Podcast Content Strategy: Audiograms Vs. Video Shorts

Want your podcast and videocast to be seen, heard, found and rewarded in this noisy digital world, you are not alone. Join the nonprofit community at Podcasters United and podcast industry experts Tom Hazard and Tracy Hazard as they debunk all that outdated and bad advice you've been getting from the podcast gurus and find out what actually works. Today, get ready to feed. Feed your brand with smart cut tactics proven to cast your original voice to the world.

Hey everyone. Welcome to Feed you'd brand. I'm Tom Hazard along with my co host Tracy Hazard and today we're going to talk about a podcast content strategy, specifically audiograms versus video shorts. This is really important and we have some insights to share from our experience, not only with our own podcast, but all the podcasts that we produce and host for podcasters. Just like you listening to this and or watching this on YouTube, we have a lot of data that supports what we're about to share with you about what's working and what's not working. Right, Tracy?

Absolutely. So because we have multiple shows that we're doing every year of our own, we, we do a lot of experimentation that other people can't do because we've got plenty of content to share out. Where some of you are maybe struggling with your content and strategy in general, but the type of content is a significant part of the decision. It's not just what channel am I going to share in, that's a critical piece, but then what type of content am I going to share and what resonates? And one of the things that you and I recommend here, and we recommend starting with one channel, getting the content types right in that channel and then moving on to the next channel. So unless you're already everywhere on social media and you're adept at that, that's a strategy that we put in place. And there's a past episode here in feed your brand on that about the one channel strategy that we do. And this is a great way for you to get started, but it is this, I'm going to call it, design of experiment of the content types match to the channel and audience type that is critically important in the decision making process. And then what you do is you try to take the learnings that you made in one channel and then take it to the next. Well, very early on we were very strong in a couple of platforms. We were very strong in Facebook and we were really strong in Pinterest, interestingly enough. But that's where I was already strong before we started our first podcast. So when you start Something early, you tend to stay strong in that. So. So in that channel. And so we had. Pinterest had started to develop some strategies early on for allowing videos, and the short clips were doing really well there. And so we didn't always produce videos for our podcast. And so very early on I would test video clips, but we didn't really have video to use, so we created audiograms and that's what we want to talk about. So. Hey, Tom, would you define audiograms for this community here and how podcasters use them specifically?

Sure. I mean, I think experienced podcasters have probably heard of them and seen them, or maybe you've seen them and you didn't realize they were called audiograms. But for those of you that don't know or are new to podcasting, an audiogram is the way to take a clip of your podcast audio and share it on social media. Because guess what, social media platforms do not let you share an audio clip by itself. An MP3 file or M4, a file or other audio file. The only mechanism for sharing a clip is to share a video. So what happens in an audiogram is you create a video, a short video, with usually a still image or sometimes there can be some movement to it, an audio waveform. Certainly the captions of what's said in this audio clip are also very often part of an audiogram. And essentially you're taking this audio track of a clip, 30 seconds, a minute, whatever length you want, converting into a video so you can share it on social. But I want to be clear, it's not full motion video.

Yeah, it's a still image, but sometimes it has like the audio wave moving and the captioning is usually moving if you've got captioning going on to it. Yeah. So those are the components of it. And usually it's formatted in vertical for social media. So you have a long portrait style style and then if you are pushing it into YouTube, if you put it into the regular YouTube videos. There are a lot of podcasters who do full length audiograms where it's a still image of their brand, of their cover art, or a podcast captioning, and they use that to broadcast it when they don't have video, but they use that to. To on their YouTube channel in the full length version. So there is some cases where you might use a full length video, but it's not as common. But it does happen in YouTube.

Boy, Tracy, I remember when audiograms were kind of a new thing and there were some new Services that came out specifically to create audiograms in an easier way. I mean, really, anybody that ever did any video editing had all the tools necessary to be able to create an audiogram, but there were some automated tools that would do it.

And.

And in the beginning it was like, oh my gosh, everybody needs an audiogram. And it's what most podcasters were sharing. But I also have to say it was at a time in the evolution of podcasting where I would say much less than half of podcasters were recording and publishing actual video of their episodes.

Oh, I think it was probably less than a third back then.

May have been. You know, I remember Tracy, when we started our first podcast, this is going back about a decade now, which is really scary to think about, but we started saying, oh yeah, we're going to video every episode. But in case you didn't know it, Tracy and I were publishing five episodes a week. That was a lot of content. And we did that for some reasons that made sense at the time, and it was very successful for us. But we very quickly, not only from the logistics and the hassles of doing it, but also the expense because we were paying someone else to edit the video, we really quickly abandoned video and went audio only for years. Right. And part of that's because you didn't want to have to do your hair or makeup and be on video, right?

Yeah, that's exactly what I say to people, which is true. But we did do video. We just did what we called video compliments, video supplements. We would do B roll type stuff and we would publish those on YouTube and. Cause we were doing a podcast on 3D printing. So we'd show the machine and not us. And so there was other things that we would do, but we were always doing those. But when audiograms came out and really we started experimenting with them and using them in full force, mostly in our Pinterest, but in other areas, especially on Facebook and then eventually into Instagram. We would use them basically in 2018, starting then to try to refine them. We really did a lot more in 2019, and we rolled them out to our clients in 2019-2020. We started producing them for our production clients. But that's when video was not as predominant as it is right now. Now we see upwards of 65% or more of our client base doing video. So there's video available, and so you have both video and the audio files to play with. So we've done a lot of that, experimenting, doing side by side over the last year and seeing what's going on. So we've taken the same clip that's in video and put the same clip in an audiogram and said, let's see what the social media platforms do with these. And that's the experiment that I have done with my team over the last year. Here's what we found, Tom. Video with a human face without the audiogram. Right. The video does three times better than the audiogram on Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter. X. It does 10 times better. Video does 10 times better on YouTube, TikTok and Instagram.

Wow.

Right. And think about those three platforms. They have a much more video component to em, so obviously it's more rewarded on their platform. And that's partially why there's a differentiator on that.

Well, and we've been seeing this for quite a while. To us, this isn't news. I mean, we've really been seeing the writing on the wall here for most of 2023. And I think we got to the point, Tracy, where with our customers, especially new ones, that maybe we haven't been producing for years because as you can imagine, people who we've been producing for years get sort of set in the deliverables, the things you're created for. And it's like, what do you mean you don't want to make audiograms anymore? Well, I just don't think they're going to set the world on fire for you. And it'd be better if you did this other thing. But we've gotten a part where we've been recommending to customers. Yeah, I wouldn't even bother with audiograms. I mean, they really are not worth it as long as you, you have real video to use to create social video clip shares. So that's really the big message today, right?

Yes. And right now I would say also if you were doing full length audiograms for YouTube because you don't have video, continue to do that. Because it's the only way to make sure you have a podcast playlist is to have video. So let's make sure that you see stay in that podcast playlist area. And we did a bunch of episodes about YouTube playlists and YouTube podcast playlists and how to make sure you've got yours running. But right now it doesn't run from an RSS feed. I suspect it will in the next few months, but right now it doesn't. And so you need to make sure that you've got video in there to be able to utilize the YouTube audience and attract to that audience. So continue to do them if you have no video, but start thinking about putting video into your plan. And how many of you record on Zoom already or record in in a platform where you are capturing and interviewing your guest and you've got the video? I mean all those times over the decade, there was never once we didn't have video files. We always had a video file to use.

We did because we wanted to see in real time who it was we were talking to and interviewing. I mean boy, in the early days, Tracy, it was Skype. You remember that? And all the special tools we had the like plugins and things for Skype to make it work. Well, holy mackerel, those are the days with a big mixing board and all sorts of stuff. And reality is technology's come a long way and I'm not knocking people that use a mixing board. So don't write into me or complain on social media, please. But the reality is technology and software has come such a long way that most podcasters are not going to that extent. But still we had video. Even with Skype, we had video that we were recording and then as we moved to Zoom, we had video. I think all of the major podcast specific platforms are recording video now. Maybe there's one or two that are not, but most of them are. So you've got it. I mean, at minimum I'd be using it. Let's say for whatever reason you don't want to do the full length video and deal with the captions and the SRT files and all this stuff to put the full length video out there, you could at least be cutting some short clips for social media promotion. That wouldn't take very long, right?

Yeah. So here's my recommendation to you. Capture video. If you aren't already capturing it, capture video. It's essentially important for the future. If you feel that the video's just not good enough for full length, then creating a full length audiogram at minimum for YouTube. But I highly recommend just loading that video into YouTube raw. Don't edit it. It's okay. You can trim on the front and back. You can do a couple of things. There's some editing tools within YouTube now that are useful to you. Go ahead and use it. Load it into YouTube. If you don't know anything with about YouTube and you really would like to know some more, we have a great resource for you. We did a wonderful, I think we did done at least one to two episodes with her already. Fran Asaro, Senior tuber. Absolutely love her community and her group, she gives great advice and it is better to have a video up there than to have nothing at all, right? So even if the video is not perfect, get it up there. Here's a new tool in YouTube that's fantastic. So even if you felt like you're such a perfectionist and you didn't want to create it in public, put that video up in YouTube Unlisted and then create share clips from it. So you can go and you can clip and then share on, on social and other places. You can go create a clip of any segment from within the show and you can go and share it as a YouTube short. So you have the ability to clip straight in YouTube if you want. Now, right now they don't have an AI tool, but at this time of this recording, but I guarantee you, some of you listen to this two months from now and it'll be there. So it's not picking clips for you. You have to do it yourself. But you know your video, you just recorded it. Write a timestamp down on your little notes and then go there and make the clip for yourself. It's not difficult. And then when you share those clips, use auto captioning and don't worry about anything else. You can add a watermark of your brand. So you could add a watermark of your cover art, create like a transparent layer of it and put it in one corner. That's an automated thing you can add in YouTube. And then you can save those clips and use them in our other social media platforms. So it's already perfectly aligned for you to do this in the simplest way. If you want to go deeper, take that video that you recorded in Zoom or in any of the other programs, please, not Skype, but anywhere else I suggest, and go ahead and use tools like Opus Pro or Video AI and it's Video Yo. And so use those tools and the AI will automatically choose the clips and you can just save them out of there. You can save them with captioning, you can save them with sub branding on there, little stylistic things on there. You can do all of that and save them out. If you want to be a little fancier and you want to be a little more highly branded about what you do. So there's no real excuse for this being more difficult than creating audiograms. Creating audiograms are just as complicated. You had to go to a site, drop them in, have them output. You still had to pick a clip. So all of those things are the same. So if you're creating audiograms My suggestion to you is drop them and use the video clips.

The numbers speak for themselves on the likes and the shares, the engagement on social media. And of course, we've also talked in the past about not every social platform is a great fit for every show. And some people engage more on certain platforms than other. Their audiences seem to be spending time on certain platforms rather than others. And all that is still true. But platform for platform, comparing audiograms to video clips, the, you know, shorts if you will, for YouTube, hands down, the real video is winning and to the point where for us anyway, it's not really worth it to spend the time to create audiograms when we have real video.

Exactly. And here's the thing. If you want to be successful on social media, if you want to get to your audience, you have to tap into the algorithmic interest of the platform you're on. And they are very video short centric right now. All of them are. Facebook is getting more and more. I expect that 3x number where it's videos 3x better than the audiogram. I expect that to only increase year over year on Facebook and Twitter and LinkedIn. I'm already seeing more success on LinkedIn with video posts than I am and I think it's increasing probably close to 5x now. So there's a definite algorithmic benefit to doing real video. And I think it's going to only continue to be stronger in the future with more AI emergence. And here's why. The platforms are not only video centric, but they're face recognition centric. It's something that they do really well. They want to center in on your face. They want to see a face. Anything with a face in it does better, even in a static post. They want to know that there are human creators behind it, passion and voice and excitement and hand movement. And boy, do I do that right. And so there's all of that that comes through the video that engages people and keeps them watching. And more time on the platform is more time on the platform and more ads that get served and more money that those social media platforms make. So it's better for them. But here's the other thing. You also need to be viewer centric. The follower, the person on the other end who's receiving this, who's scrolling your feed, who's seeing this video is less taxing on the viewer than an audio grant. You don't have to read the caption, you don't have to stop and listen. I see somebody's face and I go, oh, there's something going on there. There's passion, there's excitement. I stop. I don't have to read it. I can still just listen to it. But it stopped me in my tracks before I figured out what was going on. And that's harder for the viewer and the listener. And the social media is so distracting. So video is going to continue to be strong in the future and grow better for you. Take advantage of it. And I can't tell you how much of Tom and I are really bullish on what's going to happen on YouTube podcasts and which is happening in a totally different way. And there's no way to explain it any other way except that that is a completely video focused platform. So, like, just dive in. Make sure you've got video in your strategy for this year. Make sure that you are putting video shorts in that strategy as well.

Couldn't agree more with that last point, Tracy. I'm glad you mentioned it. Cause if you didn't, I was going to. Don't underestimate YouTube podcasters. I understand many of you maybe got into podcasting, not really thinking about video or not considering it or it's not maybe as important to you. And that's fair. And don't get me wrong, we love podcasting. The vast majority of all the podcasters we support actually have a lot more podcast listeners than they do YouTube viewers. We'll see how that changes in the future. But right now, and it's always been that way, and it still is that way from the numbers that we. But YouTube is a huge opportunity right now for podcasters. They've doubled down on podcasting in 2023 and now into 2024. Lots of changes happening. I think we've talked about that in a couple past episodes. You might want to go back and listen to some of those. If you haven't, you know, you didn't listen to those ones. But do not overlook YouTube. I think you're just limiting your reach and your potential audience if you're ignoring it or if you're not really taking it so seriously.

So, Tom, who's the number one podcaster that everybody always mentions when they think about successful podcasters?

They always mention Joe Rogan. Really?

Joe Rogan, he had five times more listeners and five times more viewers in YouTube than he had listeners on his podcast. When.

What time period is that you're talking about?

In the time period before he got bought by Spotify.

Really? So even before then he was bigger on YouTube than he was in a podcast?

Yep.

Very interesting. Did not know that. And that obviously is opposite of what I was just saying for most of the podcasters that we know.

That's right. So if a podcaster that big built up his authority and his value in podcasting with a YouTube strategy as well, then so should you.

All right. Something to think about.

Yeah. So for those of you who don't remember, we have donated our show here and our live streams to Podcasters United because we're absolutely devoted to you podcast industry people. We want to make sure that you're successful. So our show is now located on podcastersunited.org and you can find that show, the binge factor, our livestream links, everything out there on podcastersunited.org so come join us there.

All right, thanks for listening, everybody. We'll be back with another great episode next time on feed.

You'd brand.

Heard something valuable today but didn't get a chance to write it down. No worries. We've got you covered. We partnered up with podcasters united.org where podcast hosts like you can get free resources, free masterclasses, the largest podcast tip library assembled, and free promotion opportunities. Opportunities. While you're there, don't forget to follow us on YouTube and on social at United We Pod so you can get feed your brand live. Until next time, keep podcasting.