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Podcasts are the new blogs. And, as an author, the best way to reach your audience to promote your novels and stories is through audio. If you’re not guesting on podcasts, it’s time to start. Audio is king, is the key message we bring away from our Podcast Movement Conference in Orlando, Florida, as we wind up our America trip and get ready to head back to Oz. And audio is only going to get bigger. Think Google podcasts, Google searches, and anything else Google you want to throw in this sentence. And Smart Speakers. One in five Americans already use one. And a fun fact to finish, for the first time in history, nearly 40 percent of podcasters are women. Yay to us. You can support us on Patreon here. Read Full Transcript [00:00:48] Hello and welcome to the final episode of our very special mini series about our trip through the United States of America. We're finishing off the mini series with an episode about Podcast Movement, the podcasting Conference where we are currently visiting in Orlando Florida. You can support our efforts over at Patreon.com/writerontheroad. [00:00:48][0.0] [00:00:51] Sam: It's been really interesting everyone. We've got lots of statistics that I can write up for you when we get home. But one of the things that has really struck us is how very popular podcasting is and how that's going to increase definitely. [00:01:09][17.9] [00:01:09] Mel: That's been the key message here and we've been talking about how even though we've got a sizeable chunk of listening people listening to podcasts there are still it's still an untapped space. There are only eight hundred thousand active podcasts globally so it's still a space even though it's really popular with listeners. It's not so popular created yet so lots of room to get in on the action. [00:01:28][18.3] [00:01:28] Sam: Writer on the Road is still in the top 10 percent of podcasts which is exciting times in terms of our downloads. But there was a real divide between I think professional broadcasters and individual podcasters which was interesting. And then again another divide between non-fiction podcasters and the very exciting growth area of audio fiction which we'll talk about later in the show. It's one of my key interests, definitely. [00:01:56][27.5] [00:02:10] Mel: I'm going to start with a session we had our own James Cridland from downtown Brisbane. I listened to a talk with James today on Google Podcasts and how that is really going to take off. [00:02:23][12.9] [00:02:27] Mel: We went to a session the other day that shows that even though Apple Podcasts have a slow percentage growth rate they had so many to begin with that their raw growth numbers are still more than anyone else combined. But as we saw with James today Google podcasts is trying to creep into that space. [00:02:41][14.4] [00:02:42] Sam: The exciting thing is that, as James explained it to us, is that Google is a service or Google podcast is a service that gets podcasts on to smart speakers, Google assistant in Australia. Google Smart Speakers have a sixty eight percent mark to market share in America one in five Americans have a smart speaker . [00:03:06][24.0] [00:03:11] Mel: What's really exciting for us is Google Search. Google searches are going to bring our podcasts up so much more easily. Google is actively doing all the work for us. So the examples I gave I was talking to Sam about how this is really good for audio is it. I've Natasha Lister so anyone who is looking for an anything about Natasha Lester our podcast is going...