Ten tips for compelling podcasts
With two award-winning gardening podcasts under my belt, I have learned a thing or two during the past six years. As my houseplant podcast On The Ledge turns four, here’s what I’ve learned …
Orchid selfie with me photobombing behind.
You are unique: so is your podcast
One thing I’ve learned over my 20+ year journalism career is that everyone is interesting.
If you spend long enough talking to someone, you’ll unearth a hobby, family history or an anecdote that’s fascinating. So, whoever you are, you can channel the uniqueness that is you into your podcast.
But - don’t assume that your uniqueness means people will want to listen to 60 minutes of you shooting the breeze with your mates about what you got up to at the weekend. Come up with a sharply-defined concept for your show, and make sure it’s something you are passionate about - that means you will be happy to spend hours talking about that topic.
Learn to love your voice
For many years I hated the sound of my voice.
It’s hard to imagine now, but it’s true. Despite being interviewed on the radio many times, I cringed every time I had to endure listening back to the sound of me pronouncing Latin plant names or interviewing an expert.
I remember doing some classes in public speaking as a teenager at school, and getting completely torn apart for talking too fast and stuttering. I can still remember the sting of that criticism, feeling my eyes brimming with tears as I returned to my seat. Never again, I thought.
And yet here I am with a podcast whose episodes have been downloaded nearly two million times. How did I get here? Exposure therapy! Repeated and prolonged exposure to the sound of my own voice slowly lessened my discomfort, until gradually I began to love my voice and appreciate what I can do with it. Now, I love the fact that no one else sounds quite like me - and that’s a really wonderful thing.
Listen back to your episodes
It’s vital that you experience your podcast as if you’re a regular listener.
Once an episode is finished, it’s tempting to publish and immediately move onto the next episode. But if you want to improve, it’s vital to get the same experience of your show as your listeners do - so try listening on your smartphone, both with and without headphones, while on a train or in the car, on your computer speakers and any other way a listener may experience your audio. That way you’ll figure out pretty quickly when things sound wrong, when you’re waffling on too long and when that intro music is just too loud.
Set personal boundaries
Including some personal details about yourself can help listeners get to know you, but think carefully about what you plan to reveal.
Be especially careful if your story touches on difficult subjects, or includes potentially sensitive information about other people.
My boundaries are these: I only talk about my children and family more widely in the most general of terms and don’t mention their names or post pictures of them: the dog, on the other hand, is the show mascot and gets plastered over social media.
(An important aside: if you are making a true crime or investigative show and have no idea what the terms “libel” or “contempt of court” mean (and that doesn’t include someone telling you something on Facebook!), it’s time to learn!)
Be consistent in your publication schedule
Listeners love to know when their favourite show is going to drop.
This was one of the things drummed into me by the lovely Ruth Barnes of podcast producers Chalk and Blade when I started my show. From early on, I decided to go weekly as the best way to build an audience as quickly as possible, and I have stuck to that schedule ever since.
Choose a day to publish, and stick to it: whether your episodes come out daily, weekly, fortnightly monthly or whenever there’s a full moon. And if you decide to carve your show up into seasons, make a plan, announce it and try to stick to it. Listeners love to know where they stand, and look forward to your show dropping into their feed at a set time.
I chose not to do seasons, and I take weeks off here and there, but listeners know that Friday is On The Ledge day. Podcast burnout is a real possibility, and when you start you’ll probably underestimate the amount of work involved, so underpromise at the outset: you can always increase frequency as you go. And if you do need to stop suddenly due to burnout, personal issues or something else, listeners will understand if you communicate with them by dropping a short message explaining what’s happened.
Build a community around your show
Granular interactions work better than grand advertising schemes.
That is just a fancy way of saying: engage with people on an individual basis. Reply to emails. If you see someone tweeting about your podcast topic, engage with them and tell them about your show. Join Facebook forums, post on Instagram and reach out to anyone who has the potential to become a cheerleader for your show. It is time consuming, but every one of those loyal listeners will help to spread the word, rate your show with five stars, recommend others listen and buy your merch: some will love your show enough to donate regularly, too.
The other really powerful things you can do are appearing on other podcasts in a similar realm, and try to get yourself mentions in the mainstream media. Don’t assume that just because someone listens to another popular gardening podcast, they won’t want to subscribe to yours too: the opposite is usually true.
Establish your podcast goals
Figure out who you are trying to reach, and why.
First, think about who you are targeting as potential listeners: there may be five of them, or five million. Are you making a podcast for your work colleagues, for close friends and family to keep up with your news, for people who watch a particular TV show, people who keep iguanas, people in your city, town or village. There is no such thing as a podcast that’s “too niche”, provided it is reaching that target listenership.
Then consider your wider goals: do you want to make money out of your show, establish yourself as an expert or a commentator in a particular field, promote your business or something else? Keep these goals in mind at every step.
Keep it natural
Very few newbie podcasters can make a fully scripted show sound natural.
I am not sure I can, even after six years of presenting! So what do you do, if you find ad libbing a struggle, but don’t want to sound wooden?
Here’s what I do. I make a list of bullet points in the order I want to mention them, roughly outlining what I want to say. Start recording warm up with a few sentences you are never going to use, but will help you warm up your mouth and your ‘presenter’s brain’. If you’re wondering why to hit record while you are warming up - you never know when you’ll come out with the perfect intro, and you may need it for your blooper reel!
When you get going, think about what you want to say, then say it. Pauses between sentences are easy to edit out, and allow you to ad lib to an extent, while giving you time to say what you want to get across. Try to be relaxed, while always thinking ahead to what you are going to say next. Hard? Yes it is, but it gets easier with practice.
Invest in the best equipment you can afford
A good quality microphone is worth investing in if you want to get serious about podcasting.
I use a Rode Podcaster with a shock mount attached to a Rode PSA1 boom arm and it is brilliant - I can yeet the whole setup out of my way when I am doing other work, but it takes just a second to bring the boom arm into position for recording. I’ve read all the articles saying pop filters don’t work, but in my experience, even with the Rode pop filter attached, I sound better with an additional pop filter. Mines a cheap-ass thing but it stops me sounding like I am a popcorn machine. I edit on Audacity because that’s what I started with and I don’t have time to learn new software. It does everything I need it to do. (Confession: I still can’t tell you what half the buttons do… but there’s a YouTube video for everything!)
Just do it!
Whatever’s holding you back from launching your podcast, put it behind you.
I have read so many posts from people who’ve spent months preparing to get going on their podcast, fiddling around with their edits, artwork, show notes and whatever in an effort to perfect them before they hit the airwaves. It’s a great idea to commit to quality, but don’t let it hold you back from pressing the launch button.
You will make mistakes. Many episodes on from your first, you will listen back to your early work and cringe . But the only way to really learn is to start.
Jane Perrone was the co-host of Guardian gardening podcast Sow, Grow, Repeat (2015-2016) and is the host and producer of independent houseplant podcast On The Ledge, which has been running for four years. More about her career here, and you can listen to her episode that goes behind the scenes at On The Ledge here.