Visualizing a Podcast Audience

If you work in podcasting, it can be difficult to visualize how big your audience is. Sitting in a recording studio, or these days in the laundry room or closet, it can be easy to lose track of the size and value of the audience.

In my previous life as co-founder of a publicly traded broadcast company, the name of the game was rating points, which over time became more valuable and harder to come by. We worked with our air personalities on several growth-related initiatives. At the top of list was ensuring that we were maximizing every talk break with valuable, funny, interesting and compelling content.

If you have ever stood in front of a crowd of 3,000, you can feel the adrenaline flowing and the nerves pulsing wanting to make things just right. Our goal was make the stakes clear, minus the nerves. What made this more real for many air staff members was showing audiences of various sizes. What does a group of 2,000, 10,000, or 50,000 listeners look like?

When you see how big your following is and think about them right in front of you, it changes how you prep

In podcasting, there is a tension between colloquial informality and the need to be efficient with people’s time. We have all listened to indulgent podcast banter which might have been quaint a few years ago but is cringing to listen to today. “Nice sneakers, are those new?”

What would you do if you had 50 people come see you speak live in a room? Imagine you’re lucky enough to lead a panel at Podcast Movement in front of 500 people. What if 5000 people came. What kind of prep would you do?

See if this connects for you:

A college lecture hall: 250 people.

Olympian Cinema, Greece 700 seat theater

Target Center in Minneapolis: 10,000 people.

The Barcelona Palau Sant Jordi sports complex: 18,000 people.

University of Michigan game day at The Big House in Ann Arbor: 100,000 people.

March for Our Lives DC in 2018: 200,000 people.

Super Bowl 50 victory parade – Denver 2016: 1 million people.

When our hosts could visualize the crowd, their preparation was better, the storytelling became more vivid, and the desire to make “eye contact” with the audience improved.

It's hard to build an audience. It is easier to lose them. If you blow an occasional talk set by meandering or running too long, the world is not likely to end, but the scale changes when it happens often. We all know those fast forward and delete buttons are used more freely than ever.

Our goal was 90% of talk breaks hitting the mark. That might seem like a crazy high standard until you think about the perfection quotient for airplane pilots. One would hope that would be a score of 100%. If 99% of the 45,000 flights each day in the U.S. were trouble-free, the remaining 1% would result in a remarkable 450 crashes daily. Well, okay then.

It's hard to build an audience, It is easier to lose them

In this crowded podcast marketplace, where podcast awareness and discovery are colossal concerns, you need every advantage you can get. Visualizing the audience makes a big difference. When you see how big your following is and think about them right in front of you, it changes how you prep and present. It forces you to be more relevant, more interesting, and more engaged. It sets you up to be better and earn what matters most - your listener’s limited time.

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