Welcome to the first episode of Podcast Hackers! I’m your host, Craig Hewitt. Today, I welcome Enrico Lugnan to the show. Enrico is a social media marketing strategist for the social media marketing agency, Avenik. He shares with me the ups and downs of launching Avenik’s podcast called The Avenik Interviews. Enrico and his team distribute the podcast through a highly successful private Facebook group and other social media sites such as LinkedIn, with the aim of helping people learn more about social media marketing.

[clickToTweet tweet=”I started the podcast as one additional way to distribute content, but actually it gave me back a lot more than I would have thought.” quote=”I started the podcast as one additional way to distribute content, but actually it gave me back a lot more than I would have thought.”]

We cover a lot of ground today including, why Enrico and his team launched the podcast and how it has changed the way he approaches business and networking. There are many great takeaways in today’s episode and if you are new to social media marketing, you just might have found a new community!

Today’s highlights:

[clickToTweet tweet=”We were able to start doing business with some of the guests we had on the podcast. Because, for those thirty minutes, or thirty-five minutes, however long it is, you are actually interacting as peers.” quote=”We were able to start doing business with some of the guests we had on the podcast. Because, for those thirty minutes, or thirty-five minutes, however long it is, you are actually interacting as peers.”]

Resources:

Avenik.com

The Avenik Interviews

The Social Media Marketing Revolution, Avenik Facebook Group

Thank you for joining me for the first ever Podcast Hackers episode! Tune in next time as we continue to have in-depth conversations with experts who can help make your podcast the best it can be!

On today’s episode, I’m chatting with Nathan Wrigley of WPBuilds about how he transition from podcasting as a hobby to podcasting as a full-time job. We talk about how WPBuilds has changed over the months, making the decision to making podcasting his full-time job, niche podcasts, the big surprises in podcasting full-time, what he does for each episode, monetizing podcasts and the importance of balance, the perks & cons of the job, the future for the podcast & his career, and how audiences change.

Resources:

WPBuilds, website

Thank you for listening to another episode of Podcast Hackers. If you liked what you heard today, please head over to iTunes and leave a rating and review. 

Today we’re presenting a segment we call “office hours” where we talk about a particular topic in the podcasting community as well as answer questions from everyone involved in the community (including listeners). Today’s topic is all about audience growth.

We talk about nine strategies you can use to promote your show (from leveraging your network to optimizing your SEO and using social media properly). We also talk about having a standalone website, defining a consistent posting schedule, how many episodes, how often to post, and what you can do if you can’t stay on schedule (how to get back on track).

These webinars are open to everyone, so if you would like to get on the email list, please visit castos.com. They happen every week (currently each Wednesday at noon, Eastern time). If you have any questions, reach out to [email protected].

Resources:

Video Blog Post and Q&A

Castos Article About Show Notes

Overcast

Podcast Hackers Facebook Group

Castos

Audacity

Zencastr

Squadcast

Zoom

Castos YouTube Channel

Camtasia

Screenflow

Castos Transcriptions

Rebekah Bek is a marketer for Ahrefs, an SEO toolkit that helps optimize your website for best SEO results. We are discussing an experiment that Ahrefs has been running for a little over a year now with podcast sponsorship. Previously on this show, we have discussed sponsorship from the show creators’ side of the deal. Rebekah is going to give us a glimpse of what it is like for the sponsor.

Ahrefs had tried experimenting with podcast ads before but it didn’t work out. When Rebekah took over the project she changed how the company approached measuring the success metric. She tells us what they look for in a good show fit and why there isn’t a black and white formula to make it successful.

Rebekah shares some interesting observations that could help you find a good sponsor for your podcast.

Today’s highlights:

• What is Ahrefs?
• How the podcast advertising experiment began.
• The shift of attitude on how the company tracked the results of the experiment.
• Podcast advertising can be great exposure but it requires a lot of time.
• How a larger show’s team interacts with Rebekah’s team vs. a smaller show.
• The Twitter contest that revealed a lot about a show’s audience engagement.
• Why good alignment is important in the podcast/sponsor relationship.

Resources:

Rebekah Bek on Twitter

Ahrefs

Midroll

Podcast Advertising: $51,975 Spent. Here’s What We Learned by Rebekah Bek

Thank you for joining me for today’s Podcast Hackers episode! Tune in next time as we continue to have in-depth conversations with experts who can help make your podcast the best it can be!