Jan 8, 2024 23:57 PM

The Power of Conversations: Humanising Your Business Through Authentic Podcasting

In the business world, we’re seeing a significant transformation in the methods of communication used by organisations both internally and externally.

Getting people to engage with your business and brand is increasingly tough, especially in competitive markets where multiple voices are vying for your attention.

Traditional methods of communication are starting to falter.

Lengthy email chains? Disregarded.

Newsletters? Skim read.

Podcasts? Well these might just be the emerging solution to fix your business comms and marketing woes.

The challenge of todays market lies in innovating communication and marketing strategies… and where better to do just that than in the global reaching market of podcasting?

Need some convincing that podcasts are the place to be in 2024?

Globally, podcasts have captivated an audience of 464 million as of the end of 2023, with this number predicted to reach 504.9 million by the end of this year.

25.2 million of these ears are right here in the UK – that’s roughly 1/3rd of the population that are estimated podcast listeners!

Of this audience, the demographic remains predominantly in the 26-35 age group – the very generation forging their career’s, climbing the corporate ladder and trying to make their mark on the workplace.

With the increasing influence and presence of Millennials and Gen Z’s in this sphere, people are increasingly turning to fresh, accessible avenues to either seek or share information within the world of work; podcasting. A perfectly accessible and efficient medium well suited for a faster, busier and more time consuming workforce.

So, now that you know that the audience is there and listening…

What’s making podcasts an increasingly popular and engaging move for business communications?

Short answer. There are many reasons…

Podcasts are perfect to consume whilst multitasking and juggling a busy work day. They’re great at diluting heavy thought leadership full of industry leading messages into an accessible audio format. Each episode can be stopped and started again to suit the listener’s personal schedule, ensuring that the content works round you, not the other way around.

Another selling point of podcasts is the personal and genuine sense of connection they can create. As a medium that is great at fostering a sense of personal intimacy, podcasts are a great avenue in generating emotion, allowing for listeners to deeply resonate and remember the messages spoken about in the content.

The shift to hybrid and remote work in recent years has empowered the workforce, giving employees more agency and highlighting the need for more humanised empathic, transparent, and authenticity in corporate communication – podcasting excels in this area as they’re great at fostering a sense of intimacy and trust over time through digestible, engaging content.

To illustrate the simple power of conversations with examples from our extensive branded podcast catalogue:

MIMA

Formerly CCD Design & Ergonomics, Mima are a design agency that’s human-centred. For the past 40+ years they’ve been crafting services, experiences, products and spaces with people at the forefront and accessibility in mind.

We were proud to produce and help set up an external 6-part podcast series that brought together leaders from across various industries to discuss accessible universal design, problems it can solve, where it’s already being applied.

The incredible and genuinely inspiring range of guests we had on from across aviation, rail, tourism & travel, digital, healthcare, museums and the arts pulled together decades of experience with diverse rich backgrounds and solutions acquired over years of practice.

It was a pleasure to bring these voices together to discuss something that affects us all and the conversations that they had on the show were authentic and inspired.

The result? Re:Design averaged +1000 downloads per episode with it trending in the Apple Podcast charts, specifically the top 100 for ‘Art’ and top 30 for ‘Design’.

THE BODY SHOP

A well-known global beauty retail company with over 84,000 employees.

We produced and help set up an internal podcast channel, alongside the endlessly talented Anaïs Nebel.

Whilst this means you and the general public can’t listen to it, the choice to go internal was a personal and intimate choice from The Body Shop.

The aim of this series was to rejuvenate the brand’s narrative, telling stories through its diverse people.

It featured a range of voices from The Body Shop, including the CEO and Store Managers, and saw diverse topics tackled such as self-esteem, strategic goals, inclusivity, self-confidence and mental health.

The result? According to their statistics, these podcasts attracted more attention than similar corresponding emails. We saw their internal audience among their employees grew steadily, with significant engagement from their US/UK markets and a gradual resonance with employees from countries where English is not a first language, like France and Brazil – proving that good communication and authentic messaging can break down barriers and engage.

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To conclude, it’s easy to see that the power of podcasts sits in their ability to humanise communication and build connection, especially amongst the backdrop of traditional lengthy corporate marketing.

Podcasts drive intimacy, intimacy drives connection, connection drives emotion, emotion drives impact, and the storytelling and authenticity sparked by podcasting and the spoken word simply goes unrivalled.

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At The Podcast Guys, we believe that podcasting is more than just a content platform; it’s an art form, a canvas, and a conduit for human connection.

Interested in harnessing the power of honest and authentic conversations to captivate and resonate with your listeners like never before?

Posted in: Thought Leadership

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