Kev Michael (0:00)

Hey, real quick, before we start, odds are you are a podcasting business owner who's been struggling to grow your podcast and you know that YouTube is the next big opportunity, but you haven't been able to crack the code. If that's true, you're not alone. For many podcasters, YouTube feels like a totally different beast because it is. The titles, the thumbnails, the algorithms. It is a lot. But here's the thing. Right now, the biggest podcast audience growth is happening on YouTube. The platform offers baked in monetization, evergreen discoverability, short form content built right in, and SEO benefits that no other platform can match. That's why this July, I'm launching the next round of the Grow the Show accelerator. And this version is completely focused on YouTube. If you've already launched a podcast and you're serious about growing your audience and your revenue on YouTube, this 12 week cohort is built just for you. Inside, we're going to work on improving your show. We're going to master YouTube growth strategies like titles, thumbnails, SEO, and we're going to convert more viewers of your podcast into customers of your business. Now, I am rebuilding all of my training material from scratch, and I'm going to be personally giving every cohort member feedback on what they publish every single week for the 12 weeks. So because of that, spots are going to be limited. That said, this cohort is launching with beta pricing, which means that it is the most accessible this program has been in years and probably ever will be again. So if that sounds like what you need right now, apply to the Grow the Show accelerator via the link in the show notes. You just answer a couple questions and if you qualify, we'll reach out and we'll set up a time for you and me to chat where I can share more details. Once again, just apply via the link in the show notes to the Grow the Show accelerator. I would love to have you aboard for this new intimate cohort that I'm launching. And I'd love to help you grow and monetize your podcast on YouTube. All right, let's get to it. If you're a business owner who's trying to grow a podcast on YouTube, but it's not working, it's because you're missing one of five things today. I'm gonna walk you through what those five things are so you can grow your podcast on YouTube. My name is Kev Michael. I'm the founder of Grow the Show, and for the past seven years I've been studying full time how podcasts grow and Monetize. And after working directly with more than 500 podcasters, I've seen the patterns of success. And what I found is that growth on YouTube is different than than growth on the audio platforms. So let's dive into the five things that every podcaster must do to grow on YouTube. So the first thing that you have to do is make your show make a promise. So recently I have been getting on calls with lots of really rich people who have decided that they want to be a famous podcaster. So what they do is they build an expensive studio in their house, they hire a bunch of content people spending tens of thousand dollars per month, and they use their rich people resources to land really, really, really big guests. Huge names with big. And they think that because they have really, really strong production and because they're interviewing other people that have millions of followers, that their podcasts will grow really fast. They think they can buy their way to audience, and they kind of can, but they're missing one piece. And whether or not you're a rich person trying to grow a show or you have no money and you're trying to grow the show, what I have found is that the hidden thing that most podcasters miss is that they don't make their show make a promise. They. So what do I mean by that? Well, through working with more than 500 podcasters over the past few years, what I have discovered is that the best shows really, truly understand who their show is for. They understand their target audience, but they don't define their audience in demographics, like what their gender is or their age or their location or their occupation or anything like that. They describe their audience not in demographics, but in psychographics. What do we mean by that? Well, a psychographic is someone's mindset. It's the situation that they're in right now. It's their current psychology. I like to define someone's psychographics as their point A. It's where they're at right now in their life. So, for example, I have spoken over the past year with a lot of women who want to make a podcast for other women who are dissatisfied with their corporate careers and they don't want to be a corporate person anymore and they want to take the leave and do their own thing. Now, when I talk to the podcaster who is making a podcast for that woman and I ask them who their audience is, they often say, my show is for women between the ages of 30 and 50. And I say, okay, tell me more about that. And they explain, you know, she's in a corporate job. She wants to take the leap. She's won the corporate game. Maybe she's an executive, maybe she's worked her way up the corporate ladder and she's not fulfilled and she wants to take a crack at entrepreneurship so that she can find fulfillment. I'm like, okay, so let me ask you this. If you got on the phone right now with a 25 year old who had worked their way up the corporate ladder and found that it wasn't fulfilling and wanted to try something different, is your podcast not for that person? Because they're 25 and they're not not 30. And every time the podcaster's like, no, it's definitely for them, I'm like, okay, then your show is not for women between ages 30 and 50. Your show is for women who have climbed up the corporate ladder and are unsatisfied. Do you see how that is a psychographic? Now, the women part is still a demographic, I grant you. So, you know, sometimes when you define your audience, it's okay to combine demographics with psychographics. But the psychographic is the most important part. And a huge reason why this is most important is because we live in the algorithmic age where AI algorithms know what your psychographic is. So if we as creators can know what our audience's psychographic is, then the algorithm's gonna be like, oh, oh, I know exactly who this is for. And they're gonna show your content to those people. But that's not all that there is to making your show make a promise. We've just been talking about who your show is for. Your show makes a promise. When you say, my show is for people who are in point A who want to get to point B. Point B is the promise. So for the example that I just laid out, the show's point A is women who have climbed a corporate ladder and are unsatisfied. And their point B is that the show will help them to take the leap into entrepreneurship so they can be fulfilled and satisfied with their life. So it takes people, sure, women, but really people who are in this point A and brings them to that point B. So if we go back to the rich people that are struggling and don't understand why their huge checks aren't getting them an audience, it's because their show doesn't make a promise. Some of the biggest shows in the world that are named after its creator make a promise. My favorite example of that is the Tim Ferriss show, where at the beginning of every single episode, Tim Ferriss says, welcome to the Tim Ferriss show, where it is my job to tease out the habits, tools and tactics of the best performers in the world. So he makes a promise to you, and he says, I'm gonna find the habits, tools and tactics so that you can be successful as well. If Tim Ferriss said, welcome to the Tim Ferriss show, where I talk with famous people, it wouldn't be as interesting to you. Same show, one version actually makes a promise. So the reason why this is super important on YouTube is because I am seeing people who have the resources to get tons and tons of views on their videos, and they're getting tons of views on their videos, but they're not getting any subscribers on their channel or to their podcast because they're just getting individual attention on specific videos. And nobody is opting in and subscribing to the promise. And so this is the writer downer, and this is the thing to take away. People do not subscribe to your podcast channel for you. They subscribe for the promise. If they don't know what the promise is, they're not going to subscribe. So the second thing that every single podcaster needs to do if they want to grow on YouTube is that they must make it so that every episode keeps the promise. So it's not enough to just make a promise. You have to make sure that every single one of your episodes keeps the promise that you've made. Recently, I was on a call with an entrepreneur where his show makes a promise. He says that his show is about success. It's about how people can be successful in their life. But then I looked at his channel and one video was about real estate. The next video was about politics. The next video was about depression. Then there was another video about politics. Then there was a video where he interviewed a $100 million founder on his life story. And then there was another video about real estate. Now, this was a smart, well rounded entrepreneur with lots of interests, and that's the pitfall. So if you're an entrepreneur and you want to make a podcast where you talk about all kinds of different things, this is the trap that you might fall into. I said to that entrepreneur, the reason why your show isn't growing is because while your show makes a promise and you say this show is about how you can be successful, your episode topics don't keep the promise. Because one episode is about real estate, which may be sure that has something to do with success. The next episode you published was about politics. How does that keep the promise that this podcast is Going to make your show successful. The next episode is about depression. How is that supposed to help people be successful? Then he went back to politics. Then he told a super self indulgent story of one of his friend entrepreneurs. It was a mess. And so this is why this show wasn't growing at all. It's because the show made a promise, but the episode topics didn't keep the promise. But I have good news. I know what you're thinking. I am a smart business owning entrepreneur. I have lots of stuff that I want to talk about. I want to talk about success and entrepreneurship and my expertise and fitness and life and all these different things. And I'm saying yes, you should talk about these things. We want to hear what you have to say about that stuff. However, if you're going to do this in the shape of a podcast, you need to take all those things that you want to talk about and you need to talk about them through the lens of the promise that your show makes. What do I mean by that? Well, if we go back to the example I just mentioned and we're working with an entrepreneur who wants to build a show about being successful, then all you need to do is say this episode that's about the real estate market. How is it that buying real estate will make people successful? So tie this into success with politics. If you want to talk about the latest and greatest in politics, you need to angle that conversation around. Here's how you can be successful, for example, that might be. Here's what you need to focus on in today's political landscape if you want to achieve your successful vision. The depression episode might be, here's how successful people get themselves out of depression. So do you see how it's all the same topics and you can be a multifaceted creator, but you can't build an audience. Unless you are building an audience around a singular promise. Or at least you can, but it's just so much harder to do. So the third thing that you need to do if you want your podcast to grow on YouTube is you need to win the click. Now, if you're somebody who has been podcasting for a while, and if you're somebody who started in the audio podcast world, you really need to listen up here because this is going to be the biggest difference for you and for your success. But either way, even if you're just starting out podcasting, you may not realize that packaging, which is your title and your thumbnail, is everything when it comes to success on YouTube. Why is that? Well, I want you to think about how people behave on YouTube. You're on YouTube. How do you pick what you're going to watch next? And I'll tell you exactly how it works. What happens is you are presented several options for what you can watch next, Whether it's in the sidebar of a video you just watched or it's in search, you know, you just searched for something, or it's even in the homepage of YouTube. But in any case, when you are about to watch a YouTube video, YouTube presents you with several options, and you pick the winner. And here's what goes through your head when you pick a winner on YouTube. The first thing that you do is you look at the thumbnails, right? So what do the thumbnails look like? Then one of those thumbnails wins, and you read the title. So what does the title say? And you read that title based on the thumbnail and the title, which combined, we call packaging. You select a video to watch. That's how you and all of us behave. Now, where I see podcasters failing on YouTube specifically is they model their packaging after what the packaging looks like in the audio world. So for thumbnails, they have a thumbnail that has a horrible headshot of the guest, the same headshot of the host every single time. It's got the episode number in the corner, it's got the show logo, and it's got lots of text that says what this episode is about. But that doesn't work, because first of all, when people zoom all the way out, they can't freaking see anything on the title in the thumbnail. And that's right next to a thumbnail where people just see someone's face and one word. And so people pick this thumbnail. So first of all, the thumbnails are just completely out of whack and they don't win the click. But then the titles are the same, because what podcasters are doing is they're going like this number 14, Chief Audience Officer podcast. And then maybe the guest name. Compare that to something like, this is the secret to audience growth. Now, my question for you is, which of these two titles would you click on? Would you Click on number 14, Chief Audience Officer podcast? Colon, Kev, Michael. Or would you click on this is the secret to audience growth. We all know what you're gonna click on. Your audience is the same way. So what you want is you want to stop using titles and thumbnails that are super templatized, that are the way you want them to be, and are easy to make every single week. And instead, you need to use titles and thumbnails that win the click. And just to hammer this home, you could have recorded and produced the best podcast episode that has ever been created by humankind. And if your titles and your thumbnails stink, they will never, ever be seen or heard. And pro tip, what I'm finding is that the most successful podcasters know what the title and the thumbnail of their episode will be before they record the episode. So as audio podcasters, we're used to hitting record, recording something, and then after the fact, figuring out what the title would be. And you can still kind of do that on YouTube. But I'm telling you, if you put some thought in advance to the title and the thumbnail, it really makes your episodes perform better. And that's because of the fourth thing that podcasters must do to win on YouTube, which is get them to stay. Now, once again, I want you to think about your own behavior as a viewer on YouTube. You've looked at all your different options for videos to click on, and you click on it and then the video starts playing. What do you do? You're sitting there like, is this really what I want to watch? Is this really what I want to watch? I don't know. And then you go to another video, right? Well, your audience is doing the same thing. In order for your show to grow and for people to pay attention and for them to listen to your 20, 30, 40, 60 minute podcast episode, the thing that must happen in the first 30 seconds of every single episode is you must get them to stay. And there's three things you want to get right. When introducing your video podcast episodes. Thing number one is immediately hook them. My favorite way to hook someone is by calling out a pain point. However, sometimes you might need to hook them in a different way by, like, making a statement or something like that. Then you must make a promise. Notice anything here? You want the first 30 seconds of your video to make a promise where if you stick around and watch this whole episode, this is what you're going to get out of it. Not necessarily what I'm going to do in the episode, but what you, as the listener are going to get out of what I do on the episode. A key difference. And then the third thing that you must do to get them to stay is cut to the chase. This is especially important for interview shows. And here's the second level pro tip to this is that within the first 30 seconds, you want to start addressing the promise that you made in the intro and and that the packaging made. So if I had packaging for a podcast episode of this show, Chief audience officer, and the title of that episode was this is the secret to audience Growth. And let's say it's with Gary Vaynerchuk, who's really good at growing audiences. He's the guest. Well, what I would do is I would hook the viewers in and I would say audience growth right now is both easier and harder than ever. And in this episode, the king, Gary Vaynerchuk is going to break down what you should do right now to. To grow your audience faster. Okay? So in like 12 seconds, I just hooked you and I made a promise. And then I would start the interview and the first question that I would have is, it's not. Tell us about your background, Gary Vee. No, it's all right, Gary, lay it on us. What is the secret to audience growth? So I would make it my very first question so that immediately the interview begins, delivering on the promise that the intro and the packaging made. This is key because what a lot of folks do is they have a promise in their episode title. So it might be how to escape the corporate rat race. And that's the title of the video. And then you turn on the video and it's an interview. It's an hour long interview with somebody who escaped the corporate rat race. And over the course of that interview, you don't start talking about how to escape the corporate rat race until minute 40. But the problem is the strangers who don't already know who you are clicked on your video because they want to know how to escape the corporate rat race. And since that's what they came there for, they're not going to sit through the first 40 minutes where you talk about the weather, how you met each other, what school they went to, what their biggest lesson was in college, their first three business failures, and then finally they get to what they came there for in minute 40. But the problem is nobody made it to minute 40 because people clicked and they were like, oh, I wanna escape the corporate rat race. Let me watch this video. And within two minutes they're like, they're not talking about the corporate rat race. And they turned the video off. So thing number four that you have to do is you have to get them to stay. Now, at this point, you are doing a great job. And these four alone are enough to grow a solid YouTube channel for a podcast. When your show makes a promise, when every single episode serves to keep that promise, it's all related to the promise. And every Single episode wins the click because it has great titles and thumbnails, and every single episode gets them to stay within the first 30 seconds. That is a completely growable show. That channel is poised to grow, but you're not here because you want subscribers, you want money, you want customers, you want leads and sales. And so the fifth thing that you must do is send them somewhere. This is the most tragic thing that podcasters miss because they're afraid that if they ask people to do something or they say, subscribe to my newsletter or go get my lead magnet or, or if you want my services, book a call, they're afraid to do that, so they don't do it. And they got all the way to the finish line and then they said, nah, nevermind. So tragic. I've seen so many podcasters miss out on money because they don't send them somewhere. And so the number one thing to remember is that you want to send people somewhere with around the 1/3 mark of the video, right? So if that's that, that's 60 minutes or whatever, however long your podcast episodes are, around the 1/3 mark, you want to have a call to action that sends them to a sales funnel newsletter or lead magnet. And when you really get good at this, you can track which individual episodes sent you the most qualified leads, and then you can run ads to those episodes and get tons and tons of leads and sales. In conclusion, what I'm discovering in helping more than 500 plus podcasters grow and monetize their show, and particularly in focusing on helping these folks with YouTube over the past few months, is that these five things are required. Number one, your show must make a promise. Number two, every single episode of your show must be there to keep that specific promise. You can't go off track. Number three is every episode must win the click with great titles and thumbnails. Number four, every episode must get them to stay within the first 30 seconds by hooking them in, making a promise and cutting to the chase. And finally, every single episode should send them somewhere so they can go further into your content and audience ecosystem. They can enter your sales funnel, they can become your best clients, your best customers, and you can make money in addition to the YouTube monetization you're gonna make. Because when you do steps one through four, YouTube will let you monetize your channel and you'll just straight up get paid to do this. You will get paid to market your business. You'll get paid to grow your podcast. And isn't that what we're all here for. So that's going to do it for this episode of Chief Audience Officer. My name is Kev Michael. Thank you. Now, at the time that I'm releasing this video, I am currently launching a new cohort on how podcasters can grow and monetize on YouTube. So if you're interested in that, you can apply to the grow the show YouTube Accelerator at the link in the description. All right, I'll see you in the next one. Real quick. Before you go, if you're a podcaster trying to grow on YouTube and you're still spending hours editing, or you're working with a team that just cleans up the audio and calls it a day, you need to check out Podcast Boutique. They've been my go to production team for over five years and now they've built something that's tailor made for YouTube first podcasters. It's called record and forget, and it's exactly what it sounds like. You record your episode, send them the raw files, and they take it from there. High quality audio and video editing, YouTube optimized titles, description, show notes, uploads, clips, everything. But here's what makes them different. They don't just polish the content. They help you script your content, trim the fat, shorten your episodes, and increase viewer retention, which is the number one factor in YouTube growth right now. And because they're in lockstep with me, anytime I uncover a tactic that helps podcasts grow and monetize, especially on YouTube, they implement it for their other clients too. So if you're still diying post production or you're not seeing results from your current team, go to podcastboutique.com and tell them that I sent you. All right, I'll see you next time.