Building a Brand Around a Podcast

Aug 14

The are many reasons to start a podcast such as you have knowledge you want to share or making your podcast a business itself. But for many, they want to go even further and build their brand around a podcast. Building a brand around your podcast can help build a strong online presence, help you stand out from others in your industry, and build a deeper connection with your audience. So, today we are going to dive into defining your brand identity, creating your look, how to promote your brand, and more.

Let’s jump in!

Defining Your Brand Identity

Before you can even build a brand around your podcast you will need to figure out and narrow down what your brand identity is. This will include your brands values, target audience, voice, brand look (which I cover in more detail in the next section), basically it is what makes your brand memorable. Here is a good read by Hubspot on how to develop a brand identity in 2023.

But if you are wanting to get a good idea of what your brand is:

First, figure out your goals and what you want your podcast (business) to represent. Is there something you want to be known for? Think of brands who you know of right away by the colors or logo? Think Little Tikes colors, Nike’s logo or even Coca Cola — these brands have built an image around their brands that you can’t forget. That’s what you are aiming to do with your show, how can you build your brand to be remembered, be different, be YOU, and stand out?

Next, get a good idea of who your audience currently is (or ideally will be) so you may have to do some research to figure out more information on them. Do some surveys, questionnaires or just ask people in your audience whether on social media, in your newsletter or through your podcast (if you have one already) and get an idea of what they are looking for when it comes to a podcast. Is there anything specific you should do to help you standout in your industry? Also compare to your competitors (and other experts/influencers with similar audiences) to get a sense of what they are looking for as well. Engaging directly with your ideal listener is a great way to get information directly from the source itself.

Then gather everything you’ve learned, what do you want to implement (and not implement) and begin building your brand. Remember, you can always change and rebrand down the road, you are never set in stone if don’t want to be. This will just help give you an idea of how to better serve your ideal listener and build your brand in a way to serve THEM (who it’s really about!)

Creating the Look

Now, as mentioned above part of building your brand identity is the visual aspect of it all. Not only do you want it to be consistent across everything (platforms, website, socials, etc.) but you also want it to be visually appealing and have it make sense to brand. Items you will want to have nailed with your branding:

Logo
Cover Art
Title
Color Scheme
Typography
Photos (if you use presets or themes you will want to keep theme consistent)
Website
Social Media
Email Marketing
Promotional material
Anywhere else your podcast is marketed or displayed - you will want to keep it the same!

This will help your listeners (and potential listeners) to remember you and relate that, that content is yours. That way even if you don’t have your name all over it or they’ve seen you before they can recognize your brand, know where to go, and where the information came from. B2B Marketing says, it takes around 7 interactions with your brand before a purchase takes place and I would apply that to remembering your brand as well.

Put your Podcast Branding to Action!

Once you’ve figured out what your brand identity is and built your branding look, you are ready to put it all in action!

If it’s a rebrand, go ahead and share with listeners about it. Hopefully if you did your market research, they may already know it’s in the works because you’ve chatted with them about it. Plus, it’s great to keep your listeners connected on behind the scenes to build trust and include them in the process.

If you are just launching, now that you have your look – begin promoting it! If you haven’t launched your show, them begin promoting the launch and that it’s coming soon. Start getting your brand and podcast out there so people will remember it when it does launch.

You can begin promoting your brand on your social media, newsletter, or do promos/collaborations with other podcasts to name a few.

And don’t forget to…

Engage with your audience to help build a community around your new brand.
Continue to gather feedback from listeners because things are always changing and you never know when you may need to make some adjustments to help keep your brand relevant and helpful for your audience.

Bob the Brand Builder!

I hope I have given you the tools to bob, the brand builder your own podcast! It just takes some initial thoughts on what your goals are, what you want your brand identity to be, and doing the market research to make sure you are hitting all the right pieces. You don’t want to be accidentally branding Oppenheimer to Barbie fans…