There are a million and one reasons to start a B2B podcast. Take it from our pals over at OpenView. The OpenView Blog is home to more than 10,000 subscribers. So when they launched a podcast, they didn’t set out to replace their already successful medium. Instead, they aimed to support it in a new way. In fact, their content strategy is specifically designed to work harmoniously, letting each channel play to its strengths.
“We use the podcast as a way to supplement that goal… just in a different channel,” says Bayley Dietz, Senior Marketing Manager at OpenView, in an interview with Lindsay Tjepkema on The Casted Podcast. “On top of every episode that goes out, we also turn those interviews into content pieces. The blog is still very core to what we do, and the podcast is a great way to supplement that.”
But when starting a B2B podcast, building a strong brand is crucial for attracting and retaining listeners. A well-defined brand helps not only attract new listeners but establishes your podcast as a trusted source of information and entertainment. It can also make it more memorable and distinguishable from other podcasts in the same niche.
By taking the time to carefully consider your audience, develop your brand identity, create on-brand content, promote your podcast, and collaborate with other industry experts, you can set your podcast up for success and grow a loyal and engaged audience.
When building your podcast brand, the first and most important thing to consider is your audience. Your listeners are the people who will be most directly impacted by and connected to your brand, so by considering their interests, values, and preferences, you can create a brand that resonates with them and makes them more likely to become loyal listeners.
Develop your podcast brand identity and build a brand package that you can refer back to using these five steps:
Once you've established your brand identity, it's important to be consistent in your branding efforts, including the content and style of your podcast, as well as the way you present yourself on your marketing channels.
Keeping your podcast content on-brand helps to establish your podcast as a reliable source of information or entertainment. When you consistently deliver content that aligns with your brand values and mission, listeners will come to expect and look forward to that type of content from your podcast.
Maintaining a consistent tone and style for your podcast also helps to make it distinguishable from other podcasts in the same niche.
While promoting your podcast, it is important to consider your audience and brand identity and use the platforms that work best for your brand. Keep in mind that one podcast can be repurposed into content that can be used multiple times across different channels. Here are just a few ways to promote your podcast:
Utilize social media — Share your podcast episodes on your social media platforms, such as LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook, and engage with your followers by asking questions and sharing related content.
Repurpose as a blog or video content — Transcribe your podcast and turn it into a written blog post, or film it and share it across video distribution channels.
Leverage email marketing — Include links to your podcast episodes in your email newsletters and send targeted emails to your subscribers promoting your latest episodes.
Attend industry events and conferences — Participate in industry events and conferences as a speaker or panellist, and use these opportunities to promote your podcast and network with potential listeners.
Utilize paid advertising — Consider using paid advertising, such as sponsored social media posts or Google AdWords, to reach a larger audience and drive traffic to your podcast.
Optimize for search — Use keywords in your podcast titles, descriptions, and show notes to improve your visibility in search engines and make it easier for people to find your podcast.
Take it from Dave Gerhardt, former CMO of Privy. As a pioneer of tech podcasts — Dave’s also the former VP of Marketing at Drift — he’s propelled some amazing brands into this space during his career. His approach to podcasting? See podcasts as fuel for the total marketing machine.
“If you start with a podcast, then you have audio. Ideally, you’d film it, so you have video too,” says Dave. “If you have those two things, you can easily get so much content out of that one episode.”
Dave has witnessed firsthand the number of marketers who stop at simply blogging and tweeting out a link. This leaves so much value on the table! At Privy, they transform all podcast content into many different deliverables to feed the entire marketing machine, including:
For example, Privy recently produced a podcast episode featuring Nik Sharma, CEO of Sharma Brands. Then the brand did a spinoff of the episode in blog form.
Was the blog about Nik Sharma specifically? Not really. Instead, it captured Nik’s expertise from the episode — direct recommendations for brands to look at for marketing inspiration and email examples (which Privy listeners just so happen to be hungry for). And because the blog contained key SEO terms for the brand, it also provided Privy with relevant traffic. (Cha-ching!)
“[Podcasting] was honestly the first that we did because I think it’s the most scalable. It’s the marketing channel that gives you the most leverage I think,” says Dave.
Bring experts from other B2B companies in your industry onto your show to cross-promote each other’s brand and reach a wider audience. (This is exactly what we’ve done on The Casted Podcast.) Having conversations with other people in your field who are driving the industry forward also makes for ultra-engaging and high-quality content. A win-win.
Building a strong podcast brand is essential for maintaining audience trust and loyalty. By following the tips outlined in this post, you can effectively establish your podcast as a quality and memorable source of information or entertainment. By taking the time to carefully consider and develop your brand, you can set your podcast up for success and grow a loyal and engaged audience.
At Casted, it’s our passion to help brands dig deep and discover the value of the content they produce. With podcast embedding, transcription, video clips, audiograms, social sharing, and so much more, we make it easy to fuel your entire marketing strategy from a single podcast. Let us prove it to you with a quick demo.