Learn How to Start a Successful Podcast

Do you already have a blog, and want to expand into another medium? Then why not start a podcast?

A lot of our Facegroup members have asked questions about starting a podcast, especially about gear, content, engagement, hosting, launching and monetization.

And to help me answer all those questions I called on an expert.

Craig Hewitt is the founder of Podcast Motor and Castos. When Craig started his own podcast, he quickly discovered that audio editing and producing a podcast was a pain. So he started Podcast Motor to help others.

The technicalities of podcasting almost stopped me from starting the ProBlogger podcast. That’s why I turned to Craig and his team to handle them.

Craig shares the nuts and bolts of podcasting:

Reach existing audience in a different way, or reach an entirely new audience.
Establish a dedicated hosting platform to store and distribute your media files.
Differentiate yourself to develop a brand and identity (i.e. your accent).
Start a podcast with everything you need for less than $100.
Be comfortable with speaking, and assemble enough content to talk about.
Identify and prepare guests to be on your podcast.
Create an intro by recording it yourself or outsourcing it to a voiceover artist.
Find a room without flat walls and hard spaces to eliminates echoes. (Try a closet).
Edit audio to match your style (buttoned-up, conversational, etc.)
Put your podcast on Android and Apple platforms, including Apple Podcast (formerly iTunes), Google Podcast, Stitcher, Spotify, and YouTube.
Get and grow your audience by getting your podcast listed in search engines. Ask listeners to subscribe, submit a rating/review, and share with others.
Record five episodes before launching. Then launch with two episodes, plus or minus an Episode 0 that offers a description of what listeners can expect from your podcast.
Engage your listeners by using a call to action through a link in the podcast audio, or continue a podcast discussion and connect with audience via a Facebook group.
Metrics don’t really matter. Instead, review popularity, downloads and listening duration.

We covered a lot in this episode, but to get all the details you need to successfully start a podcast sign up for Craig’s free course, Launch In A Week:

Podcasting Microphone and Gear
Audio Recording updated 2024 mobile phone number data and Editing
Your Ideal Listener and Podcast Personas
The Perfect Podcast Recipe
Media Host and Website Setup
Getting Your Show Ready to Launch
Launch Planning and Growing Your Audience

Examples of How to Start a Successful Podcast:

CoSchedule’s Blog
CoSchedule’s Podcast

Courses

Start a Blog
ProBlogger Pro – 31 Days to Build a Better Blog

Join our Facebook group.

Full TranscriptExpand to view full transcript

Darren: Hey hey there, ProBlogger listeners. It’s Darren Rowse here from ProBlogger. Welcome to episode 276 of the show. For those of you who are new to the show, ProBlogger is a site for bloggers and prebloggers designed to help them to start blogs, to grow those blogs, and to monetize those blogs. You can check out more of what we do over at ProBlogger. Particularly, look out for our courses. Our Start A Blog course which is free, will help you get up and running, and our 31 Days To Build A Better Blog course which is ideal for anyone with a blog who wants to take it up a notch, to have a 31 day intense burst of blogging to grow your blog. Check out the courses tab on problogger.com.

Today, we do something a little bit cell phone repair shop over different on the show. The last six or so shows we’ve been featuring stories from new bloggers as part of our International Start A Blog Day deb directory which was last week. We had hundreds of blogs start on the day. It was so exciting to see them. You can check out some of those blogs that were started over on the ProBlogger blog. I’ll put on a link in the show notes today to that.