Can you hear me? The Logical Rise of Podcasts
Communication has always been essential, and for marketers it makes a difference when you leverage your voice. Google can listen, make it count.
Does everyone have a podcast? Or at least thought of it as a primary means of getting your message across? Its a thing. Podcasts are being heard. Advertisers are flocking, audiences are growing, becoming loyal and converting.
Lets rewind… to Windows 95
My first introduction to voice software was on my Compaq 386 in the 90s. It came in a box with a floppy disk and a microphone. It was voice dictation software and it was a new thing, especially to combat the perils of “high tech workers” at their “keyboards all day”
As a kid, it didn’t make much sense to me. I had just passed every level of Mario Teaches Typing and was enjoying everything about my computer. I was making birthday cards using Corel Suite, typing (and printing) homework assignments and playing games like Duke Nukem, Keen and SimCity.
All of this amazement with my PC had nothing to do with voice. I wasn’t talking to the computer in any capacity. The software and the microphone didn’t have an impact on my computer habits, nor did my voice replace my typing.
The Popularity of Talk Radio
It wasn’t in my realm to be exposed to talk radio when I was a kid. Driving in the car there was a variety of music stations with commentary being limited to the DJ’s voice. While the back stories of classical music could take a long time on CBC radio during trips with my Grandpa, there wasn’t much storytelling or opinions going on.
What was happening on the AM dial was a lot of news, sports and opinions with a listenership that was glued to each word. While the TV and movie stars were gaining fame and celebrity, the people behind the mic were gaining authority within their station’s signal reach.
The impact that these shows and their hosts can have came in two parts for me.
- One of my first clients was a sports association who wanted to throw a gala fundraiser. When I asked who they would like as a keynote speaker, everyone on their list was local sports radio hosts, who I barely knew of… not one athlete.
- Exploring how to reach 35–55 men for an advertising campaign, I was blown away by the audience stats on our local sports radio station and ran an excellent campaign coupled with a news-focused talk radio station. The results were great and continue to work as long as the message appeals to the station’s specific audience.
I didn’t know this established platform had such an intent based audience and that you could find a variety of topics in different languages in most cities.
Radio has its limitations
While popular, each radio station can be extremely competitive and naturally has barriers to entry.
- The regulation by the government doesn’t allow for new stations to “just pop up”
- Once approved, setting up the equipment to broadcast is very expensive
- You’re limited by 24 hours per day, with a bulk of listeners only tuning in during less than half of that time
- Listeners typically tune into one — three radio stations, usually traffic, news and music. Its hard to adapt changes
- Advertising is the typical path to grow your audience, but another radio station doesn’t want to help you steal their listeners
The habits that are built into radio make it very difficult for someone to just break into the market. Being a very established industry, the typical route is career based (not counting on your celebrity status, *cough* retired athletes *cough*), starting with studying communications, interning, working the night shift… a long list of paying your dues.
As a marketer, native advertising doesn’t add up with radio since it doesn’t have the same control as a written native campaign. The costs make sense, if your audience is listening to the ads and you’re leveraging the on-air hosts authority and influence.
Leveraging the On-Air Influence
Paying a premium for a live-read in radio is well worth it. The radio host’s voice carries an influence that other platforms don’t compare with. Sure the local TV news anchor is going to do some commercial work, but its not as feasible as a radio host reading your spot. Having a famous writer pen something on your behalf doesn’t carry the weight either. Think about it, most sponsorships, outside of radio, have your famous person appearing in print and TV ads. Radio is unique.
This form of native advertising has been around for a long time and its an incredible way to get people to pay attention to your ad and have social proof since a lot of on-air personalities will decline a campaign or product that they aren’t aligned with.
Podcasting leverages the positives and breaks the barriers of Radio
Getting started with a podcast is very straight forward. If you’re interested, download anchor.fm on your phone and their on-boarding will get you ready. It won’t help you create content, but its a built in recording, editing and distribution app.
Anchor isn’t the only one, but its probably the most user friendly and effective.
Well, that addresses the list of barriers to entry above.
Now, leveraging the positives.
You don’t need to be live. You gain the benefit of editing before posting. Thank goodness.
Just like the premium advertisers pay for on-air live reads, its most effective (and free) for the host to read the advertisements. This is a big win. In fact, it wouldn’t surprise me if some of the big players like NPR or Gimlet are actually charging a premium for the show’s hosts to read ads… it makes sense.
Its been a long time since we huddled around the radio at home, TVs came along. Drive time listening has dominated as the preferred place/time for radio audiences, with the work place being afterwards. The workplace is where live streaming online started… its cheaper than buying a radio and it doesn’t take up any space on your desk. Streaming in-app was the next big jump.
People are now listening online and on their phones… NOW there’s bandwidth to bypass typical geographic signal ranges and time constraints.
You can take advantage of building an audience the same way the radio hosts have over the years. Record your own show that builds your brand presence. The trends over many decades show that voice is a good thing for content, for audiences and for advertisers.
Repurposing your Content using voice.
Content marketing is perfect for voice and repurposing into articles, videos and graphics. Often the best way for us humans to get our point across is through talking, especially a conversation or interview. The dialog allows for there to be questions and clarifications to ensure the message gets across.
Once those ideas have been refined, you can create other pieces of content. Gary Vaynerchuk shared his content model to turn a keynote speech or video into 30+ pieces of content. Not everyone is going to listen to your podcast, but its a great way to originate your content and then distribute to other platforms where they can still hear your message.
Its straight-forward:
- Podcast transcribed = draft blog post
- Podcast + image or animation = video
- Podcast transcribed + edited + designed = infographic
Start with voice, leverage the content. Good.
Is this a long way to announce your Podcast?
The short answer, no. I’m not launching a Chris Milton podcast. Or should I? The verdict is out on that one, or should I say low on the priority list.
Voice is fascinating to me and we have a podcast in the works for 3 projects that we’re working on. The plan is to launch one per quarter and we’ve already recorded a few episodes of the first. I think the branded route is a clear winner, can’t wait to start marketing it.
This post written by Chris Milton, a marketing professional who spends most of his drive time listening to podcasts and sports radio… he does too much driving.
