers requested in overwhelming capacity before, that’s the perfect spot to build some hype for your upcoming episode.
Ask for reviews and ratings
You don’t get what you don’t ask. If you want reviews and ratings you better ask people.
Rating and reviewing may not show any wonders at this point in time but in the long haul they prop up your downloads. With this you can invite support for the show.
Use auto play
If you use something like smart podcast player you can set the audio to autoplay. This is a common thing with youtube videos that start to play as soon as the page loads.
The plays of the podcast player is seen as the download of your podcast episode based on its analytics.
Each autoplay means a new download.
If you do this aggressively people may discard the show though.
Always measure the impact is having.
UP the rss feed limit
POdcast directories say Gplay and ios source directly fromthe rss feed to display the podcast to users.
BUt RSS feeds tend to generally put a limit on the number of items listed on the list. When you upload a new episode the old one at the last falls of.
This reduces the total number of episodes that listeners can actually enjoy.
The default number of items on some lists is no more than 10.
Talk to the host and find out how to set limits, remove or extend limits. If possible make the limit as high as possible so that more of your content is available to list for podcatchers and also for the different dictores.
Stick to schedule
Whether it be blogging or podcasting, sticking to a schedule is a difficult ask. I know because I’ve been a blogger for over 9 years.
But the thing with a schedule is people tend to become used to it and wait for new episodes to grab them as soon as they go live. Try to stick to it. Avoid late publishing. Don’t miss episodes and don’t disappoint them.
Choose a schedule that you can always meet and think of publishing contennt two weeks in advance.
The schedule should be explained to fnas.
Submit to directories and podcatchers
A big tip is to get the show’s rss feed and submit the same on every relevant podcast directly you can find. Spotify, iTubes and Gplay are staples but there are also little known directoriesthat provide a good link.
On an episode by episode basis, here are all the things that you can do to increase the number of downloads you’re getting.
- Quality control each episode
It’s an important and basic step. Nobody likes listening to podcasts that come with very poor quality audio. Intead craft your episodes in a way that they have grat audio. You don’t want ardent fanns abandoning the show if the quality goes down the gutter.
Before you publish a single episodeyou should filter out imperfect audio, scrub clean long pauses and bad transitions. The problems should be reviewed by a third party before you hit publish.
The perfect equipment ensures you don’t face a problem.
Craft a compelling title that has search-ability
A compelling title gives you seo benefits and helps the You’ve probably seen a million episode reader decide if the podcast is for them.
The correct title is supposed to give the reade rinformation and help them choose the podcast episode for listening.
Also this helps search engines correctly identify what the episode is about.
A good title should be compelling enough to make the reader download the episode. Use great language and description to make sure they do.
Share soundbites
A podcast is all about the interesting things you say. There may be a good quote from the guest and if you fail to give it attention people are going to miss out on the episode. Post the sound bites on social media nad email them to subscribers.
- Have your guests promote the episode
Always ask your guests to promote your podcasts on their social media feed. This gives them a good number of choices.