Two simple ways to grow your podcast audience this spring
If you’re anything like me, the resolutions you made at the beginning of the year might already feel… a little forgotten.
And honestly? I’m not a huge fan of putting all that pressure on January anyway.
Spring is actually one of my favorite times to reset. There’s something about that fresh-start energy that makes it feel easier to take a look at what’s working, what isn’t, and what might need a little cleanup.
Your podcast is no different.
Instead of trying to overhaul your entire podcast marketing plan, today I want to focus on two simple areas that can make a big difference in how your show grows:
- Your podcast SEO
- The marketing methods you’re spending time on
These small tweaks can help you grow your podcast audience in a way that actually feels sustainable.
Topics covered in this podcast episode:
- Why spring is the perfect time to refresh your podcast marketing strategies
- How to improve your podcast SEO with a simple podcast title tweak
- Why adding a descriptive phrase to your podcast name can help listeners find you
- How reviewing your past episodes can improve how to grow a podcast audience
- A simple way to audit your current podcast marketing strategies
- Why not every platform helps you grow a podcast in 2026
- How to identify marketing channels that actually support sustainable podcasting strategies
- Why growing your show doesn’t always require social media
Links
Connect with me
Unedited transcript of the episode:
We’re a couple months into 2026, which means we’ve probably forgotten the resolutions that we made at the beginning of the year. And honestly, I don’t really love the idea of making resolutions once a year. That’s a lot of pressure. So spring is a great time to reevaluate and do a bit of spring cleaning around your podcast.
Today I’m gonna talk about two things that probably need some attention. In your podcast, 📍 Hey, I’m Andy Smiley, and I’m obsessed with helping you grow your podcast without letting it rule your life.
I share strategies that actually work, the stuff I wish someone had told me earlier, and conversations with the smartest podcasters I know. One of my favorite marketing tools is Pinterest. If you know me at all, that doesn’t come as any sort of surprise.
But what might be a bit of a surprise is I didn’t set out to become a Pinterest strategist. I was simply looking for a way to grow my podcast without thinking about marketing all the time. Pinterest changed that for me. When I buckled down and got serious about using Pinterest to promote my podcast last summer, my show had a 100% increase in monthly downloads, and I promise I checked that number because.
That is crazy. My podcast also gained more than 100 email subscribers, and my business had the most successful revenue month since I started podcasting four years ago. What surprised me most was how predictable Pinterest is. Pinterest rewards the same things every time. Clear messaging, strong keywords, and a solid foundation and pins that I made years ago are still bringing new listeners to my show.
If you wanna figure out if Pinterest could be a good fit for you and your podcast, grab. My free is Pinterest right for your podcast checklist. The link is in the show notes. You know that spring energy that comes around in March and makes it feel actually fun to clean out your closet.
I wanna help you harness some of that energy for your podcast, too. The two podcast things that you should think about cleaning up this spring are your SEO for your podcast
and where you’re spending your time marketing your show.
When you’re doing some spring cleaning of your SEO, here’s a question that I want you to think about. Does your podcast’s name clearly state what your podcast is about? If not, let’s change that. No, you do not have to change your podcast art. Just add a colon and then a phrase that better explains what your podcast is about.
I did this last year and it’s really helped me to rank higher with SEO. So before I was the friendly podcast guide and now my podcast is called Friendly Podcast Guide Colon Teaching Women How to Grow a Podcast without Burning Out. And I did not change my podcast art at all. When I technically changed the name of my podcast, I didn’t have to change my podcast art because the first part is the same. You can do the same thing. And if you want to change your podcast art, you can go for it, but you don’t have to. And for me, at least as a podcaster.
A mom and a business owner and all the other things. Sometimes we just gotta do the bare minimum and then put the extra things on a list that we can do when we have an extra couple of hours. That randomly just pops up because sometimes that just happens.
Okay, another way to spring clean your SEO is to look at your last 10 ish episodes and look to see if there is one that did poorly. Like you didn’t get nearly as many downloads as you usually get,
And I want you to assess the episode’s, title and description.
Does that episode title need to be a little bit clearer? Are there some SEO keywords that you have now that maybe you didn’t have when you published this episode that you could mix in there just to make sure that the people that need your podcast episodes are finding them? And truly those two things with the SEO keyword research, if you haven’t done that yet, all of that can take like maybe an hour.
It doesn’t have to be a gigantic project. It can just be some little tweaks to help more people that are looking for content like yours to actually find your show. The other thing that might need some spring cleaning is the marketing methods that you are using. So let’s figure out if those marketing methods are actually working for you or if they. Aren’t. So the first thing you need to do is make a list.
I love making lists. It’s one of my favorite things. You can do this pen and paper like me, I am definitely a pen and paper girl. Or you can just pull up your notes app . So make a list of your main marketing methods that you use to promote your podcast, if that’s Instagram podcast guesting, um, Pinterest.
SEO can even be on that list. ’cause SEO is definitely a marketing tool that I use. Then once you have your list, spend some time doing a little bit of research. Which of these methods actually helped your podcast grow?
What I’ve noticed when I have dug into the data is that Instagram really doesn’t affect my downloads very much at all, and it really doesn’t help me sell my products and my services very well either, which is one of the main reasons I’ve become Instagram optional, and I’ve leaned all the way in into Pinterest because Instagram just isn’t doing what I need it to do.
And when you take the time to do a little bit of research, it can help you make sure that you are putting your time and energy into things that are actually serving you. So for me, when I realized just how much Pinterest was helping me grow my podcast and make money,
I did kind of an overhaul of my marketing and Pinterest became my main marketing method with everything else kind of filing and behind that, and Instagram is definitely lower on the list. I do still hang out on Instagram, but mostly for the community aspect and not so much to.
Grow my show or to make money. ‘Cause it just doesn’t do that for me. And that might be different for you. Instagram might be one of the main ways that you make money and grow your show. And if that is the case, then yay for you. Like you did the research, you looked at it and you saw that marketing on Instagram was really working for you. Keep doing it. Yes. But just make sure that you do your research and make sure that that’s actually true.
So the two things that I need you to take a look at with all of this Spring cleaning energy is your podcast, SEO, and which marketing methods you are using. Okay, just take a little bit of time, put it on your to-do list. Make it a priority so that it actually happens and set aside like an hour or two.
And if you don’t get to everything in that hour or two, that’s okay. At least you did something and you move forward in making sure that you are marketing in the best way possible for 📍 you. If you’re feeling reinvigorated about marketing your podcast and ready to spruce up your show, I bet this could also help your podcasting friend.
Would you send it to her next week? I’m sharing some of the podcasting experiments that I tried during my seasonal break, even the ones that didn’t really work at all. Thanks for being here, and I’ll see you next week.
