Over the last couple of years, podcasts have grown from simply niche entertainment to a cultural phenomenon. The very core of podcasts are stories, and people love stories. Creating engaging narratives is appealing. It's human nature.
Podcasts are a highly effective way of bringing these concepts to life. With millions of people regularly tuning to podcasts, more and more listeners worldwide are more than eager to listen. It's a fantastic strategy to engage people, provide alternative ways to connect with existing audiences, and look for new ones.
Transcription is one of the best means to maximize a podcast's potential. It gives the audience what they're looking for and, in turn, increases engagement. In this post, we'll talk about the ways how you can leverage transcription in boosting podcast engagement:
1. Provides a better user experience
Transcription offers users plenty of ways to look for their interests. For example, the interest of a potential listener is piqued with a short synopsis made possible by a podcast transcript.
In the same way, listeners can benefit from the possibility of scanning the transcript to pick parts that they want to explore further. With access to general themes and keywords, transcriptions allow you to have highly interactive content.
2. Increases accessibility and convenience
Podcast transcripts also increase accessibility and convenience. Keep in mind that information is presented in several ways. For instance, information is best absorbed when some people write it down. Aside from that, transcription makes the podcast's content available to those people with hearing impairments to non-native speakers.
You also need to factor in those that are noise-prohibited environments. By reading the transcript, they can still know about the podcast's content. Aside from that, some parts of the transcript can be easily shared on social media, providing another way for people to discover content.
Now, what if you're transcribing your podcast episodes from time to time, and you have a decent following? Isn't it enough? Well, note quite.
Suppose you want to stand out as a podcaster. In that case, you have to comply with accessibility requirements so that everyone (this includes people non-native people or deaf individuals) can access your podcast. Transcribing audio, or audio transcription, is one of the requirements to maintain compliance.
3. Repurpose compelling content
If a particular topic or theme resounds with your audience, you can use this opportunity to develop engaging content about the subject. Transcribing podcasts makes it possible to create a list of takeaways, blog posts, infographics, etc.
Transcripts simplify the entire process. It breathes new life into great SEO-friendly pieces. In the same way, transcription is an excellent way to provide the audience with what they're looking for, boost engagement, and maximize its tremendous potential.
4. Helps to boost SEO and find new listeners
Providing a transcript also makes it easy for search engines to draw traffic to your site. It's also a more precise way for search engines to index it. Why? Search engines couldn't translate audio. As a result, a podcaster can't improve its content visibility based on audio alone.
On the other hand, when you convert audio into text, it's easier for major search engines to index your site and boost your rankings over time. With so many podcasts that your target demographic can choose from, audio transcription leads to higher search engine rankings over time.
5. Expand your audience and upgrade your reputation
While some people prefer listening, there are still people who like to read texts. So, by transcribing your podcasts, you're enhancing your reach.
Providing a clear transcript will benefit your audience who aren't native speakers, or English isn't their first language. By offering transcripts, you're showing your audience that you care about them, which, in turn, accelerates your growth.
6. Get quoted and credited on other platforms
A podcast transcript also boosts your chance of getting quoted in an article, blog, or tweet, significantly improving your page authority and SEO.
So, if you don't have a transcript yet, and someone hears something they want to quote there, they need to transcribe those texts themselves to share the content. It causes a lot of trouble for your listeners. It also increases the risk of you not being quoted or credited.
On the other hand, if you're providing a transcript, listeners can copy-paste the quote they wanted to share and appropriately credit you for it.
7. Conveys message effectively
Your video content will be so much easier to consume by using transcripts.
People don't have to watch the entire video to find the information they want. They need to look through the text, and they can quickly find it.
8. Promotes advertising efforts
Many businesses are also using ads to deliver targeted content to the audience. Ad campaigns use keyword analysis, word frequency, font size, and the overall link structure. By doing so, you describe what the web page is all about and how it can match Google ads to every page.
Instead of only posting videos, posting transcripts below the video lets search engines know what are the correct terms and publish the most relevant ads.
9. Enhances shareability and social media engagement
It's challenging to share insights from audio podcasts and can even be time-consuming. You can solve this problem by offering a transcribed format that's highly engaging.
As we've mentioned previously, you can easily create articles, blogs, and quotes with transcripts. You can also publish these on your social media platforms, which, in turn, enhances your reach.
Over to You
So there you have it. With all the recent advancements in technology, transcribing a podcast doesn't require you to spend a lot of time, nor is it costly. Podcasters nowadays don't need to spend a lot of their time transcribing them since recent technology has made it more quick, accurate, and cost-effective.
It's also an excellent way to help the audience find what they're looking for, increase your engagement with them, and maximize the enormous potential in these podcasts.