How to Get Better SEO for Your Podcast
by Elikqitie
July 2022
The one priority at the top of every podcaster’s mind is to figure out how to get more listeners to their show. Without listeners, your message isn’t getting in front of other people.
While putting your information about your podcast episode on social media is good, you’ll definitely want to make sure you’ve completed these digital marketing steps to ensure you’ve got the basics down to increase your SEO for your podcast.
But first, let’s get down to the basics; what is SEO?
SEO is an acronym that represents Search Engine Optimization. In a nutshell, SEO is the ability of a person who is searching on Google, YouTube, or another search engine to find your platform, website, or business. In this case, we will focus on how someone else can find your podcast.
While there are many facets to creating fantastic SEO, the first place you want to start is to have your own domain name and your website.
Why?
Google down ranks any podcasts that don’t have their own website. If you want to find more listeners, you’ll want to make sure that your podcast has a website. You don’t have to spend a considerable sum for a website either - and you don’t have to use WordPress if you have a podcast - that’s a big misnomer.
You can easily make a well-designed and simple website on Weebly, Wix, or another DIY website design site. For example, here’s my podcast website for Travel Gluten-Free Podcast. I created it on Weebly several years ago. I modified it once or twice a year to keep it updated.
Secondly, you’ll want your own domain because if you use the website’s domain, you’re sending all your SEO to the website creators and not your podcast! So make the $15 investment and purchase your own domain name. My favorite domain space to purchase a domain is Gandi.net. I love this site because it’s easy to use, they don’t try to sell you a bunch of stuff you don’t need, and they are reasonably priced.
Adding Keywords to Your Podcast Website Content
When you’re building your podcast website content, remember to add keywords to your titles, subtitles, and the body of your website content. You can use Google Trends to find keywords related to your podcast. Make sure to add keywords to your website content so online internet searchers will come across your website content.
Create a Blog for Your Podcast
Blogs are a wonderful way to gain traction for your podcast website! And creating blogs is an easy step when you’re a podcaster. You can easily turn your show notes into a longer format for your blog post. Or, in reverse, create your blog first, then take your blog and shorten that content into your show notes. Voila! You’ve just repurposed your podcast episode into a blog and show notes!
To be clear, you don’t have to turn every episode into a blog. You can choose the episodes you feel are the best fit for your blog, check your stats to see which episodes ranked the most listened to, or if you publish a podcast that has both interviews and solo episodes, you can make blogs from your solo episodes only.
When creating a blog post, make sure to add links to other websites. Google sees this action as playing nice in the sandbox and will boost your blog if you cross-link to other websites. This can give you a huge advantage when you podcast swap with another podcaster!
This brings me to my next SEO boost - podcast swap with another podcaster!
Podcast Swapping
Podcast swapping is an art - you don’t want to podcast swap with any podcaster that comes along because their audience may not be a good fit for your message. Instead, vet podcasters who want to swap with you, exchange ideas and find out if the other podcaster promotes their podcast. If they do, your podcast will get more traction; you’ll most likely see a bump in listenership and get more downloads to your podcast.
In addition, if you want to see who is being interviewed in different podcasts, you can place a name in the search bar of your favorite podcast player. Every podcast that mentions their name will show up, and you can see what other podcasts they have been a guest on.
For example, I recently met the producer of The Beach Speaks podcast at PodFest podcasting conference. When we met, we immediately clicked! She has a beach podcast, and I have a travel podcast as well. So we talked and agreed on a podswap to talk about our favorite beaches to travel to on vacation. This makes sense because both of our podcasts are about travel. Also, even though she isn’t gluten-free, travel destinations are a part of what I podcast about, so our audience has a similar thread with a love of travel.
Create Show Notes That Boost Your SEO
I can’t tell you how many podcasters I’ve talked to that want more downloads but either only write a paragraph of show notes or don’t write any show notes. Suppose you’re not writing show notes, or you aren’t taking advantage of the 4,000 characters to increase your visibility on all the podcast players. In that case, you’re missing out on a huge SEO boost!
Writing podcast show notes with keywords is one of the best ways to boost your podcast SEO on podcast players or on Google and other internet search engines. When you create great show notes with keywords, then more podcast listeners will find your show and hit the follow or subscribe button. If you’re confused about best practices for writing show notes, here is a free ebook that will walk you through step-by-step how to write professional show notes for your podcast.
There are so many different steps to utilizing SEO for your podcast that if you achieve these steps and build up your content for your podcast, you’ll see steady, organic growth in your podcast listeners.
In the process of creating organic content for the past four+ years for my podcast, I’m now offered a regular paid gig writing blogs with backlinks to other travel companies. While it doesn’t make a ton of money, it definitely covers most of the cost of my podcast production, and the company is super easy to work with as well!
Elikqitie is an author, writer, speaker, podcast producer, and digital marketing expert. She loves living in McMinnville, Oregon, in the heart of wine country with her two cats - Jack and Hemmingway, three dogs, and her partner on their 11 acre farm. @travelglutenfreepodcast