A Blog vs Podcast: Which is Better for Your Small Business Marketing

So, you are at that stage where you are looking at a blog vs podcast strategy to implement for your small business marketing needs.

You know that blogging has been around for many years and it is possible that this method is saturated.

Podcasting on the other hand continues to be the new kid on the block.

It appears to be getting more popular and seems to offer more versatility.

However, you’re not sure which one is easier to produce.

At this point, you would like answers to the following questions.

Between the two mediums which one is easier to get started?

What is the cost to start a podcast compared to a blog?

Is there an established methodology to go from 0 to 1,000 visitors a month on a blog compared to getting 1,000 listeners on a podcast?

How to get the 10-20 blog posts written compared to podcast episodes recorded and which one will take longer?

Which option would be more suitable for your target market?

In this post, you’ll learn how to choose between a blog vs podcast for your business. The process involved in getting started and how to get your listeners to your podcast and readers to your blog.

Disclosure: Please note that this post may contain affiliate links which means that if you buy one of my recommended products I get paid a commission for sharing the link at no additional cost to you.  I only recommend products that I have tried myself and have experienced success.

tablet, coffee mug and a flower vase

The Definitions

In order to help you choose between these two mediums let’s first look at what they are in their presentation.

Both blogs and podcasts can be used as inbound marketing channels as they are in a digital format which is great news for small businesses.

A blog is a written form of content that ranges from 300 to 10,000 words in length.

The reason why there’s such a wide range in the length of a blog post is that it depends on the type of post as well as the reason it was written.

Blogs are normally used to build authority and grow a following. When it comes to blog content it is normally educational and/or entertaining in nature.

Looking at the definition of a podcast, it is a form of audio content ranging in length from 7 minutes up to 2 hours.

Again, the reason why there’s such a wide range is that some podcast episodes are full-on performances.

If you want to know the average length then it is between 30-60 minutes.

Podcasts can also be used to build authority and grow an audience. The way each one is consumed can be very different.

One major reason why people listen to podcasts is to learn something new.

Podcast vs Blog: The Statistics

A key way to figure out which content marketing medium is right for your business is to first look at the statistics behind each one.

It would make sense for me to spend time looking at the statistics of each one individually to help you gain a frame of reference.

Podcast Statistics

At the time of writing this blog post, there are over 48 million podcast episodes in existence. These came from over 2,000,000 podcast shows.

In case you don’t understand the difference, a podcast show can have several episodes.

Two years ago, there were only 525,000 shows with 18.5 million episodes. So, the number of podcast shows have quadrupled in number.

According to Podcast Insights, 50% of all homes in the USA are podcast fans, which represents 60 million homes in total.

At least 155 million people in the US said that they listened to a podcast.

Of the total number of podcast listeners 51% are male, 63% of listeners are white and 45% have a household income above $75,000.

In terms of devices used to listen to a podcast, Ying Lin at Oberlo states that 65% of listeners use a smartphone or tablet to engage with podcasts.

When it comes to advertising revenue, podcasts ad revenue is expected to surpass $1 billion this year.

Blogging Statistics

There are currently over 600 million blogs on the Internet today worldwide and 32 million bloggers in the US alone.

Already you are starting to see the vast differences between blogs vs podcasts.

The current rate of newly created blog posts stands at 70 million new posts a month.

60% of consumers find blogs very valuable in the early stages of their buying process.

Bloggers that publish 16 posts a month receive 3.5 times more visitors compared to those who publish less.

97% of bloggers use social media to promote their posts.

36% of readers prefer blog posts that are list-based. This is according to Optinmonster.

Every month over 409 million people view 20+ billion blog posts.

image showing two computer screens with a keyboard and coffee mug

Who is Your Audience

Before choosing a content marketing strategy it is important to get really clear on who is your target audience.

The reason for this is that if you know that person really well, you’ll be able to produce content to suit their needs.

Another aspect of knowing your audience is understanding why they need your content.

A great way to understand your audience is to create an ideal avatar.

Here is a list of questions to get a really intimate glimpse of them.

  1. Age
  2. Gender
  3. Where do they live? (country, city)
  4. Do they live in a house or an apartment?
  5. Their neighbourhood, what does it look like?
  6. What are their daily, weekly, monthly or annual challenges?
  7. Outline their biggest needs?
  8. The kind of problems they are trying to solve personally, financially
  9. Their deepest desires and dreams for them and their family, what are they?
  10. In terms of their biggest fears, what are they? (not spiders, emotional ones?)
  11. Do you get their short-term and long-term goals?
  12. Any idea of their good and bad habits?
  13. What gets them excited?
  14. The stuff that annoys them, what are they?
  15. Their passion projects, what are they?
  16. Where do they spend the most time online?
  17. List the kind of items they spend their money on when they get paid?
  18. What type of podcasts do they listen to?
  19. Which software and/or apps do they use?

As you can see the process of mapping out your ideal client can be very comprehensive but definitely worth it.

The Buyer Journey

After getting really clear on who your ideal client is and giving them a name, it is time to look at their journey.

By their journey, I mean understanding the steps they take to make a purchase.

As you can imagine people don’t normally wake up one morning and decide to purchase a car.

Of course, there are impulse purchases for smaller items like food, clothes and gadgets.

However, for larger items like buying a car, house or investing in education this takes time.

What does your ideal client buyer journey look like?

Do you know the steps they take before making a decision?

To help you answer this question let’s first look at the stages of a buyer’s journey.

Buyer Journey + Know, Like, Trust

As you can see a typical buyer needs to become aware of your brand, become interested in it and then add your brand to a shortlist of options at the consideration stage.

Notice here how blogs and podcasts are both involved at the interest stage.

Here’s a question for you, do you have the other elements of the buying cycle ready?

In many cases, it is so easy to focus on looking at a blog vs podcast comparison when the bigger picture hasn’t been considered.

How to Start a Blog

Now that you know what a blog is as well as who your potential ideal client will be, let’s look at the creation process.

When it comes to starting a blog and maintaining it there are a lot of things to consider.

In order to start a blog you’ll need the following:

  1. A blogging platform
  2. Hosting provider
  3. Your domain name
  4. WordPress theme (premium) for a WordPress blog
  5. 5 pages (home, about me, terms and conditions, contact us, privacy policy)
  6. Blog topics
  7. Consistent blogging schedule

Of course, starting a blog is not going to be free as you will need to invest time and resources to get things going.

If you are wondering what the blogging expenses would look like for the first year, here’s a summary.

ExpenseCostProvider
Domain name$10/yearNamecheap
Web Hosting$5.95/monthSiteground
WordPress Theme$69/yearGeneratePress
Email marketing$29/monthConvertKit
Landing pages$49/yearElementor
Total$547.40/year

There are cheaper options available for email marketing but they will not give you the sophisticated features that come with ConvertKit as standard.

You can take a look at these 5 low-cost email service providers here.

Would you like to get a step by step guide to starting your blog in 10 days or less? Enrol in my 10-day blog challenge here.

How to Start a Podcast

If the blog creation process doesn’t look right for you and you’re wondering how to get started with podcasting then let’s look at it briefly.

The process involved with starting an audio podcast can be more challenging for some people.

In order to start a podcast you’ll need the following items:

  1. Hosting provider (for your online audio file)
  2. A domain name
  3. 2-3 pages (home, about and contact us)
  4. Topics for your podcast (for your episodes)
  5. Podcast mic or headphones (Apple ear pods are fine)
  6. A pop filter (if you’re using a microphone)
  7. Digital audio workstation (DAW)
  8. Audio editing software
  9. Audio Leveller (adjusting sound levels)
  10. Audiograms (marketing)
  11. Submission to Apple podcasts
  12. Distribution to Google podcasts

As you can imagine, starting a podcast is not going to be free so let’s look at the expenses you can incur when you become a podcaster.

Podcasting Expenses

ExpenseCostProvider
Hosting provider$20/monthBlubrry
Domain name$10/yearNamecheap
Podcast mic$100 – $199Rode
DAWFree to $28/monthResonate or Alitu
Audio Editing$60 one timeFilmora
Audio Editing $28/monthAlitu
Audio LevellerFreeAuphonic
AudiogramsFreeHeadliner
Total (year one)$746.00 and $646/year (2nd year)

Three years ago when I started my podcast there were not a lot of options in the market when it comes to podcasting equipment.

However, as you can see, there are a ton of options available for new podcasters.

Many people will advise you to use Audacity or Adobe Auditions for your DAW and podcast editing but I can tell you this from experience.

Adobe Auditions is costly and it has a steep learning curve if you are not a sound technician.

I’ve tried Audacity on several occasions on my MacBook and it has not been great at all.

If you would like a step by step guide on how to start a podcast then check out my resource over here.

Everybody and their relatives recommend Libsyn as the best podcast host but you need to check out my Blubrry vs Libsyn comparison here.

It is important to mention that there are free platforms available to host podcast content and long-form content like a blog article but remember your exit strategy.

How to Get Your First 1,000 Blog Readers

One of the most difficult things to do after starting a blog is getting readers to know it exists.

In fact, building a following can be quite a challenge if you don’t know where to begin.

Part of the process when building out a client avatar is understanding how they consume content.

Knowing the 2-3 platforms where they hang out will help you to formulate a promotion plan.

You’ll need to divide your strategy into three different areas as follows:

  1. Short-term
  2. Medium-term
  3. Longterm

Short-term

In order to get readers to your blog instantly or within a period of a few weeks there are two methods. You can use paid traffic from Facebook or Google Ads.

Using Pinterest to promote your content is the next best way together with social media marketing (Twitter, LinkedIn and Instagram).

Medium-term

Looking at medium term methods you’ll have to consider a combination of 3-4 methods. While social media marketing still falls into the category of medium-term adding search engine optimisation to the mix will help.

Guest blogging has also proven to be an effective strategy when it comes to getting your content in front of other people’s audience.

Long-term

When considering a long-term strategy for your blog marketing, continuing to use social media marketing and Pinterest marketing should be included.

Continuing to build out your SEO efforts and adding in some public relations outreach will really take your blog to new places.

How to Get Your First 1,000 Podcast Downloads

As I mentioned at the start of this resource, podcasting is still fairly new when compared to blogging. There are a number of marketing strategies that you can implement to get more listeners.

Guest Podcasting

These include becoming a guest on other people’s podcast and before you give me a list of excuses why no one will interview you. Here’s a list of places looking for podcast guests.

  1. Matchmaker.fm
  2. Boss Mom Facebook Group
  3. Goal Diggers Podcast Insiders Facebook Group
  4. PodSeeker (assist with Podcast outreach)

Other great ways to promote your show include marketing it across social media platforms like Instagram and Twitter.

Promoting it on Pinterest using Tailwind to automate the pinning process. Creating audiograms to help you with social media promotion, you can use Headliner to create audiograms.

Podcast Advertising

Remember that you can also use paid promotion channels to advertise your show as well. Here’s a list of places to advertise your show.

  1. Podcast Addict
  2. Google Ads
  3. Overcast
  4. Pocket Casts
  5. Podbay
  6. Spotify
  7. Podnews

It is important to have a marketing budget set aside to run paid promotions, doing this will help you drive interest to your brand and paid products and services faster.

image showing a laptop with hands on the keyboard

Pros and Cons of Blogging

At this stage, so much information was covered on blogging that a short summary covering the pros and cons would help you decide.

There may also be some things that you may not have considered when it comes to blogging.

Cons

  • To be successful at blogging you’ll need to produce content on a regular basis.
  • Research is something that would be key to your blogging success
  • It takes a minimum of 6 hours to produce a successful blog post
  • SEO brings the best growth results for bloggers
  • Getting good quality backlinks can be challenging
  • A good PR outreach campaign is needed to grow your domain authority
  • Choosing a self-hosted blog is best for monetisation and an exit strategy
  • Blogging is competitive so choose your niche wisely

Pros

  • You can use blogging to build your authority in the niche
  • A blog is a valuable asset that you can sell on for money
  • Successful blogs can be a great source of passive income
  • Outsourcing the writing and researching is a common practice
  • Choosing the fastest growing blog type can make you successful in 12 months
  • There’s no need to be great at writing to become a blogger
  • Easier to generate leads and grow a mailing list compared to podcasting
  • Monetising a blog can be easy after generating traffic if you want to sell products

Now that you have a fair idea of the good, the bad and the ugly when it comes to blogging let’s move on to podcasting.

image of a high end podcasting microphone

Pros and Cons of Podcasting

While podcasting may not require many things that you’ll need for blogging there are still some essential must do’s to keep in mind.

Depending on your chosen route for either a blog or a podcast there is a bit of a learning curve and some technical aptitude required.

Disadvantages of Podcasting

  • A podcast hosting service is required to store your audio files
  • The podcast host is needed to generate an RSS feed or podcast feed for distribution
  • Having a good DAW for recording will save you a lot of time in post-production
  • Post-production can take a long time if the recording isn’t good
  • Podcast promotion does require reaching out to other podcasters
  • You’ll need to interview celebrities (like industry experts or business leaders) to gain traction fast
  • It takes more effort to grow a podcast audience compared to blogging
  • Some technical knowledge is required to produce podcasts
  • More difficult for listeners to take the desired action on an affiliate link
  • Newer medium compared to blogging

Advantages of Podcasting

  • Interviewing people can be a lot of fun
  • Writing amazing show notes can improve your podcast SEO
  • Potential clients connect with you better on a podcast compared to a blog
  • You get to be more creative on audio compared to written content
  • Depending on your show less research time will be required compared to blogging
  • No need to spend 6 hours creating one episode
  • Revenue can be generated via dynamic ads
  • Outsourcing the post-production is a common practice
  • Podcasting has the potential to reach a wider audience faster
  • Podcast consumers would binge listen to several episodes at once
  • Active podcasts tend to get a large number of weekly listeners

While podcasting may require more technical knowledge to get started remember that this is something that you can outsource depending on your available resources.

A Blog vs Podcast: Which One is Right for You?

Now that you have a fair overview of the similarities and differences between a blog vs a podcast you’ll need to take everything on board and look at your options.

Before deciding on going for a blog or a podcast spend some time looking at the following considerations:

  1. How much time commitment do you have available each week?
  2. What is your monthly budget?
  3. Do you have sufficient resources to outsource some of the work?
  4. Have you considered your end goal?
  5. Is there an exit strategy in place?
  6. In terms of years, how do you want to run this blog or podcast?
  7. When do you want to generate a return on your investment?
  8. How will you monetise the blog or podcast?

While there are some people who decide to start a blog as a hobby, at some point they may want to turn it into a business.

I know the feeling when you’re first getting started as you don’t have the answers to many questions.

Depending on your situation it may be easier to just get started.

In other cases, you’ll need to calculate everything before buying a domain name.

As someone who started over 100 blogs, I can tell you it is better to answer those questions listed.

Your other option is to start a blog in a niche where you’re passionate about the topic.

For the record, this blog started as a podcast which then became both a blog and a podcast over time.

image showing a bunch of flowers next to a coffee mug and notepad

Summary

Starting a blog or a podcast is not an easy decision.

For this reason, it is essential to have a sizable budget available if you want to run either one as a business.

Don’t spend your entire budget in the first year if you’re unsure about your niche or end goal.

It is better to run it on a shoestring budget for 1-2 years until you know what direction to take your business.

When it comes to blogging, you’ll spend more money on hiring researchers, writers and influencers. Maybe you’ll need an editor in time as well.

With podcasting, you’ll spend more money on podcast editing, advertising and outreach services.

At the end of the day, you can run both a blog and a podcast if that is something you want to do.

You can start with a blog and then start the podcast later on.

Both a blog and a podcast requires time, energy, resources and a good understanding of your audience.

Over to you, which one did you choose between a blog vs a podcast and why?

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As an entrepreneur, you generate income from solving big problems and challenges.

I started this blog in 2017 because I had a burden on my heart to reduce women illiteracy globally.

Because this is a huge undertaking I have decided to help 1,000 women over the next 10 years to become wildly successful in their online business through simplified marketing strategies.

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18 thoughts on “A Blog vs Podcast: Which is Better for Your Small Business Marketing”

  1. I have started a podcast just recently, and unfortunately the app that I am using cannot be monetized in my country yet. But, nonetheless, I enjoy making a podcast out of my blog posts.

  2. Yeah. It depends on who your audience are but of course, it will still depend on you in the end because we have our own preference of doing things. writing and speaking are a totally different thing for some of us. =)

    • Michael, yes indeed, after all, we are not robots so each of us will need to take that step.

  3. I think it depends on which you enjoy more. Some of us are better writers vs speakers vs on camera presence. I toy with the idea of podcasting but have my hands ful enough with YouTube and blog!

    • Lori, great to hear that you actually thought of doing a podcast. The editing post-production is going to be the killer if the recorded version was not done well.

  4. I agree with you. It really depends on the audience. 🙂 By the way, thank you so much for sharing this super insight post. Very helpful in deciding which way to go.

Comments are closed.

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