How to make your podcast more visible: Maximizing podcast discovery more

>> Nicholas: Hey, everyone, and welcome to the Headliner Podcast. We're your hosts, Nicholas and Elissa, and we're here to keep you in the loop on all the things you can do to promote your podcast. So, Elissa, what are we talking about today? >> Elissa: Yeah, so interestingly enough, um, we are going. Or excuse me, this entire conversation is going to kind of stem from a response we got on a social media post, funnily enough. >> Nicholas: Okay. And, um, what is this post?

>> Elissa: Yeah, so, I mean, the gist of it is basically we kind of were actually just doing a follow up to our last podcast and also blog post. Um, so it was just talking about really podcast discovery on social media. And it's a little long, so I won't read the entire thing out. Um, but anyways, one of our followers, which by the way, if you do not follow us, Headliner app on all social media platforms for pretty awesome on there. So just a quick

little plug. But um, anyways, one of our followers replied back to it. Yes, most of the shows I found lately come through reels or threads, not. Not apps. Makes me wonder what great shows I'm missing just because they aren't surfacing in search. >> Nicholas: That's a very interesting point. And yeah, I mean, I think people listening might be able to tell where this is going.

It's talking about the importance of posting to social and following your buddies at Headliner app on social, which, quick aside, easiest way to get a hold of us. Because, Elissa, we are both in our twenties. I am for another month. Um, so, you know, we live on our phones. So if you ever need help with Headliner, probably just spam us on social, you know. But anyway, the importance of posting to social. Yes, this commenter is totally right. A lot of podcasts are discovered on social media.

I'd venture to guess it's most of them. And I'm sure there's a lot of data to back that up. Hint, hint, nudge, nudge. Please take the baton from me. >> Elissa: Yeah, but, um, even going just beyond social today, we're going to be just more or less talking about all the things you can do

to help make your podcast more visible. So whether that is on social media, that's on YouTube, that's on search, that's in podcast apps, um, there's a lot of things that you can do and thankfully there's a lot of kind of cross pollination with those. So it's not necessarily like you have to reinvent the wheel, um, multiple times. So the first thing that we're going to go ahead and talk about of course, is just getting on social media.

So the kind of the statistic that we had put out there on our last episode is that 71% of listeners have reported finding a podcast on social media. Um, that came from one of our studies. So we had like this lovely little poll that we sent out to uh, a bunch of podcast listeners and we got hundreds of people coming back saying how they're finding podcasts. And that was um, the actual number one way people are finding podcasts. So social media, you definitely can't ignore the power

of discovery on social. Um, I personally found podcasts on there. So pretty cool. And then kind of secondary from that is of course going to be kind of more the power of video on social media. So a separate study by Zebra Cap conducted this year, uh, 68% of video podcast viewers discover new shows via social media clips. So a little bit more specific, so R is kind of just more broadly that could have included static, uh, posts or text based posts across different

platforms. But this one specifically looks at the power of video clips on social media. >> Nicholas: Which, I mean, let's break that down for a second. It makes total sense because what do people do whenever there's any downtime or you know, they just, they need to stop focusing on something so they need to distract themselves. They open Instagram, they open TikTok, Snapchat to people still snap the chats. Maybe, you know, maybe the youths. The youths do. Okay, well that

hurts because now I'm not a youth, apparently. Um, no, but it makes sense. People go onto these apps to watch content, quick form content, and if they're getting something informative and interesting from a podcast, they're going to stick around. You just said that you discover podcasts through social media. I discover podcasts through social

media. It isn't that crazy of an idea to suggest, you know, so, but okay, so let's say they get on social media and they've turned on their push notifications, all the fun stuff. What can you do as a podcaster to like get your content seen by more people on their YouTube wherever. >> Elissa: Yeah, so social media and YouTube, that's going to be a little bit different. So social media, it's going to lean more into engagement. Um, algorithms do tend to kind of push content that performs

well and drives engagement. So whether that's going to be your attention, people commenting back, um, those are kind of the things you can do on social media. So, um, having a clip starting off with like the most interesting bit, it's going to get people in the door

that's kind of going to be one of the easier ways. Or if you're not doing video, m having more like thought provoking content. So maybe having people or, excuse me, encouraging people to write back or do something, um, just a clear call to action on social media is going to help you out there. Um, in regards to YouTube, this is going to kind of just segue into our next kind of point. So ensuring that you're having kind of smart titles and

descriptions. So similar to your actual show title and your show notes, um, these are going to kind of go hand in hand. So of course you can just kind of copy and paste a little bit, um, ensuring that your title and your description is going to have those keywords in it. >> Nicholas: Sure. >> Elissa: Excuse me, I need to cough. >> Nicholas: No, go ahead. In the meantime, I will say one thing. You're talking about YouTube titles and that absolutely applies to social media too.

You don't have to put the title in your description necessarily. But like one thing that we always encourage people and we used to call it the meme template at Headliner, like internally, um, is you make these videos and then you just have the title right on the top of it. You know, you still do the same basic thing. You still put your keywords there, you still appeal to people's emotions. You said, um, talking about kind of thought provoking stuff that gets people to

reply. At its base, what you're trying to do is you're trying to appeal to some human emotion, be it a happy emotion where someone reads your title and they're like, I agree with this sentiment. Or you challenge something they believe in and they go, well, what is this person talking about? Let me stick around. And yeah, titling a YouTube video in a interesting way. Or your

social media post just slapping a title in there. And not just slapping a title in when you're making the video, but maybe using, you know, TikTok and Instagram's in system titler to do that can help because you're indexing that information. That's data that these apps are going to have. So just stuff to keep in mind there. Anyway, back to descriptions. You were talking about SEO before you needed to cough. >> Elissa: Thank you. You're welcome.

Yeah, so looking at your descriptions, um, algorithms in YouTube, they can't index and they cannot crawl what's going on in your video. But all of the text related things connected to that video they can kind of look at. And so I'll just go into my stat. Um, 52% of podcast discovery is happening on YouTube 27% through search. So that's going to kind of be your SEO friendly stuff. Once again, looking at, like, going into Google, typing in comedy podcast or something.

You know, probably something a little bit more intentful than comedy podcasts. >> Nicholas: No, no, no. >> Elissa: I, um, do that. >> Nicholas: I don't do it on Google. I do it on DuckDuckGo. But I do type comedy podcast. Yeah. >> Elissa: Yes, yes, yes. And that study, excuse me, was out of sound, uh, profitable. And then kind of following up with one from Buzz Sprout. Um, but so again, looking at, you have your podcast, and then now you're going to be more intentional with

what's going with that podcast. So just having SEO stuff in there, you know, maybe have one or two keywords in that title, couple of keywords in your descriptions. Um, you can get a little bit longer with it to kind of add some more queries in there, more context, more data, all that jazz. >> Nicholas: And just to kind of build off of that a little bit and to give Elissa the chance to get her voice back. And also. And also because it's helpful information, one of the best

ways you can do that. I know, like, SEO is a scary thing to a lot of people. Elissa, you're in marketing, so you're, like, impervious to it. But I hear SEO and I quiver in my boots using tools like Eddy by

Headliner, where the second you give us your audio, we're giving you a whole promo pack that includes keywords and descriptions and all that stuff. And you just have to kind of skim over those keywords and use a couple of them in your description. That's all it takes, you know, so just wanted to put that out there. Some practical information for everyone. >> Elissa: Exactly. And while we're on the topic of Eddy, um, adding a transcript to your

podcast. So whether that's uploading into your host directly or on YouTube again, that's going to kind of load your show down with all sorts of keywords, because you're probably going to say it once or twice in your show. If you're talking about a topic, there's a pretty good chance you're going to say it again. Search YouTube Can't Crawl what's going on in your audio or in your video, but your transcript is a literal one for one replica of what you

said. So, great news. It can technically crawl it because you have a written account of what's going on there. >> Nicholas: Precisely. >> Elissa: And then some podcast apps, uh, that allow for transcripts, which I believe Spotify is now allowing for transcripts. So that's pretty Exciting news. Um, I would imagine that that's going to kind of impact the algorithm a little bit more and kind of give it a little bit more, um, intentful search discovery stuff. Um, more on Spotify specifically.

But other podcast apps, um, they've had kind of that podcasting 2.0 initiative. They've had the transcripts in there. So they're going to have a little bit better kind, um, of search like discovery in those apps. So having your transcript is going to make it a little bit easier for your show to be discovered on those apps more specifically. >> Nicholas: Mhm. We'll get back to Spotify in just the next bullet actually. But I do want to add one little thing there also. So yes, get

a transcript. I think I've talked about it on this show before. What I do when I upload something to YouTube, scripted podcast, whatever is I upload the transcript as English and then on YouTube they have like multiple versions of English that I then go in and I add the same transcript. So it's Canadian English, it's British English and I haven't changed the content. I haven't like put a U in the word color for example. But you know, I haven't changed the letter Z to Z

or anything. But um, it's still, it's helping index it and it's helping get that stuff, you know, trending on search more is the point I'm trying to make. As for the social media side of it, if I'm not mistaken, you can't upload a transcript onto Instagram or TikTok right now. But other than the fact that you can add captions using make by Headliner, which you can access free from Eddy. See that? That's really good vertical integration. >> Elissa: Good segue.

>> Nicholas: Um, thank you. So other than the fact that you can and should do that because it makes your visuals more appealing to people, people tend to follow along even if they have the sound on. Though most people don't have the sound on when they're on social media, believe it or not. You know, that stuff aside, you can still help your indexing. So this is like my little hack. And I've been doing this since like I started here at uh, 2018. I've been doing it since like 2018 probably.

So we've already talked about how writing titles for your posts indexes that information on TikTok and on Instagram, the same thing goes for their generated captions. So if you generate captions on TikTok and Instagram, they may not look as pretty as if you made them on Headliner. But what you can do is you can resize them and put them on the side of your video where no one's going to see it. You can make them minuscule so nobody will ever know the captions

are there. And then you can just use your headliner captions and get the extra indexing from these apps. So

that's my little pro tip. It's probably superstition, but it takes two seconds, so give it a shot. Uh, it worked for me. That's all I'll say. I posted something a couple of weeks ago, and I think it has like 20,000 views on Instagram right now, so it clearly might work. We love definite statements that aren't definite. Anyway, Elissa, let's talk about creating videos. >> Elissa: Yeah, we're on the topic of creating video. We've said it before, we'll say it again. Make video for your podcast

really does truly help. Kind of add a little bit more discovery, give you some more reach. Um, more specifically, I have a stat. Ooh, Going with that statement. So social video posts actually drive up to 1,200% more engagement compared to static posts post. >> Nicholas: Mhm. >> Elissa: Wow, that's crazy. >> Nicholas: That's a lot of percent.

>> Elissa: That is a lot of percent. So, you know, if you have just like an image that's going on Instagram, that gets engagement, but if you have video, you can get like 10 fold. >> Nicholas: Yeah. >> Elissa: One point or 10.2 fold. 12 fold. 12 fold. It'd be 12 fold. >> Nicholas: Right? You're. Yeah, one of those is right. >> Elissa: Sorry. The Day tool is, um, it's. We'll blame the Day quil. Not the. Not even good math. >> Nicholas: But no, what you're saying is totally right

in spirit, if not mathematically. Um, no. Video is a lot more engaging. Again, it's the natural language of social media at this point. Ten years ago, Instagram was all text posts, video or uh, not text posts, all image posts. Right. And captions and stuff like that. But it isn't anymore. And podcasting used to just be audio, but now there's a big video component to podcasting. You know, we were talking about how we're going to come back to Spotify, and this doesn't just apply to your Instagrams

and your Tiktoks anymore. Spotify now allows you to post podcast clips. You can put audiograms on Spotify. And it's. I mean, I feel so validated by this because for the longest time I've been saying that audiograms are the single. If your podcast is an album and now when you look up a podcast on Spotify, you literally are getting that exact model of do you want to try one part of this podcast out? So it's literally a single now? Um,

so yes, make videos for your podcast. Even if your show isn't full video, you should be making video clips for it. That is a pretty standard thing. It's as simple as if you're recording remotely on Riverside or Zoom. Anyway, you already have the video, so just use it. >> Elissa: Exactly. And, you know, kind of going with that video. Really easy content repurposing. So if you're like, hey, I need to have a content plan, I need to get on social media. Tools like Headliner can help.

So every time you have a full length video or a full length release of your audio, first podcast you can get up to 10 different clips, caption style, branded, all of the beautiful things sent to your inbox directly. So really easy way for you to kind of have 10 really solid social posts that can drive up to 1200% more engagement than if you were to just send out a tweet or say, or post your show art say, hey, guys, new episode. Really easy way to kind

of boost that up. Get more discovery, get more visible on all of the platforms and all of the things. >> Nicholas: Precisely. And tangentially, I'd love for us to do a study where we actually compare that, where we tweet out,

yo, I have a new podcast out and see how much engagement it gets versus an image of, yo, I've got a new podcast out versus a video. Just saying, if you ever want to do a study, Elissa, we, we could. >> Elissa: Very well do that. You know, it's. We have. I have the power to do that. >> Nicholas: Yeah. Okay, cool. Um, all right, cool.

So what, what else can we do? I mean, it kind of sounds like what we're talking about is setting up a content strategy, using Headliner to, in as few steps as possible, get the most out of what you are already doing for your podcast, which is

recording and editing it. And yeah, I'd love to know, like, what else is there? Social media sounds covered. >> Elissa: Yes, social media is very well covered. Um, and if you want to learn more about social media, just click like the back button and go listen to our last episode because it talked all about podcast discovery on social media. >> Nicholas: Precisely. >> Elissa: Fun stuff. Um, but kind of the last thing. So we're talking about what can you do to make your podcast more visible?

Optimizing your content, doing all of the things, making a website. >> Nicholas: Hm. >> Elissa: That's one of the easiest Ways to kind of control your web presence, um, in a more kind of direct way. So especially if you, excuse me, the more kind of web pages you add. So if you're adding your transcripts or if you're creating blog posts, whatever, you're kind of increasing all of that data, all of that content, so you're going to kind of rank a little bit

higher. Um, but it's just such an easy win for organic search or just larger kind of like SEO queries, that kind of stuff. >> Nicholas: Um. >> Elissa: Having a podcast does. Excuse me, Google can kind of index your podcast now. Um, it's okay. You can typically figure out like podcasts, but you're normally like, the person's gonna have to type in like Headliner podcast and then the podcast will come up on the side.

>> Nicholas: Sure. >> Elissa: Um, but if they're not typing in the word podcast, having a website or a web presence of some type is going to help you in the side where people are looking and they're clicking on the links. Um, tools like PodPage, really awesome. Um, ways to kind of help podcasters very specifically build a web presence using again, what they have their podcast. >> Nicholas: And then I'm sure also like the type of stuff you would be

posting on your web presence. Right. It doesn't have to be these huge, immaculately crafted blog versions of your episode. If you're doing an interview, you can literally just post the interview's transcript there, I'm sure. Or if you have a key takeaway, it can be as simple as taking your episode you've just finished editing while it's fresh in your mind and writing 2 to 300 words on it. You know, a more built out version of your show notes could work, um, for all we know. And also I

think a lot of podcasters, they do podcasting in conjunction to a business or some other thing that already has a web presence. So it might be as simple as just making a category on your website for your podcast and doing some of these things there. And not only are you building your podcast out at that point, but you're building out your main thing also. >> Elissa: Mhm. >> Nicholas: So, yeah, stuff to consider. Yeah, cool.

>> Elissa: That's kind of what I got. So we just wanted to give like five really easy things that podcasters can do to help build your show's visibility. >> Nicholas: Mhm. And also on top of that, on top of all the practical stuff, I just want to underline the fact that this was all inspired by a comment. I just want to bring things full circle. We care here at Headliner. We read the comments. We

talk about the comments. And you should just follow us on social media because again, if you need help with something, it's the easiest way to get a hold of us. We might not record a whole podcast episode for you, but you'll get an answer. >> Elissa: Somebody will respond back. >> Nicholas: Yes, somebody will respond back. Exactly. So on that note, thank you for listening. We hope this helped

you. Even if you knew a lot of this stuff, hopefully just kind reminded you of the importance of some of them that maybe you need to lean into or maybe you want to try and lean into. So yeah, until the next episode, thanks for listening.