Morgan Franklin: You know, I find it very funny that I'm
recording the how to convert social media followers into
podcast listeners, episode right after the episode about why you
don't need social media to grow your podcast. But I think that
this brings up a very important point. Just because people see
you promoting your podcast on social media does not mean they
are going to listen to your podcast. Sadly. Unfortunately,
it's just usually not that easy and without a dedicated strategy
to convert a social media follower to a podcast listener.
That transition might never happen in this episode, we're
going to talk about how to optimize your social media
profile and content to drive listener traffic, why you have
to put yourself in the mind of the content viewer, and how to
effectively turn a social media follower into a fan of your
podcast. Hello and welcome to podcast for profit. My name is
Morgan Franklin. I'm a Podcast Producer, strategist and
educator. This podcast will help you create and grow a podcast
that cuts through the noise of social media and speaks directly
to your target audience. If you're ready to create a podcast
that will align you with the experts in your industry,
position yourself as a trusted leader and create another source
of revenue for your business. You're in the right place, all
right, so think about the last time you were just Mindlessly
scrolling on Tiktok or Instagram or Facebook or LinkedIn.
Probably wasn't that long ago. For me, it was about 15 minutes
ago, I was working on another podcast, and I was just getting
kind of sidetracked. I thought, Okay, I'm gonna just take a
break and treat myself to a few minutes of scrolling, and before
I knew it, I had to pry myself off the phone and get back to
work. For most of us, social media is a distraction. It's a
little treat. It's a mental vacation we can go on and just
turn off our brain and let someone else drive right.
Normally, when we're on social media, we're letting the
algorithm run the show, and whether we're paying attention
to it or not, it will just keep serving us up more content,
which is kind of a double edged sword for us podcasters who are
hoping that someone will see our content and want to listen to
our podcast. On one hand, in this digital age as we all know,
how else would we be pursuing new listeners who weren't
explicitly searching for a podcast like ours? It'd be
pretty hard, right? I mean, you can get a billboard, or you can
take out an ad in a magazine, or you can buy paid ads on Google
or meta, but those are all gonna cost you a pretty penny, and
especially if you keep running them, and if you're doing this
podcast already with money out of your own pocket, that is
going to get you even deeper in the hole. So all that being
said, you know, we're kind of forced to play the organic
social media game. It's not really a choice. I mean, it is,
but it isn't if you want this podcast to grow and thrive and
fulfill any of the goals that you've created for it. So let's
go back to us. And I know that I'm going down a rabbit hole
here, but let's go back to us on social media, just scrolling
like a brain dead zombie. Have you ever, in the entirety of you
using social media, saw a piece of content that was promoting an
episode and left the social media app that you're on, open
Spotify or Apple podcasts, or whatever podcast platform that
you're using, and search for that podcast and then started
listening to that episode? For me, I can think of very, very,
very few times that this has happened, and maybe which is
something that happens to me all the time. I'm on Tiktok, and I
think, Oh, I'd love to listen to this episode, and I save it. And
guess what, I never go back. I do that all the time. I'll save
something that looks interesting, that I might want
to listen to, but I never go back and check, hey, what was
that podcast that I wanted to listen to. Think about how you
use social media on a day to day basis, and how likely you would
actually be to go from someone's Tiktok or reel or whatever piece
of content it may be, open up another app to find that podcast
and follow it or listen. That'd have to be a very, very special
piece of content, right? And it have to really be speaking to
you. So why have social media for your podcast at all? When we
think about it this way, it seems like you know, why would
we do it? It feels like a huge waste of time. But what I need
you to think about and remember is that it takes the average
customer eight to 12 interactions or touch points
with a brand to purchase, and a touch point can be the customer
seeing an ad or getting an email or seeing their social media
content. If it takes eight to 12 times of someone seeing a
product or a brand to spend their money with them, I would
say that it takes eight to 12. Of times of someone seeing your
podcast and them having that touch point with you, for them
to use their most valuable resource, their time, to listen
to your podcast, there is a component of trust that has to
be built exactly like between a buyer and a seller with a
podcaster and their audience. You aren't asking them to watch
a 15 second video. They're not just scrolling around on Tiktok.
You are asking them to invest minutes, even hours, of time
with you every week, and for them to make that investment in
you, they're first going to have to see the investment you've
made in them. Plus, again, if they aren't already searching
for a podcast like yours, if you aren't on social media trying to
build that awareness, realistically, how are they
going to find you seriously, if they weren't looking for a
podcast like yours, how would they ever find your podcast?
People very, rarely stumble across a podcast that wasn't
recommended to them or that they sought out in some shape or
form. Let's talk about how to convert followers or viewers
through your content. And I know that I've talked about this so
many times in so many different episodes, but I'll say it again.
Promoting a new episode for the sake of promoting a new episode
is not enough. Imagine you opened up your Instagram and
someone was promoting their new episode, but they didn't really
tell you what it was about, and you had never listened to this
podcast before. That's an instant skip. Don't care. Zero
thoughts. I'm scrolling right past it. Having a new episode
isn't impressive. It's the status quo. It's the thing that
your listeners are expecting from you. So find a better way
to promote your new episodes. This advice is relevant for
video or static content, but find the most interesting or
valuable part of your episode and find a way to promote that
leave the person consuming it wanting more. If I'm watching
your video, I want to want more and go onto your podcast.
Nothing will hook me into content and make me want more
than telling me, either literally or figuratively, hey,
if you liked this, there's more where this came from. Go listen
to my podcast. Right off the top of my head, I can think of
several historical podcast that I've started watching because of
Tiktok, that just started by telling a story or basically
throwing out a fact, like, Hey, can you believe XYZ? And it gets
me hooked. And then they say, if you want to hear the rest of
this story, listen to the full episode on my podcast. That gets
me almost every time, because I want to know what happened, but
also I already know that I like this person and I like how they
tell stories, and that is just one thing that I think video
does a little bit better than static content for podcast.
Conversion from social media specifically, is if someone
likes what they are watching in the video, they're already
building that trust and curiosity to go to your podcast,
really the promotional content that you are posting on social
media for your podcast should be a hook for the person that's
watching it to think, Hey, I should continue listening or
watching this on their podcast. But in order for that to work,
you need to give exact instructions, and you need to be
clear on what it is that is expected. So in other words, you
need a compelling call to action that tells the viewer what to
do, how to do it, and why they should do it. Here's an example.
Let's say that I have a podcast about being a makeup artist in
the wedding industry, and let's say that I decided to make a
video about my worst experiences with brides and how I manage
them. I'd start with a short form piece of content for social
media with something like you will never believe what happened
to me at this wedding, and just start and tell a story. I might
tell the whole story, and then at the end, I'll say something
like, if you want to know how I dealt with this situation, or
you're a makeup artist in the wedding industry who wants to
learn more about how to make money in weddings without losing
your cool. Listen to XYZ podcast. I have new episodes
every Thursday, and you won't believe the other stories on
this episode, and maybe just give a quick preview of one of
those stories. I mean, if I was a makeup artist that was in the
wedding industry, and I'm just scrolling and I saw that, that
would probably convert me instantly from that social media
platform to the podcast to follow, because I'd feel like
that was talking to me, like that was directly spoken to me,
and now I have an assignment to do. And I think this is where so
many podcasters go wrong, because so many times we're
posting an aimless clip of our podcast and it's getting nothing
because it's giving nothing. Put garbage in, get garbage out, and
if you aren't giving someone a direct call to action, good luck
on getting. Them to do anything. I personally think that Tiktok
and Instagram are the hardest to convert followers to listeners.
They also happen to be the most popular social media for people
under the age of 40. And I'm saying that it's hard to convert
because you can't put a link in the caption or comment. Also,
these are both algorithms that are set up to just keep
scrolling, an endless loop of just scrolling. So if someone
wants to take those extra steps to go on your profile and search
for a link or the name of your podcast, this is where you
having an optimized profile is a must. You must, must, must have
a link that's going directly to your podcast from your link in
bio, and this can be a direct link, or it can be a link tree,
or a link from your website that immediately shows someone where
to go. But if you have to take more than three steps, you're
gonna lose them. So when I say three steps, I mean like, click
on your profile, then click on the link, then click on the
podcast. That is what I mean by three steps. You need to keep it
to three steps or less, ideally one step. Also make sure that
you have the full name of your podcast in your bio. You have no
idea how many times that I click on a podcaster's page and their
podcast name is nowhere to be found, and I'm like, Oh my gosh,
how am I gonna find these people? So make sure that the
name of your the full name of your podcast is in your bio,
because really, if somebody's not clicking through to that
link, how are they going to know what the name of your podcast
is? Make sure that you are telling your future listener
where to go in your content, and that the listener path is
crystal clear. People need to know how to get to your podcast
with zero effort. But what about the other social media like
Facebook or LinkedIn or even Pinterest or threads, they make
it so much easier, because you can put a link in your content
so literally, there is just one step that someone has to take to
listen to your podcast. Make sure that you are taking
advantage of this, please, please, please. I see podcasters
all the time. They're posting about a podcast episode on
Facebook or LinkedIn or wherever. There's no link to it.
That is a huge problem. There are zero reasons why someone
would see you promoting an episode and not have the link
right there for them to click and go straight to that episode,
and unless you're talking about your full podcast, I would link
directly to that episode. So if you're talking about Episode
222, make sure that the link is going to Episode 222, don't just
send them to your broad podcast. Make it as easy as possible and
direct them to the thing that you're talking about. I know
that visibility on social media is a fickle friend for your
podcast, but my advice to you, if you are trying to make more
engaging, compelling content, is that you are a little bit more
aware and intentional when you're on social media. Notice
things. Notice what hooks you in. Notice when you get lost in
watching something, save that content. So the next time that
you're feeling uninspired or like, oh my gosh, I have to make
content today, please. No, you can go back and watch it. Don't
copy it. Obviously, you are creator. You know how it feels
when someone copies your content and it feels terrible. But study
it. Study what you like about it. Study what works and why it
works. Try to put yourself in the mind of your future
listener, and with every piece of content that you create, ask
yourself, would this make me want to listen to this episode?
That is huge, and also think about if I did want to listen to
this episode. How many steps would it take me to get there?
Also, is it clear that I have a podcast? I think that so many
times we get wrapped up thinking that everybody knows everything
about us. When I'm scrolling through and I'm thinking, are
they a guest on somebody else's podcast? Is this their podcast?
What's their podcast name? So make sure that you're making it
very clear, this is my podcast. This is the name of my podcast.
This is how you can get to my podcast and listen to my
podcast. Remember, views don't equal downloads. You need a
clear and direct call to action and a clear and direct path to
finding your podcast. If you can master those two things. You are
never gonna have to worry about promoting your podcast again.
And if you still need help with this and you feel like, oh my
gosh, all I do is post on social media about my podcast and
nothing is happening, just spinning my wheels. If you want
to schedule a social media audit with me, where I look through
all of your social media and tell you what's working and how
you can start converting more followers into listeners. The
link is in the episode description, and as always, I
can't wait to listen to your podcast. Hey, thank you so much
for joining me on this episode. If you enjoyed the podcast and
you'd like to hear more episodes like this one, go ahead and
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