Five Reasons You Shouldn’t Launch a Podcast for Your B2B Company

We’ve all heard about podcasts being the media play we just shouldn’t miss, and it does seem like every company is considering launching one. Should you?

• There are an estimated 464.7 million podcast listeners globally in 2023.
• There are almost 2.5 million podcasts listed on Apple Podcasts. 
• Podcasts are a global phenomenon. In 2022, Brazil had the highest podcast consumption globally, then Sweden and Mexico.

But is a podcast the right investment for your B2B company? Here are five reasons why it might not be the best move for your business right now. 

This post covers: 

1. Planning, production and funding requirements for B2b podcasts
2. What makes a great B2B podcast host? 
3. What makes a good podcast guest?
4. What equipment does podcasting really require?
5. How should B2B podcasts measure success?

Podcasts have doubled in listenership worldwide in the last six years, and continue to grow. 

The most highly ranked podcasts on Apple podcasts and Spotify have over 10,000 downloads per episode, putting them in the top 1% of podcasts. What if you could capture even a small percentage of that number, potentially turning those listeners into customers for your business-focused company? 

That mindset is exactly what has led plenty of B2Bs to decide that a podcast is the right next investment for their marketing money. And it’s also what has led many, a bit farther down the road, to realize it wasn’t a smart investment. 

Here are a few of the key things to think about if you’re considering a podcast, and why other strategies might make more sense for your business. 

1. The best podcasts are well planned, well-produced (and probably well-funded).

That’s assuming we’re calling the top-ranked podcasts “the best.”

But here’s the thing about that assumption: the top 20 ranked podcasts (and beyond…) are all consumer-focused. They’re news, and true crime, and entertainment. And science geared for consumers and finance geared for consumers. The point? These podcasts are not YOUR podcast. 

And so we really can’t compare. 

Okay, you say. We’ll look at some business podcasts instead. Made by businesses for businesses. Good plan. 

The top-ranking B2B podcasts are much harder to find – at least if you’re looking for a verified list. And that makes sense. Because odds are good the target audience for these productions is exponentially smaller. But that is not to say that these don’t exhibit the same traits as the top-ranked consumer podcasts, and that goes back to point number one.

If you’re going to launch a podcast you’ll need: 

• A well-thought out content plan with each episode ideated and the guest identified and secured. Ideally, you will map out a full season before you begin production. 
• A production plan. Will you be hiring someone externally or do you plan to produce internally? Will you use a dedicated space in your office or your home? How is your equipment? 
• A charismatic host and excellent guests (we’ll get to this more later). 

So you may not have the same investment capabilities as the top-ranking podcasts (many of which are produced by media studios and publishers like Wondery, NPR, NBC, and iHeartMedia.) But if rank isn’t going to be your primary metric of success, that’s probably okay. 

Let’s look at some other reasons podcasts aren’t for everyone.

2. Most companies don’t have an excellent host on deck.

Like it or not, podcasts are largely about their hosts. This may be less true for B2B podcasts, where most listeners are coming to you to learn something, but still, the host is what will keep them coming back. While lots of B2B companies have smart and dynamic executives on board, how many of those execs have the extra time required to successfully host a podcast weekly or even monthly? 

Hosting a podcast takes time away from day-to-day responsibilities, and while you may have charismatic employees, odds are pretty good that they have jobs already. 

In addition to charisma and a willingness to be in front of the microphone and pushed into a somewhat spotlit position where they may never have imagined they’d end up, a great host needs a few more things: 

• A quick and inquisitive mind that allows them to listen carefully as guests speak, forming insightful questions on the fly. While scripted podcasts are a thing, relationships are not built by asking every guest the same ten questions (and one of the biggest reasons to invite someone to be a guest on a B2B podcast is to build a relationship.) 

• A lack of social anxiety–or a controllable level. Most people are slightly uncomfortable in front of an audience. Some people are unable to put themselves there at all. And then there are those who believe they manage their discomfort well enough, but who come across in a way that will make even the most empathetic listener uncomfortable. It might be unfair, but one aspect of audio media is that listeners must enjoy the person they’re listening to. They must trust them to be confident and to guide the journey the listener is agreeing to embark upon. You wouldn’t get behind the wheel with someone who was clearly not a comfortable driver, would you? 

• An ability to disarm guests who might suffer from exactly the same anxiety described above. Making someone forget they’re being recorded is not an easy task. 

Having the right host is critical, and this isn’t an easy one to fake or finesse. Do you have the right host onboard?  

3. Many companies don’t have the right roster of guests.

It’s easy enough to decide that you’re going to interview CEOs in your industry. It’s a little harder to get those CEOs to join you for the session, and even when you do, there’s a good chance that you’ll exhaust your realm of topics and potential listeners pretty quickly that way. Who wants to listen to CEOs talk to other CEOs?

Mostly CEOs. That’s a very limited potential audience. 

How do you broaden your potential reach and remain relevant to your ideal customer in a way that will make the podcast valuable as a marketing effort? 

One surefire way is to find guests who you’d really like to have as customers. But as you might imagine, the ask will need to be subtle and nuanced. And there has to be something in it for them, right? 

• Make your topic about your guest or about their specific area of your industry. A podcast episode is not a sales opportunity. Your goal is to produce value that will resonate with your ideal customer, so asking guests about creative ways they’ve approached specific problems all your customers might have is a good place to start. 
• Offer distribution. The benefit of adding guests to your show is that you expand your network of potential listeners (and customers) through their network. If you produce content they are happy to share, you’ve just grown your reach to their entire network. 
• Don’t reach for the CEO every time. Think about the people who don’t get asked to speak as often, those with important information relevant to your customers and audience. They’re more likely to say yes, and more likely to be excited to share the content you produce. 

4. Lots of companies assume recording podcasts is as easy as recording Zoom calls. 

Hopefully you already know there’s more to it.

Plus, if you’re recording only in audio, you’re narrowing your potential distribution channels significantly. If you’re already set up to record, why not capture video as well? There are a wealth of tools available that do this exceedingly well, and more and more capture tools are offering production tools as part of their subscription bundles. Most are even integrating AI at this point to auto-produce transcripts and suggest likely spots for cuts and edits. (Descript, Riverside.fm, Veed, Vidyo.ai, to name a few.) 

Take the time to learn the software and take it for a test run (or seven). There’s nothing worse than reporting back to a guest that you didn’t capture that incredible interview because of a technical glitch. 

5. Most companies are measuring success the wrong way. 

See point 1. 

You’re unlikely to rank on any top 20 lists for downloads, and that’s okay. 

If ranking and fame is your goal, you’re in the wrong place. Instead, look at each episode as an opportunity to create lots of at-bats. Maybe you can slice and dice a thirty-minute podcast into fifteen social media clips, four YouTube shorts, and two fifteen minute YouTube episodes, maximizing reach for both you and your guest. Every single one of those “at-bats” is a chance to resonate with your target audience and bring in new interest for your product. 

As with all content, the return on investment is not likely to be immediate, but with excellent planning and execution, and a commitment to the long game, a B2B podcast could be a great diversification of your content strategy. 

And if we’ve convinced you that maybe a podcast isn’t right for you? Here are a couple of fast ways to get started feeling out the space without the commitment of a full-on production: 

1. Get a few of the SMEs at your company together and record a “fireside chat” on an industry topic that gets them talking. Turn that into clips, and distribute those across your channels (LinkedIn, YouTube, other socials, your site). 
2. Make a habit of interviewing a thought leader in your company once a month or more, and create long-form content as well as clips from those one-on-ones. 
3. Record helpful how-to videos using Loom and screen sharing to show your customers great ways to use your product. 

There are lots of ways to move into multimedia production without the commitment of podcasting. We’d love to hear how it goes!