Since we launched the Podcast Newsroom last August, I have been getting questions about how private podcast feeds work. One of the biggest questions has actually been around how I could use it. Today we’re sharing three ways you could be using a private podcast feed in your business right now.
We’re starting right here and we’re going to talk about three ways you can be using this tool in your business. But we’re going to actually follow this up over on the Podcast Newsroom. Make sure you’re subscribed there if you’re not yet because I’m actually going to have a training happening over there so you will be able to go right after you’re done with this episode and grab that training and it’s going to talk about the tools I use (HelloAudio), it’s going to talk about editing and production of those shows.
Using Private Podcast Feeds to Support Your Clients
There are a thousand ways I can think about using a podcast feed to support your clients but we’re going to specifically talk about three today because I think these are the three easiest and honestly, most impactful, the best bang for your buck as it were with private podcast feeds.
Use private podcast feeds to add an audio component to your course materials.
Taking in audio trainings and making them accessible right on a podcast feed. Because more often than not, I want to consume content not in front of my computer. I spend so much time here already—I’m guessing you do too—I want to be able to take that content literally anywhere else with me and when you have a video component, you can do that now—full disclosure, put a little asterisk here, not unthinkable that this won’t work. If you are teaching graphic design and you need someone to literally see what you’re doing, then you’re going to need a video, so an audio-only source might not work as well.
What you can do though is office hours, Q&A, and additional content, those kinds of things fit really well into this private audio feed. A great way—and this is one of the things I love most about the client who we got started doing this with—office hours, Q&A calls, group coaching calls, those things, making the replays of those available. Because more often than not, there’s not actually a visual component to that training, there’s not a slide presentation, there are no websites or examples necessarily, but what there is, is coaching and consulting and information delivery. That’s absolutely perfect to be putting in an audio form. Course materials are a great, great, great way to do this.
Using private podcast feeds to create bonus audio content for clients.
The other way I think this can be really helpful is bonus audios. Maybe you’re somebody who does coaching or consulting, and there’s just a bit of extra information that it would be helpful if your client had. Distribute them via an audio private podcast. A great example of this is let’s say that you are a business coach and you have one-on-one clients, that’s your coaching package, fantabulous, your clients meet with you once a month, twice a month, whatever it may be, maybe it’s weekly, but maybe there are some additional audio tracks that you would like them to have in between so that coaching time can really be specific to them.
Maybe there is information they need on mindset, or maybe there are some affirmations you want them listening to, or maybe there is some generalized content that you want to prime them with before a conversation about email, offers, or setting up your ideal client avatar, those things, basically the bit of information that everybody needs to know, you can give that to them via private podcast feeds so that when you get on the call, you can dive into the meat of the conversation—the specifics of their needs, the specifics of their business, the nuance of their concerns—you can do that a whole lot easier when we start talking about doing that via a private audio podcast.
Use private podcast feeds to support your client with implementation.
What are some things that will help maximize the results they’re getting from their work with you? Let’s say you are a graphic designer and for them to get the best results from you, you really need them to think about their design concepts in certain ways. You really want them to understand some core branding principles before you sit down for, let’s say, a half-day branding VIP day setup.
What is the pre-work that you want them to do?
What is the language you’re going to be using throughout that time together that you just need them to have on board?
You just need them to get it. Those onboarding training, audios, preparations, whatever you want to call them, can absolutely happen in a podcast feed. It doesn’t have to be something that you record over and over again or you feed all the time, it can absolutely be something that is just a part of your onboarding and they get a link to the private podcast feeds, and in there, they can go and listen to the two audios or five audios or ten audios they need before they join you for your call.
I can also see this being super helpful for people in copywriting, basically, anybody who has, as somebody who’s done a full day and a half day VIP intensive setup, I gotta tell you, being able to send pre-work and saying, “Hey, start thinking through these things,” because let’s be honest, we know that every single client needs to think through the same things so that we can really get into the meat of the conversation, we can really get into the part that’s going to actually be valuable for the client when we’re spending our time together. Because that’s what they want to invest in, that’s what they want to spend that time on is the nuance, is the part that is specific to them. Don’t waste that time with pre-work.
This also helps fight overwhelm because they come with a better understanding of what the day is, better understanding of the kind of things that are ahead of them, and so they can come into the room confident that they can show up and get the maximum ROI out of their investment. What are those pieces that if they just had these little extras, it would help them get better results from your work together? Those are ways you can be using these podcast feeds with your existing clientele to deepen the relationships, to build a stronger referral source, to build stronger long-term clients. This is especially, especially valuable if you are somebody who works with a client again and again and again or on long-term retainers.
We want to increase the value, the lifetime value of those clients because that money is a whole lot easier to make than going and finding new clients. It just is, and you’ve already started a relationship with this person, you already probably like them and want to see them succeed, so what are all the ways that you can do that? Increasing their lifetime value does exactly that.
Using Private Podcast Feeds to Support Your Team
Let’s shift gears a little bit. This is an unexpected one. I know you’re thinking that I’m going to say an opt-in and we are going to talk about that but not yet. What I first want to talk about when we talk about another way you could be using private podcast feeds in your business right now is with your team.
When we look at B2B, when we look at remote teams, when we look at having contractors who are executing things for our clients, we want to make sure they are set up for success, we want to make sure that we’re giving them absolutely everything they need, and a private podcast feed is a great way to do that. I want to buzz through these ones a little faster but it’s a lot of the same concept, we’re supporting them and getting their best results, we’re supporting them in really being ready to step into whatever success looks like in their role. The only difference is this isn’t a client, it’s a team member.
Use private podcast feeds to train your team.
If you have any training that you want everybody on your team to consume, an audio podcast kind of delivery is a great way to do that. Maybe there’s just some nuances or specifics that need to happen in working with your team. Having those as part of your onboarding is really, really, really important. This can be a great delivery mechanism for that.
Using a private podcast feed to update your team
This is something that I think could be really cool specifically for businesses where a team is remote and you got lots of different people touching the end result, maybe you’re in some tech development or sales, or you’re actually executing client work like a site development team or in our case, we’ve got a production team where we have team members in one two to three countries currently. Team meetings aren’t always super easy but delivering client updates via something that they can consume on their own is really, really easy.
For right now, we have a text base in our project management software and then I do a Loom video with it but I could absolutely see moving that to an audio feed so they just got it in their podcast feed on Monday mornings, they got the team update. Here’s what’s happening, here’s what’s happening with clients, and here’s what you need to know.
Our Monday morning team updates, it’s a lot of like, “Here’s who’s out, here’s what’s happening, here’s where we need coverage, here’s where maybe we’ve got a tight turnaround because we’ve gotten content late from a client,” whatever the case may be, that’s absolutely deliverable in a podcast medium. That can be another great way with your team to use that.
Use a private podcast to share assets with your team.
If you’ve got a sales team who is doing sales for you, you want to make sure that they have a really good understanding of what’s going on. You could use a podcast feed so that each episode is essentially a couple of variations of pitches for different offerings, handling objections that you see coming up over and over and over again across your team, giving them assets to be able to negotiate those objections so that the people who need support working through those objections are getting it and what are the objections like when you get that objection. This is a great way to deliver that information and allow them to consume it multiple times on their own in a way that they are best in the reception of that information. Private podcast feeds for your team to get that information to them could be hugely, hugely valuable.
Using Private Podcast Feeds as Lead Generation
You can also absolutely use private podcast feeds for your leads, to nurture and convert your leads. A great example of that is actually an episode we did a couple of weeks ago. We had a public-facing episode where we talked about the things you need to know as you wrap up your Q4 marketing plans and then additionally, there was a bonus episode I could specifically point to in the call-to-action to go listen to next that had three specific examples of episodes to include in your Q4 content plans.
You’ll probably have noticed, this is also a version of that, we’re talking about ways to use private podcast feeds here and your next step is to go listen in on that private podcast feed for a training on how to do it. I’m walking you through “Do you like this idea? Here’s how you do it,” and yes, full disclosure, there’s also a pitch at the end of that episode to sit down with me to talk about how to do this for you. I think I’ve earned it. I think you’ll agree.
What I want you to be looking at though is how we tied them together. Because when you use a private podcast feed as a way to nurture and convert leads, you want to be very, very, very—I’m going to say one more time—very conscientious that you’re not just creating another free piece of content to nurture people. If you have been subscribed to the Podcast Newsroom since the beginning, you know there are only five episodes—and the fifth episode is actually this episode, the one that goes out with this, the training—in three months. For this show, that would be eight or twelve episodes in two or three months. No, no, no. We have maybe two episodes a month that go out. A lot of the reason there are two episodes right now is because we’re building up that asset library, we’re building up the value of that opt-in, I want there to be some binge-ability in that space for when people opt-in and go in there (full disclosure, complete transparency here) and so I want you to be looking at how are you strategically tying these things together, how are you strategically moving people through so that they’re making decisions at each point.
I’m not going to have a podcast episode go out to the private feed that points you back here because this isn’t where I’m trying to get you. The calls to action on the Newsroom are never opt-in or never go listen to something else. They’re “Here’s how we help you execute this.” Because your next step, once you subscribe to the Podcast Newsroom, is to decide whether or not you want to work with our agency.
The answer can be no and you can consume the content, go crazy, but you’re going to get asked every time, “Is now the right time to take the next step?” Because that is the next step after the Podcast Newsroom. I know it works because all of our clients are subscribed to it too. It’s actually how we deliver information to clients as well. There’s an inside win-win.
I want to make sure what you’re doing is going to serve your sales goals and not just put you deeper into a content creation wormhole. That’s why we started with “How can a private feed serve clients and increase lifetime value? How can we increase value to our team and make our team more effective? How can it help us convert leads?” That’s the way I want you to think about it, not just “How can it help us nurture them more? How can we move them through what’s next?”
Get Your Private Podcast Feed Set Up!
If you are interested in learning more about the hows of this, head over to the Podcast Newsroom, listen to the training, it’s available right now. If you don’t care how this happens and you just want to know how you make it happen for you by working with us, we can absolutely handle the production of a private feed just as well as a public feed.
