After 100+ episodes of the CMO Series Podcast, we were delighted to bring CMO Series Live to London this month to bring professional service marketers and digital agencies together to share their learnings and experiences.  

I had the privilege of joining Gemma Lyon, Head of Marketing Communications at Macfarlanes, on stage to delve into the world of successful podcasting and how it can extend a firm's brand and the brand of its lawyers. 

In the session, we explored the growth of the CMO Series podcast and the inception of The Macfarlanes Podcast, discussing strategies for content creation, community building, and leveraging influencers and the power of podcasts in the content marketing mix.

Here’s a breakdown of what we discussed: 

Building a Thriving Community 

Using Passle's COPE philosophy (Create Once, Publish Everywhere), we looked at how the CMO Series podcast has fostered a community of professional services marketers by consistently sharing high-quality content across multiple digital channels. Starting with one interview on Passle, the podcast has evolved to now releasing new episodes every week and achieving over 350,000 listens across all platforms, with consistency and quality being pivotal to its success. We discussed why the launch of CMO Series REPRESENTS on International Women's Day 2023, is a testament to the community the series has built.

Leveraging Influencer Marketing to Engage Audiences 

Gemma shared insights into The Macfarlanes Podcast, which launched in 2021 as a response to the rising demand for audio content amid "screen fatigue" during the pandemic. Their most popular series, Policy in Practice, hosted by David Gauke, features 20 episodes where Heads of Policy at the firm discuss government policies and how those may impact their clients. By leveraging David's connections and expertise, Macfarlanes has successfully aligned its professionals to talk about specific topics, resulting in engaging and relevant episodes that resonate with their audience.

The Challenges and Opportunities 

While podcasting presents exciting opportunities to connect with the growing listenership (21.2 million people in the UK and rising), it also comes with its challenges. Aligning busy schedules and producing time-sensitive content can be demanding. To address this, Gemma discussed how having a skilled team capable of editing and maintaining a content pipeline is crucial. Gemma also shared insights on how the team developed the topics for the podcast through regular meetings with David and the Heads of Policy and highlighted how new episode ideas can arise during the recording process.

 

Feedback and Stakeholder Engagement

Relevant feedback plays a vital role in demonstrating the impact of podcast content to internal stakeholders and identifying the listenership. It provides valuable insights to stakeholders and helps refine future episodes. The discussion highlighted the importance of gathering feedback to continuously improve and provide value to the audience and the experts featured on the podcast. 

 

Takeaways:

• Podcasting is an effective tool for building and extending a brand's reach as part of the content mix 
• By following the principles of content creation, community building, and leveraging influencers, firms like Macfarlanes can successfully navigate the podcasting landscape 
• As the demand for timely and relevant content grows, embracing podcasting can help law firms establish their thought leadership, engage audiences, and foster meaningful connections.