Podcast Monetization Secrets

There's a better way to sell your products and services than just having them listed on your website.

Today, I'm sharing how you can get yourself an automated sales person that works for you 24 hours a day for a very low cost.

If you are missing this piece of your sales strategy, it's no wonder your sales may be suffering.

If you need a sales funnel built for your products, simply email me at [email protected] and we may be able to get you into our beta program.

Today I'm sharing a strategy that will help you increase your open rates and therefore make more revenue.

In order to increase your open rates, I recommend focusing on creating engaging content and using effective copywriting to attract listeners. By doing this, you can increase the likelihood that your listeners will convert into paying customers.

Now, if you're not familiar with testing, one principle of testing is that even if you're only changing one thing, you still want to collect data to see if it's the change that made the difference.

And so if you're not getting that much of an opening of your email and you still aren't getting conversions then what you want to do is look at what your calls to action are, look at the story that you're telling to drive home the points, look at what you're doing to change their false beliefs, and just look at your whole pitch.

If people are opening your email but then they're not getting through to the conversion part of it, then you have a different problem.

A tool I like to use is subjectline.com. It can help you improve your email open rates. This tool looks at common rules for email headlines and assigns point values to them, with 100 being the best score.

So here's the simple strategy that will more than double your email open rates:

1) Send out your regular email and wait 5 days.

2) Create a new list segment for all the contacts that did not open your previous email.

3) Create a subject line that is the polar opposite of the first one you sent. Use Subjectline.com to help you optimize your subject line.

4) Send the exact same email to this new segment with the only change being the subject line.

 How to Monetize Your Podcast Faster and Easier

• The key to increasing open rates for your email marketing is to focus on creating valuable content that your audience will want to read and share.

• Podcast monetization secrets includes strategies such as creating valuable content, building a following, and monetizing early on in your podcasting journey.

• Email marketing is not the only way to monetize your podcast, but it can be a powerful tool if used correctly.

 How to Improve Your Email Open Rates

• Testing is important to improve your campaigns and ads.

• One principle of testing is that you should change just one thing with each iteration.

• Testing can be done with different versions of emails, ads, and images.

• Gathering data and testing multiple changes at once is important.

 How to Increase Email Open Rates

• If your email open rates are low, look at what your calls to action are, story you're telling, and changes you're making to your beliefs to improve conversions.

• To increase email open rates, send out emails regularly and keep your list nurtured.

Need help figuring out how to monetize your podcast? I help clients do this with a Podcast Audit. Click here to learn more.

If your podcast has ever hit a growth plateau, you need to listen to today's episode.

Growth plateaus can happen at any level, so I wanted to give you 3 ways that you can push past these plateaus and achieve a new level of growth.

This is a problem every podcaster will have to deal with at some point as long as you don't quit before you break through the plateau.

If you want help with your podcast, a podcast audit is the best way for you to work with me on your monetization strategy. Simply click here to learn more.

Recently, I was speaking to a group of podcasters who were interested in monetizing their podcasts. The main reason they haven't monetized is because they haven't connected their podcast to their pipeline. I explained that they need to start with a purpose and be confident in their ability to sell their programs and courses. I encouraged them to make an offer to their listeners and to be persistent in pitching their products..

Today, I'm sharing why your audience actually wants you to pitch them on your services, and showing you the consequences of neglecting to make offers.

Need help creating your blueprint for monetization? A Podcast Audit is the best way to start. Click here to learn how you can get your very own Podcast Audit.

I was working with a client who was hoping to launch a course in the near future. In our conversations, I discovered that she had a lot going for her. She had been consistent in her publishing, she had been attracting the audience of her ideal customers, and she had been building her email list. Despite all of this, she was still struggling to monetize her podcast.

I introduced her to the concept of a course presale, and we set a goal of selling 25 courses in four weeks. She promoted the presale through her email list, social media, and podcast, and ended up selling 38 courses. She was then able to sell a few more courses after the presale closed, and six weeks later she had made more than $10,000 from her courses.

In this episode, you will learn the following:

1. A client went from earning nothing from their podcast to earning $10,000 in just six weeks.

2. The client accomplished this by starting a presale for their yet-to-be-completed course.

3. The client was able to make this happen by taking action and being willing to put in the work.

Resources:

Join the Podcast Monetization Challenge. Sign up here.

Follow me on:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/cahaussler/

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCGf3vX8ihoVMibG6FdQXb1A

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Team_podcast

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christyhaussler/

Website: https://teampodcast.com

Learn how to get more leads for your business by implementing a simple change to your website. In this episode, Christy Haussler shares how she was able to increase her conversion rate and get more leads by making a small change to her website.

I was having a conversation with some fellow podcasters about the fact that many of us have a hard time monetizing our podcasts. We all agreed that it's a universal problem and that we need to find a way to fix it. I shared with them an example of how I recently had to go back to the basics in my own business in order to increase my conversion rate. In this episode, you will learn the following:

1. How much does it cost to acquire a customer?

2. How can you recapture leads that fall out of your funnel?

3. How to shorten the time between when someone begins planning their podcast and when they're ready to launch?

Resources:

Join the Podcast Monetization Challenge - Sign up here!

Follow me on:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/cahaussler/

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCGf3vX8ihoVMibG6FdQXb1A

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Team_podcast

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christyhaussler/

Website: https://teampodcast.com

Alright, so today I'm going to talk to you about something that I have struggled with and still am struggling with. And you are too, probably because almost every person that I talk to and every consultation I do, those people have the same problem too. So it seems to be kind of universal. So why don't we talk about it? I'll tell you what it is and how we can fix it right after this.

Hi there. Welcome to Podcast Monetization Secrets and I am Christy Haussler and in case you haven't met me yet, I'm the founder of Team Podcast. We're a full service podcast production company and for the last four ish years we have just been going deep, deep, deep on Monetization. And I'm glad that it's now on your radar too, because I firmly believe that we need more podcasts making money. And I've just made a decision in my life that I will not start another podcast unless it can be monetized, unless it's going in that direction. And I'm not saying if you aren't starting it for money that you're wrong, it's just that's not where I'm heading.

I think too many people have started podcasts with the hope of making money and they never knew how and they don't know where to go from. I've gotten started and so I don't want to put any more people in that situation where we continue to have podcasts every single month that fade away.

And right now it is a good time for us to sometimes go back to the basics. And part of the reason I say this is because you might have felt a little bit of a crunch with like maybe even your revenue dollars or ad dollars or other campaigns that you're doing and money that you're spending on. And you think, how is it that I'm not getting the value that I once did for the money that you're spending? Right?

I mean, I think we're in a situation where we're feeling that on every aspect of what we're doing. And so many times when we get in a situation where we can't just rely on throwing money at it and throwing money at an ad campaign to get it to convert, many times we have to go back to the basics. And I'm going to tell you about a situation where I've had to go back to the basics on a couple of things and it really has been a lesson that I'm like, I knew this and I just ignored it and it wasn't even on my radar. So putting it out there on your radar today, we're going to talk about it and make sure that you're not missing it too.

But one of the things, if you have a business, if you don't have a reliable way to generate leads each month, then I would sometimes even question whether you might have whether your business is very sound at all. Let me just say it that way. And one of the things that differentiates like a business from a successful business many times is that lead pipeline, the fact that you always have methods out there and channels out there where you're getting new leads every single month. Now, I'm not saying they're free. I'm not saying at all that getting leads are free. In fact, getting leads for your business is probably one of the most costly parts of your business.

That's why in marketing, there is a separate number called cost of acquisition. And so that means how much does it cost you to get a customer? And when I say get a customer, it includes all of it. Like the marketing you did to get somebody into your top of funnel, the sales person that talked to them or the appointments that they scheduled and the closing of that. And just all these things go into acquiring a customer. And it's a very high cost most of the time for most businesses to acquire a customer that has a high lifetime value, if that's what our businesses are. And not just a one off type buy it once, and not just a one off type buy it once product, and you never see or hear from your customers again. So most of us are in the recurring type, customer base, type services and products and that sort of thing.

So you should know as a business owner how much it costs you to acquire a customer. And that is part of the determination of how much you can pay to acquire a customer. I think Dan Kennedy said it best once when he said, whoever can pay the most to acquire customers wins. And that just means it's kind of like, you know, you're buying attention and you're buying influence and you're buying the attention of your ideal customer and getting them into your top of funnel, getting them into your ecosystem, and suddenly they're aware of you and they know about you, and then you begin nurturing them to become customers.

So I did something with my Google Ads. I run Google Ads all the time for our podcast production company. And it's one of the ways that we can constantly have a pipeline of people that are actually looking with search based intent for our services. And so one of the things that I have found is that often whenever people come to our website, the call to action is basically schedule a call with us and let's talk about what your needs are. Let's talk about how we can help you. And I'll give you the whole work up and the pricing and kind of how we'll work together, and we kind of go about it that way. But oftentimes people there's no barrier of entry to going to the website and scheduling a call. And at the same time, when I do get you to schedule that call, I have you fill out. I think it's answer five questions about yourself and your podcast so that I can know and have a little background of who I'm going to be talking to.

So from the end of last year, like, let's just say last quarter of 2021, fourth quarter, I began noticing I was having less conversions on my Google Ads. And it turns out, as we dug deeper, there was a change that I made to our website that I would say is probably responsible for this. Now, it's one of those things where you do something in the moment thinking it's the right thing to do. And for me, the change I made to our website was whenever Facebook shut my account down, and I was in the middle of marketing for challenges and putting out ads and that sort of thing for our challenges, and because I no longer had the Facebook Avenue, which was doing very well for us, I put our challenge information on our website. But where I put it and where it was, it was creating a real disconnect for all the traffic that I was getting from the Google Ads.

So Google people were searching for podcast production companies, how to get your podcast production done, and all that sort of thing. And they were coming to our website, and because of where I put the challenge information, that was the first thing they saw. So there's a real incongruence there with what they were searching for and what they were seeing when they came to the website. So what it did is it bottomed out my Google Ads. And so no longer was I getting consultation scheduled and getting leads from my Google Ads and the same volume I was prior to that.

So then I figured it out, figured out what was going on, and made a bunch of changes to the website. And part of what I wanted to change about the website was that I wanted to make the schedule a call more prominent because we had kind of gotten some other ways. Like we had sort of confused our market with like, oh, you can email us or, oh, you can call us, or you can do all these things. But really what I want is them to schedule a call. And so I went back to that one singular call to action and that focus, and made changes about two weeks ago. Now, made changes about two weeks ago. And since then, our conversion rate, and I'm talking about conversion rate for getting a call scheduled, has exponentially increased over what we were doing after I made that change in first quarter of this year to our website and bottomed out my Google Ads.

So I was talking about this to one of my marketing Mastermind groups that I'm in and one of the things that came up and it was a completely valid point, and I got so busy, like sometimes if you're like me, you grow your business as best you can sort of by yourself, and then you get help and people come in and you know, more, you do better, you learn more. But a lot of times there's some missing fundamentals on the ground level that you never actually circle back and fix. And so what I realized in talking to my Mastermind people is even once people schedule a consultation from me, there's a certain percentage of those that don't show up whenever it's time for our call. Despite text reminders and email reminders and other things, it's still a no show. And we were talking about what I was doing for those people, and most of the time I just reach out to them and try to do a very nonjudgmental and not trying to throw shade or guilt or anything like that, but sort of, hey, I see you missed our call time. I know something must have come up, you're probably very busy, as am I, and if it's not a good time still, and you want to still schedule a call, here you go, you can reschedule, I'd still love to talk to you, kind of thing. So I do that manually a lot of times. And sometimes I get people following up and like, oh no, I just forgot, or something happened or something came up. And people do eventually schedule.

So one of those things that you can count on is that 100% of your free consultations that people schedule are not going to show up. And so we began talking about how I can nurture people back to that same mindset in that same place where they were whenever they were prompted to go to Google and search for podcast production companies. And so I've been working on really honing in my nurture campaigns.

And the thing is that this is an area that I find most of my customers and most of my clients are struggling with as well because it's not an immediate thing on our radar, but we all have not just people that don't show up to our consultations, but we don't close 100% of our calls. And so the real challenge then is how do you segment those people out and make sure that they're properly getting followed up on through email and other ways that you're in touch with them so that they're eventually potentially going to be able to come back and be a customer of yours.

Bottom line is you paid for that lead. I paid for that lead. I paid for it through Google whenever I went out to get an ad that would return search results that they were looking for. And when I paid for it and then it converted and I got the call, there's a whole lot of dropping the ball on my part. That happens if I don't end up getting a sale and a new client from that potential lead, right? And so I've been forced to go back and look and say I'm not ringing out every bit of value on the back end, on the nurture sequences.

I've got clients right now that we're working with that it's the same thing. Like we've got to build out nurture sequences to get people back to that same place where they were motivated to get the help they need. And we've got to get them coming back through and like re-engaging them in our content, reengaging them in what we're talking about.

So that's my focus right now. And that's my focus for several of the clients that we have. Because when you're putting out a certain amount of money on the front end and then you have a certain percentage of those fall through and not even show up now, you also have to remember that not showing up also brings a certain amount of shame and guilt on that person's part that they're sort of afraid to show their face again.

So what can I do to get them back there and bring them back to the fold and say, no, it's okay, I understand something came up or you freaked out or whatever, but let's talk about this because the fact that they eventually might come around to the same place they were when they were in that motivated state and you can get them there, is very high. So how I handle that is one thing, but then how do I handle the people that talk to me and don't take our service?

They might not take our service for a lot of things. In podcasting, there is this very long time between when you start planning things and you're trying to get your ducks in a row and you actually are ready to get off the ground. And what can I do to shorten that time? And can I start helping people by giving them a nurture sequence that will get them there faster? And then if I help them get there, then aren't they going to probably want to talk to me about my service again if I'm the one responsible for helping move them in the direction they want to go?

I wanted to point this out and I wanted to use this as an example today because it's something that I see so it's something that I see just so frequently and so many times our efforts are just all on the front end. And I think when you're in marketing groups and that's where you start, you start with the front end of stuff. But if you really talk and really listen to tried and true marketers, what you will find out is that many times they expect their campaigns to barely break even on the front end so that they can get people in their email list into the funnel, consuming their content, consuming their products even. And then they continue to nurture them and get sales over the lifetime of that client, that lifetime of that contact, I should say.

And so what you begin to think about is that they're sort of doing whatever it takes to get them in the front end of their funnel, knowing they have systems and processes and let's just call it safety nets, to keep recapturing these people that fall out of their funnel and keep putting them back in. And many of us have not built that out. My sole focus this week is to get our nurture campaigns and our sequences and all of our tagging of our email list and all of those things set up. Because if I do that once, then it's forever going to run and it's forever going to be in place and I'm never going to have to think about it again. But I'm also never going to not optimize a lead again. If I'm paying $20 or $30 a pop for a lead, then I need to make sure I'm doing everything in my power. And that means the low hanging fruit of the consultation calls and the low hanging fruit of the follow up emails.

But maybe there needs to be a certain nurture sequence that starts long before my consultation call. Right now I've got calls booked several weeks out. That means weeks of time that I can begin nurturing them, getting them ready for that call. What am I doing? What am I doing to build out ways to move them step by step by step, closer to me, step by step, closer to our services, step by step, closer to being your ideal client. We can do that with our marketing emails. We can do that with how we create content.

I'll give you a scenario the other night, the other day, that scenario that happened. And sometimes just doing something different than everyone else does makes you stand out. And I have clients that many times I get off a consultation with them and they want a lot of different things and they sort of need a lot of different things. But if they already have all these entities going, sometimes I want to take a minute to look at what they're doing already to see if it sort of matches up with what they're telling me or to see if I can even see how they're getting their clients and where their traffic flow is coming from and all that sort of thing.

Because I'm interested in way more than just their podcast. I'm interested in way more than just podcast production for them. I'm interested in strategy and making everything successful. And so I had that happen a couple of weeks with a client. It's now a client, but it was a potential client at that point. They hadn't signed up yet. And one of the things that I noticed was there was just some real low hanging fruit that we could pick off with marketing. So I knew I couldn't convey this in a regular proposal that I would do. So I sat down and I made the proposal. But I also made them a video going through each aspect of it so they could understand what I was looking at and understand what I was saying and understand how it can impact them.

So this is something I don't do that often, but I have done it a few times. And they told me right up front, Christy, we're talking to a bunch of other people. We're talking to you're, one of the masses, sort of, so to speak. And when I showed them what we wanted to do, they realized it was way more than production. And they were immediately I became a category of one immediately. Nobody else existed in their world. And it was just, can we figure out how to work together? Can we figure out how to untangle ourselves from the things that aren't working and move it over to things that are working?

And so one of those high touch things about making videos or making content specifically that you could send out to a very microtargeted person on your list might be a great way to separate yourself. And I could do that with nurture sequences prior to someone's podcast production call. Then that would set me up for also doing it after this free consultation for podcast production, whether they don't show, whether they do show and they don't become a customer, they're not ready yet, they're not making a decision today, whatever it is, we have the opportunity. But until I've gone through all of those, I should not count that lead as let's just call it a dead lead yet, right?

I should do all of those things and continue nurturing them to the point where they're going to have to be the ones to make the decision of unsubscribe. Don't follow. Not interested in podcasting anymore, whatever else they're wanting to do. But I just thought I would share this with you because even as much as I mean, these aren't things that I don't know, but all the time, it's just because I know something doesn't mean I've actually implemented and executed on it. And so it may be that for you too. And so I would encourage you as money gets tight, maybe tighter, or you begin to feel the effects of inflation, or you begin to feel like your add costs are going up and you're getting less qualified leads or less leads altogether, I would encourage you to go back and look at your process like I'm doing and make sure that you're properly filling the holes in your...

Most people won't tell you about the three secrets to podcast success. But I'm going to give you a behind-the-scenes look at what it takes to be successful in this rapidly growing industry.

So, what are the three secrets to podcast success?

1) Keeping a consistent release schedule is one of the keys to success. continue to produce your podcast on a normal schedule. Don’t be tempted to skip weeks or go on hiatus. That’s just a fancy way to podfade.  If you can stick to a regular cadence, it will show potential customers that you're reliable and trustworthy. Plus, it makes it easier for them to say yes to your offers!

2) Don’t be afraid of promoting yourself and making offers. Don't be afraid to promote the work you do with clients on your podcast. You're doing great work, and your clients deserve to hear about it! Besides, promoting your work on your podcast is a great way to attract new clients. So go ahead and talk about the amazing work you're doing! Your listeners will appreciate it, and you never know who might be inspired to work with you as a result.

3) Make more offers. You are helping your podcast listeners out by making offers. You're not doing anyone any favors by being shy about your work. Let people know what you can do for them and be proud of what you have to offer. 

If you need to make more revenue, then go deep on making your offer as juicy or irresistible as possible. Go crazy with ways you can enhance your offers. The worst thing that can happen is that you end up with too many conversions, and that’s rarely the worst thing that can happen to a business.

Need help monetizing your podcast? Join the Podcast Monetization Challenge here.

Here's a news flash - you've already learned enough to monetize your podcast. You're already qualified. You haven't monetized yet, not because you don't have the right ideas or information. You haven't monetized yet because you have not forced yourself to execute.

Today, I'm sharing 4 steps you can take to move yourself closer to monetization. There's never been a better time to get your podcast monetized and develop multiple streams of income with your podcast.

Need help figuring out the best way to monetize your podcast? Join our Podcast Monetization Challenge - it's free and 5 days of intense focus on monetizing your podcast.

Our next Podcast Profit Challenge starts soon! This is the perfect opportunity for you to get the help you need to begin to monetize your podcast. It doesn't take years to monetize your podcast, it can be done in as little as 90 days!

Join now!

When it comes to your podcast, we have a lot of recommendations that can help make your podcast journey easier. We've used almost every tool available and we only recommend the tools that we use, know and love.

Best USB Microphone: Shure MV7 USB Microphone

Best XLR Microphone: Heil PR-40 Dynamic Microphone

Best Headphones: Apple AirPods Max Headphones

Best Microphone Interface: Scarlet Focusrite 2i2

Highest Quality Recording Platform for both Audio and Video: Squadcast

Best Podcast Hosting Company: Captivate

Best Software for Email Marketing and List Building: Active Campaign

Best Software for Building Sales Funnels: Clickfunnels

Best Software for Keyword Research and SEO Optimization: SurferSEO

Best Software for AI Generated Writing: Jarvis

Best Software for Creating Captioned Video Snippets for Social Media: Zubtitle

Not every podcast is created for the purpose of solving problems for listeners, so how are those shows supposed to monetize? It's a question I get asked all the time.

Today, I'm showing you the method I would use to monetize this type of show. My recommendation is to focus on building a community...a paid community around the topics and themes that your show discusses.

Want to learn how to build a community? I'll tell you in this episode!

Our next Podcast Profit Challenge starts soon! This is the perfect opportunity for you to get the help you need to begin to monetize your podcast. It doesn't take years to monetize your podcast, it can be done in as little as 90 days!

Join now!

When it comes to your podcast, we have a lot of recommendations that can help make your podcast journey easier. We've used almost every tool available and we only recommend the tools that we use, know and love.

Best USB Microphone: Shure MV7 USB Microphone

Best XLR Microphone: Heil PR-40 Dynamic Microphone

Best Headphones: Apple AirPods Max Headphones

Best Microphone Interface: Scarlet Focusrite 2i2

Highest Quality Recording Platform for both Audio and Video: Squadcast

Best Podcast Hosting Company: Captivate

Best Software for Email Marketing and List Building: Active Campaign

Best Software for Building Sales Funnels: Clickfunnels

Best Software for Keyword Research and SEO Optimization: SurferSEO

Best Software for AI Generated Writing: Jarvis

Best Software for Creating Captioned Video Snippets for Social Media: Zubtitle

Today I'm talking about Which Links Should You Use to Promote Your Podcast and I really want you to understand why it is important for your podcast.

Sharing the wrong link can lead your followers to a dead end and that doesn't do either of you any good.

There's one place where you should drive our podcast traffic that is most valuable to you. I'll tell you all about it in this episode.

Our next Podcast Profit Challenge starts soon! This is the perfect opportunity for you to get the help you need to begin to monetize your podcast. It doesn't take years to monetize your podcast, it can be done in as little as 90 days!

Join now!

When it comes to your podcast, we have a lot of recommendations that can help make your podcast journey easier. We've used almost every tool available and we only recommend the tools that we use, know and love.

Best USB Microphone: Shure MV7 USB Microphone

Best XLR Microphone: Heil PR-40 Dynamic Microphone

Best Headphones: Apple AirPods Max Headphones

Best Microphone Interface: Scarlet Focusrite 2i2

Highest Quality Recording Platform for both Audio and Video: Squadcast

Best Podcast Hosting Company: Captivate

Best Software for Email Marketing and List Building: Active Campaign

Best Software for Building Sales Funnels: Clickfunnels

Best Software for Keyword Research and SEO Optimization: SurferSEO

Best Software for AI Generated Writing: Jarvis

Best Software for Creating Captioned Video Snippets for Social Media: Zubtitle