Podcast transcripts and a good transcription service are well worth the extra effort and can bring huge advantages to websites, blogs and online marketing campaigns of all kinds while tremendously increasing your visibility. Admittedly you will need the podcast done well and professionally for the best results. Fortunately this is not difficult to accomplish.
Here are the top 10 reasons why you need to transcribe your podcast;
1. For search engines and increased traffic
The way search engines work is that they scan a site for keywords and then index and rank the site accordingly. Increased traffic will give you more visibility, more targeted leads and more income from your site. What all this means is that if you have failed to transcribe your podcast you are actually leaving money on the table.
2. Some of your visitors may not be in a position to access the podcast
Chances are that you have come across some excellent information online and wished that there was a transcript. There are many reasons here. Perhaps you were in a hurry and wanted to quickly scan the information and hurry elsewhere. Always remember that reading is much faster than listening. Also not everybody has a high speed internet connection and in some cases accessing your podcast no matter how good it is may be difficult and cumbersome. And so you will end up losing valuable leads and prospective customers.
3. Sharing your content on social media
There is plenty of content that ends up going viral these days. Thanks mainly to folks sharing them all over social media. This is mainly done by quoting part of the text in your article. It is highly unlikely that people will find time to listen and then quote certain sections of your podcast. It is much easier for them to scan through text and end up finding something that they can share with their friends.
4. Google Adsense revenue
Higher earnings from Google Adsense contextual ads on your site will come from transcripts rather than your podcast standing alone. The Adsense crawlers always look for keywords and phrases that they can match with available ads so that what is served is as relevant as possible. With just your podcast this will not be possible and once again you will be losing revenue.
5. Ebooks revenue
Many internet gurus have made a killing out of eBooks created from transcripts of podcasts. The truth is that most folks find it difficult to write an eBook and yet here is one very easy way to produce eBooks quickly from material that you already have on audio.
6. I hear I forget, I see I understand
It is not easy to retain information that you have just heard. It works out better when you read it. That is just how humans are wired and you cannot go against this and fail to suffer some repercussions. It makes a difference to give visitors to your site options and the option of a transcript will always make a huge difference.
7. A better way to reach and touch foreign audiences
For those of whom English is not a first language, fully understanding the content of your podcast may not be easy. It will be much simpler for them to read an article based on it.
8. Reaching those whose hearing is impaired
Inevitably there are those who are deaf or with various hearing problems who will end up on your site or blog. Your podcast will be completely useless to them and you will have lost a golden opportunity to speak to them. And yet all you need to do is transcribe your available information into an article.
9. Get more mileage from busy bloggers
Bloggers are quite often very busy and in a constant rush to get things done. Obtaining and using quotes from your podcast is highly unlikely if the audio is not translated into an article. By continuing to fail to transcribe your podcast you are actually greatly limiting your exposure and marketing.
10. Site visitors at a place where they cannot listen
A significant percentage of people are accessing the web from mobile devices these days. The numbers are huge and growing rapidly all the time. The reality is that they will not always be in places where they can listen to your podcast. By thinking about them and offering them an article version of your audio information you will be reaching a huge audience that you would not have possibly accessed with just your podcast.
