Essentials
Podcasting Essentials
Related articles:
Written by Addy Saucedo
Podcasting and audio content continues to grow in popularity because more people are consuming new media content on mobile smartphones and smart devices. Creating a podcast is affordable and easier than ever. Now is the perfect time to start a podcast for your hobby, personal brand or business. For easy to follow steps and expert support, you’re in the right place. Previous experience? Not required. You’ll discover absolutely everything you need to start your podcast in the following phases:
✅Download this free podcast launch checklist to follow along!
Share
Once you have all the elements of your podcast (such as the audio file, artwork, episode title, and show notes), it’s time to learn how to make it available for your audience. This phase will help you set up podcast hosting, create your RSS feed, publish your first episode and share your podcast with the world. This is the home stretch!
Hosting
You have put a lot of hard work into planning and creating your episodes. Without a doubt, you don’t want to lose those files or not have your podcast available for your audience to listen. A professional podcast host provides distribution, reliability, control, and tools to allow your podcast to grow and stay alive. To power-up your podcast and start sharing it with your audience, consider Simplecast.
Simplecast
Simplecast goes beyond podcast publishing and distribution. We make professional podcasting easy. Podcasters like yourself have access to a wide array of tools when using our platform, such as:
- No limits to how many downloads you receive, or storage you use.
- Get to know your audience right from your dashboard with our enterprise-level, IAB 2.0 compliant, and Spotify-inclusive analytics
- Say goodbye to repetitive publishing tasks with our easy-to-configure and user-friendly podcast websites. Episodes and show notes automatically populate. See this example: https://overtime.simplecast.fm.
- A beautiful multi-platform (website and social) embeddable audio player.
- Give account access to your co-host and/or producer with their own login.
- Distribution to Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, iHeartRadio, TuneIn, Google Podcasts and more.
- Ready-to-help customer support via email or messaging app.
- And a continued mission to provide you better podcasting tools.
What About Self hosting or Using My Website For My Podcast?
The technology for websites is designed particularly for those websites, not podcasts. Along with not having the features listed above, you will run into service issues that will either force you to move to a higher website hosting price (that’s more costly than a hosting service designed for podcasts) or settle with slow to no podcast downloads available for your audience.
Podcast Settings
Setting up your podcast is one of the first things you’ll need to do before you can submit to podcast directories. It is important to fill in all of the information in podcast settings to help directories list your show in the best way possible and to make it more search-friendly and discoverable by your existing and potential audience.
Podcast settings information:
- Podcast Title = the name of your podcast.
- Contains Explicit Language? = mark this box if your podcast contains profanity and is not censored.
- Type = select how you want your podcast to display in Apple Podcasts - episodic or serial.
- Search Keywords = provide words that relate to your podcast’s topic.
- Website = provide your Simplecast provided website or domain URL.
- Author = name of the podcast talent host/s.
- Podcast Owner = name of the person/s or network who owns the podcast.
- Owner Email = email of the person/s or network who owns the podcast. Podcast directories will use this email address to communicate important details regarding your podcast. Provide an active email address.
- Copyright = © current year and podcast copyright owner.
- Artwork = upload your podcast artwork. Review the artwork section in the creating phase for more artwork specs.
- Categories = select up to three podcast categories and sub-categories. Click here for reference.
- Language = the language of your podcast.
- Publishing Time Zone = your time zone.
- Checkboxes = check the boxes that apply to your podcast.
- Apple Podcasts URL = enter your apple podcast URL (come back to this after your show is approved).
💫Helpful articles and podcast episodes:
Apple Podcasts Specs
8 Things to Check with Your Media Host’s Podcast RSS Feed
What’s Inside a Podcast RSS Feed
Set Up Your Podcast Website
Giving your podcast a home is easier than ever with Simplecast. Simplecast customers have access to customizable ready-to-share podcast websites. Want to point a personalized domain to it? You can do that. Want icon buttons to your social media profiles and podcast directories? You can do that, too. Want to see Simplecast website examples? You can do that below:
Rants and Randomness with Luvvie Ajayi
Three and a Half Degrees: The Power of Connection
Start customizing your podcast website by heading over to the Website Design tab from your Simplecast dashboard.
💥Hot tip: place your podcast website link in your social media profile bios.
💫Helpful articles and podcast episodes:
Can Simplecast also host my website?
Add an Apple Podcasts Smart Subscribe Banner for iOS devices
How to build a website for your podcast
Setting up your Custom Domain
Publish
One last step before you can submit your podcast to podcast directories: publish at least one episode! Grab that episode one audio file and show notes and follow along with this step-by-step article: Creating and publishing a new podcast episode in Simplecast
Why stop at episode one? Save the next episode (or more) as a draft:
How to save your podcast episode as a draft in Simplecast
Submit To Directories
The best way to share your podcast with others is by submitting your show to podcast directories. You have been waiting for this day, so let’s get right to it with an article listing the top podcast directories and how to submit: Which podcast directories/apps do I need to submit my show to?
Fun fact: by submitting your podcast to Apple Podcasts your show will also be available on the following apps:
- Overcast
- Pocket Casts
- Castro
- Downcasts
- Podcast Addict
- Castbox
- and much more
It’s Live, Announce It!
Congratulations, you have a podcast now!🎉Don’t be shy to share the great news. Here are a few ideas on how to spread the exciting news.
Recast it!
One of the newest ways to share your podcast with an audiogram. Quickly and easily create your personalized audiogram right within your Simplecast episode!
Here’s how: Podcasts, say hello to Recast
Social Media
The goal is to let your following know your podcast is available on all platforms. There are a variety of ways on how to share your podcast on social media:
- Simple text with a link to your episode or link to your podcast website.
- Text with your Simplecast audio player designed for social media: How to use Simplecast’s new embeddable audio player
- Drop that Recast into your social feed.
- If your podcast is available on Spotify, here’s how to share it on Instagram stories: Share Podcasts on Spotify To Instagram Stories
💥Hot tip: Not every show needs its own social media channel. If you have a large personal following, and the show is related to your personal interests or work, try using your personal channels first, before building out show-specific accounts. Meet your audience where they are!
Email Newsletter
Have a newsletter? Introduce your email subscribers to your podcast with a short description of the show, where they can hear it, how to subscribe, and any teasers to get the ball rolling.
💥Hot tip: Strike the curiosity of your email subscribers by taking a screenshot of your episode’s audio player, insert that image into the newsletter and hyperlink it to the episode.
You Are Now A Podcaster
It’s official; you are now a podcaster! The initial stages of creating a podcast is an adventure. Now that you’re past that, it’s all about continuing to have fun and sharing your message. With all its elements, podcasting has a learning curve. Don’t be hard on yourself when it feels like you’re not getting the traction you had hoped. Gaining an audience, comfortable with your equipment, learning how to promote your show, and finding your style will happen over time. Many successful podcasters admit their first episodes are embarrassing to listen to and that with consistent planning, creating and sharing, they found their stride and so can you. ✨
✅Reminder: Download this free podcast launch checklist to follow along!