Value for Value: How to build unbreakable relationships with your listeners
Fountain hosted a webinar for podcasters to offer practical guidance on how to maximise engagement with Value for Value. Here are the key takeaways.
We recently hosted a webinar with RSS.com to inspire podcasters about the potential that Value for Value brings and offer them practical guidance on how to drive engagement with your audience. This is what we covered:
Part One: Introduction to Podcasting 2.0 and Value for Value
Part Two: Building unbreakable relationships with your listeners on Fountain
Part Three: Q&A with Chris Fisher (Host on Jupiter Broadcasting)
This article focuses on the key takeaways from part two. To catch up on parts one and three, watch the recording at the top of the page or read the full recap on the RSS.com website here.
1. Ask your listeners to support the show
Firstly, you need to find a way for ask your listeners to support the show and it’s important to do this regularly in your podcast.
Get your pitch right: Find a compelling way of explaining why should you and experiment with your language until you begin to see a good response.
Don’t ask for tips: When people hear the word “tips” they think “pocket change” so you are likely to receive smaller amounts.
Be specific: Your listeners might not be familiar with phrases like streaming and boosting, so it’s important to explain simply how it works and how to get started.
Get listeners excited: Given that you’re asking your listeners to try something new, you need to get them hyped up!
Show your gratitude: Thank your supporters, let them know how much it means to you and explain how their contributions help the podcast.
2. Read and respond to messages from supporters
The podcasters who acknowledge their supporters and read their messages typically see much better engagement and earn more money. It makes your fans feel part of the community and creates a sense of FOMO for other listeners. It can also be a great source of content and discussion.
Have a consistent and dedicated format: Most podcasters that read out boosts do it regularly at the start or the end of each episode. They read out the top 3-5 boosts by value, acknowledging the sender and the amount.
Gamify it: Some podcasts run their own leaderboard and award prizes or exclusive merch to their top supporters over time.
3. Get familiar with show and episode splits
Splits are a simple way of sharing income from your podcast with the other people who are involved in creating value for listeners. You can set the default splits for your show, which is useful for adding your co-hosts, your producer etc. Or you can set splits for each episode.
Add your guests as a split: This is a great way to incentivise your audience to support the show. It also incentivises your guests to tell their followers to listen to the episode and support on Fountain. Tell your guest to download Fountain and create an account once you have finished recording with them. Then when the episode has been published, simply update the splits for that episode by finding them and adding them. They will then see their share of the income and all the engagement from that episode in their Fountain wallet and they can reply to the boost comments too.
Contribute to good causes: Some podcasters are happy to share their income with good causes that are close to their heart. And having a worthy cause is also a great incentive for listeners to support your podcast because they know exactly what they are contributing to.
4. Drive discovery of your podcast with clips
Clips are a great way to get your podcast discovered and attract new listeners. You can also share clips as videos on social media, which is really helpful when you are promoting a new episode of your podcast.
Explain how it benefits you and the listener: When a Fountain user creates a clip they earn sats when other users likes the clip. If you tell your audience that the clips that they make help bring more listeners in, they will be happy to help.
Like clips from your listeners: Interacting with clips made by your listeners also make your podcast more likely to be seen by other users in their feed.
5. Attract new listeners with Fountain Promotions
Promotions are a cost-effective growth hack for getting new supporters that allow you to reward new listeners for trying out your podcast for the first time. Listeners earn sats for every minute they spend listening and you decide the maximum amount each listener can earn.
Once you claim your show on Fountain you will be able to promote the latest episode of your show or a specific episode. Once your promotion is live you will get access to metrics so you can see how your promotion is performing.
6. Claim your show on Fountain
Some of the features that we mentioned above are only available to you once you claim your show on Fountain. Here are the main benefits:
Read and respond to boosts sent from all Podcasting 2.0 apps
Manage your splits easily in the Fountain app
Get supporter stats for your show
Access to Fountain Promotions
To get the presentation slides and a complete transcript of the webinar, read the full recap on the RSS.com website here.