Do you remember where you were when you first heard about podcasts? Did you hungrily reach for your headphones, overcome by desire to try out the latest and greatest content medium? I’m going to take a guess – probably not.
But I would venture to say that since that moment you’ve taken a listen. Maybe you’re one of 90 million active podcast listeners now, or you may just have a few favorites.
Either way, podcasts are powerful. Today there are over 850,000 active podcasts, compared to 500,000 in 2018. And I promise – your potential customers are listening.
It’s no secret that having an audience or a following can have a massive impact on the bottom line of your business. No matter what your business is, you need to include podcasting in your SEO and content marketing strategy.
Launching a podcast is an easy way to produce content for your business and you’ll get a lot more benefits, with less work, compared to other forms of content.
Podcasting 101
Until recently, podcasts were seen as more a form of entertainment and information rather than an SEO and marketing asset. Podcasting has changed the game of online businesses by offering the following benefits:
- Ability to massively grow your audience
- Generation of backlinks, leading to higher rankings in search engines
- Networking
- Cross-promotion by being a guest on another podcast, and having guests on yours
Podcast voice
Many business owners are hindered by the idea of speaking for the duration of a podcast. If interviewing is out of your comfort zone, it can be tempting to hire someone else to serve as your podcast voice. But remember, podcasts are about connecting with your audience. Your customers want to hear from a voice that represents the brand. Take the opportunity to tell them about your company straight from the horse’s mouth.
Authenticity goes a long way when trying to build an audience. Allowing people to hear you speak will give them a better sense of your personality and build trust. People will get a feel as though they know you, and this helps build an audience much quicker than stale posts of text.
Launching a podcast for SEO benefits
What you need:
- A website or page for your podcast (so people can link to it)
- A consistent posting schedule (once a week on the same day)
- Keywords for content enrichment
- Interesting topics
Podcasting offers new and crucial SEO features for your brand. By producing consistent, quality content, you will be able to build trust from your viewers, grow your audience exponentially, and acquire backlinks necessary to increase your search engine rankings.
Google has stated that podcast audio will be searchable within their search engine. Zach Reneau-Wedeen of Google’s podcast team has said this in an interview:
“Google is really good at giving you text and video related to your search query. With all the amazing work podcasters are publishing each day, there’s no good reason why audio isn’t a first-class citizen in the same way…it has the potential to help people find the best content for them at that moment, better than they can today.”
How to make your podcast SEO-friendly
Now that you’ve recorded your podcast, it’s time to optimize it for ranking in search results. Google isn’t going to listen to your podcast, but there are other ways to show search engines that your content is relevant to their users. The following strategies will help you capitalize on all of the SEO benefits that podcasting offers.
Use transcriptions with keywords
When you post each podcast episode to your website, include a written transcription of the episode for Google to consume, like it would a blog post. There are several transcription solutions like Rev or Temi that can transcribe your episodes for you, or you can hire a virtual assistant.
If you want your podcast content to rank, you should also add in some keywords related to your topic in your transcriptions for each episode.
Channel link equity to your money pages
While your goal should be to get each individual episode to rank high for a specific topic, you should be using your podcast to acquire links from other websites to boost your domain authority. Channel that link equity to the pages that matter on your website by simply adding a link to a service page or a blog post at the beginning of each podcast episode.
Your podcast is going to be a link-building asset. But you probably have more important pages on your website that you want to view and rank higher. Spread the link equity (or “link juice”) from your podcast pages to give those pages a boost in rankings.
If your podcast features guests, ask them to add it to their blog and include a link to it. A lot of businesses are willing to do this and it gets you a backlink. Or get featured on other podcasts to acquire high-quality links.
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Podcasting marketing strategy
Once you have a podcast in place, and you’re consistently putting out content, you will slowly begin to grow your audience. For the podcast itself, you can build your audience faster by doing the following:
- Ask your listeners to subscribe so they never miss an episode
- Offer a lead magnet if they join your email list
- Provide links to your social media
- Provide links to your site(s)
- Ask listeners to leave a review
- Give out your email address for people to ask questions or submit ideas
- Host a contest or mention special sales
By engaging with your audience, you are more likely to not only retain them but grow your audience as well.
Have guest interviews on your podcast
Having guests on your podcast is a great way to build brand awareness, generate backlinks, and channel link equity. When someone is a guest on your podcast, you are also earning their audience for that episode which gives you more exposure. If people like you, they are more likely to convert to being in your audience too.
When publishing a podcast episode with a guest, reach out to them, and ask them to share the episode on their social media accounts. More often than not, they will. Social signals are a ranking factor, so social shares will help your SEO as well.
Be a guest on other podcasts
Appearing as a guest on someone else’s podcast will not only generate backlinks for your brand, it will also increase your referral traffic. By being a guest on a podcast, you automatically have their audience as listeners. It also shows the podcast host trusts and respects you in order to bring you on as a guest. This is a great opportunity to mention your own expertise, brand, and channel to convert referral traffic.
Being a guest on a podcast can help you to leverage traffic to your own business. It’s a huge advantage and it’s free marketing. You can bring to the table what sets you apart and how you can help their audience. Place yourself in a position of authority and watch your audience grow. Plus, it’s evergreen content. Meaning once you create it, it’s out there and will continue to reach new people consistently.
Start your podcast now
When you’re ready to get your podcast off the ground, start with the following to be sure your SEO and marketing strategy game is tight:
- Research the “Top Ten” podcasts in your genre, what stands out? What’s missing that you could fill-in?
- Create an amazing landing page for your podcast
- Research keywords and outline each episode around them for SEO
- Find people with authority and ask them to be guests
- Find similar podcasts, reach out and ask to be a guest
- Provide social media links to podcasts that you are a guest on
- Promote your podcast
Guest author: Tanner entered the digital marketing industry in 2018, starting his own digital marketing agency while he was still attending college at The University of Utah. What started as a side business/hobby has quickly transformed into what Ranksey Digital Marketing is today – a fast growing marketing agency that helps business grow by building websites that convert traffic, brand identity that resonates with clients’ target markets, and digital marketing strategies that produce results.
The post Why Podcasting is Essential for Every SEO and Content Marketing Strategy appeared first on Jeffbullas's Blog.
source https://www.jeffbullas.com/why-podcasting/
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