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Jan. 15, 2020

#BestOf2019: Are Podcasts the Next Big SEO Opportunity? w/ Sam Balter

In this episode we talk to , Senior Marketing Manager, Podcasts at & host of the podcast. No. 12 in our countdown of the Top 20 episodes of 2019. drives search marketing results for enterprise brands around the world, but you’ll feel like...

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B2B Growth

In this episode we talk to Sam Balter, Senior Marketing Manager, Podcasts at HubSpot & host of the Weird Work podcast.

No. 12 in our countdown of the Top 20 episodes of 2019.


Directive drives search marketing results for enterprise brands around the world, but you’ll feel like their only client.

Learn more at: directiveconsulting.com


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Transcript
WEBVTT 1 00:00:05.360 --> 00:00:08.310 Hey there, this is James Carberry, founder of sweet fish media and one 2 00:00:08.310 --> 00:00:11.189 of the cohosts of this show. For the last year and a half I've 3 00:00:11.189 --> 00:00:14.990 been working on my very first book. In the book I share the three 4 00:00:15.029 --> 00:00:18.910 part framework we've used as the foundation for our growth. Here is sweetfish. 5 00:00:19.350 --> 00:00:22.620 Now there are lots of companies that everised a bunch of money and have grown 6 00:00:22.699 --> 00:00:25.579 insanely fast, and we featured a lot of them here on the show. 7 00:00:26.339 --> 00:00:30.579 We've decided to bootstrap our business, which usually equates to pretty slow growth, 8 00:00:31.100 --> 00:00:34.700 but using the strategy outlined in the book, we are on pace to be 9 00:00:34.859 --> 00:00:38.609 one of inks fastest growing companies in two thousand and twenty. The book is 10 00:00:38.729 --> 00:00:42.729 called content based networking, how to instantly connect with anyone you want to know. 11 00:00:43.250 --> 00:00:45.329 If you're a fan of audio books like me, you can find the 12 00:00:45.369 --> 00:00:48.450 book on audible or if you like physical books, you can also find it 13 00:00:48.570 --> 00:00:54.359 on Amazon. Just search content based networking or James carberry CR be a ary 14 00:00:54.759 --> 00:00:58.719 in audible or Amazon and it should pop right up. All right, let's 15 00:00:58.759 --> 00:01:03.439 get into the show. Hey, everybody, logan with sweet fish here. 16 00:01:03.679 --> 00:01:07.629 It's a new year and at do decade and we're celebrating by rounding up the 17 00:01:07.750 --> 00:01:11.469 top twenty episodes as we look back on two thousand and nineteen. Will be 18 00:01:11.549 --> 00:01:15.950 sharing them here throughout the month of January in our Hashtag best of two thousand 19 00:01:15.989 --> 00:01:19.900 and nineteen series. And coming in at number twelve is an episode that I 20 00:01:19.980 --> 00:01:23.420 got a lot of feedback on last year. Many people were really intrigued by 21 00:01:23.459 --> 00:01:30.459 what Sam Balter over at hubs on shared around the Seo Opportunity in podcasting right 22 00:01:30.500 --> 00:01:36.129 now. Welcome back to be tob growth. This is another episode in our 23 00:01:36.209 --> 00:01:38.890 hy podcast work series. My name is Logan Lyles, was sweet fish media. 24 00:01:38.930 --> 00:01:45.129 I'm joined today by Sam Balter. He is a senior marketing manager podcasts 25 00:01:45.409 --> 00:01:49.439 at hub spot. Will get into white. PODCAST is actually in his title. 26 00:01:49.680 --> 00:01:52.879 He's also the host of the weird work podcast from hub spot. Sam, 27 00:01:52.959 --> 00:01:55.519 how's it going today, man? It's going great. I'm so happy 28 00:01:55.519 --> 00:01:57.280 to be here. Awesome, man. Well, I would love for you 29 00:01:57.519 --> 00:02:01.310 to give folks a little bit of context. Obviously anybody listening to this most 30 00:02:01.349 --> 00:02:06.230 likely knows of hub spot, knows what you guys do, but give us 31 00:02:06.230 --> 00:02:08.669 a little bit of context on your background, what you and the team are 32 00:02:08.710 --> 00:02:12.669 up to at a hub spot, and then we're going to dive into some 33 00:02:12.830 --> 00:02:15.340 specific things. You wrote an article for marketing props about, you know, 34 00:02:15.539 --> 00:02:21.900 a huge seo opportunity potentially in the podcasting space based on some things Google is 35 00:02:21.979 --> 00:02:23.539 doing. But before we get into that, give us a little context. 36 00:02:23.580 --> 00:02:25.699 Man. What are you guys up to these days? Yeah, so, 37 00:02:27.020 --> 00:02:30.610 just for just for in case anybody hasn't heard of hub spot, where a 38 00:02:30.650 --> 00:02:34.650 company that bakes marketing, sales and service software that helps companies grow, and 39 00:02:35.409 --> 00:02:38.610 the show that I host is weird work. It's a podcast where I interview 40 00:02:38.650 --> 00:02:42.449 folks who kind of left the traditional nine to five jobs to pursue an unusual 41 00:02:42.490 --> 00:02:46.240 occupation. So for us, we've been doing podcasting and hub spot for a 42 00:02:46.280 --> 00:02:51.080 few years now and we've launched a couple shows. We have the grows show, 43 00:02:51.199 --> 00:02:53.000 we have scale up, we have weird work and I've taken on this 44 00:02:53.159 --> 00:03:00.069 role of marketing manager for podcast to kind of just grow our global audience of 45 00:03:00.150 --> 00:03:04.590 podcast listeners. So it's something that we are continuing to vest and it's a 46 00:03:04.669 --> 00:03:07.590 going that we see as a big channel that has a lot of room for 47 00:03:07.789 --> 00:03:10.110 growth and it's kind of like, even though that podcasting has been a why 48 00:03:10.310 --> 00:03:14.740 around for a while. It's still feels like very early stage right now, 49 00:03:14.860 --> 00:03:19.419 especially for companies. Yeah, absolutely. I mean there are some big indicators 50 00:03:19.539 --> 00:03:23.860 with spotify's acquisitions last year, with the growth of the number of podcasts, 51 00:03:23.900 --> 00:03:25.979 but there is still a lot of green field opportunity. I think. You 52 00:03:27.060 --> 00:03:29.250 know, when things we talked about a sweet fish. A lot is. 53 00:03:29.449 --> 00:03:31.409 You know, when podcasting first came around, we weren't quite ready for it 54 00:03:31.689 --> 00:03:37.729 right and now there are just a lot of social and technological factors that are 55 00:03:37.810 --> 00:03:42.159 playing into what I call a second wave of podcasting. Before we jump into 56 00:03:42.759 --> 00:03:47.080 the audio and Seo Topic for today, you know something you touched on their 57 00:03:47.120 --> 00:03:53.599 salmon's how you guys have invested in podcast and explored podcasts at hub spot and 58 00:03:53.840 --> 00:03:58.189 obviously being a thought leader in the marketing space in Bob. I would love 59 00:03:58.430 --> 00:04:01.469 for you to share some of the things that you guys have thought about internally 60 00:04:01.590 --> 00:04:05.750 and other brands should be thinking about. On why would you add podcasting to 61 00:04:05.789 --> 00:04:10.900 your mix, because obviously there's reason why you moved into this role. You 62 00:04:10.939 --> 00:04:15.020 guys are dedicating resources to it. Give us a little bit of context there 63 00:04:15.060 --> 00:04:17.819 and what was the the thinking in the strategy for you guys? Yeah, 64 00:04:17.819 --> 00:04:21.740 I mean I think a lot of companies are looking at podcast now. They're 65 00:04:21.779 --> 00:04:27.610 looking at starting podcast, and I think part of the reason is just because 66 00:04:27.649 --> 00:04:31.329 more and more people find themselves consuming information that way. A lot of marketers 67 00:04:31.370 --> 00:04:34.649 are out there listening to podcast and they think like maybe this is a viable 68 00:04:34.689 --> 00:04:40.279 channel for me. For us, we look at it as like podcast audiences 69 00:04:40.319 --> 00:04:44.120 also been growing. Right we're at a point where more than half of the 70 00:04:44.160 --> 00:04:47.079 United States has listened to a podcast. More than a third of the United 71 00:04:47.120 --> 00:04:51.439 States is monthly listeners, and we're also seeing that when you look at the 72 00:04:51.759 --> 00:04:59.069 demographics of that audience, for almost any business it's a really great demographic slice. 73 00:04:59.069 --> 00:05:03.550 It's people who are young, millennials, who are well educated, so 74 00:05:03.629 --> 00:05:06.899 they're more likely to have kind of higher paying jobs, they're more affluent, 75 00:05:06.980 --> 00:05:12.579 things like that. So it's this really good group of people that businesses are 76 00:05:12.620 --> 00:05:15.500 going to want to interact with. So that's one thing to keep in mind. 77 00:05:15.620 --> 00:05:19.060 Is just like the audience is good and people are consuming the content and 78 00:05:19.620 --> 00:05:25.410 generally marketers kind of flock to those two things, like content, engagement, 79 00:05:25.569 --> 00:05:29.649 mark and a good market. The other thing is for us, and especially 80 00:05:29.689 --> 00:05:31.449 as we've started to kind of expand out the number of shows we have. 81 00:05:31.610 --> 00:05:34.410 We don't. We used to just have the grows show, which was very 82 00:05:34.449 --> 00:05:39.439 thought leadership, very business interviews focused. Then we have skill out, which 83 00:05:39.439 --> 00:05:42.439 is very how to weird work, which is a little more mass appeal. 84 00:05:43.079 --> 00:05:47.800 That podcast content is in itself really flexible, right, like you and I 85 00:05:47.839 --> 00:05:50.790 could have a podcast in this episode could be five minutes long. We could 86 00:05:50.790 --> 00:05:55.430 also release an episode next week that's a forty five minute podcast, right. 87 00:05:55.550 --> 00:06:00.149 It's hard to necessarily do that with a lot of other mediums. You know, 88 00:06:00.230 --> 00:06:02.389 you might have video. People don't want to watch a video that's like 89 00:06:02.509 --> 00:06:06.660 forty five minutes long. So that's really cool the flexibility of the content. 90 00:06:06.980 --> 00:06:11.139 And the other thing that I think is really is important for marketers that a 91 00:06:11.459 --> 00:06:15.779 lot of marketers worry about is like am I cannibalizing my other channels? And 92 00:06:16.420 --> 00:06:19.610 if I have people, if I'm pushing people to a podcast, is it 93 00:06:19.730 --> 00:06:25.569 going to be a more convoluted conversion process than having them go to a blog 94 00:06:25.689 --> 00:06:29.089 post? So maybe I should not ever do a box podcast because I want 95 00:06:29.129 --> 00:06:31.089 all my listeners to be on a block. But that thing is podcasts just 96 00:06:31.170 --> 00:06:36.199 aren't consumed in the same time and space as things like webinars and blog post 97 00:06:36.480 --> 00:06:40.959 so it's also an area where brands can look at it and they could be 98 00:06:41.040 --> 00:06:44.759 like, oh, this is a great opportunity. It's furthering our engagement with 99 00:06:44.920 --> 00:06:49.029 individuals, it's not being interrupted into some sort of time in their day and 100 00:06:49.310 --> 00:06:54.310 it fits in really well with their schedule. So basically, kind of just 101 00:06:54.470 --> 00:06:58.829 as a quick summary, it's like great audience, flexible content, good good 102 00:06:58.870 --> 00:07:01.699 time where it's not cannibalizing other channels. Yeah, you make a great point. 103 00:07:01.699 --> 00:07:04.699 I talked with folks all the time. I heard Gary v talk about, 104 00:07:04.939 --> 00:07:09.740 you know, the the TRIFECTA, the triple threat of podcasting. The 105 00:07:09.860 --> 00:07:12.620 other day I I was going to say on Linkedin, but of course, 106 00:07:12.779 --> 00:07:15.329 Gary View it was on Linkedin, instagram, twitter, everywhere. It's ready 107 00:07:15.449 --> 00:07:19.170 talked about that idea of passive consumption. You know, whether you're walking the 108 00:07:19.290 --> 00:07:25.970 dog or you're driving, you're not taking up time where that attention you're taking 109 00:07:26.050 --> 00:07:28.889 them from a blog post or a video or a Webinar that they would be 110 00:07:28.930 --> 00:07:32.519 attending. Your gaining market share of attention, like Gary v talks about, 111 00:07:32.600 --> 00:07:36.199 you know, day trading attention. That's what we want as marketers is at 112 00:07:36.240 --> 00:07:41.240 tension and trust, and so you're gaining kind of this green field area of 113 00:07:41.319 --> 00:07:45.110 attention that's not already being taken advantage of. The other thing it made me 114 00:07:45.230 --> 00:07:46.990 think of is, you know, and this would be me getting on our 115 00:07:47.110 --> 00:07:50.230 soapbox here a little bit at sweet fish, but you have a podcast. 116 00:07:50.350 --> 00:07:54.269 It can feed those other content. You know, we have a thirty minute 117 00:07:54.269 --> 00:07:58.509 conversation that turns into a blog post, that turns into a two hundred word 118 00:07:58.779 --> 00:08:01.300 status update on Linkedin, it turns into a little thread on twitter, all 119 00:08:01.339 --> 00:08:05.699 those sorts of things. So I could talk on that for a while, 120 00:08:05.819 --> 00:08:09.660 but it you summarize it really, really well, Sam so let's dive into 121 00:08:09.939 --> 00:08:13.529 this topic that led you to write the article for marketing props, basically framing 122 00:08:13.569 --> 00:08:20.290 audio as potentially one of the next biggest SEO opportunities for marketers. Tell us 123 00:08:20.329 --> 00:08:22.129 a little bit about what's going on there, what you guys see, and 124 00:08:22.209 --> 00:08:26.810 will dive into it. Yeah, totally. So I think like just stepping 125 00:08:26.930 --> 00:08:30.480 back a little bit, one of the things people have been noticing about podcasts 126 00:08:30.519 --> 00:08:33.519 for years is that there's this big issue with discovery. Right it's hard to 127 00:08:33.559 --> 00:08:39.360 actually find podcast and and you see that as like people mostly recommend podcast through 128 00:08:39.440 --> 00:08:43.830 word of mouth or you tend to see a lot of people finding podcast through 129 00:08:43.909 --> 00:08:48.669 things like a top one hundred chart. and Google is in a really interesting 130 00:08:48.750 --> 00:08:56.500 position because Google has this you know, has this mission to basically catalogue every 131 00:08:56.539 --> 00:09:01.019 single piece of information out there and make it searchable. So obviously you have 132 00:09:01.179 --> 00:09:05.659 this huge wealth of information in podcasting and that has a discoverability problem. So 133 00:09:05.820 --> 00:09:11.730 this is like ripe for Google to take on and one of the big things 134 00:09:11.769 --> 00:09:16.450 they said last year it's they've sort of mentioned we want to double the number 135 00:09:16.450 --> 00:09:20.370 of lists of podcast listeners globally in the next few years. They've done things 136 00:09:20.649 --> 00:09:28.120 where they've started building more podcast into their phones, into their software, into 137 00:09:28.200 --> 00:09:31.279 everything they have, and they've also mentioned that they're going to start surfacing more 138 00:09:31.360 --> 00:09:39.750 and more podcast up in search results. And once somebody mentions Google putting something 139 00:09:39.830 --> 00:09:43.909 good to search results, like obviously marketers are going to take notice. So 140 00:09:43.070 --> 00:09:46.110 that's sort of a rat. Now we have the big problem that they're trying 141 00:09:46.110 --> 00:09:50.269 to solve and then the question is, like how is that going to kind 142 00:09:50.309 --> 00:09:54.659 of play out, like how and what is that opportunity? So I think 143 00:09:54.700 --> 00:09:58.500 the important thing for us to think about is, like Google wants to get 144 00:09:58.539 --> 00:10:01.980 a bunch of people listening to podcast so with that means they need to get 145 00:10:03.379 --> 00:10:07.139 guest content in front of people more often. So the first thing they decided 146 00:10:07.169 --> 00:10:11.809 to do is transcribe all podcast content. Right, all podcast content is already 147 00:10:11.850 --> 00:10:16.649 being transcribed by Google in this point. So now it's a question of how 148 00:10:16.769 --> 00:10:20.129 is that content got to get start getting surfaced up, and I think the 149 00:10:20.289 --> 00:10:24.759 best analog to look at would be how did youtube videos move into search? 150 00:10:26.759 --> 00:10:31.080 And I don't know if I don't know if you remember like this sort of 151 00:10:31.200 --> 00:10:35.830 pathway that you saw, like first there was a little video tab on Google. 152 00:10:37.350 --> 00:10:39.990 Then there was like you started seeing if you typed in, you know, 153 00:10:41.190 --> 00:10:45.070 maybe interview with Kim Kardashian or something like that, there would be all 154 00:10:45.110 --> 00:10:48.429 of a sudden would pop up and you would see a video on top of 155 00:10:48.509 --> 00:10:52.340 your search results in a carousel. There's a really good reason to believe that 156 00:10:52.460 --> 00:10:58.820 this is how Google is going to move podcast results in, because people might 157 00:10:58.860 --> 00:11:01.379 say Google might say, Oh, okay, you know, you want to 158 00:11:01.620 --> 00:11:07.570 have an interview with Kim Kardashian. It might surface up audio results as well 159 00:11:07.649 --> 00:11:11.250 as results that are related to videos or articles or things like that. So 160 00:11:11.450 --> 00:11:16.250 talk a little bit about the transcription piece that you've mentioned, Sam that Google's 161 00:11:16.289 --> 00:11:22.919 already transcribing podcast that is, all of those that are live in their native 162 00:11:22.960 --> 00:11:26.399 directory. Right, Google podcast, correct. So that's that's something you need 163 00:11:26.440 --> 00:11:28.840 to be thinking about if you have a podcast and you want to start, 164 00:11:28.840 --> 00:11:31.990 let veraging this opportunity that your show should be live in that directory. Right. 165 00:11:33.029 --> 00:11:35.750 Yeah, oh, absolutely, and Google has offered. They've also offered 166 00:11:35.830 --> 00:11:41.350 some really basics on on page seo so that you know if you in bed 167 00:11:41.429 --> 00:11:45.789 your RSS Player in there, there's some tagging you can do on your page 168 00:11:45.870 --> 00:11:48.580 to make sure that you know it says this is a podcast page, we 169 00:11:48.740 --> 00:11:54.059 have podcast content. Basically, if you look up Google's best practices on it, 170 00:11:54.139 --> 00:11:56.779 it's a great thing to include on your site. It's just very basic 171 00:11:56.860 --> 00:12:03.730 start a housekeeping. Today's growth story centers around exactly ASSASS company that helps enterprise 172 00:12:03.809 --> 00:12:09.850 companies with their incentive compensation. They'd work with search marketing agencies in the past, 173 00:12:09.210 --> 00:12:15.529 but they'd had issues with transparency and Roy. They wanted to improve net 174 00:12:15.649 --> 00:12:18.960 new leads via their organic and paid search channels, so they reached out to 175 00:12:20.120 --> 00:12:26.159 directive optimizing search engine market share for exactly was the top priority directed did this 176 00:12:26.279 --> 00:12:31.110 by improving search engine visibility for target audiences at the bottom of the funnel. 177 00:12:31.470 --> 00:12:35.789 In order to generate qualified leads. They focused on value driven content on relevant, 178 00:12:37.110 --> 00:12:41.389 winnable terms, landing page testing on PPC platforms and a laser focus on 179 00:12:41.629 --> 00:12:50.059 third party directory optimization. Specifically, Cap Tara directive grew sales accepted lead volume 180 00:12:50.179 --> 00:12:54.899 by one hundred percent, increased cap teric conversion volume by three hundred and thirty 181 00:12:54.899 --> 00:13:01.850 six percent and boosted pre qualified clicks to Captera by thirty nine percent. If 182 00:13:01.889 --> 00:13:05.730 you're looking for results like this with your search engine marketing, there's a good 183 00:13:05.769 --> 00:13:11.850 chance directive can help. Visit Directive consultingcom and get a free customized proposal. 184 00:13:11.929 --> 00:13:16.279 All right, let's get back to the show Nice. I love it. 185 00:13:16.679 --> 00:13:20.639 So where do you see some of the folks that are maybe not not podcasting 186 00:13:20.720 --> 00:13:26.269 yet? What is the opportunity for them with audio being added to search and 187 00:13:26.669 --> 00:13:31.590 how should they be thinking about it? You know, quantity, types of 188 00:13:31.710 --> 00:13:35.830 shows. What what is going to likely play into this the most? I 189 00:13:35.909 --> 00:13:37.429 mean, I think in your article you mentioned like the big winners are going 190 00:13:37.429 --> 00:13:41.230 to be folks that already have a ton of content. So if you're not 191 00:13:41.700 --> 00:13:45.899 doing audio content yet, just start, because that volume there. It's kind 192 00:13:45.940 --> 00:13:48.460 of, you know, maybe like the early days of you know, when 193 00:13:48.620 --> 00:13:52.539 when hub spot started putting up massive blog content and then and the quantity, 194 00:13:54.019 --> 00:13:56.529 you know, was number one, and then it starts to become other things, 195 00:13:56.610 --> 00:14:00.250 this strategy, the quality, all those sorts of things. So talk 196 00:14:00.289 --> 00:14:01.570 to us a little bit about there, because I think you know, you 197 00:14:01.769 --> 00:14:05.330 being at hub spot, there's some interesting correlations here of what you guys went 198 00:14:05.409 --> 00:14:09.690 through, you know, maybe ten years ago, and the shift in audio 199 00:14:09.889 --> 00:14:13.200 here, you know, much like you guys leverage flogs when that was less 200 00:14:13.200 --> 00:14:16.720 of a crowded space. Yeah, totally. I mean Husbun as done an 201 00:14:16.759 --> 00:14:22.039 amazing job of created content in basically text intent over the years. Like we've 202 00:14:22.320 --> 00:14:26.110 really thrived at that and I think being an early mover and having a high 203 00:14:26.149 --> 00:14:30.590 production sort of method of creating a lot of blog boast and then going back 204 00:14:30.669 --> 00:14:33.950 at a highly creating like that has been a very, very effective strategy for 205 00:14:35.029 --> 00:14:39.700 brands. I think it's actually I think it's also sort of important to think 206 00:14:39.700 --> 00:14:45.700 about blogs as one of the things that helped hub spots blogs do well is 207 00:14:45.779 --> 00:14:50.539 we understand how the search result and the blog end up getting to each other. 208 00:14:50.980 --> 00:14:54.330 Right we started writing blogs that were saying how to, because we know 209 00:14:54.529 --> 00:14:58.169 that's a term. We know that when two things are verse each other, 210 00:14:58.370 --> 00:15:01.769 that's a term, that's a what a thing we should write. Like even 211 00:15:01.889 --> 00:15:07.399 Brian Halligan has talked about sort of the very early blogging stuff that they would 212 00:15:07.399 --> 00:15:11.240 write and they would be like it was like business school class things, you 213 00:15:11.320 --> 00:15:15.960 know, it was like longwinded essays on like PNL and all of these other 214 00:15:16.039 --> 00:15:18.919 things that it's like that wasn't going to work for search. So I think 215 00:15:18.919 --> 00:15:22.350 one of the things to think about is like, yes, there's going to 216 00:15:22.389 --> 00:15:26.389 be this really nice early admit mover advantage for, you know, people like 217 00:15:26.509 --> 00:15:31.470 sweetfish who have created an enormous amount of content that's really easily crawlable and then 218 00:15:31.470 --> 00:15:35.940 it has like really catchy headlines and titles and stuff like that that are going 219 00:15:35.940 --> 00:15:39.539 to align super well to search results. So the people are going to do 220 00:15:39.740 --> 00:15:43.139 well in the beginning are definitely going to be people who have all of this 221 00:15:43.659 --> 00:15:48.220 stuff already. But I think to your question more like you're just starting out. 222 00:15:48.460 --> 00:15:52.730 What should you do? Think about it. In my mind it's like 223 00:15:54.809 --> 00:16:00.169 think about how search is going to change the format of podcasting, and in 224 00:16:00.289 --> 00:16:03.679 a lot of ways, like, if you think about how podcast will be 225 00:16:03.919 --> 00:16:10.080 consumed in a search sense, it's probably going to be shorter episodes. Right, 226 00:16:10.480 --> 00:16:12.600 if you look at the top one hundred podcasts, the average episode length 227 00:16:12.720 --> 00:16:17.039 is about forty five minutes. But if you think about how people are going 228 00:16:17.120 --> 00:16:19.710 to find podcast via search, I got a feeling that it's going to be 229 00:16:19.750 --> 00:16:26.750 a lot more shorter episodes, because shorter episodes increase more ranking opportunities, which 230 00:16:26.789 --> 00:16:30.269 means you're going to show up more often. The other thing to think about 231 00:16:30.509 --> 00:16:37.220 is like how you structure all of your information, and the way we talked 232 00:16:37.259 --> 00:16:41.700 about things a lot at hubspawn is the pillar and content cluster model, where 233 00:16:41.740 --> 00:16:45.419 you have one sort of big central topic and then you have a bunch of 234 00:16:45.539 --> 00:16:49.850 clusters of topic after at around that. So let's say this is a great 235 00:16:49.889 --> 00:16:56.049 example why podcast work series, this is a topic, this is a definitely 236 00:16:56.090 --> 00:17:00.679 a central topic, and then you have several episodes around that topic that are 237 00:17:00.720 --> 00:17:04.200 all feeding into it. Right, like people who lit, who might like 238 00:17:04.359 --> 00:17:07.680 this episode, might go back and find another one. So I think when 239 00:17:07.720 --> 00:17:11.000 people are going into the future and they're thinking about, okay, I want 240 00:17:11.000 --> 00:17:17.630 to start a podcast, think about it in a like seasonal topic structure. 241 00:17:17.910 --> 00:17:21.509 For bad the show doesn't have to release on the feed that way, but 242 00:17:21.710 --> 00:17:23.910 like you want people to say, like this is a big topic we're going 243 00:17:23.950 --> 00:17:29.269 to cover. We want to have lots of little episodes with lots of titles 244 00:17:29.349 --> 00:17:32.740 that are that are tied to searches that we think people are going to have, 245 00:17:33.380 --> 00:17:37.500 and then we want all that content to be connected together in some way, 246 00:17:37.700 --> 00:17:42.180 either by a season or a theme or something along those lines. So 247 00:17:42.259 --> 00:17:47.410 you really want to think about the quantity of episode you're making, like you 248 00:17:47.529 --> 00:17:52.170 want to make a lot of episodes that are going to be short and they're 249 00:17:52.170 --> 00:17:55.609 going to have and they're going to be connected to keywords that people are going 250 00:17:55.609 --> 00:17:57.720 to be searching for. But that then you don't want to do, is 251 00:17:57.759 --> 00:18:03.079 you don't want to just totally skimp on production and make kind of a crappy 252 00:18:03.119 --> 00:18:06.240 podcast, like if you make a grabbing bad guys, people are not going 253 00:18:06.359 --> 00:18:08.880 to listen to it, they're not going to you're not going to get downloads 254 00:18:08.920 --> 00:18:12.349 and people are not going to go to the next episode, and so one 255 00:18:12.390 --> 00:18:17.470 of the things to think about is like how can I get a broad topic 256 00:18:17.829 --> 00:18:22.390 that's focused enough where I could build out a whole bunch of material and usefully 257 00:18:22.509 --> 00:18:26.460 answer people's questions and be very helpful? And how could I make a show 258 00:18:27.140 --> 00:18:32.140 that after somebody listens to one episode, they want to listen to another? 259 00:18:32.539 --> 00:18:34.460 So I think those are the two things you need to balance, both answering 260 00:18:34.500 --> 00:18:38.579 the questions and appearing in those search results as well as, on the other 261 00:18:38.700 --> 00:18:45.490 side of things, actually making a decent show. Yeah, absolutely, things 262 00:18:45.569 --> 00:18:48.369 we are. We are advocates of, you know, developing a show that's 263 00:18:48.369 --> 00:18:52.769 going to last a while that people want to listen to. We've always leaned 264 00:18:52.849 --> 00:18:56.720 into on BB growth, short tactical episodes that we can get granular. You 265 00:18:56.799 --> 00:19:00.640 know, when we talk about ABM, we kind of try to get beyond 266 00:19:00.680 --> 00:19:03.960 the why and like let's get down to the how of starting or taking to 267 00:19:04.000 --> 00:19:07.240 the next level or whatever. So the things you're saying or just things that 268 00:19:07.359 --> 00:19:11.589 we think about all the time, and volume being important as well, because, 269 00:19:11.950 --> 00:19:17.309 you know, you tell leverage that searchability and also just leverage the serial 270 00:19:17.470 --> 00:19:21.549 nature of podcasting. Right, if they're hungry for more and you don't have 271 00:19:21.589 --> 00:19:25.900 anything else in your feed for a month. It's tough to build that audience 272 00:19:25.940 --> 00:19:30.700 over over time. As we wrap up here, Sam you mentioned something on 273 00:19:30.900 --> 00:19:33.500 just, you know, another thing that brands can be thinking about in how 274 00:19:33.579 --> 00:19:37.259 they how they leverage to add spots, things like that. I think that 275 00:19:37.339 --> 00:19:40.930 would be interesting, a little bit tangentle the what we've been talking about here, 276 00:19:41.049 --> 00:19:44.890 but just something else as we close things out. Any other words for 277 00:19:45.769 --> 00:19:49.170 marketers, especially at be tob brands thinking about podcasting with all of these things 278 00:19:49.210 --> 00:19:53.240 we've been talking about? Yeah, I think that I talked to a lot 279 00:19:53.400 --> 00:19:56.960 of, you know, small the medium companies who are looking to start a 280 00:19:56.039 --> 00:20:00.519 podcast and I think one of the things that people struggle with is how do 281 00:20:00.599 --> 00:20:06.039 I how do I make this like an asset right, like a valuable asset 282 00:20:06.119 --> 00:20:10.710 that's going to last a long time, and one of the big ways that 283 00:20:10.750 --> 00:20:15.109 I think you can is by thinking about it through search, through Google search, 284 00:20:15.269 --> 00:20:18.390 things like that. The other thing that I think about is ads and 285 00:20:18.910 --> 00:20:22.619 like we don't need ads on a branded podcast, like it doesn't. You 286 00:20:22.660 --> 00:20:27.420 don't need them there, but they're useful in terms of breaking up an episode 287 00:20:27.779 --> 00:20:33.819 and they're useful to promote other services that the company might offer. So let's 288 00:20:33.900 --> 00:20:37.849 like kind of think about it. As you have all of these listeners, 289 00:20:37.329 --> 00:20:41.970 how do you get all these listeners to hear another thing here, another product 290 00:20:41.970 --> 00:20:44.329 here, another service? Well, you can very you can run an ad 291 00:20:44.490 --> 00:20:47.650 like there's ads in the front of this podcast promoting other things that you guys 292 00:20:47.690 --> 00:20:51.839 are doing, which is really good, and I think that is helpful for 293 00:20:52.279 --> 00:20:56.319 explaining to people who are thinking about starting a podcast why it's going to be 294 00:20:56.400 --> 00:21:00.519 valuable long term. Like a blog post isn't just a blog post. A 295 00:21:00.680 --> 00:21:03.759 blog post is also a place where you could put a call to action. 296 00:21:03.160 --> 00:21:07.349 The blog post is what gets somebody in the call. The action is what 297 00:21:07.430 --> 00:21:10.910 moves them down the funnel. In a branded show, a branded podcast, 298 00:21:11.029 --> 00:21:12.869 can basically get somebody to engage with your brand in a new way. It 299 00:21:12.950 --> 00:21:17.950 can increase brand affinity and you could use the ad space in it to all 300 00:21:17.950 --> 00:21:19.500 of a sudden, you know, promote a service, promote a free product, 301 00:21:19.539 --> 00:21:22.740 promote at a d or something like that. And for me, when 302 00:21:22.779 --> 00:21:27.140 I step back and I look at the future and it's like you see the 303 00:21:27.420 --> 00:21:33.410 advent of dynamic ad insertion, which, if anybody's unfamiliar dynamic. Mcadd insertion 304 00:21:33.490 --> 00:21:37.450 is where you take basically you mark a moment in the podcast and then you 305 00:21:37.529 --> 00:21:41.250 say this is an ad, and then you could swap out ads across all 306 00:21:41.329 --> 00:21:44.849 of your podcast. So if we imagine a show like be to be growth, 307 00:21:44.930 --> 00:21:48.119 like if you guys had been doing, you know, tagging every single 308 00:21:48.240 --> 00:21:52.440 episode with an add, you probably get my guests would be like a large 309 00:21:52.480 --> 00:21:56.799 chunk of your downloads come from your back catalog. Imagine if one day you 310 00:21:56.960 --> 00:22:00.240 could just you have an event coming up, it's in San Francisco, you 311 00:22:00.589 --> 00:22:04.549 you say one ad for that event, you click a button and all of 312 00:22:04.630 --> 00:22:10.670 a sudden it's distributed across hundreds of episodes. It's in front of thousands of 313 00:22:10.829 --> 00:22:14.829 thousands of people. Now, all of a sudden the podcast has gone from 314 00:22:15.190 --> 00:22:19.500 just this one time content play to like a full machine, and I think 315 00:22:19.539 --> 00:22:26.099 that a lot of people who are looking at podcasts now are a little bit 316 00:22:26.220 --> 00:22:30.369 confused about how to get from I want to make a show to I want 317 00:22:30.369 --> 00:22:34.089 to make this part of my marketing strategy right and I think if people could 318 00:22:34.170 --> 00:22:40.410 see the value of podcast as evergreen content, if they could see it as 319 00:22:40.569 --> 00:22:45.920 a way to drive people towards, you know, new things, new services, 320 00:22:45.039 --> 00:22:48.200 new products. It's going to have a lot more legs. It's going 321 00:22:48.279 --> 00:22:52.799 to go a lot further. Brands are going to get a lot more value 322 00:22:52.839 --> 00:22:55.440 out of it. So I'd say for people to look it, looking to 323 00:22:55.519 --> 00:22:59.950 start podcast. Get out there, go start today a try and make some 324 00:23:00.069 --> 00:23:03.630 of your content on your own. It's not easy. It's got to be 325 00:23:03.710 --> 00:23:07.750 a struggle but like you can, you could do it and the opportunity is 326 00:23:07.910 --> 00:23:14.220 like really now and it's starting. It's only going to get harder. That's 327 00:23:14.339 --> 00:23:15.539 that's the big thing. I'd say. It's only going to get harder to 328 00:23:15.619 --> 00:23:18.819 get into this space. So it's better to invest to this kind of stuff 329 00:23:18.819 --> 00:23:22.980 in the beginning to take advantage of these kind of disproportion it rewards. I 330 00:23:23.099 --> 00:23:26.410 promise guys. I did not tea Sam up to do it that well, 331 00:23:26.529 --> 00:23:30.089 but he did it about as good as I could. And you spoke to 332 00:23:30.210 --> 00:23:33.369 some of the things. They're like. Back to the tactical examples of how 333 00:23:33.450 --> 00:23:37.730 we use our own podcast with a pre roll add spot for sweet fish. 334 00:23:37.130 --> 00:23:41.000 Oftentimes we're doing a call to action to subscribe to our email list. And 335 00:23:41.079 --> 00:23:45.559 so you're exactly right. The podcast is not just this one thing. It 336 00:23:45.680 --> 00:23:52.119 can feed other content, it can be part of your overall marketing machine and 337 00:23:52.519 --> 00:23:56.430 feed other things and find this crossover. So I obviously totally agree with everything 338 00:23:56.470 --> 00:23:59.910 you're saying there. Sam. I love the way that you're breaking down, 339 00:24:00.269 --> 00:24:03.309 you know, some of the trends that you guys are seeing, explaining a 340 00:24:03.390 --> 00:24:07.670 little bit more about this, you know, looming thing coming with Google adding 341 00:24:07.710 --> 00:24:11.500 audio to search and and something that we should all be thinking about. You 342 00:24:11.579 --> 00:24:15.380 Know Gary v talks about you know he won on search and email because it 343 00:24:15.539 --> 00:24:19.579 wasn't crowded yet when he was coming up. You guys have obviously done a 344 00:24:19.700 --> 00:24:23.569 fantastic job of text over the years at hub spot, and so there are 345 00:24:23.730 --> 00:24:30.289 these moments in time where there's opportunity to kind of seize this opportunity before it 346 00:24:30.369 --> 00:24:33.490 gets too crowded, before it gets even harder, as you put it. 347 00:24:33.609 --> 00:24:37.089 So I love what you're saying here, Sam, and I appreciate you making 348 00:24:37.170 --> 00:24:40.519 some time for me today. Man, if anybody listening to this would like 349 00:24:40.720 --> 00:24:44.680 to tune into some of the hub spot shows, weird work. Where can 350 00:24:44.680 --> 00:24:48.680 they stay connected with you? Find some of the shows you're hosting and learn 351 00:24:48.680 --> 00:24:51.279 more about what you guys are up to on your team. Yeah, so 352 00:24:51.599 --> 00:24:55.670 I totally encourage everybody to come check out listen to an episode of weird work. 353 00:24:55.750 --> 00:24:59.029 You can find it on apple, podcast, spotify, wherever you listen, 354 00:24:59.549 --> 00:25:03.269 just type weird work and if you want to connect with us on social 355 00:25:03.269 --> 00:25:07.819 media, it's just weird work. Or me it's just sp Baalter at twitter 356 00:25:07.460 --> 00:25:11.059 or on twitter. So yeah, that's that's where you can get me. 357 00:25:11.259 --> 00:25:14.740 Please ask me any questions you have about podcast, any questions about starting things. 358 00:25:14.779 --> 00:25:18.339 Always happy to chat. Awesome, thanks, man, Sam, and 359 00:25:18.380 --> 00:25:21.380 a fantastic conversation. I appreciate it, man. Yeah, now, it's 360 00:25:21.380 --> 00:25:26.250 been great being on the show. We totally get it. We publish a 361 00:25:26.410 --> 00:25:29.890 ton of content on this podcast and it can be a lot to keep up 362 00:25:29.930 --> 00:25:33.329 with. That's why we've started the BOB growth big three, a no fluff 363 00:25:33.410 --> 00:25:37.839 email that boils down our three biggest takeaways from an entire week of episodes. 364 00:25:38.279 --> 00:25:45.200 Sign up today at Sweet Phish Mediacom Big Three. That sweet fish Mediacom Big 365 00:25:45.519 --> Three