Hey podcasters! I see you out there, plugging away at your podbaby. And I really love you for it.
It’s common for podcasters to try out new channels to promote their podcast. It’s a great way to raise a podcast’s profile, spread a message and engage with a podcast audience, all of which are possible to do through the magic of repurposed content.
Today's post is to highlight an opportunity that I don’t think most podcasters pay enough attention to when it comes to repurposing their content: Email.
Email is a great opportunity for podcasters for a couple of reasons:
Sure, there are filters that might mean that your email doesn’t drop into someone’s primary inbox. But this is nothing compared to the algorithms that dominate popular social media platforms. Those algorithms tend to favour big players with healthy ad budgets and the platforms are designed to make sure that the house always wins.
Sure, you might strike it lucky and have a social media post about your podcast go viral. But ask yourself: would you rather talk into the void on social media for months on the off chance that one of your posts blows up, or do you want to steadily build up an email list of engaged, dedicated subscribers that read your content, give you feedback and are perfectly positioned to buy from you? I know which I’d rather pick.
Email usage is pretty high around the globe and many email users will check their emails at least once a day, if not more frequently than that. This high level of engagement means that the money you spend on your email marketing is likely to bring you a healthy return on investment.
This isn't guaranteed, of course, but according to one recent study, every $1 spent on email marketing generated $36 in revenue. And that’s definitely not to be sniffed at.
One of the major problems of podcasting is the lack of a feedback loop. You may already be aware of this or have tried other solutions to close it, but I suggest email.
The 'feedback loop problem' refers to the fact that podcasting makes it easy for you to get in touch with your listeners, but not so easy for them to get in touch with you. Of course, you can suggest a load of ways for them to reach out to you, but involve your listener jumping out of their podcast app and into another app or browser. And people are lazy, so they tend not to do it.
However, if you’re regularly in contact with your listeners via email and you provide them with content that they love to hear AND read, you can send out a survey asking your listeners what they think of your podcast and emails. Or, you can encourage them to respond to you directly by sounding warm and approachable in your emails and by asking genuinely for their opinion.
Email’s a great channel to start growing a platform because it’s not as visible. Sure, that’s why some people might advise against it. But if you’re still finding your feet in terms of your public persona, posting on LinkedIn or going live on Instagram can feel very intimidating (I know, I’ve been there too). It’s a public sphere and people can and will share their thoughts.
Email, on the other hand, is a forum where you can experiment in front of your followers and JUST your followers. If you feel like you did something ‘wrong’, it’s not automatically going to be picked up and then picked over by a lot of people that don’t know you.
This last reason that I recommend using email as your main channel for repurposing your podcast content and growing your presence is perhaps the most important reason. Email is well adapted for this purpose because *it feels familiar*. One of the most common words used to describe podcasting as a medium is ‘intimate’ — and that’s because it is. You’re talking right into your listeners’ ears, wherever they choose to listen to you. It’s just you, your mic and your listener.
To my way of thinking, email replicates that familiarity better than any other format. It doesn’t have that attention grabby, clickbaity feel of social media. It’s not all about eye-catching images or shocked-face thumbnails. It’s you writing to your subscribers and them reading those emails wherever they happen to be. And you can easily reward them for choosing to be on your email list by sharing exclusive content and by interacting with them in a more personal, focused way.
So if you’re ready to start investing in repurposing your content and growing your podcast, choose email as your preferred channel. And if you want to learn how to turn your podcast content into solid gold emails that your listeners will love, sign up for my email list. I'm writing a special 8-week email series just for my subscribers about just that.