The explosion of popularity in Podcasting over the last five years looks set to continue into 2021, offering Northern Ireland businesses tremendous opportunities.

The rise owes a lot to American podcasts from Joe Rogan, (yes, the bald UFC guy who’s always talking about Conor McGregor), and the wildly successful crime podcast ‘Serial’.

But Podcasting isn’t just useful for UFC commentators or people immersed in ‘Who Dunnit?’ crime stories; when used correctly, it can be a hugely worthwhile content type to add to your marketing plan. And while Podcasting has taken off across the Atlantic, we’ve been a little slower here to get on board.

The old saying, “When America sneezes, the whole world gets the flu” springs to mind. It could just as easily be applied to Podcasting, “When America proves the benefits of podcasting, we should all listen.”

So, let’s look at 3 reasons why every Northern Ireland business should use Podcasting.

1. Your customers are listening. Are you?

According to Ofcom, around 7 million people in the UK now listen to podcasts every week. That’s one person in every eight regularly listening to podcasts.

Still not convinced?

When we look at it at a Northern Ireland level, an impressive 22% of adults have used ‘listen again’ services or podcasts. So, one out of every five of your current or prospective customers are consuming this type of content: are you going to provide it to them, or will it be one of your competitors?

Could your opportunity be: “Hear today, gone tomorrow?”

2. Hear, Hear: Reach more qualified leads.

Let me take a wild guess and say that you use the below as part of your marketing efforts:

• Print newspaper advertising
• Google Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising
• Facebook advertising

But guess what? If 10,000 people read a newspaper, how many of those are A, interested in your business, B, see your advert among hundreds of other adverts and C, take action?

The percentage is minuscule. Now imagine that you’ve set up a PPC campaign on Google; you’re attracting clicks to your website but not turning these clicks into sales.

Or you could be ‘boosting’ a post on Facebook, but how does that translate into sales?

The sobering reality is that with all options above, your success rate could be 0.7% on a good day and you’re in a constant state of ‘Pay To Play’ – once your advertising stops, so does the website clicks and impressions.

Say hello to your new best friend: Podcasting.

If someone listens to your podcast, chances are they’re already a ‘warm lead’ – they clicked to listen to your podcast after reading a description, and they’re most likely involved in your industry or have a vested interest in it.

Take a Hospitality Manager in Northern Ireland as an example; chances are they might listen to any of these Top 9 Hospitality Podcasts.

Will they also tune in to podcasts about Cricket, Medicine or learning Italian?

Hell no, they only listen to what is of interest to them.

3. Cha-Ching: Podcasting won’t break your budget.

With belts tightening after the pandemic, it’s only natural to wonder what you can do to save the pennies.

But the beauty of Podcasting is that you can create waves (pun intended) for a fraction of the cost of traditional and digital advertising.

At Granite Podcast Studio we charge just £40 + VAT per hour for a one-off session (we’re practically giving it away at that price!).

Need your podcast edited too by our experts?

Our editing option costs just £40 + VAT per hour.

And for just £80 you can have your podcast professionally recorded and expertly edited.

So, what are you waiting for?

Find out more by clicking HERE.