Guys! Today we are going to chat all things SEO for Podcasts, so get excited!
Podcasts are becoming an increasingly popular growth strategy for solopreneurs and personal brands, and for good reason. They are an amazing way to increase your visibility and reach new audiences that you might not otherwise be able to.
But how do you optimize them for SEO?
If you have a podcast, you know how important it is for you to grow your audience and get more listeners. Using targeted keywords in your podcast titles and other SEO marketing tactics will help you do just that.
If you’re not sure how to get more listeners for your podcast, keep reading! I’ll show you how to grow your audience with Podcast SEO, and I also have an exciting announcement to share with you at the end.
What Is Podcast SEO?
Podcast SEO is the art of optimizing your podcast for search engines in order to increase your visibility and rank for keywords related to your podcast and episodes. Sounds familiar, right?
Quick History of Podcasts and Google
Google started indexing Podcasts in 2019 when they realized how popular they were becoming, and they wanted in on all of that extra search potential. Now podcasts are included in search results, and they can even scan individual episodes and pull keywords and related content directly from your audio! This just goes to show how important good podcast SEO is.
Because of the amazing power of SEO, Podcast SEO should 100% be part of your overall holistic SEO strategy, just like blogging or Pinterest. It’s not just about choosing topics that users are interested in, though of course that’s important too. It’s about optimizing your show notes and podcast episode titles, but also, descriptions, tags and more.
Start With Keyword Research
Just like with traditional SEO, keywords are going to be the anchor of your podcast SEO strategy. Recording an amazing podcast is awesome, but if no one can find it then you’re missing out on reaching new listeners (and new leads)! Using the right keywords (in the right places) signals to Google that your podcast episode is relevant to a user’s search, meaning you have a better chance of showing up in the search results for that keyword.
Keyword research is the first step, and it’s important for a few of reasons. First, it helps you find the keywords that people are searching for related to your content. Second, it will help you create the actual title of your podcast episode. Using a tool like Ubersuggest or SEMRush can help you find the right search queries to use. But doing some old-fashioned google searches can also help you find ideas.
Once you have your target keyword identified, it’s time to do some optimizing!
Where to Use Your Target Keyword
- The title of the podcast episode
- During your podcast episode
- Image file names
- Image ALT attributes
- Show notes or episode blog post
In the title of your podcast episode!
The #1 place to use your keywords is in the podcast episode title. This helps Google and users understand what your podcast episode is about.
Use the keyword in your podcast audio
Google can scan audio and audio SEO is a real thing! S make sure to use your keyword naturally throughout the podcast episode.
Image file names & ALT attribute
Don’t forget to use your keywords where applicable when naming your images. Also, the ALT attribute is super important. Not only for podcast SEO, but SEO and accessibility in general.
Optimize Your Show Notes
Show notes are an often overlooked and underutilized opportunity when it comes to podcast SEO. They are a great way to get people introduced to your brand and podcast via searches on Google.
I always recommend that clients structure their show notes like a blog post. Not only does this make them more readable for users, but also easy to optimize for SEO.
In the example below, you can see that the third organic result for a search on “what is bro marketing?” is a podcast show notes page!
Follow the same tactics you would use to optimize a blog post as you would your show notes. If you need tips on how to do that, my free blog post template has everything you need to know.
Quick Tips for Optimizing Show Notes for SEO
- Optimize your title
- Use header tags to break up your content
- Don’t forget on-page SEO (meta title, meta description)
- Use the Keyword naturally throughout the show notes
- Link out to other pages on your website + your podcast episode
Bonus tip! Don’t forget to include transcriptions of your Podcast episode. These are word-for-word transcripts of your episode, which is great for users and accessibility, but also great for Google too.
Conclusion
Finding more listeners for your podcast is a challenge, but it’s not impossible. With the right strategies, and some smart, podcast SEO, you’ll be able to increase your podcast’s audience and grow your audience. In fact, it can be easier than you think!
Whether you want to increase your audience size or just want to grow your overall reach, all of the different tactics we discussed in this post can help to find more listeners over the long-term. If you’re looking for a simple approach to growing your podcast, you’ll be happy to know that keyword research, guest posting and creating well optimized show notes can get you started on the right foot.
What did you think? Are you going to start utilizing some of these podcast SEO strategies?
Oh, and I promised you a big announcement! If you haven’t heard, I am launching a podcast soon! The tentative name is The Elevated Visibility Podcast and I will be chatting all things SEO strategy, storytelling and soul searching for the female founder who is looking for alignment (and maybe a little disruption) in her business. Make sure to get on my email list to be the first to know when it launches!
Ok, that’s a wrap! Until next time!
xxx
