A faceless old woman who secretly lives in your attic and a twitter account: Welcome to Night Vale
“Guns don’t kill people. It is impossible to be killed by a gun. We are all invincible to bullets and it is a miracle,” explains a calm radio announcer. Although to most this might seem like something a shifty Republican might say, others will recognize it as one of many prolific quotes from the trendy Night Vale podcast. The podcast was created by Joseph Fink and Jeffrey Crano and is a news program for the fictional and bizarre city of Night Vale. A quirky blend of Stephen King and Neil Gaiman’s storytelling styles, the podcast offers listeners a glimpse into an intriguingly dangerous world where a floating cat lives in the men’s room and the existence of the dog park (into which neither dogs nor people are allowed) is illegal.
Although the program has a niche topic, its popularity has grown immensely and is now one of the most downloaded podcasts on iTunes. Its only source of marketing is its Twitter account which has over 270,000 followers, rather than advertising their products the Night Vale team uses it exclusively to share disturbing, insightful, and darkly humorous thoughts such as parenting tips: “It’s time you tell your kids about the birds and the bees. Then tell them about the bears, then try to explain lizards. Pace yourself.”
Through this account Night Vale aptly uses social media not to answer fans’ questions or promote their merchandising, but as a natural extension of the podcast. While the podcast itself focuses on the narrative of the city of Night Vale, the twitter account broadens its topics to apply to the lives of its followers and engage with their world directly, yet it still stays true to its roots. The ingenuity of this tactic is that the team has not only created a new universe for its listeners to explore during its podcasts, but extended this surrealism to offer fans escapism in their daily lives.
Night Vale reinvented the tried and true storytelling approach to engage with its consumers in a meaningful way which is relevant both to the narrative of the podcasts and the lives of the fans. Creating a unique universe in a 30-minute podcast is an incredible feat, however demonstrating the same talent in a 180 character limit may explain how the podcast has become a phenomenon in its own right.
Listen to the podcast here:
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