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Hey Reader! - I got lost in food metaphors today; perhaps I shouldn't write these when I'm hungry or when I live 200 miles away from the nearest Vietnamese restaurant! Quick heads up that I am now offering Growth Machine Podcast Audits if anyone needs help growing their show

How To Turn Social Media Followers Into Listeners – an Alternative Strategy

Social media is a frustrating place for a podcaster.

You’re putting up clips, asking people to listen, and making great graphics about upcoming episodes.

But no one seems to be clicking your links to find your podcast. And I know why.

Today, I’m going to share an alternative strategy you can use to grow your podcast from social media.

Stop Talking About Your Podcast

Imagine you’re walking around a food market, and someone stops you saying, “I have this amazing restaurant you’ll love. Follow me, and I’ll take you there.”

But you’re hungry now, so you walk away.

You carry on walking as the smells of sizzling pans entice you. A man stops you outside his stall and offers you a sample of crispy spring rolls. You love it. Vietnamese food is your favorite. You place an order for spring rolls and head home.

Then, next week, you see the man again. He tells you his name is Lan, and he gives you another sample – a small bowl of delicious pho. You place another order and walk off satisfied.

This goes on for weeks before Lan says, “Oh, by the way, I have a restaurant. If you like the food you’ve had, you should check it out sometime.”

You’re ecstatic because you’ve grown to love Lan’s food, and you can’t wait to get more of it. You go to the restaurant, get a big bowl of pho, and you’re blown away. It’s your new favorite restaurant, and you proceed to take all your friends with you.

This is how you approach social media.

People don’t care that you’ve got an awesome valuable podcast somewhere else. They want value now.

You need to spend time building an audience on the platform. Then you keep showing up and keep providing value while occasionally pointing people to your podcast.

Slowly but surely, you take people from social media across to your podcast.

Become a Content Creator

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Alex Hormozi @AlexHormozi Five years ago, I made my first podcast episode. The first 4 years, my podcast wasn’t even ranked. At one pt, I even accepted it as “never gonna grow” But I kept making them, out of habit more than anything. It’s now a reminder for me: sometimes you gotta give time, time. 6:54 PM • Jul 6, 2022 52 Retweets 556 Likes Read 36 replies

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Here’s how I started listening to Alex Hormozi’s podcast.

• I hear about Alex Hormozi in a blog post.
• A few weeks later, he appears in my YouTube shorts. I start to watch
• I seek him out to follow on Twitter.
• Somewhere down the line, he mentions he has a podcast and I start to listen.
• I’ve been a listener ever since.

I later found out many other people did the same thing. His podcast grew from 20,000 downloads per month to 400,000 downloads per month in 6 months because it went from making 7 pieces of content a week to 80 pieces of content a week across all channels.

Now, are you going to do this at his scale? Probably not. He had money to hire a team and all that good stuff, but that doesn’t mean you can’t start.

For instance, this newsletter has around 225 subscribers. Meanwhile, my following on Twitter and Medium is close to 4,000. But 75% of my subscribers have come via those platforms, and without growing those platforms as useful standalone projects, most of you wouldn’t have found this newsletter.

How Can I Provide the Most Value?

Justin Welsh @thejustinwelsh 5 types of content that build your following: 1. This person teaches me 2. This person motivates me 3. This person entertains me 4. This person makes me think 5. This person understands me That's just about it. 4:35 PM • Mar 3, 2023 186 Retweets 1337 Likes Read 116 replies

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Choose one social media channel and start building an audience there. Provide them with as much value as you can and mention your podcast occasionally.

Not every follower will become a listener, but every follower will build your audience, and your podcast will grow as a result.

Community Wins

Well done, everyone! If you have a win you want to share, hit reply!

How I Can Help You

1) I can add you to my best podcast lists. Just email your podcast, description, and category

2) I have a page of ​Recommended Tools​. These are the tools I use to grow my podcast. I focus on tools that improve quality and save time.