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How to make a successful branded podcast in 20 quick steps
By now you’re either exploring a podcast for your commercial or not for profit brand. Great start. And by the sheer scale of podcast production in our media landscape, we know it’s not only doable, but worthwhile.
People are talking. People are listening. You want to get involved.
So how do you get it right? While every client is unique and every show has its own variations, we follow a basic shortlist to map out the process of making our branded podcasts, breaking down the action into 3 distinct phases, namely Pre-Production, Production and Post-Production.
PRE-PRODUCTION
Audience - who are they?
Audience - what do they want and need to hear?
Audience - how much time will they be prepared to give you their ears?
Creative - what will make them sit up, listen and want to download the next episode immediately?
Creative - what’s the format? How many people can your audience listen to at once? How long for? How many episodes? Should this be a limited season or a weekly show that lasts forever?
6. Script - time to commit some digital ink to screen to see which ideas might actually work.
7. Casting - who can host, guest or perform for you within the resources and logistics available?
8. Approval - who’s budget is this? Who’s decision is this? Time to make some decisions.
9. Booking and scheduling - once you have the format, script or conversation guide ready and your host and guests are all booked, where to record, when to record and working back from your release date, when does all this need to start?
PRODUCTION
10. Audio - ideally, you want your professional audio engineer in a professional studio with all the
equipment they need to capture the best quality audio possible. Nothing worse than sound of static or dropped signal in your audience’s noise cancelling headphones… While there are some fantastic remote recording platforms, it’s good to know that you have a studio that can accommodate real live human interaction too.
11. Audio - you’ll need an edit of that recording, to clear up coughs, splutters, crosstalk and the odd
fumble.
12. Audio - thought about music? A consistent intro and outro?
13. Video - while podcasts are not traditionally a visual medium, there are good reasons to create a video
document of your podcast. Mainly SEO. Audio is not yet searchable on the internet, so creating the most simple of videos with accompanying captions gives your podcast the advantage of both text and video searchability.
POST PRODUCTION
14.Text - as mentioned above, your audience will have more chance of finding your podcast with video captions and with a full transcript (preferably better than basic AI gobbledygook too). Find your transcriber and nail down every typo.
15. Text - this would be a good time to make sure you have a great name for your podcast, a relevant and compelling title and show notes that describe your guests and the conversation with some relevant links for each episode.
16. Graphics - if you haven’t already created a piece of key art for your podcast, now it’s time to do so. Call it a logo, call it artwork - this depends on how strong your brand can flex to create sub-brands or simple initiatives.
17. Website - every good podcast deserves a home of its own. Creating a page on your existing website or a simple separate website should be a decision made in the creative phase. But now you have your podcast, it’s time to get that page / site live and ready to receive your audience.
18. Storage - now you’ve recorded all this great audio and video, you’ll need somewhere to store it safely and from where you can distribute your show.
19. Distribution - okay, now you have 2 options. If you have an internal podcast, your distribution will be on a private platform, most likely downloaded from a simple link as an app by your audience. This will look and feel like your brand, have all your brand values and principles and can operate as much as a training tool as a culture building machine. And as all the data is first party (belonging to you and you alone), it’s an incredible way to measure and manage your expectations, results and decisions around content and style.
20. Distribution - if you’re going public, it’s simply a question of sending out your audio to Apple, Spotify, Google, Amazon, Acast, Overcast and multiple other podcasting channels. And don’t forget your video channel pals over at Vimeo, YouTube and the other friendly video platforms.
Of course, this isn’t an exhaustive list of the whole podcast process. But as you can see, there are a few moving parts to this journey. And that’s why so many clients prefer to come to The Horse’s Mouth to handle all the strategy, creative, prep, production and distribution. Because while you’re running a brand, we can take care of executing it in line with your purpose, principles and marketing plans.
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