Podcircle Podcast

We really want you to use your podcast to identify your listeners' biggest problems. And then because you have their attention, because you're giving them your expertise freely, you are going to position yourself and your products as the answer. Many of your target market's problems lie within your expertise but may be solved with knowledge rather than here's a product for you. You're still giving them your subject matter expertise and demonstrate your value. Welcome to the Podcircle Podcast where we bring practical tips and insights for every podcaster.

Whether you're just getting started or you're already a seasoned podcast pro, these conversations dive into all the topics that matter most to you. So thanks for tuning in to another episode of the Pod Circle podcast. Today, we're talking about 5 ways to use your podcast to sell your products and services. And over the last couple of weeks we've been talking about all the incredible benefits that a podcast can bring to your overall content strategy but today we're gonna dive a bit deeper into strategic ways that you can make sales to your podcast listeners. And as a reminder, we post all of our episodes up on YouTube.

So make sure to subscribe to our channel at Podcircle and follow along with this episode and catch up on past episodes as well.

Also, if you're listening on Apple Podcasts or Spotify, we would love it if you would give us a quick 5 star review and rating. Alright. The first way to use your podcast to make sales will come as no surprise if you've been listening to us for very long. The first tip is to show up. People buy from those they know, like, and trust, and a podcast is a phenomenal way to humanize your brand.

Every week, you get the opportunity to provide value and build trust on a consistent basis. We often joke that we would probably all cut off our left pinky toe if we could have even just 30 seconds of uninterrupted time with our target market. Can you imagine having 30 minutes? That is the opportunity you have every week when you have a podcast.

It's true. Our second point is to show and not tell. So this is one area that's a little bit of a slippery slope. And for many of us, if we have our ideal customer's attention, we wanna jump right in and tell them about all the wonderful things that we have to offer, our product services, all the things. But Mhmm.

We encourage you to show and not tell, and that's to demonstrate your value and your expertise to your audience. So if you have a product based business, offer your expertise freely, position yourself as the subject matter expert. And if you have a service based business like coaching or in our case, podcasting services for busy business owners, Having a podcast offers you the opportunity to provide small glimpses of what it's like to work with you, which I think is super valuable.

Yeah. I love that you get to humanize your brand every week, and people get to know what it would look like to work with you. And then, also, you're honestly, consistently always sharing your expertise. So I love that. The third is to offer solutions to your listeners' problems.

So back in my baby days as a marketer, I discovered that your greatest content comes from the intersection of your ideal customer's problems and your expertise. So kinda think about it like a Venn diagram. This is a side tangent for you. But if you're ever struggling to come up with content, just continually go back to that image. What is their problem?

What is my expertise? And how do they cross over? Next, we really want you to use your podcast to identify your listeners' biggest problems. And then because you have their attention, because you're giving them your expertise freely, you are going to position yourself and your products as the answer. Many of your target market's problems lie within your expertise but may be solved with knowledge rather than here's a product for you.

You're still giving them your subject matter expertise and demonstrating your value. So an example, podcast downloads were going down. We identified that as a problem our customers had or maybe they didn't even know they had, so we agitated the problem for them, provided the answer, built trust. You didn't buy anything from us yet, but we continue to position ourselves as subject matter experts in podcasting. One of the best ways to sell yourself and your products is to continually stay tapped into your audience's problems.

So the next one is to share your customer's success stories. People are compelled by the power of storytelling so as often as possible share your customer stories in the form of interviews, audio or video testimonials, written testimonials, examples within larger teaching concepts, etcetera.

So for example, Kyle, we just casually brought in a testimonial in an episode about why we think everyone should be recording video. Instead of just telling you what you offer, we shared an example, and we shared the results that came and the success that came from your client who was continually recording videos, not ready to launch a video channel yet, but on our recommendation, they were still recording content. We could go back and create an entire video podcast for them because they'd already done it. In doing that, we demonstrated your expertise. We demonstrated your client success, and we probably motivated someone to be thinking more, how could this person solve my problems?

Alright. And this brings us to our final point. Use your podcast to invite your ideal customer into deeper relationship with you. This is my favorite one. I love this because it just taps into marketing.

And we often joke if your sales pitch is a marriage proposal, stop asking people to marry you on the first date. Your podcast is the top of your funnel. It's a great way to build a relationship with your target audience, and, honestly, some will buy. Many are just going to be invited to go steady. You're gonna invite them into the next stage of relationship with you.

A few ways that we invite you into deeper relationship with Podcircle through our podcast is the CTAs that we often give throughout and at the end of a podcast episode. So we invite you to subscribe to the show wherever you listen to podcast. That's gonna invite you in a deeper relationship because you're gonna not miss episodes, and continually we're gonna pop up on your feed and be reminded. We encourage you to follow us on Instagram or LinkedIn. Those are places we're showing up and we're bringing content in bite sized forms.

We're building more trust. We invite you to join the conversation on YouTube. We invite you to sign up for our free complete podcast starter kit at podcircle.com/start. We invite you to join our bimonthly newsletter, Podcast Pro Tips. And lastly, we often invite you to schedule a free consult with Kyle in the show notes.

Those are just ways that we talk casually throughout the episode or at the end when it relates back to our content to invite you into deeper relationship with us. We say you don't own your social followers. You don't own your podcast listeners, but you own your email list. So are there ways to move people from this platform to a deeper relationship and somewhere else where you can continually talk with them and continue the sales process? For your business, it may be you're inviting them to attend a webinar.

You're soliciting user generated content or email comments. You're inviting them to join a Patreon. You're inviting them to purchase a lower tier lead gen product, or maybe you have a free giveaway, or maybe you do have an email list that you're providing value. Maybe you invite them to an event you're throwing at your brick and mortar store. There are lots of ways to just continually nurture the relationship and invite them to go deeper and to become a more loyal raving fan.

And the next one is one of my my favorites in the ways that you can utilize your podcast to promote yourself, your product, your services, etcetera, and that is to utilize dynamic ad campaigns. We think that the best ad strategy in 2024 is to bet on yourself, and we encourage our clients to do ads, record ads for their own products within their shows, and those can be inserted dynamically throughout the episode. You can do it as a pre roll, which runs at the very beginning. You can slot it in as a mid roll. You can you can have a couple of different mid rolls that, you know, maybe roll in the first 10 minutes and then another one that rolls around the 20.

So there's a lot of different ways to do it, but we're just a really big fan of it. And if you wanna learn more about ads and why we think you should always use dynamic ads, check out episode 18 of the podcast, how dynamic ads can supercharge your podcast. So in your ads, you're gonna wanna talk explicitly about a product or service, whether it's seasonal or maybe it connects to the topic of the episode that you're recording. Use a pre roll, like I mentioned, to quickly catch your audience's attention at the very top of your episodes. And what's amazing is that you can run that pre roll across all of your episodes, all of your past episodes.

Maybe I have a 100, 200, 300 episodes. A lot of podcasters are surprised that people actually, especially new fans of the podcast, actually go back and they listen to those old episodes Mhmm. Once they become a new fan. So being able to run new and relevant ads on those episodes is so valuable. Mackenzie, I know that you do that for one of your podcasts.

Yep. Especially if you you had a strategy before where you were doing baked in ads. We've used pre rolls a ton in the last season since we switched over to dynamic ads rather than going in and removing the baked in ads. We just throw a pre roll to make sure we can keep the relevant content if someone is going back into our catalog.

Yeah. And at Podcircle, we can go in and and remove those baked in ads, but there is you know, it can be an expensive process, especially if you have a couple hundred episodes. So one of the best ways to continue to ROI those episodes and get that return on investment is just to roll newer relevant pre rolls. And there it's at least on our end on the Podcircle and in what we do, it's very easy to set up those ad campaigns. The last thing here is that it says studies show that people are not only expect ads within their podcast, but they're also not really that bothered by them, especially when they're directly correlated to their felt needs.

And Yep. Oftentimes, if you're watching a YouTube video, YouTube kinda knows demographically where you're set up. So, like, right now, I'm I'm really into ebikes because we're we're moving to a coastal town. We're moving to Charleston, South Carolina, and I'm gonna get an ebike as a substitute to having a second car. So, like, all of my ads right now are, like, outdoors and ebike related.

And it's like, I I like that because I'm I'm doing a lot of research on that right now. So I don't mind the ads as long as they're speaking to what my interests are and what my felt needs are right now.

Totally. Well, I hope that this episode has been informative and valuable. We really do believe that not only can you sell your products and services, but a podcast might be the best way for you to get sales because of the opportunity to build trust with your target audience and really continually show up and add this into your marketing. We believe that not only can your podcast sell your products and services, but it might be one of the best ways to get sales and one of the most efficient ways for you to optimize your marketing. So we really do encourage you to think about how you could use a podcast to supercharge your business.

Totally. And we work with a lot of our clients on, you know, when they were spending a day or maybe even more than a day per week working on their podcast. Instead, moving that into working on their podcast, maybe even just a day a month, and then we help them and provide all the support necessary to where they can use their time much more efficiently, but then get all of the wonderful benefits of Out there talking about their brand, their business, and their services, it's all really powerful. Out there talking about their brand, their business, and their services. It's all really powerful stuff.

So we're we're really in the business of helping people market more efficiently, which means just better use of their time, better use of their of their marketing dollars that are just gonna go further for them. So if that sounds like you and if you're ready to take the next step in your podcasting journey, we can help you every step of the way. You can simply schedule a time to chat with me and to learn more about how we can support you in the launch and the day to day of your podcast. You can email me directly at kyle@podcircle.com. That's kyle atpodcircle.com.

You can also follow one of the links in the show notes. We offer a suite of podcast offerings for busy business owners like you so if that sounds like you if that's up your alley we'd love to connect with you and we'll see you next week.