- So you want to know how to make money with your podcast
because let's face it, what's the point of having a podcast
without all that sweet pod-cash?
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And don't just take my word for it,
let the numbers speak for themselves.
I've got three podcasts, hundreds of episodes,
tens of thousands of downloads,
and I have made ZERO DOLLARS from any of them.
So welcome to my video on how to make money with podcasting,
which is in all seriousness,
the reason that I wanted to make this video
is because it is not something
I typically talk about very much
because when it comes to podcasting,
if you're doing it at the level
at which most of us are doing it,
which we could call hobbyists and advanced hobbyist,
part-time, it's probably not gonna be a significant
source of your income.
If any source at all,
like I have literally never made any money on my podcasts.
If anything, I've lost money because it costs money
to produce them and to upload them
and all that kind of stuff.
I even made a course
all about launching your own podcast
that specifically does not talk about monetization
because I think that similarly to starting a YouTube channel,
if you get into podcasting with the goal of making money
and monetizing it,
you're already setting yourself up for failure
because you're gonna need to put in a lot of time,
energy and effort to get to a point
where you could even possibly monetize at all.
And if you're not doing it
because it's something you care about
and something you enjoy
and you really like are having fun with,
it's not something that's going to be sustainable
to the point where monetization is even on the horizon.
Now, of course, there are always exceptions
to what I'm saying,
and I'm sure we can all think of examples of people
who make insane amounts of money from podcasting
or even just full-time middle-class incomes from podcasting.
But for the vast majority of us,
that's really not going to be the case.
However, that doesn't mean it's impossible
to make money with your podcast.
I do joke that I have not made any,
but I've also not made a tremendous effort to do so.
And so I wanted to share with you five ways
that you can monetize your podcast
while keeping your expectations grounded in reality.
Now the most obvious one is probably ads
and a big question that people have
when they start their podcast
is how the heck do I put ads on it?
And a lot of podcasting platforms
kind of work the same as YouTube,
where you can just add in add space to your episode.
So for example, something like Buzzsprout or Anchor,
they let you just add in segments before or after episodes,
and then they fill them with ads.
So you don't get to choose which ads are on your episodes,
you don't get to have any say in that.
You just get to say, "Hey, here's a spot
"where you could put an ad."
And then they, or another third party company,
they work with advertisers to make those deals,
place the ads on your content
and then you get a share of the revenue.
Very, very similarly to how YouTube works.
So for example, here's my Buzzsprout monetization page
for my personal podcast.
And you can see, I can add in sponsor segments here.
I could even work with some affiliate stuff,
we'll talk about that, and I can even add links over here.
So a lot of podcast hosts do have built in options
to help you monetize your show,
but I don't know what the actual income would be.
And I'll be very transparent here looking at my statistics
and as I'm recording this,
I'm in between seasons four and five on my podcast,
so I've taken a couple of weeks off,
but here are my download numbers.
The season four finale,
which a finale episode or premiere episode
are probably gonna get more downloads the normal it's 510.
My typical downloads, as you can see are anywhere between,
you know, 400 and 500, this episode got 600 good for me.
Remember when it comes to podcasting,
your numbers are gonna be significantly lower
than something like YouTube,
where if you get 28 downloads in the first seven days,
that your episode is up, that puts you in the top 50%.
And I've said this in a few other videos,
but that's just 28, not 2,800 or 28,000,
just 28 downloads puts you in the top 50%.
However, advertisers don't seem to be as impressed by that
as the rest of us and so those 28 downloads
aren't gonna generate a ton of ad revenue,
like literally at the end of the month,
if you're doing 50 to 100 downloads per episode,
you could probably have a few dollars in ad revenue.
Now, the second way you can monetize your podcasts
would be through sponsorships, which are different than ads.
At least how we're talking about them here,
because an ad, you don't really have any say in what it is,
you just give the ad space and it gets filled up.
Whereas a sponsorship,
even if you are advertising something,
you're working more directly with that company
or that brand and your negotiating a deal on your own.
So that could be something like an ad read before your show
or after your show,
or you take a break in the middle
and talk about your sponsor.
It could include adding in links and things
to the show notes for your episodes, how you set those up,
there really depends on you,
and in this case, you're going out there
and you're the one building the relationship with the brand
and setting up the deal.
In general, though,
if you have no preexisting relationship with a brand
or a company and you approach them for a sponsorship,
they will probably give you a rate
of somewhere between 20 and $30 per 1,000 downloads.
So just as an example, right in the middle,
say you have an episode that gets 1,000 downloads
in that first week and you get a sponsor,
they would pay you $25.
But in my case with 500 downloads per week,
I would get somewhere between 15, maybe $20 per episode.
And to me selling out my show and my audience's attention
and my relationship with my audience for 15 or $20,
just totally isn't worth it.
Now you can negotiate sponsorship deals on your own,
so even if you do have a relatively tiny audience,
if it is a dedicated audience
and you build a relationship with the brand
that actually values the relationship with your audience,
they could be willing to pay more for a sponsorship
because they know that even though it's a small audience,
it is a committed audience and they value that,
and they actually want to compensate you
for access to that audience.
Now it is your responsibility
to protect the thing that you have built.
So even if it's small audience,
if you've built a strong relationship with them,
you can easily damage that or hurt it
by doing too many sponsorships
or bringing in things that are totally unrelated
and making yourself seem a little untrustworthy,
or a little insincere in authentic.
So there's a very fine line to walk,
but it is possible to find a brand
that aligns with your values and the topic of your show.
That would actually be good for your audience,
and then you can be the glue that connects those,
and in some cases, brands will pay a premium for that.
And you could also go beyond that,
I've known a few people who have sold entire seasons
of their podcasts to sponsors.
So you could take a block of 10 or 12 episodes,
however long one of your seasons might be,
and you could sell that entire season to a sponsor,
if you feel that you have found a sponsor
that would be a good fit,
and you could potentially charge a higher premium for that
because regardless of downloads,
they're taking an entire season like an entire chunk
of your content there.
Of course, that means if you're in the middle of a season
and another sponsor shows up,
you can't really say yes to them
because you're already being sponsored
by these people over here.
Now the third way to monetize your podcast,
kind of switches it up a little bit.
So instead of going to outside sources like brands
and advertisers,
now you're going directly to your audience
and that's where you can use something like Patrion,
buy me a coffee, any of those,
either donation or monthly membership services.
And that is where your audience can support you directly.
And in the world of podcasting,
that can actually be a really strong thing
because you can decide what tiers you wanna offer.
You could use Patreon just basically as a tip jar
and just say, "Hey, join it, you know,
$1 a month or $5 a month
and help support the show and that's it."
But if you look at podcasts who have success with Patreon,
so this is one of my favorite podcasts,
and I think one of the most successful examples
of podcasts on Patreon and that's Talking Simpsons,
where their entire full-time income
for multiple people comes directly from Patrion,
so you can select tiers and then you can decide
what to offer, I mean, you probably know how Patreon works,
but in terms of podcasting,
that means you can build a community,
you can let that community have input on show content,
you can literally bring them into shows,
if you want to, you can release stuff early.
In the most successful podcasting Patreon pages
that I have seen,
are the ones that are interactive like that.
If you just do it as a tip jar,
not that many people are gonna be interested,
but if you actually do offer perks and things,
then it does make sense that more people
would wanna support you.
And even though that's true,
no matter what you're using something like Patreon for,
I think podcasting lends itself to that a little bit better
because it's just easier to do, you know, special episodes,
early episodes, additional content,
photos, videos, that kind of stuff.
Maybe you have a video only version of your podcast,
that's for your Patreon supporters.
Everybody else gets the audio only version,
and that could be a huge incentive
for people to sign up to your Patreon.
It's important to keep in mind though
that whatever you're promising through Patreon,
you have to deliver and so that can be a lot more work.
If you're saying every person who joins
gets all these things, and then every time someone joins,
you have to spend hours fulfilling their membership perks,
that can be a significant drain on your time
and make it harder to actually just keep producing the show
that they wanted to support in the first place.
So you really have to remember that something like Patreon,
while you are building a community,
you're monetizing off your audience,
it can also then take your time
in addition to the normal time of producing your show.
And of course you can combine some of these ways as well.
You can have sponsorships and Patreon,
and the fourth way of monetizing your show
is one that fits in kind of no matter what you're doing.
And that would be affiliate links
depending on what your show is about,
it may or may not make sense.
I talk a lot about gear,
so affiliate links are pretty natural
because if I talk about something like a camera lens
or microphone, people wanna know about it,
so I need to put a link to it.
And if I'm putting a link to it,
why not make it an affiliate link?
I know sometimes people get really upset
about seeing affiliate links in descriptions.
But to me, affiliate links are kind of the best way
to advertise because they can be so unobtrusive,
of course, you need to disclose very clearly
that they are affiliate links
and follow whatever guidelines
for whatever affiliate program you're a part of.
But beyond that, you don't have to take time
out of your video or your podcast or whatever
to talk about the affiliate links.
You don't have to do direct call to actions,
they can just be there for anybody who's interested.
And then when people decide that they wanna use them,
they can use them.
A lot of times, if you use affiliate links,
you will also find
as people become bigger supporters of what you do,
they actually want to seek out your link
to see whether you have an affiliate link
for the product or service they looking for,
or even just the online retailer
that they wanna shop through
and they'll just click through your link to get there.
So that's an easy way for people to support you
without having to spend any additional money.
Just be sure that you are following all the guidelines
for whichever affiliate program that you're a part of,
and whether or not affiliate marketing
is gonna be successful,
really depends on the content of your show.
And if there's something that lends itself naturally
to being part of an affiliate program.
And the fifth way of monetizing your podcast,
of course would be through merchandise
that sweet, sweet merch.
Now I'm not an expert on merch as I have none,
but it is an opportunity for you
to let people support your show
and monetize at the same time,
since you are dealing with physical products,
a lot of the time with merch,
unless it's like a digital download or something
that doesn't mean you have storage and manufacturing
and shipping and even if you're using a third party,
like a t-shirt company, where when someone places the order,
they just print it to order and send it to them.
Usually that company of course,
will still take a cut of the purchase
because they need to support themselves as well.
So finding prices that are affordable to your audience,
but also still worth it for you can sometimes be tricky
and then finding high quality merch,
you don't wanna just do the cheapest option,
and then everyone buys your shirt or your hat or whatever.
And what they get is an absolute piece of garbage
that they never wanna wear
'cause that's not going to make them happy,
and that's going to reflect very badly on you and your show.
And also it's important with merch to keep in mind
that there is kind of an upper limit.
You make a t-shirt and someone buys it,
are they gonna buy five more T-shirts
if you keep releasing them?
Your most intense fans probably will,
but the average casual person
getting them to buy one piece of merch,
might be a huge leap,
and then getting them to rebuy that or buy more,
might be kind of difficult.
So that means if you have a small audience,
once they've already bought one thing, they might be done,
and you might not be able to get them to buy more.
And of course there are other ways to monetize your podcast.
So if there's something I left out here,
something that's been successful for you,
then please feel free to leave that in the comments
and let us know what's working,
'cause it might be a really cool idea
that could be really helpful to a lot of people.
And I know every time I brought up
a monetization suggestion in this video,
I also pointed out why it might not work
or why it might not really generate a lot of money.
And that's really not to discourage you
or to keep you down or anything like that,
but it's to keep things realistic
because you can read a news article
about some company purchasing a podcast
for tens of millions of dollars.
You can read about how some celebrity
makes hundreds of thousands of dollars a month
or more through their podcast.
And then you start your podcast
excited for that sweet revenue,
and then there's none and you might feel disappointed.
And that's why I want to remind you and everybody,
that the reason you're starting your podcast
should not be to earn revenue,
but it should be to share something that you care about,
something you're interested in,
something you're passionate about
with an audience that feels the same way.
And if down the line opportunities organically emerge
that allow you to monetize and earn an income
or even a living off of that, that's awesome.
But if that's what you have in mind,
when you're starting out,
you are just setting yourself up for failure.
So please be sure that it's the passion of the podcast
that guides you and not just the passion for the cashing.
But I really do hope this video was helpful.
I'm a fan of podcasting,
both as a listener and as a podcaster.
And I feel like it's one of the last places on the internet
that's still kind of that wild west of creativity
and independence, and that's really important to me,
which is why I am so guarded when it comes to monetization.
And I wanna make sure that if people
do choose to monetize their shows that they do so correctly,
in a way that's going to keep the show sustainable
and successful for them and their audience.
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