Speaker 1: Hi, I'm Sarah, OSHA's U.S. Podcast Ambassador, the podcast marketing platform that helps grow your audience and boost your podcast. Today, I'm going to talk to you about Apple Podcasts and Spotify, and how to improve your rankings on both directories. Welcome to Tips. Apple Podcasts and Spotify are the two most important podcast directories out there. They account for about every 7 out of 10 downloads for every podcast that's hosted on OSHA. That's a lot. And there are over 2 million shows on these platforms, which means it can be hard to stand out and even harder to get listened to. But do not worry. I got your back. OSHA's got your back. Today, I'm going to give you some tips to improve your rankings and increase your visibility. Of course, the algorithms of Apple Podcasts and Spotify are a bit like those of Twitter and Instagram. Top secret. And in our research, we've noticed a few things that could be interesting for you. When someone subscribes to your show, they get a notification as soon as a new episode is released. Now, this is cool for you because you'll know you'll get a certain number of listens. But it also shows the platforms that you have a community that likes your content and is listening to it. The algorithms love that. So remember to encourage your audience to subscribe at the beginning of your podcast, at the end of your podcast, or even in the middle of your podcast. Go nuts. By the way, did you know you can subscribe to this YouTube channel? And we're in the middle of the video. Then there is category, and there are definitely some that are more competitive than others. And it's definitely harder to get subscribers when you are in a heavily saturated category, as opposed to one that's a bit more niche, where you can stand out. For example, 20% of all podcasts are referenced under the music category, but they only represent 2% of podcasts that are listened to. I mean, that's like finding a needle in a haystack. So try to reference yourself in a less competitive category. And the third thing to please the algorithms is the frequency in which you release your episodes. I think I've said this before in previous episodes, but let's just say it again. The most important thing when it comes to publishing your podcast is regularity. So just make sure you have a schedule that you stick to, whether it's monthly, weekly, bi-weekly, daily. Ooh, that sounds hard. Whatever you want, just keep it regular. And finally, a fourth element is the title and description of your podcast and your episodes, because they play a huge role in the referencing and visibility of your podcast. FYI, platforms, they do not like it when people put episodes or podcast in the title of your podcast or episodes. We get it. You're listening to a podcast. Your audience already knows that. You don't have to explain it to them, unless it's your grandma. But in which case, she's actually quite a tech-savvy grandma downloading that podcast. Way to go, granny. Yes. So while titles and descriptions don't play a big role in the ranking of your podcast, they do play a big role in the discoverability of your podcast. And I'm talking about the good old keyword technique. The more keywords in your metadata, the more easy it is for your audience to find you and listen to you and subscribe to you and love you. Did you know that it is actual real humans who choose which podcast to be featured on the homepages of the different platforms? It's true. They are not robots, and they wanted me to tell you that. As much as you might think that they are. Every day, dozens of podcasts are reviewed by the various editorial teams who are looking to find the next best podcast for their audiences. Now, podcast curators allegedly do not have any specific criteria when selecting a podcast, but they have hinted to some top things they are looking for in general when selecting a podcast of excellent quality. The hook. From the very first seconds of the podcast, they want to make sure the audience is engaged and wants to keep listening. The format and style. A podcast should be informative yet entertaining. Authenticity. Engaging conversations. They love shows that are thought-provoking and get people asking some questions. Consistency in the quality of the content. Surprises in the episodes. Personality and the energy of the host. Themes. Themes that are diverse and interesting and can appeal to a large amount of people. Production quality. And finally, experimental formats like fiction, for example. So, you know, just do all of that and you'll be fine. You'll be good. You'll be on the front. You'll be selected as one of the best podcasts of the year by Apple. And don't forget to also pay attention to your podcast cover, because all the platforms like to have beautiful covers that have a beautiful homepage as well. If you don't know, I already made a tips episode about how to make a beautiful podcast cover, so if you want to boost your cover game, definitely go check it out. While Apple and Spotify do publicly communicate some things that can positively impact your rankings, they are very vague about others, specifically your reviews and ratings and completion rate. But hey, it doesn't hurt to talk about it. I mean, I think we can all agree, most times when people leave reviews, it's not usually a positive thing. So if you get feedback on your podcast, positive feedback that is, that's great for you. It shows you've got engagement, people like your show, and hopefully the platforms take notice. One last thing that may influence the algorithms is your completion rate. The completion rate is the statistic that lets you know if your audience listened to the end of your episode, if they completed the episode. Get it? Completion rate. Completed the episode. We get it. We get it. Okay. All right. For now, we don't know if that stat has much impact on your ranking, but take care of your content as much as possible because you want people to listen to the end of your episodes. And that only brings good things for you in the future. And that's it. If you want to go even further in the development of your podcast and discover all the tools that OSHA's created to make your life easier, please visit our website at OSHA.gov. I hope you liked this video. If you did, please like, subscribe, and share it, or leave a comment below. We'd love to see it. Thanks so much. See you later. Bye.