Why Your Podcast Isn't Growing: The Problem I Found on Your Website

Dave Jackson [00:00:00]:

So I'm in a Facebook group and somebody says, hey, I need some ratings and reviews because my show isn't growing. To which we all reply, ratings and reviews don't help you get found. And I went over to their website and once again I see the same problem as to why your podcast is not growing. And I'll explain today what I saw.

Mike Russell [00:00:29]:

Welcome to your podcast consultant small Lessons with Big Value. Now he wants to work with you. He's your podcast consultant, dave Jackson.

Dave Jackson [00:00:43]:

So I went over to this person's website and it was all sorts of fun things to do there. It was a great case of using a podcast as the marketing arm to promote your products and services. And when I clicked on podcasting, I expected to see players for me to click play on and I didn't see any. All I saw were YouTube videos. And there's nothing wrong with that. But it's like having two guitars. I'm a guitar player, I can only play one at a time. And so you have to ask yourself, as always, why am I doing this? And if the goal is I want to get advertising, which for the record is not my favorite way to monetize your show, then you need more downloads.

Dave Jackson [00:01:32]:

And so in that case, you should put players on your website. So when people click play on your website and listen to at least a minute, it will count as a download. But if they click on YouTube, you're going to get whatever YouTube is paying for a play, assuming that you have enough views and times to be part of their payment program. But you kind of have to figure out, is this an audio podcast that also has video or a video first podcast that has audio. So what I often do is I consider this show an audio podcasting. And if I do a show like this that also has video, I will put a link, it'll just say video version and on YouTube I will promote that. And in my newsletter I will promote that. But I don't give them both.

Dave Jackson [00:02:25]:

I guess I could, but that to me leads to paralysis by analysis because now I got to figure out what play button I click on. And the bottom line is you have to promote your show and on that website you were promoting your YouTube channel. And there's nothing wrong with the YouTube channel. But while we're on that subject, keep in mind that technically, that's the key word here. Technically YouTube isn't a podcasting. I know that podcasts are coming to YouTube music, but technically a podcast needs an RSS feed and YouTube doesn't have one of those. That's why you can't watch YouTube on some other app. It has to be on YouTube, which on one hand makes it easy until YouTube doesn't like something you say.

Dave Jackson [00:03:16]:

And if you lose your YouTube channel, there aren't that many options to go someplace else and do video. That's one of the beautiful things of podcasting. If for some reason Spotify doesn't like me and they kick me out of Spotify, I'm still available on many other apps. So if you're doing audio and video, make sure that on your website, whichever one you choose, there's no wrong answer here. Maybe you're more of a visual show. Then put the YouTube stuff on there and then have a link that says, would you like to listen to this on every episode? Click here to listen and just go that route. But when you try to promote both, one of them is going to have to be your first string choice and one is going to have to be your second string choice. I have found in many cases, people are just putting YouTube videos and then there's no link to listen, there are no links to follow the show on Apple, Google and Spotify.

Dave Jackson [00:04:15]:

And so consequently, the only people that are following you in the apps are people that happen to run across your show. And that's typically not the way podcasts are found. They are found via word of mouth. And so if somebody says, oh, you got to go listen to this podcast and they go to your website and they see YouTube videos, they're going to click play on that YouTube video and that is not going to boost your download numbers in your media host. So it's kind of a hard choice at times. You're like, Well, I kind of want to promote both. Well, you could then have a link on your website. Instead of saying podcasts, you might have a link that says Listen.

Dave Jackson [00:04:58]:

That leads to all of your posts that have an audio player and then have another link that says Watch and have a post, kind of the same post, but this time with a video. Or just send them to your YouTube channel where they can subscribe. So it's one of those things I'm just seeing where people are saying my show. It's just one of those things I'm seeing where people are like, hey, my show isn't growing. And you go over and your podcast isn't on your website, there's no way to follow it, there's no way to subscribe to it, and consequently I kind of want to go, yeah, I think it's easy to see why your downloads aren't growing and then that's where you have to decide, am I here for YouTube? Am I here for my podcast? Because it's kind of hard to promote both. When you do start a YouTube channel, it's not that you're expanding your podcast, you're starting a second show even though it's the exact same content, because there are people on YouTube that watch YouTube twenty four seven and they don't even know what an actual podcast is. And then there are other podcasters that just have their Power listeners. They've got their playlist set and things like that and they're not watching a whole lot of YouTube, so you're actually starting a second show with a second audience.

Dave Jackson [00:06:20]:

And so when you really focus on just one of those audiences, the other audience is going to suffer. So figure out what you want to do, why you're doing it, who it's for, and move forward. Now, if you need help with that, it's super simple. Just visit me over@schoolofpodcasting.com listener and sign up for either a monthly or yearly subscription. And not only does that come with step by step courses, it comes with an awesome community. We just had a comedy writer sign up today. I'm so excited because that gives us a psychiatrist. We've got marketing people, we've got ex pastors, we've got X radio people, we have video people.

Dave Jackson [00:07:02]:

Brilliant community. But also it gets you unlimited one on one consultant with me. Check it out, schoolofpodcasting.com listener. I look forward to working with you and seeing what we can do together because I want to be your podcast consultant.