Why Your Podcast Needs a YouTube Channel

When we first started our podcast, the Branding Deep Dive Podcast, we didn’t really take video seriously. Sure, we posted the video footage of the podcast on YouTube, but we really didn’t make YouTube a priority. We figured since we’re putting all this effort into making this, we might as well post on YouTube too since its free.

With time, we realized that we should have been paying more attention to how we showed up on YouTube. In fact, if I were to start another podcast today, I’d make sure the YouTube channel is where 80% of our energy went to. And here’s why.

Podcast growth is incredibly hard and slow. Unless you already have an audience, it can be very hard to get new listeners for your show. You can share on social media and invite on bigger guests, but the reality is that podcasts spread by word of mouth - one person at a time. There are a few podcast search engines but really there isn’t a YouTube for podcasts. And that’s where YouTube comes in.

YouTube is a search engine and it also has a content recommendation algorithm. If you can create content that gets clicks, you can build an audience on YouTube.

For our Notion template business, Falconnotes, we started creating content that was primarily focused on trying to get some search traffic. What we found is that we were getting some search traffic - 10-20 views a day - for a few months and we also had some direct traffic. After a few months some of those videos started getting recommended on browse and the view counts grew exponentially. My theory is that by consistently getting some views from search and direct, the YouTube algorithm was able to really pinpoint who the ideal target audience for the videos would be and then started pushing out the content to those people.

YouTube has 122 million daily active users, so once the algorithm figures out who the right audience is, traffic can start coming your way insanely quick.

Alright, I get that I should be on YouTube, but what does that actually mean? How do i properly optimize the podcast for YouTube.

Great question. Most people will take this as, we need to get a high quality camera and nice lights and make the video look all fancy. While that can help, there are plenty of channels that don’t have fancy equipment that are doing tons of views daily. There are three main things to focus on when creating content to really get the most out of YouTube’s algorithm.

By far the most quickest way to get views is to find whats trending and create a video with a unique angle or take that other people aren’t covering. Add to the discussion. Our best performing video came right after Apple announced the Apple Vision Pro. I did an analysis of Apple’s marketing keynote of their headset compared to Meta’s marketing keynote. This was an analysis that really hadn’t been done on YouTube with footage from both keynotes. I made sure to finish the video within 2 days of the event so it was still fresh and the video got picked up on the algorithm and got to over 20k views.

The best YouTubers spend considerable time before they even start writing a script for a video on what the title and thumbnail will be. If its doesn’t make them want to click, they don’t even bother making the video, no matter how interested they are in the subject. If you can’t get people to click on your video, then it doesn’t matter how good the content is, no one will watch it. The mistake I made in my YouTube journey was that I was recording podcasts about what I wanted to talk about and then i threw together a title and thumbnail after - and most of the time the titles and thumbnails weren’t anything clickworthy.

Another mistake I made is creating what I wanted to create, not what people wanted to see. YouTube is a search engine, so people come to the platform when they’re looking for answers or some specific content as well, not just browse. If you’re having difficulty breaking through with browse, spend some time doing keyword research and really think through how you can provide value or give a better experience to people searching the queries in your niche. Most of the time search traffic isn’t as exponential as browse, but itll bring in consistent views every month. Over time, you’ll slowly keep getting exposed to new people and the people that find value in your videos will start to watch your other videos as well.

So you’re saying we should make clips and post on YouTube?

No, I’m not saying you should simply take clips from your content and post it on YouTube. This works for established podcasts that already have a following, but for someone starting from zero you’ll have to create YouTube specific videos and content. You can dedicate your time in your podcast recording to create a YouTube segment - or you can format your show in a way that it makes for good clips where you cover the whole point and then move on to another topic. That way you can clip it out easier. That being said, you have to spend time before you record anything thinking through the title and thumbnail, or you’ll just be blindly swinging. Sure you may hit the ball once or twice, but its a lot harder to bat blindfolded.