Good podcast titles for SEO are built around exact search problems and curiosity loops rather than episode numbers. "The New SEO Business Model: Buy News Sites Instead of Backlinks (w/ David Quaid)" tells a searcher something, and "Episode 42: Talking SEO with David" doesn't.
Real podcast title examples beat invented ones, so these all come from The Edward Show, a daily SEO show with 1,212 episodes. Each one tells a searcher what is inside before they press play.
| Real title | Characters | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| How to Get High-Quality Backlinks From Podcast Appearances | 58 | States the problem in the words a person would type |
| Can You Rank on Google Without Backlinks? Legendary SEO David Quaid Answers | 75 | Asks the exact question, then names the guest |
| The Backlinks Worth Paying $2,000 For (w/ Ilias ISM) | 52 | A real number and a guest |
| Google Explains How It Understands Keywords (And How to Rank for More) | 70 | Leads with the news, ends with the payoff |
| He Did 2,000 Podcasts in a Year Just for SEO Rankings | 53 | A curiosity loop the episode pays off |
| How to Get Listeners to a New Podcast | 37 | Short, and matches a real search |
What 1,212 SEO podcast titles show is how a show that publishes daily actually names things. The Edward Show catalog on this site carries every title from the show's feed, so these counts are direct, not sampled.
| Measure | Count | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Use an Episode 42 pattern | 0 | 0% |
| Run past 60 characters | 562 | 46.4% |
| Contain the word SEO | 425 | 35.1% |
| Contain a number | 363 | 30% |
| Start with How | 160 | 13.2% |
| Contain a question mark | 83 | 6.8% |
The median title is 59 characters, and the newest 100 run to 67. One show is an example, not a benchmark, and no study has tied title length or style to downloads. Be wary of any page that promises one.
Episode numbers go in their own field, because Apple tells creators to keep them out of the title. Its wording is plain: "Do not include episode or season numbers in the episode title." Apple adds the numbers itself when the fields are filled in, and says numbers in a title can hide important information from view. So the fix for Episode 42 is to move the 42 into the episode number field, not to lose it. The guest was never the problem either, since Apple lists a guest's name as a good hook. What that title lacks is any reason to press play. A number that is part of the idea, such as 3 link building techniques, is fine. Apple also asks you not to repeat the show name in the episode title, since it is already displayed.
Episode titles and show titles do different jobs, and most advice mixes them up. A show title should stay short and specific: Spotify suggests three or four words with a keyword in them, and Apple uses Our Community Bulletin as its example of a name too vague to work. An episode title has room to state a problem. Spotify praises a show that writes episode titles like the searches they answer, such as "am i too old to have acne".
The title field is also where people get greedy. Apple's RSS guide says a long list of keywords can get a show removed from the directory. YouTube's advice is to pick one or two main words and use them in both the title and the description.
A podcast title should be as long as the idea needs, because no platform publishes a cut-off for how much appears in a list. The firm numbers are input limits: 150 characters in Apple Podcasts Connect and 100 on YouTube. Spotify only says long titles get cut in search and on mobile, and Google says links are truncated to fit the device. The advice to stay under 60 characters is a rule of thumb from vendors, and 46.4% of The Edward Show's titles ignore it.
The safe habit is to put the useful words first, so the title survives a cut. An older Pacific Content study of 23,206,500 episodes found a median of 36 characters, so a daily SEO show runs long by comparison.
A curiosity title can go as far as the episode can back it up. Apple encourages a hypothetical question, a headline, a guest's name or a hint at the next turn in a story. YouTube's spam policy draws the line at misleading titles on a video that doesn't deliver what was promised. A title like How to Rank #1 on Google Without Backlinks would also be a hard promise for this site to make, since David G Quaid says on camera that you do need backlinks, a point he makes in his SEO strategy for a new website. Asking the question is safer than promising the answer.
A podcast title goes in quotes or italics depending on the style guide, and only when you write about the show. Chicago style puts the show in italics and the episode in quotation marks. AP style avoids italics, and secondary guides say it uses quotation marks for both. Inside a feed, or on Apple and Spotify, no platform asks for quotation marks around a title, so leave them off there. For the rest of the job, read what SEO means for a podcast.
Sources for this answer were checked on Nov 1, 2026.
More SEO and podcast questions from the same counter.