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Should your podcast have inside jokes?

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Thank you for joining me for the Audacity 2 Podcast.

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I'm Daniel J. Lewis. Inside jokes can offer fun potential for your podcast, but also have some potential costs.

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So here are some brief things for you to consider as you engage with your podcast audience.

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And keep those words in mind. Engage with your audience.

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In my signature fashion, when I started preparing this episode, I was making a whole list of

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pros and cons and some big thinking on inside jokes. But it's really not that complicated.

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An inside joke is some form of callback, a trope, or a catchphrase, or similar that only

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those in the know will get and enjoy. Because of this, inside jokes can be hilarious, but

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only for those who actually get the jokes. Inside jokes can be a sort of reward for your

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loyal audience but can alienate your new audience. I've heard some people advise against inside

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jokes exactly because your new audience won't get them, but that seems overly focused on

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the new audience at the cost of engaging your existing audience and making them feel special.

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I think it really comes down to this simple guidance.

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Avoid inside jokes with your co-hosts and guests (because your audience won't get those)

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but embrace inside jokes with your audience.

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So where do inside jokes come from? First some examples of inside jokes that I've heard from various podcasts.

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There's "Lemons Lemons" from That Story Show or "Hit in the Mouth" from No Agenda, "Catakai"

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from Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend, Super Easy, Barely an Inconvenience from Pitch Meeting.

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Now that's a series on YouTube. So it's not a podcast.

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I'm pausing for everyone to go, "Did he just say that?" Yes I did. I'll do a separate

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episode about that sometime later. There's also Mail Kemp from Serial. If you've been

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a loyal follower of any of these shows then you're probably familiar with and know exactly

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what these jokes are about. Or you can at least laugh at them every time you hear them.

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So where do these jokes come from? Well, when a joke really loves a joke. No, no. Some jokes

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will arise naturally as your audience essentially feeds the growth of those jokes. That's what

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I've seen from inside jokes from That Story Show, No Agenda, and Serial, where the audience

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really takes something and runs with it and it becomes an inside joke because the audience

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made it an inside joke, while other things become inside jokes because of how often the

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host or multiple hosts of the show use those inside jokes, such as the examples from Conan

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O'Brien Needs a Friend and Pitch Meeting. It's the audience-fed jokes that I think

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you should work to embrace the most because they will more deeply reward and engage your

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audience. That's not to say that inside jokes that you come up with within the podcast

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should be completely abandoned, but definitely focus on the ones that your audience is feeding.

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So what about the new listeners then? There are three approaches that I've seen and

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experienced with podcasts regarding inside jokes. Number one, letting your podcast audience

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eventually catch on with your inside jokes, even if they might not even know their origins.

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Number two, occasionally, not every time you use inside jokes, but occasionally explaining

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or pointing to the origins of those jokes.

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This gives you a great time to call back to previous episodes and link to those previous

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episodes in your notes for your current episode.

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Or you can point people to the name or number of those past episodes to look up.

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And number three, making a glossary of inside jokes.

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This could even be a supporter exclusive or email opt-in incentive for your podcast.

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Your goal should be to both engage your existing audience and make them feel special, and to

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create an environment welcoming to your new audience.

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This comes from having a good balance so that your podcast is not overly filled with inside

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jokes, but it does mature with loyalty.

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As people stick around for the podcast, they start to appreciate it even more.

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Like a good marriage or a good friendship. Think of inside jokes just like extra seasonings for a meal.

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They can add something special and especially be appreciated by your insiders and celebrated

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when your new audience gets in on the inside jokes.

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And I think there is something special like a sort of leveling up when your audience becomes

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familiar with your tropes, catchphrases, and inside jokes.

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Then they'll feel like one of the cool kids when they can throw around the inside jokes too.

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And that's a precious moment for them to step up to that next level.

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Maybe you even celebrate it if you want to.

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And speaking of celebrating, you can even turn your inside jokes into swag. Especially

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when your audience starts using your inside jokes too. Or they are feeding those inside

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jokes with the content they give you. Like the lemons lemons thing from that story show,

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I don't know if they really intended it to be that much of an inside joke, but then the

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audience started feeding into it and it's a running joke now that comes up every now

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and then for that show. And the loyal audience knows what's going on. And what they did with

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that joke and several of their other inside jokes is exactly this. They turn those jokes,

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and you can do this too, turn those inside jokes that your audience loves, that's the

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big key there, that your audience loves, might not even be the ones that you love, turn those

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into swag that you can sell or give away. Like you could put them on t-shirts, posters,

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stickers, and more. And if you want to be really cutting edge about it, maybe you could

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even turn those inside jokes into NFTs, but don't go crazy there. But there is some potential.

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You could think about that, but just don't expect to get rich. Just expect to have a

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fun time with it. This was a very short episode, I know, because this is really a simple thing and it does

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come down to this one simple concept. Avoid the inside jokes with your co-hosts and guests

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Because your audience wouldn't know those and might never know those.

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And they might just wonder, "What are you laughing about?

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I don't get it." But embrace the inside jokes with your audience.

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The ones that, yes, they can laugh with you because they were there for it.

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Or they can go back to be there for it because they can listen to those older episodes and

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appreciate them. Those are the good inside jokes.

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Embrace those. away the ones that do actually exclude your audience, no matter where they are in their

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listening history with your podcast.

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If you'd like to share this super brief episode and article, then go to theaudacitytopodcast.com/insidejokes.

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Let's also take a brief visit to the community corner. Thanks for the streaming Satoshis

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from Dwev, that's how I'm going to pronounce it until I'm told otherwise, Dave Jackson

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and Brian Insminger. And thanks for the 5 star review from John Moore on Podchaser.

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John said "I've listened to just about every episode of this show over the last year. Excellent

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content and advice. I particularly like his SEO episodes." And thank you very much for

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that kind review John. And there will be more podcast SEO content in the future and some

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cool tools coming to Podgagement. And speaking of Podgagement, if you want more tools to

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to help you engage your audience and grow your podcast,

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try Podgagement over at podgagement.com.

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You can track all your ratings and reviews. You can get a nice landing page

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to help you collect more ratings and reviews,

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collect feedback from your audience, even recorded voicemails from your audience,

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which can be all kinds of fun to use in your podcast.

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You can do more like discover networking opportunities

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for your podcast, collect ratings and reviews directly from your audience

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so that they don't have to sign up for an account anywhere.

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and there's so much more coming to Podgagement.

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So check it out over at podgagement.com.

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And now that I've given you some of the guts and taught you some of the tools, that's not a joke,

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that is my catchphrase, it's been that way since the very beginning,

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it is time for you to go start and grow your own podcast, passion and profit.

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I'm Daniel J. Lewis from The Audacity to Podcast.com.

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Thanks for listening.