Listenable: The Content to Set Your Podcast

Showtime

Dax Shepard’s Armchair Expert is “a podcast that celebrates the messiness of being human.” His show, however, is anything but messy. It’s carefully structured to welcome guests such as Justin Timberlake, Carey Mulligan, Tom Brady, and Randy Jackson with humor, candor, and authenticity. At the end of each show, Dax lists affiliates (with links on the Armchair Expert website related to content on the show or his own connections). Fight-Camp, HelloFresh, FIGS, and BetterHelp are just a few of the examples.

Armchair Expert’s pace, banter, celebrity guests, and high-profile affiliates have made the podcast a success. So has its consistency—new episodes air Mondays and Thursdays—and each show lasts about ninety minutes. Listeners love this.

Earlier, I wrote about my mentor, Kidd Kraddick, and how he would come into the studio five minutes before the show with no schedule, write three things on a piece of paper, and ad-lib his way through four hours of the show. Every morning. I’m not that talented. And, no offense, my bet is neither are you.

You need a plan.

It’s okay to break the rules sometimes if you have an extra-long episode or something like that. But as a new podcaster, you’ll feel more comfortable with structure. It makes it easier for you to plan your show, but you don’t have to stress if you’re going a few minutes long on the first part.

With a plan, you can sound as if you had no plan and are just flowing through each interview flawlessly. So here’s how you put your show together and keep your act together.

When to Publish Your Podcast

Big podcasts today don’t necessarily have to worry about when they publish because they most likely have loyal listeners who will download the episode no matter what time it’s available.

But what about if you’re launching a new podcast?

Luke Riley, a data analyst at Megaphone, has done some research on podcasts and whether the timing of publication affects overall downloads. His research shows the most popular times to publish a podcast are Wednesdays at 2 a.m., Thursdays at 2 a.m., and Tuesdays at 11 p.m. Publishing midweek shows the most promise, as research reveals people tend to download the most on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays. This may be surprising, but the numbers of downloads decrease rapidly on the weekends.¹⁷

Why is it popular to publish so early? The theory is it beats the listener’s morning commute. Many people listen to podcasts while they drive to work, and so it makes sense why the most popular time to publish podcasts is in the wee hours.

The podcasts that tend to get the most attention are published between the hours of 2 a.m. and 4 a.m. Avoid publishing from 11 p.m. to 1 a.m., when the number of downloads plummets.

Show Schedule

Mic: Check.

Co-hosts: Check.

Recording equipment: Check.

You’ve set up your studio with all these new mics, you and your co-hosts sit down ready to make the world’s first podcast that goes from zero listeners to the top of the iTunes podcast chart in one week. It’s never been done before. But stand back, world, you’re about to make history.

You start recording, open the mic and … and … and … everybody looks at each other with the expression of: “Well, who’s gonna start? What are we gonna talk about?”

You were gonna wing it?! I’m laughing at you so hard that I’m doubled over in pain right now. Wing it? Lol lol lol lol.

Just. No.

Your show needs some kind of set schedule. Period. I know. I know. You have mad ad-libbing skills and you’re the world’s most gifted conversationalist. You still need to really think out a set schedule before you get in the studio. If you have co-hosts, you need to have a pre-planning meeting where everybody contributes content. This is no different from a bunch of writers on Saturday Night Live pitching their sketches. Not all of them make it on TV. Not all ideas make it on the podcast. So you have to formulate a hard schedule for everybody to follow. If you’re doing your podcast solo, you still need to follow a schedule.

It might look something like this.

My Podcast Show Schedule

1. Intro: Welcome to (name of podcast).
2. One sentence mission statement: (Each week I/we _________.)
3. This week: Sensationalize tease of contents of show (“This week I talked to Gary V, and I can honestly say this conversation changed my life forever. He told me three things that make a company destined to fail, how to spot the best social media empires at the ground level, and the one relationship every successful entrepreneur has that sets them apart from all others.”) Or: “This week is a game changer because I have proven science of the three elements that make any long-term marriage work. Astrologically, you’ll know by the end of the show today if your relationship is doomed or not. And my bf snuck into my DMs and pretended to be another person and now I’m single.”
4. Topic One: Three elements that make marriage work.
5. Tease: “I looked at this list of the three scientific elements of long-term relationships and I knew I was in trouble.”
6. Content: The points you must make during this convo. Put the most important first!
7. Tease Next Topic: Doomed Astrologically. “Your relationship is doomed and you have no idea. It’s because you’re not aligned astrologically.”
8. Content: Again, the points you must make during this convo. (Lather, rinse, repeat with the remaining podcast topics.)
9. Conclusion.
10. Tease next week’s episode.

Of course, no single schedule fits all. Only you know if you’re better with a lot of guidance or just a few notes that will spark convo. The point is you have to design some kind of schedule.

Here’s an example from In The Moement.

In The Moement Podcast

Episode 53

Intro

• Farted during prayer

  Things I’m Mad At

• My throat is embarrassing
• Thanks Moe, he’s dead
• Credit cards
• Waiting at the movies

  Shout Outs

• Man with seventeen kids
• Toilet man

  Down to Business

• Kevin Hart
• Lauren London

  Listen to Life?

• Tom Brady compares to life

  Laugh of the Week

• I f&*^ed my hair up

  Moement of the week

• Digging deep in your patience bag

  Reflective Moement of the week

• I’m mad at how many years it took me to truly be myself

  Quote of the Week

• Nipsey: You gotta be a beast

Tailoring to Your Audience

Remember how much we discussed your audience? Well, your show structure is a great opportunity to give them what they want. Even more specifically, consider how your audience can download content. Recently, I stumbled upon a post that mentioned The Bert Show as an example of a morning show podcast with individual episodes for each bit or segment.

“Many morning shows tend to upload their entire daily shows as single podcast episodes (such as Elvis Duran and the Morning Show),” wrote the poster. “However, I don’t have time to listen to the entire thing. I prefer being able to download individual segments based on topics that interest me.

“My ideal example is The Bert Show, which is a nationally syndicated show based out of Atlanta. Every day, they upload individual episodes for each segment. Sometimes they are light hearted and funny, and other times it’s more serious topics (spouse cheating, relationship advice, family drama, etc.). Each one is typically about 5–10 min. I would love to find another show like this.”

Repeat after Me: Consistency

Consistency creates trust and builds momentum.

As a listener, I find nothing more maddening than when my fav podcast goes AWOL for a week with zero explanation. As a consultant, I think this is a huge breach of your relationship with your audience. You worked hard for your audience’s loyalty. Don’t take it for granted. And that’s exactly what an inconsistent podcast does. Look, this podcasting thing is hard work. And there is no quicker way to lose an audience than by disrespecting them.

You must have a consistent delivery day and stick to it. I suggest that our talent have two or three podcasts saved for the weeks when “life happens.” Ya know? Family emergencies, scheduling problems. Never miss a week of your podcast. BROADly Speaking, a podcast hosted by Davi Crimmins and Cassie Young, is doing something brilliant on this front. For the weeks Davi and Cassie are on vacation, they produce mini-podcasts to keep the audience engaged.

Full disclosure: my company, Pionaire Podcasting, consults for BROADly Speaking, and Cassie is also the Executive Vice President, Digital & Marketing of Pionaire Podcasting Network and The Bert Show. She’s brilliant. And she’s under contract, so don’t even think about it! Her thoughts on mini episodes:

“The consistency of delivering your podcast is one thing. However, consistency in promoting and marketing your podcast is important too. At Pionaire Podcasting, we have a marketing schedule we construct with our talent to be sure they are marketing across social media at the right times to maximize their growth. There is pre-promotion, launch-day promotion, and post-promotion scheduled every week. We provide the schedule, and our talent provides the content. Sometimes it’s audio samples of the podcast. Other’s times it’s the talent talking about what’s coming up on this week’s episode. But it’s done consistently each week to build an audience. Which is so tough. You need every edge to get noticed. And consistency is a main ingredient.”

The Beauty of Podcasting Is Editing

Remember Tiffany and Lauren from Permission to Enter? At first they put everything up, which listeners don’t need or want. It’s the same as when I’m doing a live show and our material just stinks. The beauty of podcasting is editing. You have to have an ear for it and take your ego out of it. Part of what made Call Her Daddy so popular were the hours and hours of editing that went into each show. They edited it down to their best content and their best conversations.

Earlier, I talked a bit about Ryan Dobson and how he and his wife have mastered the art of collaboration in their parenting podcast. But I also talked about Ryan’s passionate belief in the power of high-quality content. If you need a reminder, “High quality is KING!”

There’s a reason Ryan and his wife have found the success they have, and it goes beyond playing to each of their team members’ strengths. Their podcast is reinforced heavily by the fact that they employ team members whose strengths specifically lie in beautiful editing. Ryan and Laura might speak the truth but, without the right editing, they might as well be as indecipherable as the static you’d see on a cable TV.

The Secret Sauce

Breaking your podcast up into segments is the secret sauce that’s going to get you paid.

One guy I know does a two-hour sports show in Jacksonville. I told him about chopping it up into segments. Jags fans who just want to hear about the Jags game average only about three thousand five hundred. But his overall listeners are up five hundred from him breaking the show up into segments.

When I take a look at my numbers every day, eight thousand people listen to the whole podcast or at least are downloading the whole podcast. Eight thousand. That means one hundred forty-two thousand of my downloads are coming from people checking out the segments—that’s where the money is.

One podcaster who has a huge bottle of the secret sauce is John Lee Dumas of Entrepreneurs on Fire. He creates specific segments—and saves himself a boatload of time—by sending his guests questions (often the same questions about entrepreneurship) before they participate in the show. So during the interview, he can breeze through his part because the guests already know the questions and their answers. At one point, John had it scheduled so that every Friday, he was doing seven or eight 20-minute interviews in a row. He’s making more than a million dollars a year, so it works. It’s different from how I roll because I focus on the art of conversation and the connections we create—but he makes his approach very clear.

Another example can be found in Aryeh Sheinbein. I’ve told you all about his “Lion’s Den Concept,” but he also has made a (smart) habit of breaking the ice with his guests before they go on air. Building that chemistry and shattering any nerves means that not only does the conversation go more swimmingly but also that guests are able to dive into the juicy stuff sooner rather than later. There’s no boring the listener with introductions. It’s kind of like skipping the first day of class in high school. We can teleport past, “Hi, my name is Victoria and I love to juggle when I’m not eating Dutch pancakes.” Instead, we’ll dive into a deeper conversation with Victoria so she can bring the value we have her on the podcast for. Get it?

Planning Your Teases

A tease is a sensationalized line that gets your listener excited about your upcoming content. You want to use the 80/20 theory. You give them 80 percent of the story and they stick around for the other 20 percent because they are so intrigued. Here are some bad teases I’ve heard, along with my suggestions to make them much better.

Bad tease: You guys, I had the most awkward thing happen at my chiropractor’s office.

Great tease: Guys, my chiropractor asked me if he could stick his finger up my rear during my appointment this week.

See the difference? Generally, when somebody tells you a story consists of a finger in the rear, you’re going to stick around for the payoff. (Maybe that’s just me.)

Bad tease: This week we’re going to discuss the one thing most of you guys are doing wrong when training your dog.

Good tease: I know two clients who were sued by neighbors because they made the same mistake 90 percent of dog owners make when training their dogs.

When you hear statistics along with a little legal drama, you’re more likely to tune in for that podcast, right?

Three Ways to Tease during Your Podcast

Table-of-contents tease: You have a podcast with a series of great topics you’re going to discuss during your episode. Consider teasing the three most intriguing stories; it’s like offering a table of contents. No matter how many “segments” you have time to include, you want listeners sticking around because they can’t miss the three you teased in the beginning of your podcast. Here’s an example from one of my shows:

“So much to cover this week.

• Moe’s sister is lucky to be alive this week. She literally struggled for her life while a guy tried to kidnap her on a college campus.
• My mom has dementia and is not fit to continue being a therapist, but she still desperately wants to continue her practice. Is it ethical for me to hire actors for her to counsel so she thinks she’s still working?
• I know a dude who slept with a woman during a trial separation from his wife. She walked right in on him in their own home! She says he was cheating. He says, no way. Who’s right?”

In this example, I used that 80/20 rule. My listeners know the root of the content, but they’ll want to stick around for the other 20 percent.

I might get to four other things in our show. But I want listeners intrigued enough to wait for those top-of-the-podcast, table-of-contents teases.

If you’re focusing on one topic during your podcast, be sure to give your audience reasons to stick around and the feeling that they are going to miss something big if they leave you: “You are wasting your time on 95 percent of investment websites. I have five that have never given me bad advice.”

Immediately tease the best content on your podcast—even before you sell those endorsements (wink). Listeners will hear the moneymaking aspects of your show when you’ve got them hooked with table-of-contents teases.

Transition teases: Following the same 80/20 formula, use a tease from one topic to the other. Avoid rookie-sounding transitional teases such as “Moving on,” “So that’s how that ended,” and “So let’s take a look at ____ now.” The world has zero need for those. Once you’re done with a topic, let the momentum pause. Take a breath. Then launch right into the tease to make sure they hang out for the next segment. It will feel strange the first couple of times, and you may fail at keeping it smooth, but I assure you no listener is thinking: “Man, give me a transitional line or something before starting your next story. I’m never listening again. This person is terrible at transitioning. Loser. I’m giving them a one-star rating because of their awful transitions. A person who can’t transition is so unlovable.”

Let’s go back to the sample show I included above. These were the transition teases:

“So they caught that monster, my sister won’t leave her apartment and my dad has moved in with her. It’s a total cluster, but we’re lucky she’s alive.” (Pause, breath.) “My mom would have no idea if I hired an actor to play the part of a new patient because my mom has dementia. So, why would I even consider doing this …?”

You’ll use the same formula with each and every transition into a new topic. The smart play is to write these down on your show schedule to use as a reference when switching topics. (You’re thinking: “Whoa. Wait? Did this dude just write ‘show schedule?’ What the heck? Now I have to do a show schedule?” Indeed. But more on that in a bit.)

Remember, when you’re editing your show, leave in spaces between transitions instead of immediately cutting out the sound of your breath. Choppy edits that eliminate your natural breath sound awkward. You want them to sound natural.

End-of-episode teases: You have just completed your hall-of-fame episode. Nobody in the history of podcasts has provided the kind of entertaining insight that you just did. Your audience laughed. They cried. Their hearts sang and you touched the depths of their soul in a way no podcaster ever has. They experienced unimaginable joy and discovered the meaning of life. So now what? Make sure they know that your next episode is going to be equally epic. How? You need to have one or two things to tease for your next episode. Use that 80/20 rule the same way.

• “Next Tuesday when I drop the next episode, I’ll tell ya about walking into my parents’ bedroom to find my mom in a swing with my eighty-two-year-old father. Don’t forget to subscribe …”
• “I didn’t get to it this week, but in my next podcast on Thursday, I promise to tell you guys the three beauty secrets that every celebrity uses in their press photos that will immediately upgrade your online presence.”
• “I recorded a conversation with the one and only Gary V last week. I can’t believe I got the interview. But he told me two things about getting started in business that changed my life and it will change yours too. That’s on Monday. Do not miss that one.”

Your teases must be sensationalized. You want to make your listener eager to get to next week’s episode. Then you have to tease that episode all week long on social media or marketing. Wait, what?! You weren’t expecting that, right? Teasing all week on social? Marketing?

When you tease on social, be sure to sensationalize the same way. For example:

• Bad social tease: “The one and only Gary V joins me on Tuesday’s podcast.”
• Good social tease: “The world’s premier entrepreneur, Gary V, joins me to tell you the three elements of starting a business or it’s destined to fail.”

(OMG. That interview didn’t even happen and I’m excited to listen to that made-up podcast!)

NOW HEAR THIS

• With a plan, you can sound as if you had no plan and are just flowing through each interview flawlessly.
• Your show needs some kind of set schedule. Period!
• A tease is a sensationalized line that gets your listener excited about your upcoming content. You want to use the 80/20 theory. You give them 80 percent of the story and they stick around for the other 20 percent because they are so intrigued.
• Consider teasing the three most intriguing stories; it’s like offering a table of contents.