When it comes to podcast growth, everyone thinks they have a tactic problem.

That if they could *just* find the right tactic their show would take off immediatly.

What they don't realize is they probably already have the right tactic.

But they're missing something else...

🧵 Ask ChatGPT “how to grow a podcast” & it will give you every tactic you'll ever need:

✅ Cross-promos
✅ Podcast SEO
✅ Leverage video
✅ Advertise in podcast apps
✅ Content repurposing
✅ And more

You can execute all of these perfectly however & still fail to grow.

Why?

The smartest podcasters are using AI to save dozens of hours every month.

But most folks still have no idea what's even possible.

Here are 3 simple ways you can start leveraging AI to cut time from your production & marketing process ASAP: 1. Streamline Audio Editing

Editing is the single most time-consuming task for most shows.

But it doesn't have to be.

Use @resoundfm to remove all the filler words from an hour-long episode in less than 5 min.

Then, import to @alituapp for polish & you're done.

Everyone tells you to niche down your podcast.

But no one ever explains how it actually helps you grow.

Let's change that.

Here's the secret to how (& why) niching will supercharge your growth: Imagine you have a choice of two ponds to fish in

Let's call them Pond A & Pond B.

Both ponds are stocked with the exact type of fish you're hoping to catch.

But there are two key differences between them.

The biggest source of podcast growth is word-of-mouth recommendations.

But for people to share your show, it has to be highly "recommendable".

Recommendable shows have 4 simple traits in common that most shows lack.

Here's how to nail each of them and get people talking: 1. Relevance

Relevance is the foundation of any recommendation.

This is true whether it's a listener recommending your show to a friend, or another creator in your niche recommending it to their audience.

Your job, then, is to make it unmistakably clear who your show is for.

In January 2022, I was averaging 100 new email subscribers/month.

In January 2023, I had more than 800.

This month, I'm on pace to break 1,200.

Here are the 7 changes I made to my email marketing strategy to 10x growth. 1. Added More Email On-Ramps

In Jan 2022, there were 2 ways to get onto my email list:

👉 My free course on podcast sponsorships
👉 Creative Wayfinding Newsletter landing page... a newsletter that wasn't directly aligned w/ my offers

I knew I needed to do more.

If you're serious about growing your podcast, you need to know your numbers.

But download numbers alone don't tell you much about whether what you're doing is working.

Instead, track these 7 obscure (but valuable) metrics to help you grow: 1. Average Monthly Growth Rate

On their own, monthly download numbers are a vanity metric.

But in relation to past months, they're an indicator of momentum.

They're also a clear indicator of how well your marketing is working.

So what should you be aiming for?

Best Friday vibes playlist? @TKellzzz @_reminiscentfm care to weigh in? I'm stuck.

One of your biggest challenges as a podcaster:

Audience engagement.

A highly engaged audience accelerates growth, generates content & makes the process fun.

But most creators don't know the levers to pull to get there.

Here are 7 tactics to go from crickets to engagement👇 1️⃣ Engage w/ *Them* First

Instead of waiting for listeners to reach out to you, take the lead & kickstart the engagement yourself.

👉 Create a list of 10-15 of your best-fit listeners
👉 Follow them on their social
👉 Spend 10 min/day engaging w/ their content

Sooner or later your podcast's growth is going to plateau.

When it does, you can carry on & hope things get better.

Or you can find the reason & fix it.

Here are 5 common problems that cause good shows plateau & how to get around them 👇 1️⃣ Problem: Your Content/Audience Is Too Broad

Ironically, the biggest reason shows plateau is that they're trying to appeal to too many people.

Yes there are huge shows w/ mass appeal but by trying to emulate them, you're competing w/ them directly.

You can't win that battle.

Marketing strategies are like a new pair of shoes.

They need to be worn, walked around in, broken in & made your own before they start to work.

Don't quit a strategy too early just because it's uncomfortable for the first few steps 7️⃣ Chasing Shiny Objects

Most growth strategies follow an all-or-nothing rule.

Invest the time to understand & master them & you'll get phenomenal results.

Dabble around the edges & you'll get nothing.

If you want to succeed, then, you need to go all-in somewhere.

You're always looking for new tactics to add to your podcast strategy.

But your biggest opportunity for growth is actually to *stop* doing the things that are wasting your time & holding you back.

Here are common 10 podcast marketing mistakes to eliminate immediately: 1️⃣ Focusing on Promotion over Marketing

Most creators think of promotion & marketing as the same thing.

But they're different tasks w/ different purposes.

And most creators focus all their time on promotion... which doesn't actually result in growth.

Here's why:

Most podcasters use the wrong marketing tactics for the size of their audience.

And then they wonder why they're not growing.

Here's how to use the right tactics for the growth phase you're in👇 0-100 Podcast Listeners

This phase is defined by manual legwork that doesn't scale, like:

🏃 1:1 outreach to people who are interested in your topic
🏃 Participating in community discussions related to your topic & sharing *where relevant*

But this phase isn't about growth...

Quick Podcast Tip #126

The most important podcast metric you've never thought of:

Average Time To Value (ATV)

In other words, how long does it take for a listener to get a taste of the thing they tuned in for in the first place.

Improving your ATV requires two things 👇 1. Understanding what listeners get out of your show.

Depending on your show, this will vary, but could include:

👉 Education
👉 Insight
👉 Entertainment
👉 Feeling seen
👉 And more

The best way to determine the value your show gives listeners is to hear from them directly.

This week I'll publish the 100th issue of my newsletter.

Over the past 2 years it's grown to 2000 subscribers & has become my most valuable activity in my business.

Here are 10 unconventional (+1 cliche but true) lessons I've learned to help you grow your own creative projects. 1/ Feed Yourself First

We're often told to serve our audience above all else.

But in my experience, creative projects have a *much* higher chance of succeeding when the act of creating them gets us something personally, before anyone else ever interacts with them.

Quick Podcast Tip #76

To grow your podcast there are 2 types of tasks you need to focus on.

But most creators spend all their time on just 1.

Which means it's no surprise that their shows don't grow... even when they're fantastic.

Here what you need to know.

🧵 Podcast tasks can be divided into two categories:

1. Maintenance-Oriented Tasks
2. Growth-Oriented Tasks

Both are essential to creating a successful show but most creators spend all their time on maintenance.

Let's take a closer look at each category & how to balance them.

Quick Podcast Tip #15

If you want your podcast to grow, it has to be compelling.

It's probably already compelling to you, but it also needs to be for your audience.

Here are 5 ingredients that go into a compelling show 👇 1️⃣ Compelling Topic

The foundation of any show is the topic.

The most compelling topics are those that haven't been covered before or haven't been covered from a certain angle.

Your opportunity then, is to explore your topic in a way that brings something new to the world.

Only 1% of the 2M+ podcasts in existence get more than 3K downloads in the first week.

Many of the other 99% have solid content & production.

Many of them feature the same guests as the top 1%.

So what gives? We can talk about the marketing and content strategies top podcasters use to create and grow compelling shows.

But there's something deeper, more foundational that those strategies are built on top of:

To grow a successful show, create the show that only you can make.

Creative work requires a consistent supply of new inputs.

We usually think of those as articles, newsletters, podcasts, etc.

But what about our environmental inputs?

Here's how following the 20-5-3 rule of time outdoors boosts your creative output 🧵

via @Michael_Easter Why Time In Nature Matters

In nature, our brains enter a mode called “soft fascination”

SF is a mindfulness-like state that restores & builds the resources to think, create, process info & execute tasks.

Ie. everything we need to do creative work.

But there's a catch.

Let's talk adolescence.

Acned
Gangly
Awkward
Uncomfortable
Often embarrassing

A time many of us are glad to have put behind us.

Except that when it comes to our work, we haven't.

And it's in this awkward, in-between stage that we're most likely to get stuck as creators.

🧵 Our work’s adolescence mirrors our own.

When we first start creating, we’re aware our work isn’t all that good.

Like toddlers we find our feet, playing with the basic building blocks of our craft, doing our best to piece them together.

With time, our work improves, but...

5 things I learned this week to be a better creator.

1. The Overjustification Effect - @KateBour
2. Selling To Your Audience - @jspector
3. 5 Step Storytelling Framework - @growthcurrency & @RobbieCrab
4. Technical Debt - @jayclouse
5. Compassion - @AniPemaChodron & @holstee 1. The Overjustification Effect - @KateBour

The tension between doing things for intrinsic vs extrinsic reasons.

Why it matters:

When incentivizing our audiences to take action, we risk incentivizing things they would have done for "free" & now expect rewards in the future.

🖐 5 Things You Might Dig

Here are the 5 top links from last week's Creative Wayfinding Newsletter.

I hope you find something here that helps you make and market better work.

🧵 1 / Inspiration: Best First Lines

Best First Lines, by @TeamJohnH is a living database of sentences that grab your attention, pulling from books, speeches, screenplays & more.

This has already been added to the top of my writing toolkit.

bestfirstlines.com