Grow Your Podcast with Email & Quizzes with Kylie Chandler

Meet Kylie Chandler

Kylie Chandler is a podcast growth strategist and the host of the Podcast Growth Tools podcast. She has a gift for creating podcast-first lead magnets and quiz funnels that don’t just grow email lists — they build genuine communities of superfans. Kylie has worked with heavyweights like Amy Porterfield and Kathy Heller, and she brings a creative, data-informed approach to email marketing that feels fresh, fun, and totally doable. If you’re a podcaster who wants to grow a podcast audience without relying on social media, Kylie’s strategies are exactly what you need to hear.

Curated Lead Magnets: A Smarter Way to Grow Your Email List

One of the first things Kylie and I talked about is how most lead magnets feel kind of… meh. A checklist here, a freebie PDF there — things your audience could honestly just get from a quick AI search. Kylie’s approach is different. She creates what she calls podcast-first lead magnets, which means instead of handing someone a generic download, you’re handing them a curated playlist of your own podcast episodes tailored to exactly where they are right now.

Think about it from a listener’s perspective. If someone discovers your show and you have 200 episodes, where do they even start? A curated bundle takes the guesswork away and says, “Hey, you want to build a business on part-time hours? Here are the six episodes made for you.” That’s not just a lead magnet — that’s a wow moment. And wow moments are what turn casual listeners into people who binge your entire back catalog.

This is such a practical podcast tip for women who already have a solid episode library and are ready to put it to work in a smarter way.

Why Quizzes Are One of the Most Powerful Podcast Marketing Strategies

Okay, can we talk about quizzes for a second? Because Kylie completely changed the way I think about them. People love to learn about themselves — that’s just human nature. (Kylie reminded me of filling out quizzes in Teen Bop magazine as a kid, and honestly, nothing has changed.) When you create a quiz that’s genuinely fun and gives people personalized results, they’re excited to hand over their email address.

But here’s where Kylie takes it up a notch: on the other side of the quiz, she delivers a personalized podcast playlist based on the results, along with other juicy bonuses. So instead of just telling someone, “You’re the Creative Entrepreneur type,” she’s saying, “Here are the five podcast episodes that were made specifically for you.” That’s next-level value — and it turns a quiz taker into a superfan almost immediately.

The results speak for themselves. One of her clients saw over 4,000 people take their quiz. Amy Porterfield’s quiz funnel has had over 15,000 people go through it. And one client experienced a 77% revenue increase, with 67% of buyers coming directly from her quiz nurture sequence. These are real numbers — and they’re what’s possible when you commit to sustainable podcasting strategies that work in the background for you.

The Newsletter Strategy That Gets a 60% Open Rate

Growing your email list is only half the battle. The other half? Keeping those subscribers engaged so they actually open your emails when you send them. Kylie’s secret weapon is the lifestyle newsletter — one that leads with a personal story before ever mentioning the podcast.

Her own newsletter recently started with a story about her mom going camping. From there, she transitioned into industry updates, a quick tip or hack she’d tried, and then the podcast plug. The result? A 60% open rate. That’s not a typo. When your newsletter feels like a letter from a friend rather than a promotional blast, people show up for it.

This is one of the most actionable podcast tips for women who want to grow a podcast in 2026 — build a community through your email list, not just an audience.

Where to Host Your Quiz

Kylie’s go-to platform for quiz hosting is Interact Quiz. It was built specifically as a quiz platform, so the integrations and user experience are really smooth. It runs around $29/month, which is pretty reasonable considering what a well-built quiz can do for your podcast growth over time. She also noted that the quiz platform itself is just one piece — you’ll also want a landing page, results pages, and an email nurture sequence to make the whole funnel work together.

How Pinterest Fits Into All of This

If you’ve been listening to the Friendly Podcast Guide for a while, you know I’m a big believer in Pinterest as a long-game podcast marketing strategy. Kylie agrees — and she pointed out that Pinterest is a fantastic place to promote your quiz and lead magnets week after week. You could literally pin about your quiz once a week and keep driving fresh traffic to it long after the initial launch buzz fades. That’s the kind of sustainable podcasting strategy that keeps working while you focus on creating great content.

Links & Resources

• Kylee’s podcast, Podcast Growth Tools
• Join Kylee’s newsletter
• Follow Kylee on Instagram
• Quiz platform mentioned, Interact Quiz
• Follow Friendly Podcast Guide on Pinterest
• Join the Friendly Podcast Guide email list

Unedited Episode Transcript

When I first started my podcast, I didn’t even think about using email marketing. Now it’s the main way I sell my offers. This week I’m sharing a conversation I had with Kylie Chandler. She has this idea for curated episode lists that I have never heard before.

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 would’ve told me sooner. And conversations with the smartest podcasters I know. And today’s guest is absolutely brilliant. Kylie Chandler has this idea for getting people onto your email list that’s been on my to-do list for way too long.

Kylie, thank you so much for being on the friendly podcast guide today. You are an absolute delight and I got to be on your show, so I’m so excited that I get to return the favor and have you on mine.

Oh, well I think we have plenty to talk about, so I’m very excited to be here with you.

Yes. Oh my gosh. I feel like we could probably do a whole series, just like with different interviews. That’d be so fun. But today is not that day. Maybe a future time, so earlier. This year I talked to, an email marketing expert. But I’ve had a lot of people talk to me about, okay, so I know that I need to be doing email, but how do I actually get people on my email list? And Kylie, you have so many insights on this, could you explain a little bit about like what a lead magnet is, like, what that means, as well as like basics, how to make that happen.

Yeah. Oh, for sure. A lead magnet essentially is gonna be anything that you create that’s going to be based on a pain point, a need, a desire, um, a curiosity point for your audience. And we need to, we need to be a little bit more, a little bit smarter about our lead magnets now and so. The reason I love the way I teach lead magnets to podcasters is because we create podcast first lead magnets, right? And so let’s get their podcast, like let’s give them podcasts that are curated to them through these lead magnets, right?

Because I think about these people who have. 200 podcast episodes, 300, 600, even 50 when they land. When somebody lands on your podcast and they’re scrolling through, it’s like, okay, which one do I wanna listen to? Which one would serve me best? And then what if they land on one that might maybe isn’t the best for them or wasn’t a good starting point. Episode two and you sound like you’re underwater. You know, it’s like, let’s curate it for them where it’s so great where they’re like, okay, I am a super fan. I wanna binge ’em all. So, a couple ways that I, I like to do this one. I love to create like a curated podcast bundle. And so I think about either the pain points or the aspirations of my audience, right?

And so for, you know, one of my, one of my clients that I’m specifically working with, we laid out a few of the pain points or the desires, and one is, um. You know, building a full-time business on part-time hours. And one pain point is, um, having all these offers without consistent revenue. And she’s got 600 podcast episodes. So we distilled them down into these bundles that we can now promote. And it’s like our listeners are listening and they think. I would love, this is what I need. I wanna build my business on part-time hours without, I didn’t leave my job to become like a full-time employee for myself, you know? Or overtime.

So when we create these podcast first bundles, essentially it’s a really juicy and sexy lead magnet that’s a little bit different than a checklist. That’s basically what you already shared with them, you know? So it’s like that curated experience. And I know we’re gonna get into quizzes as well, which is like one of my favorite lead magnets because people love to learn about themselves.

Yes, and they love to take the quiz. I mean, think about when we were kids, Andy, and it was like, you got your teen, your teen bop, you know, magazine, and it’s like, what, what, who would be your um, you know, boy bands like boyfriend or something, and then you like fill ’em out and it’s, oh my gosh, you know, Justin from the NSYNC or whatever. It’s so exciting. Nothing has changed. People want to learn about themselves through quizzes, and so we’re gonna get into what that looks like, I think a little bit later, but that’s a really, really great way to get people interested in giving you their email address, right? And it’s these, it’s, it’s not the checklist, it’s not these kind of things that they can capture on AI so quickly.

Another thing I’ll say though, that’s really important is that we have to keep them engaged on your email list, and that’s where I think some people maybe go wrong. They don’t connect with their email list, or they randomly do, or they send an email that’s like, Hey, I dropped this podcast today. And it’s just not very interesting. And so I think it’s really not only getting people onto your email list, but then it’s nurturing them because you can have an email list of 2000 people and have like a 10% open rate that’s terrible and nobody’s engaged. And then if you go to sell or you know, share a podcast episode with them. They’re absolutely not responding.

But when we curate that newsletter to them and we like, my favorite, what’s working really well actually in the marketing world for podcasters as well, is creating these lifestyle type newsletters, which I do. And I’ll lead with the story last week’s, um, newsletter started with my mom went camping and this is what it taught me about podcasting. And I like went into a story about how my mom flew in to stay in our camper and they stayed at a campground and she went and she spoke with a bunch of people and, um, was talking about what I did. And everybody had a favorite podcast. And how five years ago that wouldn’t have been the case. People would’ve been like, wait, remind me what is a podcast? Or gimme an example, you know? And then I go into like. Industry updates in the podcasting industry and um, maybe events that might be happening. Or sometimes I’ll teach something within that. Like, Hey, I tried this hack and it worked great. Here it is. And then I go into, oh, and by the way, on the podcast this week, this is what I’m talking about. And I get responses all the time that are like, I love your newsletter. It’s so refreshing. It’s so great. And my open rate is like 60%, which is. Mind blowing. Right? So that’s, that’s kind of the trick. I think it’s like the balance of it both.

Totally. Yes. You have to have something that will, that they’re interested in to get their email, but you also have to keep them interested. Like you said, you can’t just get their email and then have it sit and they don’t actually like get to know you better via email. Mm-hmm. A hundred percent.

Yeah, which I think truly one of my really good friends, her name is Whitney. She is the host of the Family Lab. She is honestly one of the most interesting people to talk to. She is just like full of so many creative ideas and that’s why she’s so good at her podcast is like she always has a new idea for how you can like, help your kid get potty trained or help your kid stop whining, like she is the best. I adore her, but she is so nervous. To start emailing her people. I’m like, no. You have so many great stories, like you need to start talking to your people because they wanna hear from you. So yes, this is, this episode is partially for her to help her remember that email is a good thing and it doesn’t have to be scary. So.

If I could add something kind of interesting to that, I have people all the time like, well, I don’t really have something to offer them, so what am I gonna talk to them about? And like a paid product, right? So if we’re talking about like monetizing your business, and here’s what I’ll say is. Get them on the email list and just nurture the heck out of ’em, because all of a sudden when you go to sell, literally you could nurture for six months, nine months when you go to sell to them, you’ll make a decent chunk of money if you decide you wanna offer something. So that’s what I’ll say to that is just start the email list with 20 people on it. Email them with 200 people on it. Email them with 2000 people. Continue to email them.

I, yeah. Oh, I love it. Even if you’re not selling something, you’re still wanting people to listen to your show, right? Like I feel like, no, you’re not selling your podcast ’cause it’s, well, I guess some people have it behind a paywall, but like most of us have a free podcast. Like you can just listen to it. So you’re kind of selling your podcast episodes of being like, Hey, go listen to this episode, take your time and listen to this episode. So no, you might not be selling something, but you’re still asking them to take time outta their day to listen to a show that you created. A hundred percent.

Now I wanna dive into quizzes. So why, why are quizzes such a powerful tool for growing your email list and, and truly like growing your podcast?

Yeah, well, the way that I do them specifically is essentially doing like a podcast centric quiz. And so, like I said earlier, people love to learn about them itself. So we know this, we know this about, you know, demographics, we know this about psychology. And so when we bring people into our world and we say, not only can you take this quiz, but on the other side of the quiz, I’m gonna give you a personalized playlist based on where you are, personalized podcast playlist that you can work through. And then on top of that, I’m gonna give you. X, y, z. So it can be a bunch of things. So like when I created Kathy Heller’s quiz, we did, it was like a what’s your morning personality or something. And we gave them like a morning affirmation and a meditation and their, their curated podcast playlist. And then we gave them like, um, an angel card or something like that. So you can use that quiz. To go above and beyond to really deliver value. And now they’re on your email list and you can move them through a nurture sequence. Whether you sell to them in that nurture sequence or not. You can continue to provide them with extra resources to just continue to serve. Oh, and more podcast episodes. And then that’s how they become super fan is they’re just like, they’re in it. You provided so much value and. I think this is where a lot of people go wrong with quizzes is they’re just using AI to bust out a quiz that’s just like gives the person results they already knew about themselves and they’re like, well, why did I take that quiz?

But when you can go the extra step to not only like. Lay it all out. Maybe give them a roadmap and give them the curated podcast playlist and give them like extra things that make it really juicy. Make the results juicy and stand out. That is when your quiz can really turn somebody who came into your world, took the quiz, listened to your podcast into superfans, that will continue to binge your show. Um, they work so well. And here’s the other thing I’m seeing with clients is. It does take a lot to put together a quiz. But here’s the thing, you can literally use that quiz for years. Like we used, Amy Porterfield still has the quiz up that we created from like five years ago.

A lot of my clients let it run for a couple years. You can go in, you can modify it with new podcast episodes, or maybe you have a new offer you wanna plug into your nurture sequence and. Really what we’re also seeing is, you know, you’ve been hearing people talk about trust recession and things like that. We’re in a trust recession. My clients who put together a quiz and let it run for, I know they speak, we talked about Pinterest and how it’s a long game. Podcasting’s a long game quiz like. My clients who will, who will put the quiz together, do like a promo week to promote it and get it, you know, excitement around it and get that big, that initial boost, um, and then let it run. Maybe they run like low cost ads to it or something. Over the course of six months, one of my clients I work with. Female entrepreneurs who have a podcast. So when I say offer that a lot of my clients have an offer they’re eventually going to share with their audience, but she had her biggest launch after we put the quiz together. About six months after her quiz, five or six months, she, she went into her launch. She had a 77% revenue increase with 67% of those people who signed up coming from her quiz nurture sequence.

That’s amazing. I love that so much. I know, and this is what I’m seeing across the board. The other thing I really wanna dive into that I am obsessed with when it comes to quizzes is the data that it gives us. It gives us so much data about who is in our audience. One of my clients is a, she does, um, fictional writing. She’s a fictional writing coach, and so she’s like. They all wanna write a book. They all like, everybody in my audience wants to write a book. They wanna get it published, whether it’s self or or not. And she’s like, but they’re small nuances, right? Because one person is just starting out, the next person maybe wrote their book, but they don’t know what to do next. The next person might be interested in pub, like they wanna know how to publish. So the quiz can go. You’re here. You’re in this bucket. You’re in this bucket, or you’re in this bucket. And so now we can have the quiz out into the world. We can go and say, oh, interesting. I’m only really, I really only have people in my audience in bucket one and two. I should probably not do too many podcast episodes for bucket three or I. Or like, no, I shouldn’t have offers about. A hundred. Exactly. And that’s a cool thing too with the nurture sequences. If you do have offers, you can curate not only the playlist to those people. Oh, but the offer too, so it’s just amazing.

Is amazing. Okay, so I. I have this question, so I’m assuming my listeners do too. Where do you create the quiz? Is there like a quiz builder.com or something? Or like how do you, how does, how does that work?

So, um, essentially the platform that I like to have my quiz hosted on is interact, interact, quiz, um, and. I, it was built as a quiz platform. Some people use Typeform or go high level or things, which are fine, and I have clients who use them, but I do know, like I’m friends with the Interact quiz owner and he’s like, we built this as a quiz platform, so it’s really nice, the integrations and stuff like that. But there really is. So much that goes into it beyond that, like you want a landing page and your results pages and your email nurture sequence. So the actual hosting platform of the quiz is just like an itty bitty part. But I do like interact, quiz, and it’s not super expensive. You know, I think it’s like $29 a month or something to host there.

Okay, cool. I love the idea of a quiz for podcasters because so many of us have podcasts that. Just lend themselves to quizzes. Right. Like, it just, yeah, it just makes sense. Um, do you have like an example, uh, like that you could walk us through of a high converting quiz funnel that has worked well? I, you already gave us some examples, but do you have another one?

Oh yeah. Well, um, I, yeah, I guess I have a few, so we can go back to Savannah. So she has the fictional writing one. So her quiz specifically is called, This 32nd quiz reveals your author success blueprint. So you go through the quiz, then you get onto your specific results pages. That’s where you do the high delivery. That’s where you’re giving them a personalized playlist. You’re giving them all the extra little juicy bonuses that that made it worth taking your quiz, made it worth giving you your email address. From there, they move into a nurture sequence. Through their email and then they moved through that. Um, so hers, her, oh gosh, I think she’s had over 4,000 people. Take that quiz.

That’s amazing. Another well with Amy Porterfield. So we, that was the first time I ever tested this out. I wanna say like last fall I touched base with her, um, director of marketing. I was like, how many people have gone through that quiz? Over 15,000 people. Now granted, that’s in. Probably four years or something that, but she’s not promoting it all the time and people are finding it. Um, let’s see. Another one of my clients Kathy Heller, we had like over 2000 people take her quiz within like a week and a half. Um, so not only are we getting people to take the quiz, we’re getting their email addresses, we get the opportunity to nurture them, sell to them, all the things.

That’s amazing. Like you said, like there’s a lot that goes into doing a quiz, so I feel like sometimes you have to know what the results could be so that it feels like, like reasonable to like put in the effort to make it happen. Right. A hundred percent.

I love that. Okay. Well, truly, one of these days that will be, that’s like on my list of like when I have a couple of hours to just at least map it out and then chunk it from there because yeah. Here’s what I’ll say is I’m actually working on, ’cause usually I only do it with my one-on-one clients, which is pretty high ticket. Um, but I have women in my mastermind who are wanting it. And so I think in the spring I’m gonna be offering like a, I wanna do like a little bit of like a, a speed, like a a, a week and a two weeks or something where we just like head down, we create our quizzes and I’m finding that Claude. AI is like changing the game for making quizzes. I mean, so I have some tips and tricks where it’s like we can take the templates that I’ve perfected over the years with Claude. And so I’m like, so you maybe you’ll have to. Yes. I mean, seriously, that sounds really nice, I’m like, let’s just do it like head down, get it done. And um, I think that’s what people need because otherwise you can, you can draw it out for so long and just wanna think about it and never do it. And it’s like, no, let’s get together. Let’s make it happen. And then you have it. And right? And then it’s done and you can just let it do its thing in the background. Ugh. Yes, a hundred percent. I love that so much.

And on Pinterest, are you kidding me? I mean, you could do a pin a week about the quiz and just like get people, yeah, Pinterest is really good for freebies too. I love that.

Okay. This has been so delightful. You have so many good insights and I am so excited for my listeners to be getting more email, uh, emails on their email list because. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And quizzes are kind of the way to go. Okay. And I will put, um, all of the links that you talked about in the show notes, but where can people find you?

Yeah, so I have a podcast called Podcast Growth Tools, um, which Andy is on, came on, which I’m so excited. It was a great episode. Um, and then you can also go to my website or. If you wanna get on my newsletter and see what I’m talking about in terms of like these more lifestyle ones, go to podcast marketing hub.com/subscribe. Um, I’m also on Instagram, Kylie j Chandler, and yeah.

Perfect. Oh, I’m so excited. And I’m definitely going to join your email list, if nothing else, just to see how you do it, because I feel like sometimes it’s like, yes, I like to email my list. I like to con like connect, but also. Sometimes it feels overwhelming. So it’s nice to have other examples be like, oh, okay, I like the way she did that, or whatever. So yes, thank you. Oh God. I hope it, I hope it serves you well, but thank you for having me, Andy. Yes, thank you so much.

Kylie’s take on quizzes as a freebie is brilliant. She is such a smart podcast strategist and a lovely human. You should definitely hop on her email list and listen to her podcast. I have the links to all of those things in the show notes. Do you have a podcasting friend who hasn’t had any new additions to her email list in a little while? Kylie’s email list growth ideas are sure to inspire her. Email this episode to your friend, and she’ll be forever grateful. In next week’s episode, I’ll be giving my younger self podcast marketing advice. There are some really great tidbits that I wish someone would’ve told me sooner. Thanks for being here, and I’ll see you next week.