Focus on making the podcast the best possible podcast you can before you even think of monetizing.

Step 1: avoid anyone who claims they'll "promote" it for you

What’s the topics? Frequency of new episode uploads? Are you filming the podcast?

Who hosts your podcast? Whatever website you use will have ADs and monetization options. Super simple. You usually have to get a certain amount of listeners. A lot of huge guys make money off of sponsors, not necessarily ADs.

I recommend focusing first on ensure great content, consistent episode drops, and ever-improving audio quality. Monetization will come if and only if those three are met. Think of yourself as a new musician who hasn’t played a gig yet. Money will come but not for a while.

Not at all trying to discourage! You can and will get there, provided your primary goal isn’t money, just like young musicians.

If you want to make money podcasting you need a well-produced podcast that is released on a regular schedule. You need a strong niche; the goal is to have a niche small enough you can find your audience but not so small that it only has 14 listeners.

Also, you will only have a handful of listeners for the first 20 episodes. Keep making content and by year two hopefully you will get some Patreons.

Most podcasts need 5000 downloads per episode within 30 days to attract advertisers. 70% of podcasts never hit this so it has to be a labor of love first. You most likely won't make money podcasting unless you have a strong niche or have an existing following.

Great insights! Focus on building a strong audience first, then monetize. Consistency and authenticity will take you further than fancy equipment. Stay focused on the value you provide, and the rest will follow.

That’s amazing and encouraging!!! Is it about true crime?

dumb question but did you launch 15 episodes at once in the beginning? is this the strat?

Congrats! Think the most important thing is to pinpoint the right content niche - high demand, but also from well-paid individuals so that advertisers are willing to work with you. Not easy. I had a go at a newsletter last year on TikTok case studies, and it didn't take off - only those starting off on TikTok were interested in listening, and I wanted to target social media managers at large corporates.

I just use Spreaker's built in ad network. I make about $400/month.

Disclosure: I work for Spreaker's parent company but that doesn't seem to help me get any special treatment. Dammit.

Disclaimer front and centre - I created, have an interested in and run Lenny.fm. It’s a way for any podcast to get listener support.

In my experience as an indie podcaster for 7+ years sponsors are not a good way to monetize. They work for massive shows, very niche shows or when there is some sort of incredible fit between the podcast and the brand and the audience.

Often they will be on for a bit, not long enough to see a return, and bail out.

I’ve put together a short article about other ways to get money from your podcast content.

My best advice from experience - have more than one way to monetize and think of what’s valuable to the audience.

Depends on the agreement. It’s still the Wild West - whatever you can agree on with the sponsor! They’ll probably have a budget or work on an affiliate mechanism. Which you don’t have to wait for. You can sign up with an affiliate marketing place and they’ll give you links to track purchases. Lots of people taking a small cut from a single purchase.

Besides patreon, what are people using and liking for memberships? I’m not ready to monetize quite yet but have already looked at patreon - curious about other options out there. 👀

Thanks for sharing! Interesting experience. Pod ads are fraught with inconsistencies.

See graphtreon.com Yes, you can monetize (I wrote a book on it), but keep in mind you don't monetize a podcast - you monetize an audience.
Here are the ways you can make money with your podcast:

1. Sell your own stuff (products and services) << Best (If I sell one book, I make $12. If that's a $5 CPM ad, that would be 2400 downloads. Which one is easier 2400 downloads or one book?)
2. Sell other peoples stuff (affiliate programs)
3. Crowd funding and Donations (notice it is crowd funding, not fund crowding you need the crowd first and that can take YEARS
4. Advertising
5. Live events (very similar to 1 sell your stuff)
6. Free stuff
7. Opportunities (Which lead to opportunities to make money)

It all starts with knowing who your audience is, and giving them what they want.

Moderator Required full disclosure: I am the head of Podcasting at Podpage and the founder of the School of Podcasting.

I am definitely curious too. At it's peak some of my episodes have over 500 listens, but I haven't figured out how to spin this into anything more substantial. Would also be interested in any experiences people have had with monetizing a podcast.

Unless you're in a really exclusive niche, I doubt anything below 1000, or even 10,000, listeners is worth trying to monetize.

You might get $1 per listener per year, maybe.

Perhaps you could do some sort of business podcasts on this topic. You know this idea, monetization, I think this could be part of some talk on, say, debunking business myths or something.

Monetization is really refusal to monetize from the start. As if you can attract a paying audience by charging nothing. What people too often do is start without a revenue model, then just imagine at some point they don't know when they flip the Monetization switch to the On position. Then they find out if they have a business or not.

Reddit is going on what, fifteen years. 330 million active users. Tell me, has Reddit broken even yet? If there is something anyone cares to learn -- and I seriously doubt anyone does -- perhaps it is revenue models don't work well as tack-on afterthoughts.

Of course I figure such a topic is complete out of the question and is, in point of fact, not compatible with yout podcasts. But still, I really think you'll get the point for whatever you're doing

Because I have no idea what you could be doing and have this question. The concept of trying to work out a revenue model is fine, tests and experiments and whatnot. In practice people don't test, don't try, they just wait for a magical Monetization Day. They get X listeners or users then fear doing anything -- lest they expose the truth.

Monetization is avoidance, evasion, obfuscation, denial. That's all.

I suggest most are better off without this concept. They just end up lying to themselves. Stop calling zero pay users customers. Get the bills paid. Then you can fictionalize all you want about how business should work.

How’s it going?

I would love to help you out! I think depends on your target market & how you could produce quality content for them to listen to!

Feel free to reach out!

Reach out to local businesses asking if they would like to sponsor an episode, most people will probably say no but it's definately something I'd look into.

Seconding what's been said. Start with a volunteer contribution system with rewards like Patreon and once you are up to 10k donwloads per episode, seek ads.

Generate revenue with your listeners when they ask targeted question on your podcast with https://supertalk.me

I think community supported is the move until you’re doing thousands of downloads per episode. Otherwise you’re annoying people with ads but getting pennies for running them.

I've got a bunch. Many streams make a river right?

1. I negotiate ad deals with sponsors directly.
2. I have some affiliates that I plug where I get a % of the money when my listeners sign up.
3. I have patreon
4. I have ads in my youtube channel that youtube pays me to put there.
5. I have ads on my website that google pays me to put there
6. I have turned the podcast covert art into it's own style and brand and have made over 50 shirts with different images on them and sell them. You can also read this as I use the podcast to drive revenue for my other business.
7. I've got apple podcast subscriptions set up and it's doing well.
8. I am now a popular enough public figure that I get paid to do speaking engagements and host online events.
9. I have been able to convert some of my stories I cover into written articles and get them published in magazines.
10. I have been paid to drop another podcast into my feed to promote theirs.
11. I am currently fielding book and tv deals that will likely make some money.
12. I am open to the idea of doing an NFT drop. Which if done right, could make more than all the above combined and probably many time moreover.

HOWEVER. I literally did none of these until I hit 40,000 downloads per episode. The focus when start should not be to suck value out of your podcast, but instead to add value TO your podcast. I get it you work hard and want a trickle of cash to keep you going. But if you can hold back until you've developed a nice size devoted fanbase, you'll be able to make so much more. Bake the Pie, Don't Eat It.

Generate revenue with your listeners when they ask targeted question on your podcast with https://supertalk.me

YouTube now requires you to have at least 1,000 subscribers before you can monetize. If you are at that you should be able to get a little revenue from them.

You're making a YouTube video - which is great in itself.

Generally, most people regard a podcast as something that's audio and available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Google Podcasts (collectively that's where most consumption is).

There's a good list of places to put your podcast (audio, delivered via RSS) here: https://podnews.net/article/all-the-podcast-directories

To be a podcast, and submit it elsewhere, you need to be using a podcast host. There's free ones like Anchor (owned by Spotify) and Acast, and other pay ones like Libsyn or Omny.

Some hosts - Acast, Podbean etc - provide ways to monetise your audio if you have a solid number of downloads.

My number 1 source of revenue is premium memberships. Then it's sponsors, followed by affiliate links, one-off tips, and then finally merch.

Disclaimer: I'm Head of Podcaster Support & Experience at Captivate

If you’re looking for new ways to monetize your podcast beyond ads and subs, you should definitely take a look at Fourthwall. It’s basically an all-in-one platform for creators, and it’s packed with tools built specifically for podcasters.

Their integration with Spotify allows you to host both free and locked (premium) episodes in one place. Your public episodes stay open to grow your audience, while your exclusive content shows up with a padlock on Spotify.

When listeners click, they’re prompted to subscribe via your Fourthwall membership page. That makes the transition from free listener to paying supporter seamless, and you don’t have to send them off to another app like Patreon.

On top of that, they’ve got built-in marketing tools like newsletters and email updates, so you can message your listeners about new episodes or merch drops before they go live. Plus, you get detailed subscriber analytics, including retention stats, engagement, and insights into your conversions.

And if you ever want to start making merch for your podcast, they have a full-featured POD platform with tons of products to design and sell to your fans.

Me too lol.

You guys are getting listens?!

It’s unlikely. 90% of podcasts can’t monetize.

As someone who has an independent podcast that is monetized, and less than a year old, I can say: The thing about monetization that nobody talks about it the overhead. You have to negotiate, sign insertion orders, sample the products advertised (many require endorsement), review ad for compliance (so you don’t get stuck doing a make-good), submit airchecks, send monthly download reports and invoice. You also probably need to form a corporation before any agency signs you. All this work is just not worth it if you’re only getting $100/ad.

10k is the thread hold to make agencies or networks interested.

You can certainly do local companies or niche ads directly at a negotiated rate - this would be a case-by case so I just can’t say.

Focus on a good product first, then when you get traction, promote aggressively, then you might be ready to advertise.

To some extent it depends on your niche. Whilst the big general sponsors will expect 10k downloads per episode within 30 days of episode release, if you show is niche then lesser numbers might still be valuable to a sponsor.

e.g. say your show is about fishing, joe blogs rod company and fred blogs reel company may well be interested in your show even with low numbers as all of your listeners will be their precise target market.

While it’s likely it won’t be much, if you have a very engaged audience you can certainly make money on affiliate marketing ads.

Generally it is 5000 downloads per episode to attract most sponsors. If you have a very niche podcast you could get sponsors with less downloads.

Generally only 8 percent of all podcasts ever hit this threshold so it's best to look at podcasting as a hobby more than a money making venture.