Why You Need More Engagement for Your Podcast (and how to get it)
Welcome to Podcast Workflows,
the show for people who love their podcast,
but spend too much time on it.
This show will give you short tips to improve your process,
grow your show and save you up to 12
hours per week.
You'll get deep dives on how the best podcasters produce their show and you'll
learn a ton. So let's get into it.
I have been implicitly and explicitly teasing this topic
for a while,
but I've been thinking a lot about engagement with your
listeners and how to get feedback from your listeners.
And today the three things I'm going to talk about are all
around that.
So the first thing I'll do is say I do have an
article I put out a while ago and a podcast episode
called how to get feedback from your listeners.
This was something I put out over the summer because I was really,
I was thinking about it a lot,
especially in the context of getting feedback for
my other show, the Streamline Solopreneur.
And so some of the tips I said, ask early, ask regularly,
ask everywhere and make giving feedback dead simple,
which we're going to dive more into today.
So let's first talk about maybe the
first segment or topic here,
which is getting feedback.
How do you get feedback from your listeners? Well, I just,
I just kind of gave away the high level overview in this article,
how to get feedback from your listeners.
But I think that really the biggest thing is that you need to ask for it,
right? Don't ask, don't get is something I tell my kids
all the time.
They'll look at something in the kitchen or they'll stare at
the TV or their iPad,
but they won't actually ask because they are afraid that I'm going to say no,
which I may or may not,
depending on how much they be in or how much screen time they've had that
day, but they will definitely not get it.
Or I'm trying to teach them that they definitely will not get it if they don't
ask for it.
So when you are seeking feedback
for your podcast,
definitely ask regularly.
One of the things that I'm trying to do with the Streamline Solopreneur,
especially for the solo shows is have a feedback segment.
I think this is a really good way to get feedback because you're not just
saying like, write in with your thoughts. You're saying, Hey,
if you write in, I might feature you on the show.
And as Pat Flynn has said in numerous
episodes of his podcast,
people love hearing the sound of their own name and it
makes them feel more connected to the show.
So one of the best ways that you can get feedback is by making it
explicitly clear that you will integrate that feedback.
Something that I'm trying to do more with both of my shows,
and I'll talk about this more when I talk about the tools,
is getting voice notes for feedback.
That way I can actually feature listeners in the
show. Right.
And depending on the type of feedback or how much of the contribution,
a shout out is fine.
Maybe you can tell them where the person giving the feedback
can be found.
But I find that just saying like listener Jane wrote in to
say that she's been using this tool to get feedback and it's been really
good for her. Right. And so, or, you know, listener, Jane Smith, whatever,
if they provide their, their full name.
So definitely ask for it and ask early,
ask early in the episode, say, Hey, today I'm talking about now this could,
you don't want to be clumsy about this. Right.
I didn't open the show with, if you want to provide feedback, right.
Cause there's nothing to provide feedback for.
So you don't want to ask right off the bat,
but maybe after the first opinion you give, right.
Like at the end of this segment, I might say, Hey,
head over to podcastsworkflows.com/feedback and let me know what you think.
Right.
And so ask early after you deliver the first piece of valuable content or a
major question. And also early in the sense that you want to ask
before you need the feedback, right.
So something that might not work is like tweeting or posting on social media the
day before, Hey, I'm recording an episode tomorrow about X, Y,
and Z. I'd love to hear your thoughts. Right.
Because just by the nature of social media, people are not going to,
you know, only a small percentage of your followers will see that.
So I did post something. I'm going to post it again, but you know,
I'm working on a new episode of the streamlined solopreneur where I would love
feedback. And, you know,
I posted a bunch of stuff on social media and apparently like unless it's
inflammatory, Twitter doesn't like that. So I did post a question.
And I posted it on YouTube as well,
which YouTube has never really been like a good place for me to get feedback.
I suspect like there's probably better avenues, but you know,
that's kind of the second piece of advice is ask everywhere or ask in,
ask in multiple places, right. Don't necessarily just ask on your show,
especially if it's just in one episode, right.
People might miss that episode or they might be listening and have a thought
and then forget to write in. I, and you know,
this will be different if you have a massive audience, right. Like the,
the people at upgrade constantly get feedback.
They've kind of trained their listeners over 10 years to,
to easily go to a place to provide feedback.
And even then I'm guessing they get a very small percentage of people writing in
for feedback. So I think the key is, you know,
another key ask everywhere, ask early,
ask often and ask everywhere and everywhere is going to be your mailing list,
social media,
the place where you're already engaging with your listeners or target audience.
I got really good feedback across social media for one question I asked cause it
was like the only thing I asked on social media that day.
So maybe more people saw it. But this is,
this is something really important that you should do.
My mailing list has been really nice for feedback lately.
I don't know if I've just like found the right alignment or what,
but it's been really good for that. And then the last thing, which again,
I'll get to later in the show is make giving listener feedback dead simple.
This was a problem of mine for a long time. I'm like, Oh yeah,
social media or email.
But I have been seeking better ways to get feedback because I want more feedback
now before we get into that,
I want to get into the second kind of segment or second piece of advice for,
for this particular topic for podcast engagement,
which is why should you build?
Like I think building a community is really important.
You build and capture community.
Podcasting can feel lonely and if you're not getting feedback or you're not
building a community and like if this is just a hobby for you, fine.
But if you're trying to build a business or if you're trying to leverage your
podcast as a way to elevate your status or make money,
right? Frankly, like I mean,
podcasting costs money and if it's going to be a business thing then you should
figure out a way to monetize that. Right.
And building a community is a good way. The really, the,
and I should say cause I, I've,
I've got feedback on this that some I posted like why you should try to make
money with your podcast and someone was like,
you should never try to make money with your podcast.
And that's just like an incredibly absurd thing to think.
I'm podcasting could be a very good way to make money.
You shouldn't alienate your audience.
You shouldn't put money above your audience,
but saying that podcasts should never make money is like saying teachers should
never make money, right? Teachers should teach for the love of the game.
No,
teachers are grossly underpaid and they should make more money than they actually
make. Um, so you know, I, I just want to address,
that's feedback I've gotten and podcasts should make money. Um,
and if you are providing value for a community,
that's a really good way to make money. Again, to say upgrade and relay in general,
I think they've done a really good job of building a community around their
podcasts, all of their podcasts,
and they have a way for listeners to kind of intermingle with each other. Um,
a couple of months ago, maybe in may,
they announced that they were making the first price jump in a long time.
Maybe ever, right? Their membership was always $5 per month per show. Uh,
if you know, for each show that you subscribe to,
and they were raising it to $7 per month per show.
And I was insanely supportive of that, right?
I will happily pay upgrade $7 per month,
uh, because I feel like I get value out of that or cortex, right?
Which is really $7 a month for one show.
Right. But it's, it's also like a two and a half or three hour show, right?
It's like, it's less than a movie. It's less than going to see a movie.
And I find it more valuable than most movies. Um, and so,
but there was a lot of backlash, right? They were like, that's a 40.
People were saying that's a 40% increase. Like that's like, okay. Right.
If you raise it from 50 cents to a, to a dollar 25, that's a 75% increase.
Like that's, yeah, it's just numbers that low,
like putting it in that way kind of feels obnoxious. Um,
but by I'll say by and large,
most people were very supportive because they've built a great community and they
provide value. And I should say that I don't even like get the full value,
right? I'm like not in the discord discord scares and confuses me,
but the additional content that they put out
is well worth it for me. And they have, I,
I think they have a very good model, right? It's you pay for a show.
And then you get ad free extended episodes of that show.
You get bonus.
Like there are network wide bonus episodes that go out to every member of every
show. And then they also have the annual specials where each show that has a
membership or maybe it's each show, uh, just in general,
even if they don't have a membership, puts out a bonus episode,
that again goes to every member regardless. Right?
So I am a member of a upgrade and cortex,
but I also get the bonus episodes for, let's say connected and the pen addict
and some other ones, Mac power users. Um,
and if I'm interested, I can listen to those too.
And that's a really good way to also be like, Oh, Hey,
maybe this is something else I should subscribe to. Right?
So you should build a community, but that's only one aspect of it,
I guess, right?
Build a community because that's a great way to get feedback and create fans and
connect to your fans.
And the community will be a conduit for feedback and for making your show better
and for getting questions and for making content easier.
And if you can build a community, whether that's on discord or slack,
which I recently found out is like discord for old people.
But if you can build a community somewhere,
then you'll have an easier time getting feedback,
coming up with ideas and potentially monetizing it. Right? That's that,
I'm bullish that you should think about that from the very beginning of your
podcast.
But I don't think it should be your prime objective.
Your prime objective should be serving your audience.
And if you serve your audience, you'll have an easier time monetizing,
whether that's through sponsorships, community, affiliate links, whatever,
right? You need to build trust.
So that's why I think you should build a community.
So let's move on to the third thing, which is engagement tools,
tools to help you. One of the reasons I've been thinking about this now is
partially because of YouTube and Spotify, right?
YouTube has been an increasingly big force in the podcasting space,
almost half, well, at least 35% of American adults,
just use YouTube to discover podcasts.
YouTube has all of the wonderful features for community feedback and
monetization built in with comments, with community posts,
with the ability to create a membership.
If your channel is monetized, you can also do membership ads and merch.
So that could be very appealing to podcasters, a one-stop shop.
That's the second biggest search engine in the world.
But the problem is you don't really own your community, right?
And the same thing goes for Spotify.
Spotify just recently rolled out comments.
This is not something I've been leveraging because my audience,
my stats on Spotify are not very good.
Most of my listeners are in Apple podcasts.
And so, you know, while I can add video,
I don't get a lot of streams or engagements.
I'm not sure if I'm getting comments, right? I'm not getting any comments.
I can add polls, but my audience does not live on Spotify.
But if yours does, this is a great opportunity for you to start engaging.
There have also been other tools that have come out for this exact thing.
One is, I mentioned this before, but ripple.fm.
Something that bothers me about Ripple is that the founder,
who I consider a friend, I think he does a lot of really good things,
seems very distracted.
It seems like he is launching a number of things and will pick the one that gets
kind of the most
traction.
And while I can appreciate as a business owner,
why he would want to do that as a podcaster,
who's trying to build a community,
I don't want to build my community on a tool that might not exist in six months
because the founder got bored with it.
And so it looks like a really good tool.
The ability to comment per episode,
the ability to create private podcasts.
I think it's a really good tool where there's potentially good monetization
for podcasters and for Brian, the founder.
But again,
it felt like it was launched and then onto the next one.
And when it comes to like for a task app, fine,
whatever, but like for,
for something that you're going to build a community on,
that you want something that, you know,
I'm not going to say has staying power because in six months,
like the financials might look terrible and it doesn't make any sense to keep
investing in it. But you, you want,
I want to use a tool where the person who made the tool is as dedicated to it as
I am at least. Right.
So ripple.fm check it out. It's really easy to get started on,
so you can definitely try it and see like maybe this does work for you and maybe
Brian does decide to continue using like putting resources into it.
I would love to see that,
but I'm not convinced at this point that it's going to happen.
And so I'm hesitant for that. Paid tools like circle,
they have like a $50 per month plan where you can build a community which is,
which is becoming increasingly appealing to me for a couple of reasons.
Lots of creators have their community on circle and circle has single sign on.
So if someone's part of Jay Klaus's community or my friend Chanel's community
and they use circle and they want to become a member,
they don't have to get yet another account to become a member of my community,
which is again, very appealing. Right. It's also well built.
Right. However, the,
the better features,
the better features for me at this time are not worth the cost.
I think that as far as like building a free community goes,
circle is not a good tool for that. And maybe they don't want to be right.
And that's fine. But that's, uh,
I think I'd be willing to pay for the $50 a month plan if I got like some
limited automation where someone signs up for my membership elsewhere and they
get added to the community. That's literally the only automation I would want.
And if that were the case, I'd be, I'd, I'd probably use that.
But you know, I think it just doesn't make,
it doesn't make sense for me. I've tried circle in the past.
I was on their $99 a month plan when it was $79 a month.
And so I was like locked into that, but it just,
it didn't make sense for me to do that. It could make sense for you,
especially if you have like a, another avenue for monetization.
Right. So that's one thing. Um, and again,
circle is a widely used tool that supports single sign on across every
community. You're a part of in circle. So that's, that's a big benefit, right?
Cause we do want to make it easy for our users. Um,
fan list is another one I'm currently trying.
This is actually the one I'm using to get feedback right now for both of my
shows. I met the founder, Pat at podcast movement. Um,
and I think if you've been listening to this or watching my YouTube channel,
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