How to get maximum results from minimum investment

Podcasting is a popular tactic for organizations with limited budgets—and for good reason. Recording and releasing a podcast can be an extremely affordable and effective way to promote your organization’s message. Depending on the format and structure of the show, it’s possible to produce and distribute a podcast for just a few hundred dollars a month.

However, the significant investment required by a podcast is time.

When organizations come to us for help with their podcasts, it’s almost always because they have underestimated the time it takes to produce a great show consistently. Since “time” actually means “people’s time,” it’s not unusual for the podcast to become a lower priority when other projects require staff members’ attention.

We often find that organizations spend too much time and money on low-value tasks and too little on genuinely essential strategies and tactics. When finances are challenging, simplifying and consolidating platforms and tools can lower costs.

So, where and how should organizations spend their time and money to produce a high-quality podcast? We answer that question below, but first, we want to address the most important investment you can make in your podcast. (The most common formats for organizations’ podcasts are conversational or interview-based shows, so these recommendations will focus on those formats.)

Invest in Audience Development

Can you describe your podcast’s perfect listener? How old is she? What does she do at work? When does she listen to your show? What other podcasts does she like?

If you can’t answer those questions or can only give general answers like, “The perfect listener is a member of our organization” or “The perfect listener cares about the issues our organization addresses,” the single most important investment you can make in your podcast is an Audience Development program.

What is “Audience Development?”

As I have pointed out before, audiences consume podcasts in unique ways. If you don’t understand the listeners (or viewers) you hope to reach, and how they engage with the medium, you’re likely creating pain points for the audience you have while ignoring most of the people who should be listening to your show.

Audience Development is the process of generating that understanding and using the knowledge to create, distribute, and program your podcast as efficiently as possible.

A proper Audience Development project results in a better podcast with more listeners, usually requiring less long-term investments of time and money.

An effective Audience Development program usually requires four to six months and can cost between $7,500 and $20,000, depending on the show’s format, topics, target audience, and other factors. If done correctly, however, it only needs to be done once, and the benefits will last throughout the lifetime of your show.

Learn about Audience Development

Okay, so aside from Audience Development, how should you spend your time and money when it comes to your organization’s podcast?

How to spend your time

As I mentioned, podcasting is a time-intensive endeavor, and it’s critical to prioritize spending time on the right things to ensure your podcast produces the most significant returns for your organization.

The ultimate metric of a podcast’s success is its listeners. Even a show with ideal hosts, topics, and guests can’t be successful without listeners, so make your listeners the top priority.

A chart of the benefits listeners get from podcasts. — When podcast listeners were asked…
“Looking at the following benefits associated with podcasts, how important is each benefit to you?”

82% say **hearing discussions on interesting topics is an essential benefit of podcasts**. Only 34% say listening to audio dramas is important.
(Chart courtesy of Sounds Profitable.)

Authentic Content

People love podcasts because they are authentic. The best shows make listeners feel like they are part of the conversation, not just listening to others talk.

It’s not uncommon for organizations to spend too much time trying to control a podcast’s discussions. Some, for example, draft detailed scripts for hosts to read. Others spend weeks trying to land the perfect guest. These activities result in stilted conversations and rushed episodes.

If you only think about your podcast as a series of episodes that must be planned, recorded, and released, you’ll spend much time but only generate average results. However, if you think about your podcast as a series of conversations your listeners want to have, you’ll spend less time on unimportant details and yield significantly better results.

Ask yourself: what do your listeners find interesting? Then, spend your time creating opportunities to record authentic conversations around those topics.

Rather than spending hours writing and editing a script, simply identify the three or four most compelling questions the host could ask a guest and let them discuss the questions and answers in a natural way. This will save time and result in a more genuine conversation that listeners will appreciate.

Likewise, don’t spend too much time chasing the “perfect guest.” Instead, look for opportunities to record conversations with many different guests. Then you can select the perfect conversations to share with your listeners.

Spending your time preparing for and engaging in authentic conversations on the podcast is time well spent.

Audience Engagement

The number one way people hear about podcasts is through personal recommendations. People are most likely to recommend a podcast to others when they genuinely feel like they are part of a community of listeners.

While you want your podcast listeners to feel like they are part of the conversation, you should also ensure that they feel like they are part of a community. Spend time speaking directly to listeners, and reference them throughout every episode. For example, use phrases like, “We’re so glad you’re listening to the show,” and, when speaking to a guest, “I think our listeners would want to ask…”

In addition to speaking to listeners, ensure that listeners have opportunities to contact you, and encourage them to do so at every opportunity. Your show should have a dedicated email address and, whenever possible, its own social media accounts. Invite the listeners to share their thoughts, questions, opinions, and preferences with you through these channels, and reply to them when they do.

Investing time speaking with your listeners is just as essential to your podcast’s success as the time you spend talking to your guests.

Dan Carlin loves his listeners

*Dan Carlin’s Hardcore History* has millions of listeners, yet it defies all conventional wisdom in podcasting.
The show releases just two to three episodes a year, each of which is three to five hours long. He has no guests, and his is the only voice in the show.
How does he do it? Of course, the content is fantastic, and he’s a great storyteller. But he talks directly to the listener throughout each episode. You're not listening to a lecture; You feel as though you’re sitting across the table from Dan in a coffee shop or bar while he tells you what he knows about World War I or Alexander the Great.

How to spend your money

Podcasts take time, but they also require you to spend money. Aside from staff time, an organization should budget for a few critical components. Fortunately, these outlays do not have to be expensive.

Production

When organizations contact Voxtopica, they often tell us that they’ve already set up a small office or a closet as a studio. They are excited about their new podcasting space, so we feel bad when we have to tell them they probably wasted effort and money.

In-person recording is expensive. It requires more equipment and can be harder to schedule since guests almost always have to build in some travel time.

In most cases, recording your podcast remotely through a browser-based platform will produce better results at significantly lower costs. Scheduling guests is easier when they can join your show from their own desks instead of having to leave their homes or offices.

The quality of online remote podcast recording has improved dramatically in the last few years, and there are several great platforms to choose from. Voxtopica uses Riverside, the industry standard for enterprise podcasting. Descript is also an excellent option for independent podcasts. Both of these platforms include text-based editing, which makes it much easier to take an episode from recording to release.

If your organization uses Zoom, you can use it for remote podcast recording without paying for another service. However, you will need to use some very specific settings to get high-quality audio and video outputs. Since Zoom doesn’t include editing features, you will still need audio production software to prepare your podcast for release.

Equipment

It’s worthwhile to use high-quality recording equipment for your show. For less than $1,000, you can get good microphones, headphones, and cameras for a two-person podcast. You’ll spend even less if you record your shows remotely instead of in a studio.

However, even the most expensive microphones and cameras won’t help if the recording platform is poor. In most cases, the recording platform is a desktop or laptop computer, and it will be manipulating audio files in the range of several gigabytes (significantly more for video podcasts).

In other words, an older, slower computer can significantly increase the time it takes to produce your show, and will likely negatively impact quality.

Non-profit Podcasting on a Budget

How to get maximum results from minimum investment