Page Text: Establish your podcast concept
Your expertise
Before you can start recording your podcast, it’s important to develop a solid concept. Whether you want to start a podcast that recaps your favorite TV show or helps your company achieve a particular goal, you should consider where your expertise lies and what your listeners will enjoy.
Once you’ve spent some time considering the topic, decide on these key elements:
Name
Do your research and decide on a name that’s easy for listeners to find, includes some important topic keywords, and reflects your personality or the voice of your company.
Format
Here you’ll need to decide on what kind of format will help you share your message best. Will a solocast, interview, fiction, or narrative style podcast help you.
Length
While you might be wondering what the best length for a podcast is, there’s actually no single ideal podcast length. Depending on the type of show you’re producing, the time will vary. Instead of zeroing in on a particular length, in the beginning, focus instead on creating quality content and getting to the point in a focused way. Here are a few more tips on discovering the podcast length .
SOFTWARE
Find the right podcast software
It’s about what’s right for you
With so many options out there, you’re probably wondering what podcast recording software you should use. Reality is, there are a lot of excellent choices, it just all depends on exactly what kind of podcast software you’re looking for.
Utilizing Spreaker Studio, on your phone or desktop, is a quick-and-easy tool to record, add sound effects, and crop and trim your audio.
If you’re looking for more advanced software to record a podcast with, check out GarageBand , Adobe Audition , Hindenburg and Audacity .
EQUIPMENT
Secure your podcast equipment
You don’t need to spend tons of money on podcast equipment to get started!
If you’re planning to start podcasting as a hobby, the only equipment needed for podcasts is your phone. With the Spreaker Studio app, you can record directly on your phone. If you want it to sound a bit more polished, you might want to use a microphone that you can connect to Spreaker Studio desktop on your computer, and a pair of headphones, to avoid feedback in your mic channel.
Looking to really create polished audio?
There are three pieces of equipment – condenser mic, noise cancelling headphones and a pop filter – that we’d advise you to start with, and we’ve put together a few specific recommendations on the best podcast equipment here .
Don’t have design skills?
We promise, creating good podcast cover art isn’t as scary as it seems! Before you jump in to designing the podcast cover art yourself or hiring someone else to design it, remember that the design should reflect the topic of your show and it should have more visuals than words. Start brainstorming your podcast’s art by looking at shows on your favorite listening apps and noting what visuals stand out to you.
COVER ART
Create your podcast cover art
Don’t have design skills?
We promise, creating good podcast cover art isn’t as scary as it seems! Before you jump in to designing the podcast cover art yourself or hiring someone else to design it, remember that the design should reflect the topic of your show and it should have more visuals than words. Start brainstorming your podcast’s art by looking at shows on your favorite listening apps and noting what visuals stand out to you.
Do it yourself design!
If you want to challenge yourself to design something, Canva is a handy – totally free – web-based design tool. There are pre-made templates that you can resize (to 3,000 x 3,000 pixels) and adjust with your wording and images.
Have a vision but not sure how to make it come to life?
Compile your brainstorming into a document and share with a designer you hire on Fiverr ! You can get your art designed for as little as – you guessed it – $5.
INTRODUCTION
Create your podcast introduction
Planning your podcast intro
With your podcast art complete, you can start planning our podcast cover art ... the most important audio element you’ll ever create for your podcast. It’s the first thing potential new listeners hear, and you have about 30 seconds to grab their attention, so making a podcast intro is vital.
The first thing to consider is that your intro should be made with your audience at the forefront of your mind. You want to make sure that it immediately communicates what your podcast is about.
Best music for your podcast
You’ll likely include music in your podcast intro, so be sure to utilize royalty free music (versus copyrighted music) or you run the risk of your podcast being removed from listening apps. You can find free royalty free music, or our recommendation is to invest in paid royalty free music so that your song is completely unique to your podcast. And it’s not expensive! Here’s a complete selection and music buying guide to utilize when you’re selecting your sound.
When you’re considering which song to buy for your introduction:
What are other podcasts in your category doing? Is it working? Or do you want to find a completely different sound?
What feeling do you want to evoke?
What type of music represents your topic?
Formulate your intro script
Once you’ve picked out the perfect song, you can move on to writing a short and sweet podcast intro script. Think about how you can convey your message and intrigue listeners by including:
A hook (something that grabs their attention)
Explanation or summary of your podcast
Your name/the host’s name
Your podcasts name
Planning your podcast content
Now that the branding pieces of the puzzle are coming together for your podcast,
you have to start thinking about exactly what your listeners are going to hear, and how often they’re going to hear it. It’s important to develop an organized podcast planning routine from the beginning, because it’s not something that you do once. You need to know how to plan podcast content well from the start because it’s something you’ll be doing on a very regular basis.
Drafting an episode outline
Once you have your brand solidified, you can start thinking about how to develop an episode outline. To ensure that your content is high quality, interesting, and structured properly, it’s important to develop an outline or even a full-blown script if your podcast format (i.e. fiction storytelling, narrative, etc.) lends itself to that.
Phases of planning
There are three distinct phases of planning an episode in order to throw out all your ideas and comb through them for the right ones.
Brainstorm
When you sit down to think about what you want your podcast to include, ask yourself these questions and answer them to kick things off:
What’s the purpose of this episode?
What’s the most interesting piece of information that will hook your listeners?
Research
Regardless of what your podcast format is, it’s likely that research will be a key element in sharing accurate, interesting and informative stories. Ask yourself these questions to get started:
What subject matter do I need to get more familiar with?
Are there any specific stories or events I need to know about?
What do I need to know about my co-host or guest to feel prepared?
Outline
Now that you’ve done the work required to write the outline, you can get down to it. These are the sections we suggest weaving together in order to have a organized and complete podcast episode:
Introduction