Using Calls to Action to Grow Your Audience | PodCraft 1301

We're delighted to announce our latest book. It's called Podcast Growth: How to Grow Your Podcast Audience

To celebrate, we're making season 13 of Podcraft all about podcast promotion and growth. We'll be going through the book, chapter by chapter, and picking out a single task to focus each episode around.

On this episode, we're pulling from the first chapter - Enabling Your Existing Audience - and the task in question is around Calls to Action. 

Calls to Action (CTAs) are low-hanging fruit that many podcasters miss a huge opportunity with. 

There are some key questions to ask yourself when thinking about your CTAs. Questions like how does your CTA uniquely engage your listeners? And what do you want your listener to do? 

A specific, memorable Call to Action engages your audience and drives them in the direction you want. 

You should also make it easy for them to do it. If you’re sending them to a particular web page, use a shortlink to get them there. If you want them to talk about your show on social media, invent a hashtag so you can track it.  

Your CTAs will totally depend on your content and motivations. But some of the most common and effective podcast CTAs we see are;

• Subscribe to the show in your listening app of choice
• Share this episode with someone you think will benefit from it
• Leave a rating and review on your listening app of choice, or in Podchaser
• Get in touch (solicit particular questions so this is more effective)
• Download a resource, sign up for something, or purchase an upgrade

Finally, include your CTAs in the show notes of each episode, in the episode outro, and if possible, linked in a button on your website podcast player. 

Task List: 

• For your next Call to Action, what do you want your listeners to do? Sum it up in a short sentence or less, such as “sign up for our email list.” 
• Look at the ‘Creating Memorable Links’ task, and practice making a short link. 
• Practice your intros and outros. How can you fit your new CTA into your outros?

Related to: Creating Memorable links, Encouraging Reviews

Further Reading: 

thepodcasthost.com/driveaction - How to Drive Action From a Podcast

thepodcasthost.com/outros - Introducing & Ending Your Episode

Check out the full book - Podcast Growth: How to Grow Your Podcast Audience