How the Highest Earning Podcasts Make Money

The earning figures for some podcasts are pretty impressive, and let’s face it, it would be nice to be able to make a living off of a creative outlet that you’re passionate about. So how do these podcasters make enough money to thrive?

3 Primary Paths

There are a few different paths that you can take to make some money. Podcast funding usually comes from the same three primary sources:

1. Sponsorships: Businesses provide money in exchange for promotion
2. Crowdsourcing: Raising money from communities
3. Extras: Offering extra services like editing, workshops, etc.

Usually, the most successful podcasts rely on a few different sources of income instead of just one. For example, the Strangers podcast gets roughly 500,000 downloads per month. They got there by getting sponsored by a radio station called KCRW, then by Public Radio Exchange, and now they earn a decent amount of income from running workshops and training days, donations from listeners and selling merchandise on their website.

1. Sponsorships

Sponsors can be found in many places but quite often they will find you as long as you’re putting your content out there and promoting it well. It helps to make your show as visible as you possibly can in various online communities. Niche companies are more likely to agree because as long as their product is closely linked to the content you’re creating, they are 100% guaranteed to benefit from running a promotion on your show.

Some Media Hosting websites are actually set up to help you find sponsors too. Places like BluBrry and Acast can send your notifications whenever a sponsorship deal comes up, or can even offer to insert advertisements for you when you host your podcast with them.

2. Crowdsourcing

A lot of podcasts are now getting their audience to help fund the podcasts as well. They create an account on Patreon, a site where consumers can donate money to their favourite companies, and content creators, usually for some kind of rewards.

It’s really easy to set up a Patreon account and start earning money. You just need to create some tiers of rewards for different levels of donations. These usually range anywhere from getting a pin badge set and a free shirt, to access to bonus episodes or personalised recordings from the host/s. You can decide what you put into these tiers but it needs to be something that your listener will want to donate money for.

3. Extras

Some podcasts offer extra services. This can be anything from, helpful courses on an area of expertise or editing other peoples podcasts. As long as people make a donation towards your podcast, they can gain access to these extra services.

Some podcasts offer paid courses or coaching on an area of their expertise, like the School of Podcasting podcast. This is a nice option as then you are getting funding out of it, and your listeners are getting expert advice. Everyone is getting something they really want.

Another popular way of offering extra content is to offer access to bonus episodes with a donation or paid subscription. One example of this is The Ralph Report, who coincidentally was on the list of Highest Earning Podcasts over on Podcast.co! He publishes one free episode every Monday, and then if listeners want access to the other episodes of the week, they can subscribe to pay a $3 monthly subscription fee and get an episode every single day!