Audio articles get more engagement when they're presented and promoted thoughtfully.

In this post, we'll share audio article best practices informed by our close partnerships with leading publishers. So you can get more readers to click play—and keep listening.

Here are 11 ways to boost listener engagement:

1. Choose the right voice

Choosing the right voice for your audio articles reduces friction, strengthens trust, and makes the listening experience more enjoyable. So people listen for longer and come back for more.

Many publishers choose AI voices because they're easy to scale and deliver a consistent listening experience across large volumes of content.

These are key factors to consider when choosing an AI voice:

Naturalness and clarity: The voice should sound lifelike, with smooth pacing, natural emphasis, and accurate pronunciation, so it never distracts from the story.

Brand alignment: The voice should feel true to your publication's character. Consider whether the accent reflects the communities you serve and whether the voice's personality fits your newsroom.

Tone and editorial fit: The delivery should suit the content. For example, a steady tone helps serious reporting feel more credible. You may want to use different voices across different categories.

At BeyondWords, we curate AI voices from ElevenLabs and Azure to give you the best possible balance of quality and variety. And we can help you find the best options for your publication.

That said, we recommend voice cloning above anything else.

Clone your journalists' voices

Cloning your journalists' voices is one of the most effective ways to make your AI audio feel authentic, distinctive, and closely aligned with your newsroom's identity. It can deepen audience connection, encouraging listeners to stay engaged for longer and return more often.

If your newsroom already has recognizable voices (such as podcast hosts) cloning lets you extend the value of their voices without adding to their workload.

Publishers like News Corp Australia, SPH Media, Schibsted, and La Nación have worked with BeyondWords to create Professional voice clones for their publications.

2. Customize the audio player

Customizing the player is one of the simplest ways to make audio feel more integrated with your website or app and increase playback rates.

If you're using the BeyondWords Player, you can choose from Small, Standard, or Large player designs. Each offers a different balance between visibility and functionality.

Whatever player size you choose, update the background, icon, and text colors so they fit naturally with your light and dark mode designs. Aim for strong contrast to ensure accessibility and make the play button easy to spot.

If you prefer full control over the design and behavior of your player, you can build custom interfaces using our JavaScript, iOS, and Android SDKs.

3. Position the player (and widget) strategically

We recommend positioning the audio player directly above the featured image or first paragraph of your article, so it's easy for prospective listeners to discover.

Also enable the BeyondWords Player widget, so users can access the player as they scroll down the page. Alternatively, build a custom solution for your website or app.

4. Enable playback-by-paragraph

JFM boosted audio engagement rates tenfold after enabling BeyondWords' playback-by-paragraph feature, which lets readers click anywhere in an article to start (or stop) listening.

The feature lowers the barrier to audio by making it easy to try out, while also giving readers more control over how they consume a story. Together, these benefits can increase dwell time and improve reader satisfaction.

5. Use paragraph highlighting

With paragraph highlighting, the section of text being read aloud is highlighted in a color of your choice. This reduces the friction of switching between reading and listening, improves comprehension, and makes long-form articles easier to follow.

Combined with playback-...