What do you call a group of podcasts? A pod, a feast, a litter, a lot? Whatever it is, here’s The Difference Collective digital team’s favourites to feast your ears on.
Podcasts are an increasingly popular way to catch up, tune in and zone out. According to Ofcom’s Media Nations 2019 report, around 7.1 million of us listen to podcasts in the UK each week. That’s one in eight people – an increase of 24 per cent over the past year – and more than double over the past five years.
Whether you’re tuning in to be educated, entertained, inspired or transported to another world for a bit of escapism, we’ve pulled together 10 of our favourites. Save them to your library to keep on top of social trends, be gripped by a digital mystery and take inspo from others beating their own path.
SOCIAL MEDIA
There’s a huge amount to learn from Social Chain’s social media marketing podcast. Pitched as ‘the reality of the always on media world’ and featuring people that work in the agency as well as subject matter experts, this podcast covers the impact social media has on our lives. No-nonsense, punchy stuff that you can think about and apply every day.
This leads smoothly into Social Chain’s 27-year-old CEO Steven Bartlett’s own podcast, Diary of a CEO. Follow Stephen on Instagram, and you get the full surround sound of his motivational talks and fresh, honest opinion about how Instagram can distort truth. Here, he talks about the learnings of an entrepreneur.
The first of its kind, it claims, the Charity Digital Podcast is advice-led, exploring a wide range of topics from cyber-security to building social media into charity communications. Guest hosts and broad panels keep it lively and interesting.
Plunge yourself into the world of James Nord, founder of Fohr influencer marketing platform, as he looks at a range of topics from influencer marketing, blogging, getting started on Tik Tok and the skinny on app updates and features. Jump in for a taster or take the whole flight menu. Cheers!
Another go-to for social media trends, Social Media Examiner’s podcast crams in advice, insight and future forecasting. There’s very little not covered in this virtual library of under 60-minute episodes, each a ‘How To’.
INSIGHT
This is snackable listening at its best with a focus on individuals you might not otherwise come across but will feel like you know very well in this short, 15 minute podcast which encourages you to clock up those steps while you walk. Leaning on your imagination, the stories start with a wonderful description of the individual’s shoes to bring us closer to the person featured. This is insight into people’s lives – wonderful voices to fire-up and fuel the imagination. Some stories are more hard-hitting than others – this isn’t make-believe.
7. Emma Gannon’s Ctrl, Alt, Delete
Head straight to Episode 213 which is all about the burnout within the NHS – an interview with midwife and author of Sunday Times best-selling author of The Big Push, Leah Hazard. Emma talks about burnout in freelancing, start-up culture and the career pivot, as well as a never-not hot topic, the NHS.
LIFE OF A FREELANCER
8. Out of Office
Hosted by Ruth Barnes, Radio 4’s Out of Office looks at the many ways people set out on the path of self-employment. The first episode, Breaking Free, focuses on the harsh financial realities of freelancing and as one of the women she interviews puts it, ‘creating your own day’. Packed with vox-pops, evocative sounds and subject matter experts, this podcast is there to spur the rest of us on. And no wonder it’s good; Ruth has a decade of BBC experience under her belt, her own online radio show, The Other Woman, and a podcast production company to boot. The juggle is real.
9. Doing it for the Kids and 10. Happy Place
And last but not least, these final two recommendations are good for both heart and mind – especially for anyone trying to carve out a flexible career for themselves, provide a platform for others to work flexibly or trying to instigate change.
Flexibility is a way of life for The Difference Collective. We have a team of more than 80 senior healthcare comms freelancers, all of who work flexibly because they need to or want to.
These final podcasts are dedicated to mental health and wellbeing and feature some great stories of personal fortitude and courage – enough to inspire anyone to plough on and shoo the inner chimp within (that’s an audio book, not a podcast and one for another day).
About the Author
Vicki Harper is a senior communications consultant: a social media strategist with 20 years PR agency experience behind her specialising in female-first brands across multiple sectors, public and private. She would describe herself as a PR/social media hybrid which means the social media campaigns she devises are rooted in strategy and amplify the wider marcomms campaign.