5 Reasons to Publish Podcast Show Notes

by Pat Safford | Aug 16, 2022 | Podcasting

Unlike podcast descriptions and podcast transcripts, podcast show notes are a written overview of a single podcast episode. Posting show notes can help you promote your podcast, engage your listeners, and expand your audience. Below are the five main reasons your podcast needs to publish show notes.

Help Summarize Episodes

Podcast show notes summarize the main points within an episode, which can help listeners know what to expect before checking out an episode. Show notes help answer your audience’s question “Should I actually invest time into listening?” In this way, you can hook new listeners with a sneak peek of your content. Podcast show notes can even remind your existing listenership of major ideas after they’ve finished the episode. This is helpful for your current listeners as they browse your episode archive in search of an old topic.

Demonstrate Expertise Quickly

Before you can engage with your audience, you first need to convince listeners you know what you’re talking about. Podcasts are a great medium to show off your in-depth knowledge, but some listeners will want to vet you as a credible speaker before they press “play.” Fortunately, show notes can give podcast hosts a chance to establish their expertise without requiring their audience to “buy in” right away.

Engage with Your Audience

From using calls to action to encouraging readers to sign up for your email list to making content shareable on social media, show notes can create additional opportunities for you to boost listener engagement. Listeners can post on social media about tips or information you’ve included in your podcast show notes, and content creators you’re working with can reference your work easily. Publishing podcast notes can also help you reach new listeners or convert current listeners into paid subscribers.

Offer Additional Resources for Listeners

Good podcast hosts know how to improve the listening experience for their audience, which means accommodating how people listen to your episodes. Many will consume podcasts while driving or multitasking, but you still want preoccupied listeners to have access to the information you presented later. So if you call out guest speaker bios or cheat sheets—or if you reference videos, photos, and more—during an episode, show notes are a great place to store that content for your listeners to reference when they can actually act on your calls to action.

Generate SEO Content

Creating show notes is also an easy way to repurpose content and optimize your podcast for SEO. Since searching on the internet is still one of the main ways people discover new podcasts, you’ll want to optimize your podcast content to appear in Google search results. Well-written show notes that include strategic keywords can help your podcast website and your episodes appear in search engine results, which, in turn, can help you attract new listeners.

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