💃🏻 Your Holiday Marketing Plan 🎉
🤸♀️Podcast marketing: let's have some fun. 🌈
Hello, hello!
As we quickly approach “let’s circle back to this in the new year” season, it’s a cool time to think about your podcast’s plans for the holidays. Time to consider questions like: are you going to be taking any time off? Will you be running any special content? What should your audience expect from you and vice versa?
Let’s talk about all the possibilities for this wonderful time of year.
If you take one thing from this
Communication is key. Whether you’re taking a break or running some special content during this time, tell people! Keep your audience in the know and promote any unique plans.
Let’s get to it!
First things first
If you’re planning to make any changes to your content or your publishing schedule, tell your audience. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with taking a break and letting yourself rest so that you’re ready to go for the new year. But you don’t want to leave your audience hanging if you’re planning to take a break. Later on we’ll also share some ideas for how you can take a break without a break in your feed.
If you’re planning something special, get your audience hyped up about it! Make sure they know to still tune in for what you have in store. Plus, if you are planning something special, this makes for a great opportunity to put some press out about it. Newsletters love to feature when a podcast is doing something unique or notable.
So, what’s the plan?
A break without a break in your feed
💡Idea #1: Partner with some other shows to setup some feed swaps
If you’ve been following us for a while you know we LOVE feed swaps. They offer great opportunities to partner with shows that might be bigger than yours and audiences that are very aligned with your content.
A feed swap is when you and a show you’re partnering with drop an episode of each other’s show into your feeds. Each host should record an introduction for the episode to tell their audience what it’s about and why they think the audience will love it. When done right, with thoughtful audience alignment, feed swaps can be really powerful.
What’s great about setting up feed swaps during the holidays is that it keeps your feed active with new content for your audience, but doesn’t take as much work on your end so you still get a little break. If you’re able to coordinate 3 or 4 feed swaps, you could have the whole month of December covered! Now, you might be thinking ‘wait a second, then my feed is going to get too crowded with other people’s content?!’ Here’s another great thing about feed swaps– they don’t have to be forever. You and the other show could both agree to keep the episodes in your feed for a limited time, like 30 days.
💡Idea #2: Re-air some of your most popular or notable episodes of the year
This is another great low-lift option because you’re using what you’ve already got. To make the most of this, you might consider re-recording a new intro for each episode that talks about why you’re airing it again, anything notable or related that has happened since the episode originally aired, or a favorite part you want the audience to listen for this time. If any of those episodes also featured guests, subject matter experts, or mention of other podcasts, let them know and tag them when you post about it. It’ll give them something to share on their channels and help spread the word!
Special Content
💡Idea #1: Your own year end list
People love a listicle. They’re shareable, a fun listen and a great way to spread the love. Whether it’s people or podcasts within your niche or just some of your favorite podcasts in general, putting together an episode like this can introduce your audience to some things they might love and open up opportunities for you. By mentioning some of your favorite podcasts you open up an opportunity to connect with those podcasts when you send them a note telling them they were featured!
💡Idea #2: A themed mini series
What’s a theme, problem, feeling, or question that your audience might be thinking about at the end of the year or around the holidays? Build some special episodes around that for a very timely and pitchable series that could give you an extra promotional boost. If it’s a slow time, newsletters might be hungrier for interesting things to feature and you’ll be ready to help them out! Remember, newsletters love a unique hook.
💡Idea #3: A round up of your favorite podcasts you partnered with this year
It’s similar to the year end listicle, but it’s like saying to those shows “I loved working with you, hope we can do it again in the new year!” Your audience gets a mini podcast recommendation episode curated by you and you nurture your podcast partnerships for more possibilities next year. Plus, if you tell the other shows about it, they might share the episode with their audience and help give you a boost!
✨ Bonus ✨
Remember to also include some pitches to year end lists as part of your holiday marketing plan! We shared some tips for doing this in the last issue.
🪄More Magic 🪄
☎️ Listen to Tink's Call-In Show (& how it can help you market your podcast) 🪄
From the Desk of Tink
Want a safe space to break down and understand this wild political climate? And from a Black and Brown perspective? Democracy-ish is a podcast dedicated to fighting for democracy and preserving your sanity in a time when both are under active assault by forces committed to white supremacy and stupidity. Hosts Danielle Moodie and Wjahat Ali always keep it real, blunt and entertaining as they discuss how we can achieve a multiracial democracy.