Video Strategies for Your Podcast—Including No Video
I've been producing both audio and video versions of the Sound Off Podcast for years now. Here's what surprises people: 88.1% of our consumption is audio.
I say this as someone who invests in video production. I value it. I want people who prefer watching to have a good experience. But when I look at how people actually consume this show, the numbers tell a clear story.
This matters because I keep hearing the same narrative at conferences and in industry discussions: everyone wants to watch podcasts now. Everyone? Then who are all these people spending 40 minutes listening to mine?
I recently asked the podcast community to send me their consumption stats—time spent listening from Apple, Spotify, and YouTube, same date range. I want to compare notes. I suspect many producers would discover something similar if they took a proper look at their numbers: audio is doing more work than they think.
Here's the thing about strategy: it requires knowing what you're measuring. A YouTube view and a podcast download do not represent the same experience. Someone who spends 40 minutes with an episode has given you 40 minutes of their life. Someone who leaves after 30 seconds has given you 30 seconds. Those are different levels of attention.
A video strategy CAN mean you don't even have to buy a camera. You cna use Headliner's tool to create videos like this one blow.
Before you redesign your show around video, before you invest in cameras and editing and three-angle setups, ask what your metrics actually mean. Look at completion rates. Look at how people find you and how long they stay. Then make decisions based on your show, your audience, and your resources—not on what you heard someone else is doing.
That's a strategy.
Another fun stat. One thing I would point out is that our biggest download of the year is just over 30 days old.... which skews the number up from the norm which is about 57%.
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