Podcasting Borrows A Page From Radio’s Playbook — And It Works.

How well does podcast-on-podcast promotion work? A month-long test by UK production company Audio Always suggests podcast-on-podcast promotion can be a powerful audience-growth tool. The company says voiceover promos inserted at the start of selected episodes generated an estimated 191,069 listens to the shows being recommended, offering fresh evidence that listeners are willing to follow trusted podcast recommendations.

One of the highest conversion rates in the trial came from the chat show “Leave A Message with Ally & G” promoting other shows across the Audio Always Network. One promo announcement resulted in 5% of listeners listening to the promoted show, while a second resulted in 14% of listeners giving the promoted podcast a listen.

Listeners of shows in the Always True Crime network also responded well. Audio Always says 17% of the “British Murders” podcast audience went on to listen to “UK True Crime,” while 15% of listeners to “Murder Mile” followed a recommendation and listened to “The True Crime Enthusiast.”

“We’ve always known that great audio content leads listeners somewhere,” says Claire Chambers, Marketing Executive at Audio Always. “This trial gave us real evidence that continuity announcements can genuinely navigate audiences, in the same way they’ve moved TV and radio viewers and listeners for years.”

Paul Fernley, Business Development Director at Audio Always, says the strong performance of cross-promotional announcements shows podcasting doesn’t have to reinvent the wheel, but can borrow proven audience-building tactics from legacy media.