Podcasting is popular because it allows you to be heard, share your ideas, and connect with people. But here’s the problem: If you have an interview podcast it’s not always easy to find podcast guests who can make your work better. How do you find experts, thought leaders, and high profile personalities who are potential guest that fits your podcast’s theme in a world filled with them? How do you find a good podcast guest whose stories fit with your show’s themes?
I’m Niall Mackay, The Podcast Guy. Founder of Seven Million Bikes Podcasts and host of several shows including Vietnam is Awesome, Smarter Podcasting, and DeltaMV’s Insight Bites.
In this post, I’ll share some innovative ideas that will change the way you seek out guests. I’m here to help you find podcast guests, whether you want to use powerful podcast guest directories or the power of social media networking, there are many ways to invite guests to your show.
Find out how to find, invite, and prepare podcast guests who not only fit with your vision but also add value and authenticity to your podcast. When it comes to podcasting, you can’t say enough about how important it is to have interesting people. They are the key parts that give your podcast character, a different perspective, and interesting conversations.
Expert guests make your podcast episode more interesting and draw more audiences into your podcast. Also, your guests’ audience can help you reach more people, which is good for cross-promotion and community growth.
Having great guests will make your podcast stand out and create memorable moments that will attract a loyal audience. As you look for these interesting people to contribute, keep in mind that they are the key to your podcast’s success and to making sure it has a lasting effect.
Navigating Guest Discovery
Identifying Guest Niches
Possible podcast guests must fit the theme of your podcast. When guests fit the theme of your podcast, they can share insights and ideas, and that adds value and credibility to your podcast.
Finding content that matches your listeners’ interests keeps them fascinated, subscribed, and returning for your future episodes. Podcast guests who match your theme promote your show as a niche authority on knowledge and interest. It strengthens brand identity and promotes a listening community.
Guest alignment keeps your podcast focused, interesting, and fulfilling its promises to loyal podcast listeners and new. Experts, influential people, and enthusiasts with diverse opinions and perspectives make great podcast guests.
Having guests on your podcast who are active in podcasting shows that they are comfortable with the medium, which makes for smoother and more interesting interviews.
Utilizing Social Media Platforms
There are many ways to find podcast guests, each social media platform offers a different way to connect with potential podcast guests.
X, previously known as Twitter, is a powerhouse that lets you reach potential podcast guests directly in your field through tweets and direct messages.
Facebook, on the other hand, has Groups where experts in specific industries get together. This makes it a great place for podcast guests to look for information.
LinkedIn, a place for professionals, lets you also find podcast guests and talk to other professionals, whose knowledge you can use to improve your show.
Twitter, Facebook groups, and LinkedIn enhance connections and offer member based websites. These communities are full of experts who share your great insights and connect with your listeners, making them great podcast guests.
Trying to reach potential podcast guest in these forums, you gain expertise and build relationships that can lead to collaboration with other podcasts. Smartly using these platforms, you will find your next podcast guest, who could give your listeners valuable insights and stories.
Networking Opportunities
Social and industry events are great places to make genuine connections to find great podcast guests that go beyond screens.
Personal interactions with potential podcast guests are a unique way to build relationships, show real interest, and make connections that can’t be done online. Whether it’s a panel discussion, workshop, or networking event, these events give you a chance to talk to experts in your field, share ideas, and promote the value of your podcast.
Discovering great podcast guests can be transformed by mastermind groups and community engagement. Mastermind groups provide a unique place for collaboration, support, and exchange of ideas to meet potential guests.
Meaningful interactions in these group events increase your network and expose you to other podcasters in the podcast industry.
Leveraging Specialized Resources
Podcast Guest Directory
Podcast Guest Directories are an important part of finding podcast listeners quickly and efficiently. These platforms have lists of experts, professionals, and people who are willing to share their ideas and stories. They can be used for podcasts with different podcast formats, themes, and niches.
There are many good things about directories:
- Efficiency: Directories make it easier for podcast guests to find places to stay by putting all of the possible options in one place.
- Credibility: Many directories have detailed profiles for potential guests that include their credentials, making it easier to figure out what kind of expertise they have.
- Variety: These platforms cover a wide range of industries and fields, so podcasters can find guests who fit with their unique themes.
- Networking: Directories provide an opportunity to connect with professionals and thought leaders, expanding your podcasting network.
- Time-Saving: Directories save a lot of time when choosing guests because you don’t have to do a lot of research.
Two well-known directories are PodcastGuests.com and InterviewGuestsDirectory.com. Both offer a simple way to find guests, with profiles that include their expertise and contact information so that hosts and possible guests can talk directly.
- PodcastGuests.com: This platform has a carefully selected group of people who want to be guests on podcasts. It covers a wide range of topics and industries and makes it easy for podcasters to find essential guests and get in touch with them for a possible
- InterviewGuestsDirectory.com: This platform helps podcasters send podcast interview requests with other podcast hosts, or experts in many different fields. It is a place where podcasters go to find potential podcast guests.
Leveraging platforms like PodcastGuests.com and InterviewGuestsDirectory.com enhances your potential guest’s discovery process, ensuring that you find your next guest who can contribute valuable insights to your shows.
Matchmaking Service
Podcast matchmaking services or guest booking services have become effective tools for podcasters to find potential good guests. These platforms use technology to make finding guests easier, improve compatibility, and make podcasts as a whole a better experience. Here’s what they might be able to do:
- Efficiency: Podcast matchmaking services efficiently match podcasters with guests based on compatibility factors such as expertise, interests, and niche.
- Personalization: These platforms use algorithms to find potential guests that fit a podcaster’s needs, so they don’t have to spend as much time looking.
- Wider Reach: Podcasters can connect with possible guests from different parts of the world and industries, which increases the number of people they can talk to.
- Expertise Matching: Advanced algorithms pair podcasters with potential guests whose expertise aligns closely with the podcast’s theme, ensuring high-quality content.
- Time Saving: By simplifying the process of finding podcast guests, these services give podcasters more time to work on making content and sharing it.
- Networking: Podcast matchmaking services create networking opportunities, allowing podcasters to interact with professionals from diverse backgrounds.
- Guest Diversity: These platforms promote guest diversity, offering opportunities to feature voices and perspectives from different fields.
There are two platform that stands out, PodMatch and MatchMaker.fm. Both platforms focus on how easy they are to use and how well they match people, making it easy for podcasters to find podcast guests who fit with their podcast’s theme and target audience.
- PodMatch: PodMatch uses advanced algorithms to match podcasters with possible guests who would be ideal for their podcast. Podcasters make profiles that show what kind of podcasts and guests they like, and the platform offers good ways for them to work together.
- MatchMaker.fm: MatchMaker.fm is a directory of podcast guests and hosts that helps podcasters meet good guests and high profile guests based on many factors, like expertise, industry, and podcasting goals.
Platforms like PodMatch and MatchMaker.fm leverage technology to optimize connections, and book podcast guests, ensuring meaningful podcast collaborations that result in engaging and valuable content. These services revolutionize the process of finding podcast guests, enhancing content quality, and providing a seamless experience for both podcasters and guests.
Crafting Compelling Invitations
Personalized Outreach
Crafting tailored and genuine guest invitations is valuable. It emphasizes your podcast’s professionalism and alignment with your guest’s expertise. Personalized outreach reflects respect and authenticity, building meaningful connections to your guests or other podcast hosts that you invite to your podcast.
Prioritizing connection before reaching out to your potential guest has several benefits. It warms the introduction, boosting the likelihood of an encouraging response. Building relationships through attending gatherings or socializing on social media intrigues new guests.
They’ll be more receptive to your invitation due to the recognition of your podcast and shared ideas. An existing connection personalizes your approach, making it more real and persuasive. This reduces the possibility of your invitation getting deemed spam.
By investing time in building connections, you cultivate a network of potential guests for your podcast who feel valued and respected, contributing to the overall success and credibility of your podcast.
Effective Email Communication
Email invitations must be engaging and simple to attract potential podcast guests. Here are some ways to make your podcast emails stand out and highlight its value:
- Compelling Subject Line: Use a subject line that highlights the benefits of being on your podcast.
- Personalized: Address the guest by name and show that you’ve researched their work or achievements.
- Express Interest: Begin by expressing genuine interest in their expertise or accomplishments.
- Highlight Podcast Value: Clearly state what makes your podcast unique and why it’s valuable to listeners.
- Relevance: Connect the guest’s background or expertise to your podcast’s theme to demonstrate alignment.
- Guest Benefits: Explain how being a guest can benefit them, such as reaching a broader audience or sharing their insights.
- Brief Description: Briefly summarize your podcast’s format, audience, and success.
- Social Proof: Mention any high profile guest you’ve had, positive reviews, or achievements to showcase your podcast’s credibility.
- Flexible Scheduling: Offer flexibility in scheduling to accommodate their availability.
- Call to Action: Clearly state what you’re asking of them, whether it’s expressing interest or scheduling a call.
- Gratitude: Thank them for considering your invitation and taking the time to read your email.
- Professional Signature: Include your podcast’s branding and your contact details in your email signature.
- Clear and Concise: Focus on the main points and keep the email short and easy to read.
- Proofread: Check for any errors before sending to maintain professionalism.
- Follow-Up: If you don’t receive a response, consider sending a polite follow-up email after a week.
Dear [Guest name], I hope this email finds you well. I'm HOST NAME, the host of PODCAST, a podcast about SHOW NICHE. I'm reaching out to you because I'm fascinated by your work in [name their field or achievements] and think your expertise will enrich our show. PODCAST NAME, offers insights from myself, thought leaders and experts in anything related to podcasting. Your knowledge of [guest's expertise or achievements] matches our podcast's objective, and I'm sure our audience will enjoy your unique perspective. What distinguishes us: - Deep, engaging talks on industry trends and upcoming themes. - An engaged audience of [relevant industry] professionals, enthusiasts, and decision-makers. - A history of hosting respected guests like [name any high-profile guests]. - Listener praise for our content's quality and relevance. As a guest on PODCAST NAME, you can: - Expand your audience and share your knowledge globally. - Display your skills and accomplishments to a larger audience. - Engage in meaningful brand-building conversations. I would like to discuss having you on our show. Your opinion on [expertise-related issue] would connect with our audience. If this interests you, I can work around your schedule to record. I'd like to schedule a brief meeting to discuss this or answer any questions. Your insights would enhance our show, and I appreciate your time. I appreciate your time reading this email. I hope to work with you and share your knowledge with our readers. Warm regards, Your Name Host, Podcast Name [Your Contact Info] P.S. You can learn more about our podcast at WEBSITE or listen to past episodes at [Apple Podcasts or Spotify links].
Feel free to copy and edit!
It is very important to show how valuable your podcast is. Podcast guests want to know what can they do that will make a difference. By pointing out your podcast’s unique perspective, the benefits they’ll get, and the effect they can have on your audience, you’re more likely to get them to join your show.
Preparing Guests for Success
Research and Engagement
Thorough guest research is an essential foundation for successful podcasting. It means learning as much as you can about your guest’s background, expertise, experiences, and perspectives before the podcast interview.
This makes sure that both your guest and your listeners listening will get something out of your content and find it interesting.
Here’s why it needs to be done:
- Informed Conversations
- Credibility
- Audience Connection
- Efficient Editing
- Variety
- Longevity
- Networking
Engaging with your guests through shared interests can take your website or podcast to the next level by creating a deeper connection and more genuine conversations. Here are some reasons why it’s beneficial:
- Natural Bond
- Deeper Insights
- Relatability
- Enhanced Rapport
- Compelling Content
- Lasting Connections
- Audience Engagement
- Unique Niche
- Collaboration Opportunities
Technical Preparation
It’s important to give detailed technical instructions for remote recording if you want to keep the audio quality and professionalism of your podcast interview. Making sure guests know how to set up recording settings correctly helps your show run smoothly.
This is important because it means better audio quality, a professional attitude, constant output, saving time, making guests feel comfortable, giving listeners a better steady stream experience, and building a strong brand image.
Setting Expectations
Podcasting works best when there is clear information about a particular topic. It sets up an easy process that helps both the podcast host and the guest.
Clarity helps guests make insightful comments, have interesting discussions, and act more professionally. When guests are comfortable, they are more likely to participate, which leads to excellent content.
Having honest conversations not only builds credibility but also makes your guests want to come back for the interview series. For a podcast to be successful, the interview space needs to be comfortable (if it’s a personal interview).
This encourages real conversations and useful insights from both the guest and the listener. This values authenticity, open dialogue, increased guest confidence, higher-quality content, more audience engagement, good associations, a smooth conversation flow, and the building of long-lasting relationships.
Clear expectations and a comfortable environment make great podcasts even more useful by encouraging engaged podcast guests and letting them connect with listeners, which makes your show better at reaching its goals.
Audience Engagement and Feedback
Involving Listeners
Incorporating audience suggestions into the guest selection process offers numerous advantages that enrich your podcasting journey:
- Engagement and Ownership: Your audience will feel more connected to your show and like they own it if you give them a chance to take part.
- Relevance: Make sure your podcast has topics and guests that your listeners care about, which will increase their overall engagement.
- Diverse Perspectives: Different viewers’ suggestions bring in different points of view, which makes your podcast more interesting.
- Community Building: Getting your audience involved builds a sense of community because listeners feel like they are valued and heard when they contribute to your show as it continues.
- Enhanced Loyalty: Engaged fans who see their ideas put into action become more loyal to your podcast, which means more people will listen to it over time.
- Fresh Ideas: Audience comments give you new ideas you might not have thought of before, which can lead to unique and interesting episode ideas.
- Authenticity: Including guest ideas from your audience shows that you value their input, which builds authenticity and trust.
Using audience suggestions to find podcast guests is a great way to contribute content, build a loyal audience, and make sure your podcast stays interesting and engaging. These channels let you and your audience communicate, which makes your podcast more relevant and interesting.
- Social Media: Platforms like Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook allow you to create polls, ask open-ended questions, and interact directly with your listeners for guest suggestions. Their responses can provide valuable insights into their interests.
- Newsletters: Utilize your podcast’s newsletter to directly engage with your most loyal listeners. Encourage them to share guest ideas and insights, creating a more personalized connection.
- Direct Interactions: Engage in conversations with your audience through live sessions, Q&A segments, or virtual meetups. These interactions can bring up guest suggestions and ideas you may not expected.
Referrals from Past Guests
Referrals from past guests can do a lot to boost your podcast’s credibility and help you invite guests. When guests tell other people they know about your podcast, it shows that your content is good and that they had a good time. Here’s why word-of-mouth is so important:
- Credibility Boost
- Trust Building
- Expert Validation
- Expanded Reach
- Quality Guest Pool
- Networking Opportunities
The long-term success of your podcast needs to build and maintain good relationships with past guests. These connections go beyond a single event and can be helpful in the long run. Here’s why it’s important to keep these connections alive:
- Return Appearances
- Word of Mouth
- Collaboration Opportunities
- Audience Engagement
- Referrals and Recommendations
- Feedback Loop
- Networking Benefits
Building and taking care of these relationships with your past guests is an investment that keeps paying off over time.
Creating Impactful Podcast Interviews
Focusing on Quality
It’s important to choose people based on what they can contribute. By matching guests to the theme of your show, you can be sure that the content will connect with your audience, which will increase engagement.
Their knowledge gives you insights that boost your trustworthiness and the quality of your content. This makes your listeners more loyal and helps your brand stand out. Value-driven guests who consistently provide useful content are the key to long-term success.
Preparation and interesting conversations increase the value you give. Interviews that are based on research lead to thoughtful questions that lead to in-depth conversations with useful takeaways. Active listening lets people respond with thoughtful responses, creating comfortable environments for genuine conversation.
Discussions that are interesting and keep people’s attention keep them involved and encourage friends around them to engage and share. Such podcasts stick out in people’s minds and make them want to listen again, which is good for guest relationships.
In the end, a podcast that focuses on value, preparation, and connection will stand out, connect with listeners, and continue to grow over time.
Promoting Diversity
It is very important to encourage diversity in podcasting. Having guests with different perspectives makes your podcast more interesting, challenges norms, and promotes diversity and inclusion. Diverse views broaden perspectives and help people think critically and understand.
This is something very important to me.
If you look closely at the guests on my podcast, A Vietnam Podcast, you will see it is roughly split 50/50 between males and females, in addition to having voices from different countries, races, backgrounds and sexuality. This was by design.
As a white male, I didn’t want a podcast that featured predominantly white, male voices. So I made it a point to seek out and accept guests from a diverse background.
Having a variety of guests also improves interest, learning, and empathy. It shows thought leadership, flexibility, and global reach, making the podcast a place where people can have interesting conversations. Different perspectives help make a podcast that teaches, motivates, and drives good change.
How To Find Guests For Your Podcast Conclusion
In the end, finding a podcast guest is the key to the success of your podcast. It’s hard to find the right podcast guests, but it’s important for interesting content. Guests feel valued when there is clear communication, focused outreach, and technical preparedness.
Conversations are better when people do research and take part. Finding guests is easier when you use podcast directories and matchmaking services. Getting your listeners involved and staying in touch with your previous guests gives your show more credibility.
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