Give your existing listeners some love

How much attention do you pay to your existing listeners in your episodes, show notes and on social media? Yup, don't feel bad, most of us are driven to grow our podcast by talking to new listeners but we need to rebalance things, right? Here are a few powerful tips on how to do that.

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Transcript

So when I was a Brownie, which is pre Girl Scouts, there was a song, make new friends, but keep the old. One is silver and the other is gold. I think in podcasting, oftentimes we're so busy trying to get new listeners that we forget about the old listeners.

And today I want to talk about how you can engage, appreciate, and connect with your current listeners in ways you may or may not be doing. Hey, I'm Steph from Coffeelike Media, and I am obsessed with audience growth. Audience growth so that you can connect, grow, have experiences with other people who share like experiences.

I'm doing eight episodes this month specifically for audience growth month. Don't forget that we're doing a contest this month where you can win a free podcast audience growth audit from yours truly. We already have two winners, and we have two more opportunities for you to win.

I will have the link in the show notes or video notes, depending on where you are consuming this. If you're listening to this in audio form, please take a screenshot of this episode and share that on social media. And all people need to do is look up podcasts to connect, and they should find the podcast.

Let's do this. So why is it important if someone's already listening, why do you need to pay attention to them? Because they are part of your community and you want to. And it is tricky when you're talking to already existing people who know the ins and outs of your content, your format, how you function, your inside jokes, all those kinds of things.

It is awkward to stop and pay attention to them until you're used to doing it, and then it becomes second nature. And then in the middle of explaining something on your podcast, you'll go, oh, wait, it's not all news listeners. Oh, wait, it's not all older listeners.

Oh, wait, there's someone who's listening who's not necessarily deep in this content area yet. They're just starting their geek journey into what we're talking about. So it's really good to kind of step back either before you start recording or in the middle of your recording, because you can edit things out and say, hmm, what other perspective can I give to this moment? For example, you'll notice sometimes when I'm talking in here, I might say, if you do this or if you're like that, or maybe you do this, or maybe you could do that.

I'm trying to preface it for different audiences now. Yes, you should have one main audience that you're focusing in on. However, even that main audience might include, like I mentioned in a previous episode, new listeners, existing listeners, and people that are creating content similar to yours.

That's already three different groups of people who might think of things differently. Now, I'm not saying stop every two minutes and reframe everything that's nonsense and that will drive your listeners crazy. What I am saying is there are things you can do that we're going to go into that'll really help with making sure they know you know they're listening and you appreciate them.

So let's talk about this. The first thing is in the audio, I think I already went over that. You could even say something like, for, for those of you that have been listening for a while, you'll know, blah, blah, blah.

You could just add that to the beginning of a sentence on something that you'll be saying to specifically new listeners. If you're describing a CTA that somebody might have heard a million times as an existing listener, then you might want to say that at the beginning so that the new listeners know, hey, this is what I'm going to be hearing from now on. And the older listeners know, hey, she knows.

I've heard this a few times. Me, I haven't done the action yet. Maybe I'll do it now because I feel seen.

Oh, that's gorgeous. In the show notes, you can have information that's specifically for people that have been listening for a while. You can definitely have information on that episode, but you can also have ways that they can go deeper diving into your content.

I know, I know, I know. I know that a lot of people don't go into show notes because they're lazy or they're busy or they don't even know what show notes are. That's fine.

That's not who you're writing to. Then who you're writing for in those show notes are people that do look in show notes. So leave some ways they can deeper dive to you.

I cannot tell you how many times people come to me and they say, hey, I'm just not growing. I've hit a stump. What's happening? And I look at their show notes and there's absolutely no links.

Very few of those people have no social media presence. In fact, I hit someone recently who had no links at all. And they did have a newsletter, a website, and a YouTube channel, but none of those were in the show notes.

Look, it's an innocent mistake. You think audio. I'm going to have audio.

Why do I need to put text on something? Because people want to know more about you, your project, your ideas about this content area, this topic, they know, like and trust you and they want more and you're not giving them more. So for the listeners who have been there a while or who want to deep dive immediately, give them more. In the show notes, make sure you have links.

You know what? Podcast apps are a mess. I know it doesn't look as good when the links are naked links instead of embedded in words, but a lot of apps don't actually show clickable links as clickable. So put the ugly naked links, which means you can see the HTTP blah blah blah blah blah mypodcast.com

I know it looks worse. We're not going for appearance errors, we're going for usability. If people can copy and paste your link, they are more likely to go to it even if they can't click on it.

Or they can type it in if they're really that dedicated, depending on the ridiculous app that they use. I am a podcast addict and nine times out of ten I can click on links and it's one of the reasons I'm never switching to any other app because I've tried and there's just nothing else. Checks all the boxes that I need from a podcast app.

Another thing is in the socials. When you are creating social media content, create some that are made specifically for people who are already listening. Maybe pull in a few references to inside jokes that keep recurring, or things that you say constantly, or things that, like someone in the community has said about your podcast.

Bring in quotes from people who have given you feedback, even if it's an email or a DM, by all means. If it's in a private way that they sent it to you, get permission first and give or don't give specific credit. Or maybe just say a listener if they want to stay anonymous.

Either way, even if it's anonymous, get permission first. If it was sent privately, keep it private until they say okay, but include them in your social media. Not only is it social proof, which is a super fancy way of saying somebody listened and they liked it, so you get a pat on the back visibly, but more importantly, it includes them in the community.

So they'll keep listening, they'll keep communicating, and they'll keep being a part of your content area community that you have created and your call to actions. If all of your calls to actions are things that people can do at once, and then they run out of what to do, what do the existing listeners do? Example, review my podcast. How many times do you think the same person is going to review your podcast ?

If you're lucky. Most people don't know where or how to review podcasts, so I haven't used the CTA personally in years. There's nothing wrong with podcast reviews.

They can be used for marketing purposes, but unlike what most people say in their podcast, it does not help them find you. That does not influence the algorithm very much. There's a lot of misinformation in podcasting.

Basically, they can be used for marketing if the podcaster or whoever runs the podcast is savvy enough to take that review and run with it. Most people will not review a podcast, but even if they did, they're only going to do it once. And then what do the recurring listeners do? Twiddle their thumbs and just say thank you to the air? Give them something to do.

If you have a newsletter, encourage them to sign up for the newsletter. But even that's only once. This is why I like the CTA.

If you like this episode, screenshot it and share it on the socials. Or if you like this episode, tell someone about it, send it to someone today, because that can be in there for many episodes. Someone may only review your podcast once, they may only sign up for your newsletter once.

But recurring listeners, if they really like an episode, they can share it with a different person every few months. So that's a recurring thing that they can do. Again, your CTA is what you probably want to have, I'd say one at the beginning, one at the end, the most important one at the beginning of your episode, have that be the one that anybody can do frequently.

And then for your less important ones that they can only do once, shove those at the end or switch them back and forth. You know, there's nothing in this world that says your CTA has to be the same everywhere. Every episode I checked, it's not there.

If you have a podcast newsletter, which I hope you do, and I hope it's simple and I hope it does not take you a lot of time. And I hope it includes value for your listeners. What can you do for your existing listeners, readers of your newsletter? Include value, of course.

But what can you do that's different from the new folks? For the new folks, you definitely want to introduce the podcast newsletter and explain why it's there, what it's going to do, all of that. But again, it's similar to social media. In the newsletter, you want to include bits that let them know that you know they're listening.

That can include, again, information from them. It can include polls, give them a poll, to do. Give them a poll that's not just, do you like this? Ah, give them a poll that only someone who has listened for a little while can answer.

Yes, that might exclude the new folks, but that's okay. Because later on they know once they listen to a few episodes and whatnot, they can participate in future polls. Ask them questions, ask them for comments or suggestions.

Another poll you can do is let them decide on things in the episodes in the future. If you've got like a bunch of them and you're not quite sure what order you wanna put them in, put a poll and let them order them for you, or let them vote them up, or however you want to do that for a newsletter. Have a paid section.

I know that seems weird because that seems like it would block people. But if you have a free tier and a paid tier, existing listeners who have been with you for a while, May and this took me a while to understand because I was like, I don't want to exclude anybody. I don't want to demand money from them.

But sometimes people just want to give back. When you've changed their life, and I'm nothing using that lightly at all, when you've changed their life, when you've taught them something, when you've helped them feel part of a community, a fair number of people want to give back to the person that has done that. Give them the ability to open your newsletter up for a paid tier.

It doesn't have to be a lot, a few dollars, $5 a month, or whatever equivalent that is where you are. Just give them the ability to be part of the community. All right, so we've gone over different ways that you can specifically, specifically include things that help your current listeners know that you know they're listening.

We did it for the audio show notes, social media call to actions. They're in the audio show notes and social media posts as well. But there's such a key component to momentum happening within your podcast community that I also wanted to address them separately.

And finally, in your podcast newsletter, which I hope you have if you need help with any of this. Stephfuccio.com  I’ve got a variety of services for different budgets because I want to help you find your people and engage with them and enrich each other's lives.

It's all about connection at Coffeelike Media and genuine, genuine connection. All right, more on Monday when we announce another winner and two more episodes next week. Have a good weekend.

Bye.