I have never reviewed a podcast
I listen to podcasts a lot. When I’m working, cleaning, driving, or relaxing, there is a good chance that I have an earbud in and podcast playing.
PocketCasts is my app of choice, and according to their statistics I have listened for 61 days and 19 hours since 2016. I started listening to podcasts earlier than that, but that is two months worth of podcasts!
There are podcasts that I make sure to listen to every week. Multiple times a week. They cover my professional and personal interests, and a little bit of everything in between. When asked by a friend, I can usually come up with a good podcast recommendation.
Despite this, I have never reviewed a podcast. Not even once.
This might seem odd, since almost every podcast ends with the same plea:
Make sure to leave a review if you like the show
This is usually followed up with an explanation that reviews “really do help people discover the podcast.”
The problem is: I can’t review podcasts. Outside of work I don’t use Apple products (no reviews on iTunes/Apple Podcasts). I don’t listen on Spotify. PocketCasts doesn’t have a review system, and neither does Google Podcasts.
I love that podcasts are just RSS feeds. They’re as decentralized as websites. But that creates a problem: there isn’t a way to review an RSS feed. That responsibility lies with third-parties like Apple. But when you aren’t in the Apple-ecosystem, what are the alternatives?
The short answer is there aren’t any—at least not any common ones. Some apps provide rating features, not not PocketCasts. There are some services for rating, discovering, and sharing podcasts, but they don’t seem particularly popular.
What can I do, then? I guess exactly what I have been doing. Listening regularly and sharing recommendations in real life. Complete interest surveys when they’re advertised. But never leaving a review.