52. Why your podcast needs a blog

Podcast Strategy helps you improve the value of your podcast

Laura: If

Laura: If you’ve ever wondered how to get more value out of your podcast content without having to be everywhere online all the time, this one’s for you. Welcome to Podcast Strategy that brings in clients. I’m your host, Laura M. McCrae, podcast producer and content strategist. If you want your podcast to bring in leads, build trust and support your business, you’re in the right place. Because smart content starts with your podcast, but it doesn’t stop there.

Laura: Hello.

Go to Evergreen blog and SEO strategist Anita Dykstra joins us today

Laura: And in today’s episode, I’m joined by the brilliant Anita Dykstra, the Go to Evergreen blog and SEO strategist who’s worked with major names like Lonely Planet, Huffington Post and skyscanner. Anita’s been helping online business owners grow their visibility and bring in leads on autopilot since 2019. And she’s here to show you how you can do the same by turning your podcast episodes into into Evergreen blog posts. We talk about why blog content is still incredibly powerful even in the age of AI. We’ll also talk about how you can repurpose your transcripts the right way, what to avoid if you want your blog to bring in traffic, and how this strategy can help you reduce your reliance on social media. I recently took Anita’s course, Blog Traffic Machine, and I’ve already started seeing more engagement on my blog just by updating old posts the way she teaches. And I’m now sharing it with you. Let’s get into it. So, hi, Anita, and welcome to the show.

Anita: Hi. Thank you for having me.

Having a blog is a great idea to go along with your website

Laura: So, first off, why should podcasters consider.

Laura: Turning their episodes into blog posts?

Anita: So having a blog is such a great idea to go along with your website, especially for podcasters. Because the thing is, is as a podcaster, you have tonnes of great content that you are putting out, sometimes weekly, fortnightly, once a month, whatever it is to you. And you can easily turn that audio content into written content that is hosted on your website, that is SEO optimised and also optimised for AI search engines like ChatGPT. So that when people are searching for what you teach or, you know, what you’re helping people with, um, it connects you and your content with their search intent, their search question, or whatever kind of information they’re trying to find. So you’re basically taking one piece of content and you’re making it twice as visible, um, and just in a different format. So for podcasters, it is extremely valuable because you are teaching or you’re talking all of the time and you have so much to offer, whereas you could just take that piece of Content and then just put it in a different format and you could potentially, um, increase your email subscribers, can send people to your social media, you know, whatever that kind of goal is for you, back to your podcast, and you’re just kind of like widening your visibility.

Laura: So I’ve done your course blog traffic.

Laura: Machine, and I’ve seen how you turn a, uh, podcast transcript into a blog post. And you don’t use ChatGPT or anything. Have you changed since then or do you still do it manually? Every single one.

Anita: So definitely, as AI has kind of integrated into everything that we do these days, I have started to use a little bit of AI to help me with kind of like the structure of, you know, how things should be set out on the blog post. Um, I don’t use AI to the full, like, just take this transcript and put it into a blog post because I still believe that it needs to have that kind of, that personality. And with a lot of AI tools, it’s still very robotic and it doesn’t exactly bring your, uh, kind of voice or your, like, personality to the blog post. So I’m definitely not against AI. It can be used in a really beautiful way and integrated from, you know, your podcast episode to your blog post. So I use AI, but not to, like, just copy and paste, if that makes sense.

Laura: Yeah.

Turn a podcast transcript into a blog post, please

Laura: So can you tell us how you.

Laura: Turn a transcript into a blog post, please?

Anita: Yes, totally. So what you’ll do is you will get the transcript of your podcast episode. So I like to use descript to record my own podcast, and that gives me a transcript. Then I can easily, um, I can go to ChatGPT and be like, hey, what’s a structure taken from this transcript that would help me turn it into a blog post? Like, what are the main kind of factors that I’m talking about in this podcast episode? And you want to identify those main factors because those are going to be your headings for your blog post. So you will, um, identify the structure first and then you’ll take your transcript and you

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Anita: will simply like, plug in to, under each heading, the information, if that makes sense.

Laura: What I’ve always wondered as well. So I have a blog page for my blogs, and I have a page for my show notes, which is set up like a blog page. And so I have my show notes for my podcast on one. Um, and then I repurpose them to make a blog post that isn’t in reference to the podcast. So, um, I’m repurposing it in two places, and I’m wondering if I’m, um, making life harder for myself. Or I should just put them all in one place.

Anita: Yeah, I would recommend putting it all in one place because the thing is, is that like, show notes are great and they were definitely needed like a couple of years ago. But as things are kind of like moving along differently with, um, AI and website structure and blog content and all of that, I think that you could save time by just having one resource, and that will be your blog post slash show notes, because that’s going to have all of your information in one place. What you could do is at the top of the blog post, you could have like a little like a custom box or something and you could have quick links to things that you do talk about in the podcast episode in case someone doesn’t really want to read the whole blog post. Right. So you could do that. You could do like a kind of a combination of the two, I guess. But I would have it in one place to just make it really simple and easy for yourself rather than like referencing two different URLs.

Laura: Yeah. And I guess you could just put the embed code within the blog post so they can listen to the podcast if they want.

Anita: Yeah, totally, totally. Yeah, I would definitely do that and, you know, put it near the top so that people can, you know, read through it or they can just straightaway listen to the podcast episode, make it easy for them.

Laura: Feel like your podcast should be doing more for your business. If your downloads have stopped growing, your content’s not landing, or you’re second guessing every episode, it’s not about doing more, it’s about doing what works. That’s where my podcast audit comes in. I’ll look behind the scenes, review your show, and give you a clear plan to get it working for your business. Bringing in leads and building trust with the the right audience. Head to podcastsupportservices.com audit.

So how can blogs help podcasters get found outside of social media

Laura: So how can blogs help podcasters get found outside of social media?

Anita: It all comes down to, uh, SEO. So SEO stands for search engine optimization. Search engines like Google, there is Bing, there is Safari, now there is, you know, ChatGPT, there’s Claude, there’s all of these AI tools as well. Gemini. And the thing is is that your ideal customers will most likely be using at least one of these search, uh, engines. Right. Um, a lot of people were using Google. Now they have switched over to ChatGPT. But the thing is, is that you need to know a little bit about search engine optimization and not even just with blog content, but it’s really Important if you have a website in general, so you want to basically connect one, what people are searching for on those search engines to your business. So let’s say that you were, um, doing Facebook ads. You were teaching Facebook ads, you know how to create them, what kind of creative to do. If your ideal client is, uh, searching for how to set up a Facebook ad campaign, you want to create content that connects that search question. Right. So maybe you have a podcast episode that you can then turn into a blog post. And, and then you want to make sure that you optimise that piece of content for that person that is typing or talking into their ChatGPT AI thing and asking that question. So it is really important. There is, like, a few different things that you can do to optimise your, uh, blog posts and also your website in general, which is really important. But in the grand scheme of things, it comes down to SEO. You need to know a little bit about how to connect those dots.

Laura: Yeah. And there’s a tool you use.

Laura: What’s it called?

Anita: I use key search to find what my ideal clients are searching for on these search engines. It’s a really great tool. It’s super affordable. Some of these SEO tools, to be honest, are crazy expensive. And I do not recommend, especially if you’re just getting into SEO. But KeySearch is really simple, um, easy to use, affordable. If you don’t want to invest into a tool, you could simply just do some market research and ask your ideal customers, um, and people who are, uh, you’re connected with, what kind of questions they’re asking, um, how are they wording things? Once you understand that, you will have just

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Anita: a huge amount of content that you could create or that you could connect to content that you’ve already created.

Laura: The reason I got into trying to SEO up my website is because I’m a bit over social, uh, media. I know I’m supposed to show my face and do this and that, but it gets a bit draining after a while. So I thought if I just make my blog post better and my podcast show notes better, then I’m, um, hoping to get more traffic to my website and it will just make life easier for me.

Anita: Oh, yes. Yeah. That is probably one of the top, like, reasons that I love it as well. Because I also have an autoimmune disease and I struggle with my energy quite a lot. And so quite a lot of the time, I can just simply cannot show up on social media. I just do not have the energy. I don’t do not have the time and when I have optimised blog posts, that means that every single month or every single day, people are coming to my website because my content is being connected with these search engines. So it allows you to not have to show up all the time. Um, and it allows social media to become like a happy extra thing that you can do, which I know will resonate with a lot of people. I’ve talked to so many people over the years who are just so sick of having to show up on social media to try and get their business out there. And I just want people to know that there is another way. You don’t have to do Instagram, you don’t have to do all of these social media platforms and kind of, you know, go with these algorithms. But, you know, this is why I love blog content is. It’s just, it’s something that I can do in my pyjamas, in my bed if I need to, and it’s just a much easier way to market.

Laura: Well, it has worked since I’ve been updating, uh, my blog posts. Before I just used to put them out there and didn’t think anything of it. And now I’ve noticed I’m getting comments back. It’s like, this has never happened before. Now I’m doing it properly, it’s working.

Anita: Yes. I love that. Yeah. It’s amazing what you can do once you know, like, how to do it and the steps that you need to follow. Yeah, yeah.

Laura: It really does make a difference and you get that engagement back, which is really nice.

Anita: Yeah.

Some people say no one reads blogs anymore, but do you use search engines

Laura: And so blogging, for some people, they think it’s a bit old school. So what would you say to someone who says no one reads blogs anymore?

Anita: I would ask back, do you use a search engine? Because if you do, you probably read blog posts every single day and you don’t even know it. The thing is, blog posts are, uh, basically just pages on a website. So you have to start thinking about blogs differently. Of course. Like when blogging came out, and I think it was the early 90s, it was sort of like a diary form. You know, like, today I did this and tomorrow I’m going to do this or whatever. But, uh, when businesses started to hop on to blog marketing, they realised that there is a huge opportunity to create content that really connects with their ideal customer. And so now blog posts are much, much more powerful than just what they were in the early 90s. Now they actually help you grow your email list, they help you make sales, they, they help you with the tonnes of different things. Visibility in Anything that you want in business, you can use a blog post to help you get there. And so yeah, I would say if you use Google, if you use ChatGPT, you are reading and consuming blog content already.

Can you share a simple SEO tip that every podcaster should know

Laura: Can you share a simple SEO tip.

Laura: Every podcaster should know?

Anita: Oh, okay, I’m going to share. One that is pretty basic, but I think is overlooked is when you’re thinking of a title for your blog post, it doesn’t have to be the same title as your podcast episode. That’s number one. And the second part to this is make sure that your title or the title of your blog post is not like fancy language or uh, it’s not like cute. Right. It needs to be really simple and to the point. Like for example, a blog post that I have is how to turn a podcast episode into a blog post, I think in three easy ways or something like that. So it’s very simple headline, it’s a very simple title. And that is what works best with SEO. Getting to the point like no fluff, no cute titles, no cute language that no one is searching for. Make sure that it’s really simple and to the point.

Laura: Yeah, that’s what I always believe as well. The same with podcast episode titles. Podcast names say what it is. Mhm.

Anita: Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Have you worked with a podcaster who saw a big result from turning podcasts into blogs

Laura: Have you worked with a podcaster who saw a big result from turning their episodes into blogs?

Anita: Yes. So I cannot remember their name, but they had quite a few episodes of their podcast which

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Anita: they put out over the course of, I think a couple of years. And they spent one month, uh, repurposing a whole lot of podcasts into blog posts. And they actually doubled their email subscribers within 30 days just by repurposing their old content. This wasn’t even new content that they were putting out like currently. It was old content that was just sitting there on their podcast and they repurposed it, uh, into blog content that was able to show up for their ideal customers. So the thing is, is that with blog posts, if you’re a podcaster, you probably have a library of content that you have put out already. And so don’t think that you need to like, you know, consistently put out podcast episodes in order to create blog posts. Go back to your library of your podcast content and start repurposing that first, like get into the groove of uh, it. So yeah, this particular lady, she had incredible results by just repurposing old content.

Laura: Amazing. So her podcast was getting found on search engines rather than in podcast apps.

Anita: Yes, exactly.

Laura: So thanks very much today, Anita. So where can people learn more about.

Laura: You and work with you and connect with you?

Anita: Yeah. So you can find me on my website. It’s Anita dijkstra.com I know that Dijkstra is a little bit hard to spell, so I’m sure it’ll be in the show notes. You can find me on Instagram. Anissa Dijkstra. And that’s basically it. I’m. Yeah. On my email list. Um, but you can find that all on my website.

Laura: Perfect. Thank you. Thank you so much.

Laura: How good was that? Anita has such a practical approach that makes blogging feel way less intimidating, especially for podcasters who are already creating so much valuable content. If you’re keen to get more traffic, leads and long term results from your podcast episodes, I highly recommend checking out Anita’s course Blog Traffic Machine. It’s what helped me finally update my blog posts in a way that’s strategic and sustainable and I’m already seeing the difference. Thanks for tuning in. And if you found this episode helpful, you’ll love next week’s episode where we meet with Anita again to talk about promoting your podcast on Pinterest.

This episode is brought to you by Podcast Support Services

This episode is brought to you by Podcast Support Services. Podcast strategy that attracts leads, clients, and credibility. Are you looking for a podcast producer? We may have availability. Head to podcastsupportservices.com au.

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