Supporting Cast, according to themselves, is “The best way to sell and deliver exclusive podcasts, audiobooks, courses, and memberships.” They claim, “From independent shows to top-tier networks, the industry’s most successful podcasters use Supporting Cast to build reliable, recurring revenue.” Sounds intriguing? Let’s find out more:

Most podcasters know to make their shows available wherever their audience is. However, a dedicated app removes obstacles to the navigation of your content. Supporting Cast provides this kind of platform to help podcasters own their relationship with their audience. When podcasters use Supporting Cast, they get the exclusivity of private podcasting, the community and regular income of crowdfunding platforms, and ease of use for both the podcaster and the audience so both can focus on their relationship. 

What is Supporting Cast? 

Supporting Cast is a platform created by The Slate Group to manage its podcasts. As podcasters, they know what to prioritize. The platform provides audio for the audience on demand and a relationship between the audience and podcasters that’s free of distractions.

Whether you use the WordPress plugin on your site, manage a private RSS feed, or run a private app, Supporting Cast manages your billing, provides a community for discussion, and keeps your audience relationship free of distractions (like algorithms, ads, or trolls). Your audience can use their favorite podcast listening app or go to your app or website to enjoy your show and discuss it with you. 

Supporting Cast provides the technology behind podcast networks such as NPR, Pushkin Media, Pinna, and many more. 

How Does Supporting Cast Work? 

You upload your episodes to your host and create a private RSS feed. Supporting Cast uses the RSS feed to send your episodes to subscribers and works with you to make that relationship as effective as possible.

For example, you can: 

Provide regular episodes early, send out premium content, and send out special audio clips, such as welcome messages or billing reminders.

Interact with your audience on your website or your Supporting Cast community.

Sell merchandise through a Supporting Cast storefront. 

Essentially, with Supporting Cast, you and your audience have more flexibility at a more affordable price than other platforms. 

What’s the Difference Between Apple Subscriptions and Supporting Cast?

Comparing Apple Subscriptions and Supporting Cast isn’t a better/worse comparison. It’s more like apples and oranges. Supporting Cast helps you share more than audio, maintain your relationship with your audience, and make money.

Supporting Cast Offers More Media Variety

Even podcasters who say their podcast is “audio-only” know there’s much more to maintaining a relationship with your audience and sharing your podcast’s topic than audio alone. Both Apple Podcasts and Supporting Cast help you share video files. However, Supporting Cast also helps you share blog posts and email newsletters with your audience. 

Supporting Cast integrates with MailChimp, WordPress, and many other platforms to help your show grow. Many people subscribe to shows without checking for new episodes, and Supporting Cast helps you invite them back for new installments. Everybody needs a nudge now and then.

Your Audience Is Free to Choose How They Listen

Apple Subscriptions are attractive when your audience reaches you through Apple Podcasts. But once they subscribe, they are locked into that app. With Supporting Cast, your audience receives your subscription content however they prefer. Whether it’s their favorite listening app, newsletter, or blog, your fans can listen to your audio, watch your video, and read your posts.

Supporting Cast’s Community lets you have question-and-answer sessions and discussions with your audience. Your audience gets a forum, you can add blog posts, and new episodes appear automatically. Though Apple Subscriptions has reviews, their communication system isn’t a two-way street. When your audience knows their voice matters to you, they’re more likely to keep coming back and recommend your show to others.

Keep More of Your Money

Since Apple was the first major platform to offer an ad-free monetization system for podcasters, their terms seemed generous. But, with what we now know about podcast monetization, we know that Apple could price its services more competitively.

Apple Podcasts Subscriptions charges 30% of the first year’s revenue and 15% per year afterward. By contrast, Supporting Cast takes 10% of your annual revenue, on par with Substack.

Since Supporting Cast launched, they’ve tracked how much their customers convert potential audiences into paying subscribers. Their internal data shows how podcasters can improve their investment with Supporting Cast. For example:

Ad-free podcast feeds could convert as much as 1% of the show’s total audience in a year and 1.75% in three years.

Podcasters who used Supporting Cast for early access or archive access could convert up to 1.5% of their total audience in a year and 2.5% in three years.

Bonus content can convert as much as 6% of the total audience in a year or 8% in three years. It makes you want to make more bonus content, doesn’t it?

When podcasters paywalled the majority of their show with Supporting Cast, they could expect to convert up to 20% of their total audience in a year and as much as 35% in three.

Many podcasters lean toward setting up their subscription program on Apple Podcasts since it’s the default podcast app on most phones. It may seem like the path of least resistance. That’s fine if you want to succeed by making Apple Podcasts more successful. Supporting Cast wants your podcast to grow beyond one directory. Again, it’s a question of what works best for you, your audience, and your podcast niche.

What’s the Difference Between Patreon and Supporting Cast?

Patreon and Supporting Cast are similar in that supporters provide recurring revenue in exchange for content. However, Supporting Cast is explicitly meant for audio, while Patreon is for any creator and audience. Patreon is like a portal to a world of creative people making exciting things for different audiences. If you don’t want your audience to take side quests but go straight to your show, Supporting Cast may prove a better option.

With Supporting Cast:

You promote your show on a platform made for podcasts.

Your audience gets its benefits in the app of their choice.

Integrations allow podcasters to use the software or services they want to use, not the platform’s. 

White Glove Onboarding means a dedicated manager works with you to set up your Supporting Cast system.

Your audience’s onboarding is a two-click process.

Between Patreon and Supporting Cast, the feature that grabbed my attention is Supporting Cast’s pay-what-you-can subscription tier. Podcasters allow their subscribers to lock in their preferred subscription price.

Pay What You Can Subscriptions With Supporting Cast

Pay What You Can price strategies work because they convey confidence in the product, human decency, and reciprocity. But, these strategies work best when:

an emotional relationship drives the purchase

the earnings are given to charity

you’re selling the last of something to use up the inventory.

For example, pay-what-you-can sales have been a helpful strategy for regional theatres for decades. Audiences know they’re gambling with what kind of seat they get at the last minute. But they care about the show, it’s for a good cause, and a full house is always more fun than a half-empty house.

But you’re not producing live nonprofit theatre; you’re podcasting. How can you make pay-what-you-can subscriptions work for your podcast?

Give your audience plenty of leeway to enjoy the free content they’d get wherever they find their podcasts.

Let that enjoyment build trust over time.

Remind the audience that premium, ad-free content is just a few clicks away. And make sure that premium content is unique.

Explain how their financial support improves the quality of your show, such as buying better sound equipment or taking more time to make a high-quality podcast.

A pay-what-you-can podcast subscription isn’t charity (unless you’re podcasting to promote a nonprofit organization or running a charity drive). But clearly showing where your supporters’ money goes can make them more likely to give it to you.

Over time, your audience will decide they’re ready to level up and support your show.

On August 19, 2024, Podnews reported, “Patreon, which said recently that podcasters earn over $350mn a year on the platform, is saying that Apple will take 30% of all creator payments made on its iOS app by November. Apple is already taking 30% of all creator payments for Apple Podcasts paid subscriptions – and these payments, like Patreon’s, are not subject to Apple’s Small Business Program, which lowers the commission to 15%.”

What About Analytics?

Again, with Supporting Cast, you upload your audio files to the media host of your choice. You can always see how the show’s faring through your media host’s analytics. But, once the RSS feed runs through Supporting Cast, there’s more information to gather. Supporting Cast provides analytics about:

Downloads per podcast, per episode, and user

Revenue

Signups

Subscribers

Cancellations

These analytics help you understand how your subscribers consume your content. For example, if you’re teaching a course with your podcast and one user stops after a few episodes, you may want to contact them and check on them.

You can export the analytic data and take it with you. If you move to another platform and someday need to check how well your third episode did when it was first published, the information is yours to work with.

When you know what your audience is doing, keeping that relationship happy and healthy is easier.

Does Supporting Cast Own My Email List?

Nope! The names and email addresses of anyone who joins your subscriber pool are yours. You can transfer them to another email marketing platform, send carrier pigeons or Morse-code telegrams, or whatever you like. With other podcast subscription platforms, you might not have this option.

How Much Does Supporting Cast Really Cost? 

Again, Supporting Cast charges 10% of podcasters’ revenue, plus credit card processing fees. They integrate with Stripe and WooCommerce, who charge 2.9%+ thirty cents per transaction.

With volume discounts, you can save money on credit card processing fees. For example, you can sell a whole season at once or an entire audiobook. Providing a volume discount incentivizes your audience to buy more of your content at one time.

Supporting Cast Puts You in the Spotlight

Today, 4 in 10 Americans surveyed say they’re “online almost constantly,” yet podcast discovery is tough. If I open Apple Podcasts on my phone, the app displays dozens of recommendations. At least five options are immediately available without scrolling. You work hard to earn your audience. Why should your podcast have to compete for attention? Supporting Cast makes it easy for your audience to enjoy your podcast, support you, and share in the conversation.

Of course, offering subscriptions isn’t the only way to monetize your podcast. Have a look at our guide to making money with your show, and come over to our Indiepod Community to chat about audience engagement or monetization strategies. We’d love to hear from you.

Originally posted on August 22, 2024 @ 12:24 am