How to Start a Podcast in 2024
3K views
May 6, 2024
"Thinking about launching a podcast in 2024? This comprehensive guide covers everything you need to know to get started. Learn about the essential equipment, recording techniques, editing software, and best practices for creating engaging content. We'll also explore how to find your niche, grow your audience, and monetize your podcast. Whether you're a complete beginner or looking to take your existing podcast to the next level, this video provides practical tips and insights to help you succeed in the evolving world of podcasting."
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You're thinking of starting a podcast
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I imagine if you're watching this video, you may already have an idea for your podcast. That's the very first step
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But before you go and record the first episode, there's a few things that we should work on
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to just confirm and refine your idea. What will your podcast be about
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What will you name your podcast? I like to name podcasts, YouTube channels, courses, something related to the results you want
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the listener to obtain. That's where the name created that enough came from for our personal finance channel
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I'd like to help them create a more abundant life through our podcast interviews
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I have a YouTube video all about choosing a name. I'll link to that video down below
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You'll also find a bunch of other resources down in the description. We're going to go through a lot in this video
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Just know there's more information, basically about all of it down there
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Decide in a format. Will you have solo episodes? Will you have a co-host
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Will you interview guests? Will it be in person or remote? I do remote interviews
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I'm currently in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and my guest, guests aren't here, and so to record high-quality audio and video, I record all the episodes
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using Riverside.fm, the sponsor of today's video. More on why we like using Riverside instead
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of Zoom, Skype, or Google Meet later on in this video. Write a brief description of your podcast
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Think of it as an elevator pitch. If you had 30 seconds to explain the idea to someone while
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on an elevator, what would you say to them? You'll need this in a later step when you're
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publishing your first episode, but it's important that you think about it before you say
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start recording your podcast. Make a list of at least a dozen episode ideas or guests you could
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interview. I don't want you to jump ahead, start recording, and when you sit down to record the
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fifth episode, you realize you don't have any more ideas on this topic, and you quit really
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before you even get started. If it's easy to come up with the episode ideas, you know it'll be
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easier to keep recording episode after episode. This is a marathon, not a spread. What equipment do you need
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for your podcast? You don't need to invest much to get started. You could just record using the
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microphone of your cell phone and call it good. But if you're taking this seriously, I'd at least
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make a small investment in a microphone. The rest of what I'll mention are nice to have. A good
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podcast microphone enhances your audio quality and captures less background noise and echo
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My favorite beginner microphone is the Samsung Q2U. This is a dynamic microphone that can be
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connected using either USB to your computer or phone or XLR to a recording device and currently
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cost around $70 on Amazon and elsewhere. For a list of popular microphone
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I'll include a video below in the description. If it's just you or you are interviewing remote guests
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a USB mic could be ideal because it plugs directly into your computer or phone
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so there is no need for a separate recording device. In this case, you could record the audio with Audacity
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a free software for Mac or PC. You could also record the audio and video
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using Riverside for you alone or for you and your remote guests
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With Riverside's free plan, you could record up to two hours per month
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If you have multiple hosts or guests in the same place, you'll want to record it like this one from Zoom
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This will allow you to connect up to four microphones and record each one on a separate audio track You can use any headphones you have to monitor the audio but it better not to use wireless or Bluetooth headphones because there can be a little bit of a delay or the battery can die in the middle of your recording The audio Technica M20X is a popular option costing around
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$50 or for a more premium option, check out the road NTH 100 for around $150. For a video, you can
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record great videos with your phone as long as you have decent lighting. I record my podcast episodes
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and YouTube videos with my Sony A74. There are tons of options for recording video at all price points
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One important thing to make sure of is that the camera doesn't have a record limit
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Some cameras can only record 30 minutes at a time, and your podcast episode could be much longer than that
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Find out more about recording a video podcast in the video in the description below
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We also have a free guide to launching your video podcast. You can get it by signing up
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Also, down below. Getting ready to record. Before you record your first episode, be sure to do a test recording
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You'll want to check the audio levels. Most recorders and software will tell you the decibel levels that you're recording at
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Your normal speaking voice should be between minus 18 and minus 12 decibels
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While speaking, the levels should show up high in the green area
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If it's in the yellow or red, it's too loud. If it's too high, when you're speaking loudly, the audio could be distorted
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And if it's recorded too low, it's not going to sound great either. The space you're in is also important
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So try to record where there isn't a lot. a lot of background noise, a refrigerator running, air conditioner, or traffic noise from a nearby
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window. You don't want any of that picked up in your recording. Also, you don't want to record
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a room with too much echo. This is usually caused if there are too many hard flat services. You
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can clap at a room and listen to see if you hear an echo. The more soft things there are
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on the space, the better. Think of carpet, bed, couch, rugs, things like that. If you're worried
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about the echo in a room, try spreading out pillows, blankets, towels, anything you have to cover
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some of the hard surfaces. If you're recording audio and that video, you could even record your
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podcast from within a closet. All the clothes are going to absorb all the sound so there won't be
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any echo. Write an outline for your episode. This can be a bullet point list of what you want to
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talk about and you can go through it point by point as you're recording. You can also make a list
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of potential questions for the guests that you'll be interviewing. Some podcasters will record
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a word-for-word script that they'll read throughout the episode. I'd say that most podcasts are a bit
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more free form so it's less common to have a word for a script. This step is important for the
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success of your podcast because if you just start recording with no plan, you're going to ramble
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which means it'll take a lot of work to edit out all the unimportant parts, or if you leave in all
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the rambling, the listener will have a less enjoyable experience because your episode will be much
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longer than it needs to be. They may get bored in the middle of the episode, leave and never
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return to listen to another episode. A tip here, if it's possible, try to front load the more
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interesting parts of the episode. For all types of content, audio, video, anything really
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retention is important. If everything interesting is at the end of the episode, many of your
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listeners aren going to make it that far You got to hook them in the beginning and keep them listening all the way to the end Recording your episodes now the fun part If you recording with guests I make sure to arrive early test all the equipment before they arrive so you got everything ready to go as soon as they there
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One great thing with podcasts, they aren't live. Well, in most cases
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If you mess up, don't worry, just redo that part. You can edit out the mistakes later on
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While recording, go through the introduction to hook the listener in to actually listen to the episode, then go through the main content, close the episode
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maybe you'll recommend another related episode for them to listen to next. If you're doing
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interviews, usually what I like to do is get right into the interview and then I record the
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intro afterwards because I've already had the discussion with a guest and I can create a better
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intro knowing everything we talked about. Here's what it looks like when I record an episode using
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Riverside. I'll log into the studio. The guest joins. We probably chat for a minute so they know
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what to expect. Then I hit record. When we finish the interview, I stopped the recording and if necessary
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I'll chat with the guest for a couple of minutes while we wait for the high quality audio and video
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to finish uploading to the cloud. It's being recorded on each person's computer, so regardless of the
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quality of the internet during the interview, there is no interruptions in the final recording
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Now that I've wrapped up the interview and I know everything that I've talked about with the guest, I could then go and record the introduction. After that's done, I have everything I need to then move on to
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the next step, which is editing the podcast episode. There are lots of tools to edit your podcast. You could
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use audacity that I mentioned earlier for free garage band for mac. Riverside has a handful of editing
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tools to help you quickly edit your podcast episodes. You can edit based on the transcript. It's much
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easier to find repetitive parts of the podcast. You can trim out sections just by highlighting and deleting
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the text that you want removed. If there's a software you'd like me to teach you how to edit your podcast
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write for example Riverside editing in the comments below and I'd gladly create that video
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Editing can be as simple or complex as you want to make it. I'd edit out the pauses, mistakes, or anything else you want to remove
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I'd normalize the audio, which means that if your guest's audio is lower than yours
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you'd want to increase theirs or lower yours, so it sounds similar as you jump back and forth
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between you and your guest. The levels can also change between parts of the episode
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Maybe the second half of the episode, you were further away from the microphone, so it's
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a little quieter than the first half. You can adjust all of that. When you're happy with the edit, export the audio file from the editor
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A few other notes that will help you as you're thinking about your episodes. Here's some amazing data I found from Buzzsprout
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The most common podcast length is from 20 to 40 minutes. That's 31% of the podcast on that platform
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You can see there are plenty of podcasts, though, with episodes of less than 10 minutes, 17%
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and 16% of episodes are over an hour. You might be curious also how frequently most podcasts publish their episodes, 40% publish every
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8 to 14 days and 35% publish every 3 to 7 days. And speaking of Buzzsprout, the next step in the process is
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signing up for podcast hosting. We chose Buzzsprout because it's easy to use and we like their
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ytics They have a free plan if you publishing less than 2 hours per month And here are there other pricing tiers Another popular option that always free is Spotify for podcasters formerly known as Anchor
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I'm a little wary of using one of the podcast players as my hosting provider, so I pay for BuzzSpout
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but plenty of podcasters use Spotify without any issues. Create your account, fill in your podcast name
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add the description from the earlier step, and upload your podcast artwork. You can easily create this for free
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using one of Canada's many free templates. Choose the category you want your podcast to show up under
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on Apple Podcasts. Find a full list of categories in the description below
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Upload your first episode or episodes and schedule when you want them to go live
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Add episode show notes. These notes are anything you want to share with your listeners about the episode
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Also, the show notes can help someone find your podcast or the episode when searching on their
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favorite podcast player or even searching on Google. After you've uploaded at least the first episode
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get listed on the major podcast directories. Here's a list of the top 10 directories according to Buzz Brow
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Also, it's important to know that it can take several days to get accepted by Apple Podcasts
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so make sure to submit your show to Apple a handful of days before you want to officially launch your podcast
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It's the most used podcast player, so it's important that you're listed there before you go and tell anyone to go and listen to your podcasts
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Publishing episodes, we recommend publishing three episodes for your launch. If someone finds an episode they'd like, it's important to have to
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have more content for them to listen to. If there's only one episode there, they won't know if you'll
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be publishing any further content. With multiple episodes, I have a better idea what your podcast
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is about, making it more likely that they'll subscribe and then be notified when future episodes
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are released. If you really want to be an overachiever, I'd actually have five episodes recorded
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before you launch your podcast. You can publish three for your launch and then you have the next
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two weeks, if you're publishing weekly, ready to go, allowing you to take a week off from recording to
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focus on the launch of your podcast before getting back into the rhythm of consistently recording
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Promoting your podcast, unfortunately the most difficult part of having a successful podcast is being found
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Podcasts are amazing for building trust. You're in someone's ear for maybe an hour at a time
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accompanying them on their daily commute, at the gym, or while doing chores around the house
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The best way for people to find you is with short form vertical video clips for Instagram Reels, TikTok, and YouTube shorts
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These videos can be shown to thousands of people that don't follow you
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They're a great way for somebody to find a soundbite from one of your episodes
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maybe watch several more short clips after visiting your Instagram profile, for example
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and then finding the full episode on their favorite podcast player or on YouTube if you're creating a video podcast
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Riverside with a help of AI can help you quickly create these clips. If you want to give Riverside a try, you can use the link in the description below
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If you use the code, the fig code at checkout, you'll get 15% off your first purchase
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Honestly, if I can convince you of anything in this video, record video, not just audio
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You can come back here and thank me after your podcast takes off. If you want to learn more about video podcasts, I'll show you how to create a video podcast in this video right here
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And I hope to see you in another video. Bye-bye
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