The Top 3 Podcast Trends for 2024 w/ Rosa Sarmento
It’s a brand new year, which means there are brand new predictions on the horizon. So… what’s happening in podcasts in 2024?
What’s trending in the podcasting industry? Have listeners gotten more savvy with audio quality? What tools are waiting for you to “pick them, choose them, love them” to help grow your audience? Answers to all your burning questions—plus 1 topic I thought I’d never talk about on the podcast—are waiting for you in this episode w/ podcast manager, Rosa Sarmento! Whether you’re starting a podcast or looking to deliver the highest-quality show for your audience, this episode is a must-listen!
With this podcast episode:
Discover podcast trends and predictions for 2024.
Learn what free and paid tools you can use to support your podcast quality.
Uncover podcast producer tips to help you create a binge-worthy podcast.
Don’t forget you can submit a question that will get answered in an upcoming podcast!
Meet: Rosa
Rosa supports women-led online businesses that desire to scale their impact and income with a podcast. She’s the founder of Ideablossoms, a boutique podcast agency that has launched top-rated podcasts and produced over 800 podcast episodes. She was born and raised in Rio, Brazil, but now lives the expat lifestyle in Mexico with her husband.
Mentioned Resources:
6 Favorite Online Tools For Podcast Management
Connect w/ Rosa:
Connect w/ Brittany:
This episode of The Basic B podcast is brought to you in partnership w/ Leah Bryant Co.! Help me reach more service providers like you by following the show & leaving a rating or review on Apple & Spotify!
The unedited podcast transcript for this episode of The Basic B podcast follows
Welcome back to the Basic B podcast. I'm so excited that you're tuning in, whether that's on YouTube or any of the podcast players, because there's like a thousand now. I really appreciate you being here and you're in for a good conversation, one that I have been like pushing for a while now. So I'm joined by Rosa Sarmento and we are going to be talking about 2024 podcast predictions, which I'm literally just so stoked about. So quick intro for you so you can actually meet Rosa.
Rosa supports women-led online businesses that desire to scale their impact and income with a podcast. She's the founder of Idea Blossoms, a boutique podcast agency that has launched top-rated podcasts and produced over 800 podcast episodes. She was born and raised in Rio, Brazil, but now lives the expat lifestyle in Mexico with her husband. Hi Rosa!
Rosa Sarmento (00:52.73)
Thank you for the intro. I always blush
Brittany Herzberg (00:55.582)
I know, right? Except you've got like the tan and I'm really pasty over here. Yeah.
Rosa Sarmento (00:58.878)
I'm a child. Oh, thank you. I've been getting some sun down here in Brazil. A little too much, I'm peeling a little bit on my arm. Ha ha ha.
Brittany Herzberg (01:07.046)
No, that's like the life I live. I think it's my German blood. We stay away from the sun. Oh my gosh. I'm stoked to have you here to talk about this topic, but before we do, I'm gonna ask you the one question I ask all my guests. Don't worry, it's a loaded one, but there are no wrong answers. All right, you ready? Like, I think so. Which do you believe is most important for sales, SEO, storytelling, or social proof, and why?
Rosa Sarmento (01:13.712)
Yeah.
Rosa Sarmento (01:27.134)
Yeah.
Rosa Sarmento (01:40.542)
I just want to take a minute because I want to make sure I'm intentional and not just answering for the sake of answering. I think especially when you mention all of those together, for me the first word that comes to mind is authenticity because especially when it comes to sales it's so easy to get pushed around with all these.
Brittany Herzberg (01:47.135)
I'm sorry.
Brittany Herzberg (01:57.973)
Mm.
Rosa Sarmento (02:04.638)
marketing trends and best practices, quote unquote best practices. Cause some people won't see my air quotes that I'm doing with my finger. But yeah, let them be known. So there's so much, like so many shoulds, so many best unquote best practices out there and tactics and strategies and you name it. That, and then I think when it comes to, you know.
Brittany Herzberg (02:11.738)
I know. Let them be known.
Rosa Sarmento (02:31.718)
storytelling especially when you tie storytelling to SEO to social proof to sales it has to be authentic to work in my opinion and yeah i feel like that's where a lot of people kind of get lost not that they do it on purpose i feel like a lot of them don't and it's not that they mean um anything bad it's just all the information it's a load of information out there and it's very easy to
Brittany Herzberg (02:39.73)
Mm-hmm.
I like that.
Rosa Sarmento (03:00.39)
let go of your true self or your values or beliefs or even your real story to put up this front that you believe is the right thing to do.
Brittany Herzberg (03:09.259)
Mm-hmm.
Yeah, so it sounds like you kind of believe all three but just making sure that you're being authentic throughout everything. Is that right? I love that. No one has brought that up yet.
Rosa Sarmento (03:19.421)
Yeah.
Rosa Sarmento (03:24.519)
Oh, you're welcome.
Brittany Herzberg (03:26.218)
Alright, I'm just like anxious over here to jump into that. Okay, so let's dive in to your 2024 podcast predictions and you have three, right? Okay, so I'm thinking you want to just like take them one at a time and we can chat through them a little bit.
Rosa Sarmento (03:30.402)
Mm-hmm.
Rosa Sarmento (03:35.962)
Yes.
Rosa Sarmento (03:42.45)
Yeah, I'll share all three because I don't like suspense. And then I'll break them down. So if you're interested, stick with me. So my big three predictions for podcasting in 2023, uh, they came from like the first few weeks of 2024. Uh, I was just consuming a lot of content from the industry. Everyone was putting out their predictions and talking and discussing things, and I was really like drawn to it.
Brittany Herzberg (03:47.735)
Perfect.
Rosa Sarmento (04:09.534)
Some things I agreed on, some things not so much, and then I wanted to, you know what, let me try to do my own predictions, and then at the end of the year, we'll see how I did. So my big three are, first and foremost, focusing more on the quality of listener than the number of listeners. Number two is prioritizing your audio quality and video quality if you do video podcasting.
Brittany Herzberg (04:19.516)
Yeah.
Rosa Sarmento (04:39.534)
And finally, number three, which probably everyone's talking about right now, artificial intelligence as a tool to not just repurpose because a lot of people are already using it to repurpose podcasts, help write show notes and content, things like that. But taking a step further and using it to produce the podcast as well. And I'll go into more detail later. But where do you want to start? Number one?
Brittany Herzberg (05:04.79)
I mean, that last one is spicy, but let's start with number one. Let's start with number one. So the focus on the quality, the type of listener versus the number of listeners, which I think is very interesting. You don't hear very often. So how did that come about?
Rosa Sarmento (05:08.641)
Yes.
Rosa Sarmento (05:20.458)
That came from a conversation with a client, really. She was reflecting a lot on her podcast at the end of the year. She wanted to take this new direction and we were discussing things. And finally, we came to an agreement that the type of listener was way more important than the number of listeners that she was bringing in.
because of the type of work she does and what she's trying to accomplish with the podcast Because you also have to take this with a grain of salt like if you are a podcast like a news podcast for instance Uh, I would say number of listeners is definitely important. You want to reach out to people right you want to Get that visibility If you are a podcaster that's searching for sponsors and partnership deals then yes number of listeners is going to be crucial I'm not gonna lie here
Brittany Herzberg (06:00.695)
Hehehe
Brittany Herzberg (06:15.352)
Hehehe
Rosa Sarmento (06:15.614)
But if you're a branded podcast and you're working this niche, and it's a very specific niche, and the podcast is part of that business, part of the thing you teach, it's not really about the numbers. It's about finding those right listeners, those ideal listeners that will turn into fans, and maybe even recurring clients. I think that's the end goal here with branded podcasts, again, not going viral. Because going viral, you can do it. Like,
Brittany Herzberg (06:38.126)
Mm-hmm.
Rosa Sarmento (06:43.05)
TikTok I think is a great example of this. You can go viral and reach plenty of people, but if they're all, let's say, Jan Z and you work with boomers, what are you doing? What are you doing?
Brittany Herzberg (06:54.518)
not going to help you. Yeah, really, what are you doing? Yeah, that's a really good point to focus on too, because like you said, it kind of seems like it's starting with the goal in mind. So, what's your goal with the podcast? If it is sponsorships, yeah, they're going to be looking for the number of listeners. Just like if you're looking for a book deal, they're going to be looking for the number of followers that you have. So, that is really important to be aware of.
Rosa Sarmento (07:08.103)
Yes.
Rosa Sarmento (07:16.445)
Mm-hmm.
Brittany Herzberg (07:19.178)
Where are you taking this thing? What do you want to do with it? I mean, that was one of the first things I thought about when I started this podcast is like, okay, I'm going to be doing this. I'm going to be putting time and effort and energy and money into it. What do I want it to do for me? So I really like that you brought that point up. Okay, what is your next prediction? Well, more of like why it is a thing, I guess I should say about like the audio quality. I'm really excited to get into this one.
Rosa Sarmento (07:45.726)
Okay, good. You can geek out with me here, because I don't know. I don't think a lot of people like this topic, if I have to be honest. But I do. So we'll try. Well, this is something that's really not a prediction. It's more a fact. It's been going on for a while now. And if I say it's a prediction, it would be false, because this is a conversation that's been happening in the industry for a couple of years.
Brittany Herzberg (07:48.462)
I'm sorry.
Brittany Herzberg (07:52.947)
I used to not do.
Rosa Sarmento (08:14.354)
In the very early years of podcasting, it was very common for you to bump into podcasters that were very much like amateur produced. Again, quote unquote amateur produced. Really just like one person, maybe two people hanging out on a couch, recording on their phones, whatever. And that was kind of the vibe. It was something everyone was experimenting with seeing, you know, how they felt doing it, how the response was.
So it was actually okay, but once the industry started evolving and listeners start getting more exposed to different types of podcasts, production, editing styles, there is a certain level of quality you expect. You have to be honest here and me as a listener, because I am also a podcast listener, there are certain things that really turn me off when I'm listening to a podcast because it's just too distracting.
There's no video. There's no other thing to engage. It's just audio. It's just audio So it has to be good and I'm not saying it has to be perfect I'm not saying you have to work with a producer and that's not my point I'm just I just think people can be more mindful of the quality of the audio and it's really easy Like I have three tips. They're like the big tips if you want Yeah
Brittany Herzberg (09:13.823)
Yes.
Brittany Herzberg (09:19.436)
Mm-hmm.
Brittany Herzberg (09:36.086)
Yes, yes, tell us because that's where I was gonna go.
Rosa Sarmento (09:39.01)
Cause like I know I can talk about it but then people are like, okay yeah but what do I do? So One thing, make sure you're in a place, quiet room obviously that goes without saying But in a room that has soft surfaces and many different soft surfaces Not just like a rug But if there are curtains and a rug and pillows And if you don't just literally grab pillows and put like next to the microphone It helps a lot
Brittany Herzberg (09:44.221)
Help us. Yeah, exactly. So what are those tips?
Rosa Sarmento (10:08.818)
I've done that a few times when I was like in Airbnb's. Works like a charm. To get rid of that echo, because echoes can get really bad if you're like in a square room, especially. They're not like, yeah, it will definitely ruin the recording. And that's something you can't edit. You can't get rid of it. So that's the first thing. Ah, sorry.
Brittany Herzberg (10:12.862)
Yeah. Oh, that's good to know. There was. Yeah.
Brittany Herzberg (10:31.25)
No, I know I've heard. I know I've heard. Sorry, I get like, like you said, I geek out about this stuff. I know I've heard where it sounds like someone is recording like in their kitchen or something like that where it is not there are no it's all hard surfaces. Yeah, so just be mindful. Okay, what's the second tip? Really?
Rosa Sarmento (10:43.362)
Yeah, kitchens are really bad. Yes, yes. And even offices, because a lot of people record in like home offices, but some offices, again, only hard surfaces. If they don't have like a couch and pillows, if it's just a desk in the room with like a window and walls, you're gonna get a lot of echo. It doesn't matter how small or big that room is. So yeah, I would just
throw in some soft surfaces, even if you have to grab them just to record the interview or the podcast and then put them back in their place. It goes a long way.
Brittany Herzberg (11:19.394)
Okay, good to know. That's a good tip. Alright, what's your next one?
Rosa Sarmento (11:23.238)
Yes. Next, again, turning off appliances, because this is something that sometimes you don't realize you have on because it's just that humming sound in the back. It's white noise, right? I love white noise, but it's not good for your podcast. So just make sure you turn off like any fans or ACs or too loud. Dishwashers, big thing. Make sure the dishwasher is not running. Anything that can
Brittany Herzberg (11:38.454)
Mm-hmm. Hahaha.
Rosa Sarmento (11:51.51)
throw notifications at you, turn them off, or at least, you know, turn the sound off. And finally, one rule, not everyone knows this, and this was actually our cash, shout out to cash, our in-house sound engineer at Idea Blossoms, he told me this, and I was like, why didn't you say that before? You should be this close to my-
Brittany Herzberg (12:15.986)
Wait, just like measuring it from like, okay, so for anyone who's not watching the video, we've got like, what is that like an I love you or like aloha kind of sign or something like hang loose. I'm an East coaster. I know that's a thing in California, but like it's so it's from your thumb, the tip of your thumb all the way to the tip of your pinky. So I'm a little bit further than I should be.
Rosa Sarmento (12:25.57)
I think we call it hang loose here in Brazil. I'm not sure if it's right. Yeah? Okay.
Rosa Sarmento (12:37.562)
Yes. And that is exactly what most people are. And you can see like mine is right here. And it's as close as I can get because I'm not at a proper desk right now.
Brittany Herzberg (12:45.792)
Yeah.
Brittany Herzberg (12:49.906)
Neither am I. Which is part of my hangup, but now that I know that, that's an easy way to measure it. Aw, thanks, Cash!
Rosa Sarmento (12:57.073)
I know right? Shout out to him.
Brittany Herzberg (12:58.294)
That's an awesome tip. Yeah, I really like this. I agree that as a podcast listener, and even with writing show notes, like I've been doing over the last six months or so, you can really, you start to get pretty sensitive to what the audio quality is, and the things that are annoying or the things that are good, or what makes it a great listening experience for you. And I do agree, just like we've become really picky consumers of video.
Rosa Sarmento (13:15.062)
Yeah.
Brittany Herzberg (13:26.966)
We've become really picky consumers of audio. We know what quality is. We know what we like. If something is easier to listen to and you're able to hear the person, you're going to go for a show like that versus one that sounds like it was recorded in 2017 on, like you said, someone's iPhone, and they're just chilling on the couch.
Rosa Sarmento (13:27.274)
Mm-hmm.
Rosa Sarmento (13:42.377)
Yes.
Yes, exactly.
Brittany Herzberg (13:49.542)
Yeah.
Rosa Sarmento (14:15.088)
So quality is not an option. And again, I'm not saying you have to spend loads of money just editing your podcast. You can just try to be more mindful during recording. So you can still get good quality with a very low budget and even a basic setup.
Brittany Herzberg (14:33.354)
Yeah, that's a really great point. Something that, and I would love your take on this, something that I've done before, especially with my ads, if I don't want my podcast producer to worry about that or if it's something that I come up with, heaven forbid, on the fly, like I often do, and I just want to record an ad and then get it posted into Buzzsprout, something I will use is Auphonic. Is that something that you recommend to people just to kind of like, well, you tell us, what does it do to the audio?
Rosa Sarmento (14:53.843)
Mmm.
Rosa Sarmento (15:00.126)
No, Alphonic, I think it's a great option, especially for those that are running their own show, they don't have a lot of support or team members or anything like that, because it will even out the levels of your audio, especially like speech, what do they call the speech sound levels, make sure you sound consistent throughout that audio, because sometimes you speak too close and then you speak far away.
And that is a terrible listener experience. So, Alphonic helps with that, leveling up the speech audio. It also helps with background noise and a few other things that are really way too technical for me to get into. But yeah, I think that's a great start actually. Just make sure, I mean, one thing, the recorder on your phone is really good if you need to do that. Just make sure, again, you have soft surfaces around the phone.
be very close to the phone and you can record there and then use Alphonic just to make sure it's like crisp and nice. And if you have a proper microphone then I would use something like Audacity or Reaper. I really like Reaper because it allows you to like monitor yourself. And then you get that extra layer of quality because it's a proper, you know, audio recording software.
Brittany Herzberg (16:26.078)
I really like that. Those are good tips and I didn't know about the other two sites. So that's really good. Alright. They are. Okay. Oh so it's like on your desktop. It's not even a site that you go to. Oh that's really cool because I know with Alphonic, at least the way I use it, it's just a website that I go to, pull in the file.
Rosa Sarmento (16:30.722)
Enable free Audacity and report. You can download and install it and it's free.
Rosa Sarmento (16:45.394)
I thought you mentioned like post-production a lot of a lot of podcast managers use it for post-production Treating the audio before going in and edit. I didn't even realize you could record there That's new
Brittany Herzberg (16:48.736)
Mm-hmm.
Brittany Herzberg (16:52.626)
Yes. Yeah.
Brittany Herzberg (16:57.386)
No, I'm saying I didn't know that you could record there, because I just pulled the file into Auphonic, but you're saying that you can record in something like Audacity? Is it... Oh.
Rosa Sarmento (17:01.934)
Ah, okay, okay. Audacity. Audacity and off-phonic. It's confusing, I know, but they're two different places.
Brittany Herzberg (17:10.942)
Right, and then was Ripper the other one, is that what you said? Reaper, okay.
Rosa Sarmento (17:14.234)
Reaper is the one that again, Kash recommended to us because he actually studied this and he said it's a much better software, especially if you're going to add it afterwards. And again, free to use, you can download once. And the thing about downloading to your computer that makes a difference, it's when you record online, like using online tools, you're always relying on the internet connection, which can be problematic sometimes. Tech is going to be tech.
Brittany Herzberg (17:38.237)
Mm-hmm.
Rosa Sarmento (17:42.934)
So if you can record, you know, if it's a solo episode and there isn't a guest, it's just yourself. I would definitely recommend just doing on your laptop, desktop, whatever it is, using one of those tools. GarageBand is also one. Audacity and Reaper, those are the three big ones. And then, you know, we can link into the show notes and people can test it out, do whatever feels good and easy.
Brittany Herzberg (17:43.299)
Yes it is.
Brittany Herzberg (18:05.003)
Mm-hmm. Oh, yeah.
Brittany Herzberg (18:08.754)
Yeah, that's good to know. Okay, so, Afonic, just to clarify for anyone listening, Afonic is what I use after I have recorded. Let's say I recorded something in Zoom, and I would pull the audio file into Afonic on a website, and it cleans it all up and makes it nicer to listen to. With Audacity, GarageBand, and Reaper, those are softwares that you can have on your computer, and you can go into them and treat it like a recording studio. Okay, cool. That is amazing. Okay.
Shall we get into my probably least favorite subject, which is AI? Hahaha.
Rosa Sarmento (18:43.75)
It's a love and hate relationship, isn't it?
Brittany Herzberg (18:46.586)
It is, it really is. But I liked what you said in your post, so I'm excited for you to explain a little bit more to those listening of what AI can do for a podcast. Because you had some really unique takes on what it can do and how you can use it.
Rosa Sarmento (18:59.998)
Yes, because I feel like we are all of us are trying to experiment here and there with AI. And especially in the podcast industry, there are a few very niche for podcast AI types, like the script is one they have their own AI built in the software now, which is a really good AI actually have used it a few times. And yeah, it's quality like, you're not gonna like this.
Brittany Herzberg (19:30.382)
I only muted myself so I could make notes for the show notes. It's not that I hate it. I'm just not someone who... I feel like it slows me down. I haven't found quite the thing that makes it efficient for me and efficiency is like such a thing. It's such a driver. Yeah. Right.
Rosa Sarmento (19:30.819)
But...
Rosa Sarmento (19:40.898)
Okay, yeah. It's because you are a copywriter, right? I'm not a copywriter. I work with copy, but I'm not a copywriter. So AI is that like little kick in the butt that I need to get started instead of a blank screen that just makes me wanna cry sometimes. Yeah.
Brittany Herzberg (19:52.768)
Yeah.
Brittany Herzberg (19:57.894)
to sleep or cry either way or cry yourself to sleep. Yeah, so I know that it's not my jam, but maybe one day I'll find something and I'm not like naive enough to think that something you're gonna say isn't gonna help someone out there. So I'm only muting myself to make notes.
Rosa Sarmento (20:11.714)
True, cause... No worries. And a lot of people are doing podcasts themselves, so like these AI can... Some of them can cut you hours of work a week. But as I was saying, there is some like podcast-focused AI out there, like... CapShow is one, and there is the script, which I really like. Anything that we use AI for in the script, like show notes or post...
creates like a really good starting piece. And I've tried a few other ones and it's kind of clunky. It sounds very genetic and it just doesn't help at all. You just want to start over because you don't even know what to do with that. So it's been a lot of experimenting, but what I'm starting to see, which was my prediction, it's not just using AI as a tool to repurpose, but also a tool to produce. So something that you can use for market research.
creating episode topic ideas and talking points even. Writing scripts, because I know this can be very challenging for some people. You can use AI to help you with that. Customizing guest pitches or sponsor deal pitches that you wanna get out in the world. I know those can be also very draining and time consuming. So AI.
Brittany Herzberg (21:22.251)
Mm-hmm.
Brittany Herzberg (21:31.22)
Mm-hmm.
Rosa Sarmento (21:32.862)
It's not just for repurposing, it can be used in different ways and I think it will be used in different ways. And that's something like I'm making note to start experimenting more this year because I definitely want to take advantage of that. I don't think AI is going anywhere, I think we can all agree with that. So the sooner you get on board, the better for you and your business. That's my belief.
Brittany Herzberg (21:48.558)
Mm-mm.
Rosa Sarmento (21:56.994)
I'm sorry.
Brittany Herzberg (21:58.296)
No, this is great. So Descript and Capshow, is there another? Are there any others that you can think of? AI for podcasts specifically?
Rosa Sarmento (22:07.186)
I think for producing a show, like I said before, to do market research, episode topics, talking point scripts, I think ChatGPT is actually a very good one for that. CapShow and the script, they are more for when you have the episode ready, they are more for repurposing, because they can grab that audio and turn it into any piece of content you need. Of course, you will have to review it.
Brittany Herzberg (22:26.562)
Mm-hmm.
Rosa Sarmento (22:35.37)
and customize it. It's not gonna be perfect, but like I said, for someone who's not a copywriter that might be listening to this and has a podcast, it is a great starting point because then you can just go in and do your magic, throw some personality there, but you don't have to start from scratch. But again, if you want to use it as a producer to like come up with ideas about, you know, your listeners, your market, your episodes, whatever it is, then I would go to ChatGPT because it pulls from everywhere.
Brittany Herzberg (22:41.207)
Mm-hmm.
Rosa Sarmento (23:05.482)
and I think it's the best developed one out there right now so I would use that one.
Brittany Herzberg (23:11.158)
Good to know. So how long have you been in the podcasting industry? I know you've been in it for a while.
Rosa Sarmento (23:18.866)
Hmm. I've been in it since 2019, I believe officially and I went in like Yeah on the record But then I idea blossoms only started in 29 2020 2020. Yes
Brittany Herzberg (23:24.943)
Yeah, I know, on the record.
Brittany Herzberg (23:37.142)
So have you seen a lot of these things, I can't even imagine what you've seen evolve in that time. I mean, AI wasn't even a thing back when you started. So that wasn't even in the conversation. And like you said, the audio quality wasn't as much of a concern. It was more of a, like you said, it was more of a nice to have, not a necessity. But like, what else have you seen evolve or come to fruition in those years?
Rosa Sarmento (23:45.991)
No.
Rosa Sarmento (24:02.41)
Well, SEO has been huge because it was pretty much non-existing a few years ago. Not for podcasting. I mean, SEO existed, guys. I'm not saying that just for podcasting. No, don't come for me, please. For podcasting, there wasn't a lot. I mean, there were some best practices people were sharing, and but there was no real data behind it. And now we can see actual data and there's more.
Brittany Herzberg (24:04.767)
Mm-hmm.
I'm sorry.
Brittany Herzberg (24:14.419)
Don't come for her.
Rosa Sarmento (24:32.25)
in terms of keyword research you can do. And I wish I could share this, but unfortunately, they just stopped services for lack of funding, which broke my heart. But Voxelize was a great, great tool that up to two months ago was working. And it gave you like a full SEO report on your podcast and like which keywords you were ranking.
Brittany Herzberg (24:42.139)
Oh bummer. Yeah.
Brittany Herzberg (24:55.351)
Oh wow.
Rosa Sarmento (24:57.022)
which position you were ranking for, the level of difficulty of each of those keywords. It was such a fantastic tool. I cannot believe that they didn't get funded. But anyways, I couldn't do much to help. But again, I think it's just going to be a matter of time until someone else, you know, tries that idea and brings that back because that I don't think it's going anywhere. People, I mean, there's so much competition in the podcasting world now that wasn't a thing.
Brittany Herzberg (25:08.05)
Yeah.
Brittany Herzberg (25:14.06)
Mm-hmm.
Rosa Sarmento (25:26.454)
five, ten years ago, you could start a show and grow very organically with very little effort, but now it has to have a little bit of effort. So SEO, SEO helps a lot because people are searching, they are using podcast apps as a search engine. That's another thing I've noticed evolving. If you want to learn something, you either go to YouTube or to your podcast app. Maybe if you're a little older, you'll go to Google.
Brittany Herzberg (25:35.563)
Just a little bit.
Mm-hmm.
Brittany Herzberg (25:44.118)
Yeah.
Brittany Herzberg (25:54.766)
Hehehe
Rosa Sarmento (25:55.802)
I still go to Google, I must say, I am a little lady. But if I wanna like learn something on the go, like tomorrow I'll be traveling. And then before traveling, I usually download some episodes of things I wanna learn or things I wanna, you know, maybe some industry topics I wanna learn about or get deeper into. I always download some stuff because I know it's easy. I can, you know, listen on the airplane or waiting, in the waiting room.
Brittany Herzberg (25:58.378)
Yeah, I know, same.
Rosa Sarmento (26:24.666)
So it really depends on the type of listener and the type of person you're talking to the listener type not a listener type I think it's Student type there's a term that they use in the marketing word Do you know? Yes, yes, like some people are visual
Brittany Herzberg (26:35.078)
Oh yeah, like, right with like the learning style kind of. Yeah, exactly. So that's like where the...
Rosa Sarmento (26:44.278)
Some people like to listen, some people like to read. So like those different styles, I mean, that's what it is, right? So some people go to the podcast apps to learn something because they will get really bored reading or they don't really want to sit down in front of a screen and watch a video. They just wanna pop their earphones or AirPods and go for a run because it feels good. So yeah.
Brittany Herzberg (26:46.288)
Mm-hmm.
Brittany Herzberg (26:51.266)
Yeah.
Brittany Herzberg (27:06.412)
Mm-hmm.
Brittany Herzberg (27:10.238)
Yeah, you actually bring up a good point. I'm curious because I love private podcasts. Do you have maybe like one private podcast prediction for 2024?
Rosa Sarmento (27:20.838)
Ooh, that's a good, good question. I love that question. Okay, I do. I have a couple actually. Okay, so one thing. I think it's a really great tools for monetizing your podcasts. If you want to have like a proper podcast, not a proper, I shouldn't say that because it sounds like I'm scoffing, if anything else, but fancy.
Brittany Herzberg (27:22.75)
I'm throwing this at you on the fly.
Brittany Herzberg (27:30.048)
Ooh, okay.
Brittany Herzberg (27:45.074)
No. I think it makes it sound fancy. Yeah, you got a proper podcast. You got to do this.
Rosa Sarmento (27:52.754)
All right, better, better. Maybe I'm too judgy, but if you want to really funnel your listeners into something that goes a little bit deeper into your work, that's where a great like private podcast comes into play. Because your podcast is really where you're, you know, getting everyone into like almost the top of the funnel. Not really the top, a lot of the, a lot of the clients I work with, their social media is really the top of the funnel.
The podcast is the next step. But then once they're in your world and you wanna nurture, educate, and be like in close touch with them, that's when a private podcast comes in because then you can get those emails, you can have that closer relationship and see their names and actually have a direct point of contact with them because we don't know who's listening, right? We never know who is listening until you receive a DM.
Brittany Herzberg (28:24.012)
Mm-hmm.
Brittany Herzberg (28:47.028)
Yeah?
Brittany Herzberg (28:50.659)
Mm-hmm.
Rosa Sarmento (28:50.782)
or until you get their email. And with a private podcast, you can get their email, you can start that closer relationship. So I really like it as a part of a funnel. You know, they start on your podcast, then they wanna learn more from you in a certain topic. And that's what the private podcast is for. And I would be like very mindful and intentional about that certain topic. Don't try to teach everything under the sun in that one private podcast.
just try to solve that one problem for them. That will be like the best scenario because then it can be short and sweet and they can get that quick win and then take that next step with you, whatever that is when you create the podcast.
Brittany Herzberg (29:23.916)
Mm-hmm.
Brittany Herzberg (29:38.566)
Yeah, I like that. So for me, I like hearing of private podcasts being used like that, almost having someone come into your main podcast, and then you funnel them into this paid one. So it's a little bit behind a paywall, and they're getting just deeper, more one to one, more actionable tips from you. I've also used it and I really liked this. And I actually created it because I was so frustrated with my experience with other programs. I created a private podcast for my training.
Rosa Sarmento (29:54.334)
Yeah.
Brittany Herzberg (30:06.914)
because I really didn't like, you know, log into Teachable, log into Kajabi, log into this thing. Well, I'm leaving my office and I want to listen to something while I'm on the road, but I have to like sit in the parking lot for an extra 10 minutes just to like remember what the login info was and go back to the lesson and where was I in the lesson? It was just a pain in the butt to me. So I created the private podcast for my training so people could, you know, my students could come into the program, they could start listening, just like go through in a series if they wanted to, or they could say, I wanna learn.
Rosa Sarmento (30:11.93)
Yes.
Rosa Sarmento (30:22.197)
Yeah.
Brittany Herzberg (30:36.13)
about keyword research, so I'm going to go to this lesson or whatever. So that and like getting at the listening, the not the listening, the learning styles that you were talking about earlier, that was one reason why I wanted to have that because I knew that audio was going to be important to some people. So I love hearing all the different uses, the use cases for private podcasting.
Rosa Sarmento (30:56.85)
I agree 100% I am also that person, I have so many... Oh, sorry
Brittany Herzberg (30:59.17)
Thank you so much for coming in and telling us about the predictions that you have for 2024 in the podcasting world. Where can people connect with you and hear more from you?
Rosa Sarmento (31:09.538)
Oh, okay, so you can go to my website, ideablossoms.com, and there you'll find pretty much all my links, Instagram, LinkedIn.
Brittany Herzberg (31:16.076)
Oh no, I lost her.
Brittany Herzberg (31:21.014)
Are you there? I hear you.
Rosa Sarmento (31:23.486)
Are you, can you hear me again?
Brittany Herzberg (31:29.587)
I know it cut out again.
Rosa Sarmento (31:30.414)
Eee. At least it was at the end.
Rosa Sarmento (31:42.015)
Hello?
Brittany Herzberg (31:43.214)
I pushed my luck with asking her one more question and it kicked her out. And then it dropped. Sorry, Leah.
Brittany Herzberg (31:57.442)
friend.
Brittany Herzberg (32:35.999)
Welcome back.
Rosa Sarmento (32:39.44)
It's not a podcast recording until attack issue happens. I heard you asking how we can get in touch with you. I think that's the last thing I-
Brittany Herzberg (32:39.826)
What did you hear? No, it's not. No, it's not. It's just not.
Brittany Herzberg (32:51.45)
Okay, I'll let you know me to ask it again. I'll ask it again. All right, Leah, we're going to kick off here. Thank you so much for joining us and telling us all about your 2024 podcasting predictions and even giving us that like extra little tidbit with private podcasts. Where can people connect with you?
Rosa Sarmento (32:54.147)
Yeah.
Rosa Sarmento (33:09.792)
Well, you can go to my website, ideablossoms.com. That's where you'll find all our information, all our links. We are on LinkedIn, we are on Instagram.
Brittany Herzberg (34:02.518)
That's amazing! Thank you so much for joining us. This has been really, really fun. I knew I wanted to have this conversation with you and I'm going to make sure that I linked to your LinkedIn post, which actually spawned this entire conversation. So thank you so much!
Brittany Herzberg (34:20.438)
Alright, I will catch you next time!
