Everybody's Talking About 'Serial' As Podcast's Popularity Continues To Surge

The "Serial" podcast has become a surprise cultural phenomenon, with more than 5 million downloads on iTunes since its debut in October. It's no surprise, then, that discussion of the "This American Life" spinoff -- led by host Sarah Koenig as she explores the 15-year-old murder of Hae Min Lee and the conviction of Adnan Syed -- has skyrocketed on Twitter.

Brandwatch tracked mentions of "Serial" since the beginning of October and found the podcast has more than 285,000 mentions on Twitter. Mentions have increased dramatically over the last few weeks, in part due to buzz created by articles from Vulture, New York magazine, Slate and Entertainment Weekly. The highest volume of mentions occurs on Thursdays, when new episodes are available for streaming or download. Following Thursday's release of "Serial" episode 10, "The Best Defense Is a Good Defense," there were more than 24,500 mentions on Twitter.

The top hashtags are, naturally, "#serial" and "serialpodcast," but "mailkimp" has also become popular. Whether it's discussions about whether Adnan is guilty, Jay's credibility or perhaps how the podcast could end, a lot of the talk on Twitter has focused on "cheat sheets" and "Mail Chimp." Cheat sheets, infographics, timelines and graphs are tools to organize the different timelines of events and all the details of the case.

Advertisers such as MailChimp, SquareSpace and LegalZoom have seen their gamble on podcasts pay off. MailChimp, which has its sponsorship of "Serial" at the beginning of each episode and includes the mispronounced "Mailkimp," has seen the most exposure on Twitter.

Males make up 52 percent of the Twitter conversation, with 43,676 authors, edging out females, with 40,246.