As The Audacity to Podcast celebrates 15 years of professional podcasting, I invite you to take a critical look back at the biggest mistakes I've made and things I wish I did differently with my show. My hope is that this will inspire you to either fix these things early for yourself, or avoid them altogether!

Even though I published the first episode of The Audacity to Podcast 15 years ago on June 17, 2010, I've actually been podcasting longer than that. I published my first-ever episode in April 2007. But I consider The Audacity to Podcast to be when I really took podcasting seriously and even “professionally.”

Besides the first and last items on this list, the following regrets in no other particular order. To keep this episode “shorter,” I'll let you figure out how to apply each of these yourself, but please let me know if you'd like more information about any of these in a future episode!

Regret #1: Hiatuses

This is my biggest regret about my podcast: the embarrassingly long hiatuses I've taken. It started in late 2017 when I suddenly disappeared due to a devastating family emergency. And the long times away since then have been multiple shockwaves from having my world turned upside down.

But here's what's difficult to confess: I could have returned to the mic sooner if not for my own “head junk.” It was a mix of “imposter syndrome,” self-doubt, unnecessary distractions, some level of “perfectionism,” self-criticism, and even some fear and laziness.

It cost me a lot of opportunities, audience, influence, authority, and even income.

And even though I mention income, please hear me clearly that I am not bringing back The Audacity to Podcast for money. Instead, I'm finally taking the steps against my negative “head junk” and stepping back into a burning passion to continue educating and inspiring you!

Regret #2: Not building an email list sooner

You probably hear this one so often from entrepreneurs that you're sick of it.

But email lists aren't only for marketers!

Even if you podcast only for the fun of it, there are plenty of great ways you can use an email list no matter why you're podcasting! [https://theaudacitytopodcast.com/13-ways-to-use-an-email-list-for-your-podcast-tap198/] For example, you can use an email list to provide actionable information from your podcast episodes to your audience, get more personal with your audience, solicit feedback you can share in your podcast, get to know your audience, and—yes—even promote things to your audience.

Regret #3: Not promoting my episodes via email

Speaking of email, I actually recommend against using an email list only to promote your latest episodes. But my regret is that I didn't promote my latest episodes in my emails at all! I often think about creating an additional email list solely for the sake of providing my full notes and links to you so you can easily take action on anything even after you delete the podcast episode from your podcast app. But I've not even been good at simply including an auto-updating widget in any of my emails—nothing from my email list or personal emails. Granted, part of this is because my email service provider, ActiveCampaign [https://theaudacitytopodcast.com/activecampaign], used an outdated RSS validator that would choke on valid podcast RSS feeds—at least the last time I tested it.

I actually still haven't corrected this, either. But please let me know if you would be interested in receiving my episode notes via email automatically af

394. 15 Regrets from 15 Years of Professional Podcasting

Whether by choice or beyond your control, your podcast might have to go on a hiatus—and it could so long that the podcast seems dead! How do you come back from that and get back into your rhythm? It will take some work, but here are my recommendations (and what I'm practicing myself, too!).

1. Review your podcasting goals (your “why”)

Why do you really do your podcast? What P.R.O.F.I.T. (popularity, relationships, opportunities, fun, income, or tangibles) are you after for yourself? What about for your audience?

As you resurrect your podcast, you might need to consider adjusting your purpose and goals for your podcast. It's okay to go from business to fun, or fun to business! But what's most important is that you know why you're podcasting so that you can set appropriate goals, and then take the right steps toward those goals.

2. Treat your podcast return like a launch

Think about everything you had and did when you first started your podcast.

No matter how much you've lost due to your hiatus, you probably still have much more than when you first launched. You have more skills, more knowledge, more relationships, more tools (and probably higher quality, too), more resources, and yes, you even have more audience (you had zero when you first started)! Some people will keep your RSS feed for years, holding onto hope that you'll someday return. That's what I did with the Ask a Ninja video podcast (more about that later)!

Imagine if you had all the resources you have now but years ago! So you can treat your return almost like a launch with the same kind of enthusiasm, “media” blitz, promotion, sharing, asking friends and what audience you have to help, and more. But this time, you have a whole lot more of everything than you had before!

3. Use a podcast trailer to promote the return

If it fits into your timing—and maybe don't delay your return just for this—try to publish a “trailer” to promote the return of your podcast. Make it 1–3 minutes long, like a trailer, and make sure you actually set it as a “trailer” episode type in your podcast publishing tool. As a trailer, either don't use an episode number, or set its episode number to be the same as your next episode will be so that some apps can treat it as a trailer for that upcoming episode. And soon after you get into publishing again, you can remove the trailer from your podcast feed.

Instead of making the trailer about the past by apologizing for being gone or talking about what's happened during that time, focus on the present and—more importantly—the future. Why are you excited to resurrect the podcast? What are you eager to share in upcoming episodes? What might you be doing differently that your audience will appreciate?

You could even take this opportunity to adapt this trailer into your regular whole-show trailer that can be featured in podcast apps!

4. Lower your expectations

This one is a reality check; you'll need to lower your expectations.

Lower your expectations of your podcast's influence.

Lower your expectations of your audience's response.

And even lower your expectations of yourself.

Yes, you have a lot more knowledge and experience than before, but that doesn't mean you can just jump right back in and have all the same popularity, influence, audience, and even strengths and abilities as you did before. But you haven't lost everything!

Although Ask a Ninja did not return as a video podcast (so I can finally delete that RSS feed from my podcast app!), it did return!

Am I angry with Ask a Ninja for being gone for so long? No. Do I need to know what happened

393. How to Revive Your Dormant Podcast

Redirects come in multiple types. When misused, they can cause some major problems, as even happened to me recently. Here are some warnings to watch for whenever you use redirects.

Check out my past episode and article, “Redirects and How to Use Them in Podcasting” [https://theaudacitytopodcast.com/redirects-and-how-to-use-them-in-podcasting-tap280/] to learn more about how redirects work and the different options there are.

(As an affiliate, I earn from qualifying purchases through some—but not all—of the following links. But I recommend things I truly believe in, regardless of earnings.)

Caution #1: 301 redirects are “permanent” and cached

In podcasting, we throw around the term “301 redirect” or “permanent redirect” often without realizing what that actually means: it is (or at least it's assumed to be) permanent!

I often use the physical mail or US Post Office metaphor when explaining redirects. Think of a permanent redirect as a “change of address” notice sent back to everyone who mails you something.

A 301 redirect is permanent and is essentially telling apps, “This thing has moved to over there. Please stop looking here and always look there instead. So don't look at me again.”

This is great when you actually made a permanent move—or at least intend for it to be permanent. Like when you permanently move homes and change your address!

But if you ever change your mind or—even worse—make a mistake in the redirect, that redirect will be followed and the old URL will stop being checked. So if you make a “/feedback” page that 301-permanently redirects somewhere else, then even if you change where “/feedback” goes, any app that previously loaded “/feedback” will bypass it altogether and go straight to the destination it has saved in its cache.

That cache is sometimes cleared, but you should assume it never will be! (However, this doesn't apply for anyone visiting your redirect for the first time.)

So if you get your 301 permanent redirect wrong and you don't fix it immediately—like within a few minutes—the best thing to do is to also redirect that incorrect destination to the correct one. And, unfortunately, that's not always possible. Thus, I recommend that, if possible, you make your redirect a 307 or 302 temporary redirect first, test it over a few days, and then change it to a 301 permanent redirect.

Caution #2: Your redirect destinations might change or disappear

Contrary to the Stanley cup craze of spring 2024, my favorite water thermos has been a Contigo Ashland Chill Autospout Water Bottle with Flip Straw, Stainless Steel Thermal Drinking Bottle,Leakproof,Grey, BLue, 590 ml [https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07W5GRCZB?tag=theaudacitytopodcast-20&linkCode=ogi&th=1&psc=1] (I earn from qualifying purchases through that link) that I've had since 2019. But I recently lost it—I think at a mall while my son and I were waiting for my broken-down car to be towed.

I thought I could simply re-order it for close to the original $10 price I paid, but no! That specific bottle has a new version I don't like as much, and the original bottle was listed for $

6 Cautions When Using Redirects in Podcasting (plus best practices)

There comes a point in every podcast when it's necessary to say a URL. If for nothing else, at least your podcast's own home on the Internet. (And you should have a domain for your podcast!)

Beyond your podcast website, you might also want to share affiliate links, resources, episode notes, past episodes, sponsors, and more.

Here are 11 tips for how to share URLs effectively in your podcast.

(As an affiliate, I earn from qualifying purchases through some of these following links. But I recommend things I truly believe in, regardless of earnings.)

1. Speak as few URLs as possible (per episode)

Every URL is essentially a call to action. That could be where to follow you on social networks, the episode's webpage, your support page, where to send feedback, and much more.

And calls to action are most effective when there are very few of them, but they are reinforced multiple times. This is why you'll hear most ads give the call to action (like visiting a website) at least 3 times.

That's a good practice for your podcast, too. But with all the URLs you might want to share, you'll start overwhelming your audience and making each URL less memorable.

For this reason, I recommend that you say as few URLs as possible—maybe only one!

But don't make it the same URL across all your episodes! For example, if I kept telling you to get the links for this episode at “TheAudacitytoPodcast.com,” that works best only when this is my latest episode. But the more episodes I publish, the more this episode gets shifted down my website's front page, and eventually pushed off the front page.

Thus, I recommend having a unique URL for each episode that will always take your audience to the correct information—whether they listen immediately or 5 years later. This is easy to do on WordPress with my favorite plugin Pretty Links Pro [https://theaudacitytopodcast.com/go/prettylinkpro].

2. Defer to your chapters or episode notes

If you follow tip #1, then your single URL should be your episode webpage. There, you can include all the things you want your audience to get or see: images, videos, links, buttons, and more.

Make sure this stuff—at least the links—appear in your episode notes within the podcast apps, too! Because many publishing tools and podcast apps follow different standards, the best thing to do would be to ask the maker of your publishing tool how to ensure your links show in your top podcast apps, and they can give you the right guidance for your situation. But the most universal case is—unfortunately—that a full, ugly URL, like “https://theaudacitytopodcast.com” will work more often than an HTML hyperlink, like <a href="https://theaudacitytopodcast.com/">The Audacity to Podcast</a>.

Check out Knick Knack News for a great example of actionable episode notes [https://knickknacknews.com] (it's also a really fun podcast I highly recommend!). Their notes are not effective for SEO, but they are excellent for engagement inside the podcast apps! The hosts of that fun show, Alex and Anthony, often share things you will want to see or read for yourself. And they do that in very simple and actionable ways in their notes. Here's an example from an episode:

Anthony's Stories This Week:

Ketchup: https [https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20231105470473/en/It%E2%80%99s-a-Big-Dill-HEINZ-To-Launch-New-Pickle-Ketchup-Nationwide]

11 Tips for Sharing URLs in Your Podcast

“Artificial intelligence” (“AI”) has made huge leaps in abilities within a very short time. It was only a few years ago that I felt on the cutting edge teaching how to use AI tools like Jasper (originally called “Conversion.ai [https://theaudacitytopodcast.com/go/jarvis]” and “Jarvis”), even before ChatGPT [https://theaudacitytopodcast.com/chatgpt] was released.

Now, AI has become so prominent, that it's almost surprising if a software company of any size is not offering some kind of AI-based solution.

While inflation has skyrocketed the prices of almost everything, the cost for accessing AI has significantly dropped. When I first started using AI, a good plan with access to only one central AI system cost $99 per month. But now, you can use a tool like Magai [https://theaudacitytopodcast.com/magai] to use a whole bunch of different language- and image-based AI tools starting at only $19 per month!

(As an affiliate, I earn from qualifying purchases through these links. But I recommend things I truly believe in, regardless of earnings.)

All this potential means we need to quote the line from Spider-Man, “With great power comes great responsibility.”

And thus why I want to share these warnings with you, to advocate for responsible use of generative AI, large language models (LLMs), machine learning, or whatever you want to call it.

This warnings apply to any kind of content-creation, not only podcasting!

(And in case you're wondering, I did not use AI to create any of this content, but I might be using some AI to transcribe or help me market this content.)

Aside: most warnings apply to generative AI, but not repurposing or enhancement AI

Before I get into my list of warnings about using AI, I want to clarify that these are focused using AI to essentially create something from nothing. I still think AI can be a great assistant on your content. For example, processing audio or video, clipping excerpts, suggesting marketing approaches, improving how things communicate, repurposing, and more. All of those things start with your intelligence, and then the AI works from that.

But I see most of these warnings as applying solely to generative AI, or when you start with nothing but a prompt.

Now, on to the warnings!

1. Undisclosed use of generative AI can get you in trouble

YouTube, social networks, and lots of other websites and platforms are starting to require you to disclose whenever you're putting out content generated by AI. And I think this is a good thing to do as it helps the potential audience know what kind of quality to expect.

Even for things like podcast transcripts, it's good to disclose whether AI was used to transcribe the audio. As I mentioned in my previous episode about using podcast transcripts [https://theaudacitytopodcast.com/how-to-use-podcast-transcripts/], someone on your podcast might say, “I love two li'l puppies,” but the AI might transcribe it as, “I love to kill puppies.” Sometimes, even omitting a single word can drastically alter the meaning. For example, imagine accidentally omitting the “not” in a sentence like, “I'm not guilty.”

This doesn't necessarily mean you must disclose every time you use AI in any capacity (like you [https://theaudacitytopodcast.com/you-must-disclose-whenever-youre-compensated/]

11 Warnings about Using AI in Content-Creation (including podcasting)

Inside jokes can offer fun potential for your podcast, but also some potential costs. Here are some brief things for you to consider as you engage with your podcast audience.

In my signature fashion, I started preparing a whole list of pros and cons, and some big thinking on inside jokes.

But it's really not that complicated!

An inside joke is some form of callback, trope, catchphrase, or similar that only those “in the know” will get and enjoy. Because of this, inside jokes can be hilarious, but only for those who get them. Inside jokes can be a sort of reward your loyal audience, but alienate your new audience.

I've heard some people advise against inside jokes exactly because your new audience won't get them. But that seems overly focused on the new audience and at the cost of engaging your existing audience and making them feel special.

I think it really comes down to this simple guidance: avoid inside jokes with your cohosts and guests, but embrace inside jokes with your audience.

Where inside jokes come from

First, some examples of inside jokes I've heard from podcasts:

 * “Lemons, lemons” from That Story Show [http://thatstoryshow.com]
 * “Hit in the mouth” from No Agenda [https://www.noagendashow.net/]
 * “KEDAKAI!” from Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend [https://teamcoco.com/podcasts/conan-obrien-needs-a-friend]
 * “Super easy; barely an inconvenience” from Pitch Meeting [https://www.youtube.com/@PitchMeetings] (series on YouTube, so it is not a podcast!)
 * “Mail Kimp” from Serial [https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/podcasts/serial-season-four-guantanamo.html#episode-1] (first season)

If you've been a loyal follower of any of these shows, then you probably know exactly what these jokes are about, or at least can laugh at them.

So where do these come from?

Some jokes will arise naturally as your audience essentially feeds their growth. That's what I've seen with inside jokes from That Story Show, No Agenda, and Serial. While other things become inside jokes because of how often the host(s) use them, such as the examples from Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend and Pitch Meeting.

It's the audience-feed jokes that I think you should work more to embrace because they will more deeply reward and engage your audience.

What about the new listeners?

There are three approaches I've seen and experienced with podcasts regarding inside jokes:

 1. Letting your podcast audience eventually catch on with your inside jokes (even if they might not know their origins).
 2. Occasionally explaining or pointing to the origins.
 3. Making a glossary of inside jokes—this could even be a supporter-exclusive or email opt-in incentive.

Your goal should be to both engage your existing audience and make them feel special and to create an environment welcoming to your new audience. This comes from having a good balance so that your podcast is not overfilled with inside jokes, but it does mature with loyalty.

Think of inside jokes like extra seasonings for a meal. They can add something special, and especially be appreciated by your “insiders,” and celebrated when your new audience gets in on the jokes.

And I think there is something special, like a sort of “leveling up,” when your audience becomes familiar with your tropes, catchphrases, and inside jokes. Then, they'll feel like one of the “cool kids” when they can throw aroun

Should Your Podcast Have Inside Jokes?

Monetization is not the only profit you can get from podcasting! And you shouldn't be the only one to profit, either! Nonetheless, here is why I think you should put P.R.O.F.I.T. first in every aspect of your podcast.

The order of podcasting cornerstones

Before we focus on podcasting P.R.O.F.I.T., I want to revisit how I've taught the 5 podcasting cornerstones for several years:

 1. Content—What your podcast is about
 2. Presentation—How you share your content
 3. Production—The technical side to reduce distractions and increase understanding
 4. Promotion—How you market and grow your podcast
 5. P.R.O.F.I.T.—How you and your audience benefit from your podcast.

Despite the fact that these cornerstones have always had an alliteration problem with no suitable solution, I realized it had an even bigger problem while I was preparing to teach podcasting at the National Religious Broadcasters convention. The problem was the order: P.R.O.F.I.T. should not be last! It should actually be first!

But stick with me and don't click away because you think this doesn't apply to you! Before I can explain why P.R.O.F.I.T. should be first, I want you to understand what it is, and why I keep writing it like an over-obvious acronym (it's actually an acrostic).

The Podcast P.R.O.F.I.T. Paradigm™

Several years ago, I was inspired by a typo I let go to press in an advertisement for my now temporarily retired Podcaster's Society™. As a result of that typo, I wanted profit to stand for something! Not only in the metaphorical sense, but also literally as an acrostic.

Now, it's my Podcast P.R.O.F.I.T. Paradigm, which is a list of whys you can benefit from your podcast:

 * Popularity—growing a following, being an influencer, becoming known
 * Relationships—gaining friendships, building community, and finding your “tribe”
 * Opportunities—opening doors for things like public speaking, travel, testing products before they're released, and such
 * Fun—simply having a good time, with or without laughter
 * Income—yes, earning money!
 * Tangibles—getting things you get to use or keep, which is especially profitable when they're relevant to your podcast topic!

While most people think “profit” means “money,” I challenge you to change your thinking and look at the much bigger ways you can profit from your podcast—especially if you don't even want to monetize your podcast.

The other paradigm shift is that your podcast should not only give you P.R.O.F.I.T., but also offer it to your audience! I'll explain that more in a moment.

P.R.O.F.I.T. is for all podcasters, not only professionals

Lest you think P.R.O.F.I.T. is only for people who podcast for business purposes or to try earning a living, money is only one part of the Podcast P.R.O.F.I.T. Paradigm: the I for income. The other ways could complement income, but there's nothing wrong with podcasting simply for the fun of it!

When I hosted a clean-comedy podcast, the P.R.O.F.I.T. we were after was primarily to laugh and help others laugh, too! Along the way, we also formed relationships, were given fun tangibles from our audience, and we even made a little money on the side.

And if you are podcasting to build a business, don't neglect the other aspects of P.R.O.F.I.T.! It's okay to have fun with professional subjects! And always look for ways to position yourself for opportunities and more!

Your podcast P.R.O.F.I.T. should power your decisions

Why should P.R.O.F.I.T. come first? Because it's actually more imp

Why You Should Put Podcasting P.R.O.F.I.T. First

Apple provides a portal for you to submit and manage your own podcast in Apple Podcasts. It's called Podcasts Connect. Plus, countless other podcast apps and podcasting tools rely on Apple's data through their free API. Whether your podcast has been in Apple Podcasts for years, or you're just starting out, I suggest you check these 8 things right away!

1. Check that you have agreed to Apple's terms of service

Apple usually updates their terms of service when they launch major new features. For example, Apple started generating transcripts for all podcasts in February, 2024. And that requires your agreement to their terms of service so that they can make those transcripts, which they won't do until you agree.

Apple makes it easy to know whether you've agreed to the latest terms. Simply log into podcastsconnect.apple.com [https://podcastsconnect.apple.com]! If you're let into your account, then you've already agreed to the latest terms. If not, you will be prompted to read and agree to the terms before you're allowed to manage your podcast(s).

And if you're offering a paid subscription to your audience through Apple Podcasts, check the Business tab to see if there are any actions you need to take. There might be additional new terms you must agree to, or you might need to provide legal or financial information [https://podcasters.apple.com/support/883-agreements]. (This page will also display your invoices and tax information if you have any sales.)

2. Check that your podcast is in your Apple Podcasts Connect account

Many podcasters don't actually control their own catalog listing for their own podcast! This is because they either submitted their podcast before Podcasts Connect existed, or they allowed someone else to submit their podcast for them. This might have been a podcast-hosting provider or someone helping them with their podcast.

But at least the process to reclaim ownership is fairly easy!

 1. Make sure you've checked all your possible Apple ID accounts.
 2. Log into the account you want to hold your podcast(s) and contact Apple through this form [https://podcastsconnect.apple.com/contact-us?content_type=podcasts&topic=missing-podcast-s&locale=en] and select the “Missing podcast(s)” option (which should already be selected with this link).
 3. Fill in all the other form fields completely.
 4. Await and then follow Apple's instructions, which will have you enter a special code somewhere in your podcast RSS feed to verify your ownership or control of that feed.

This is crucial to do with all your podcasts, especially any duplicate podcast listings you might have [https://theaudacitytopodcast.com/how-to-fix-duplicate-listings-in-apple-podcasts-or-other-podcast-apps/] (which is probably more likely if you've ever switched podcast-hosting providers).

The rest of these items to check require that you have access to your podcast in your own Apple account.

3. Check that your podcast information is correctly loaded in Apple Podcasts Connect

Click into your podcast(s) and look over your the “Show details” information. This includes your title, cover art, artist, descriptions, and more.

You can't change these details in Podcasts Connect! Instead, you would change these in the podcast-publishing tool that is creating your RSS feed. But viewing these details here lets you confirm that everything is properly loading from your feed into the Apple Podcasts system.

And if you're having trouble, the first thing I suggest doing is validating your podcast RSS feed through all of the following tools:

8 Things You Should Check in Apple Podcasts Connect

You might have heard people talk about IAB podcast stats, measurement guidelines, compliance, and certification. Here's what all of that means, and whether it even matters!

Who is the IAB?

Once upon a time, podcast measurement was considered the “wild, wild west”: without standards. Everyone measured what was right in their own eyes.

But like most things that start with “Once upon a time,” that was only fairy tale. And yet a fairy tale that many corporate podcasting companies believed.

Many years ago, there was the Association of Downloadable Media (ADM) that included Blubrry [https://theaudacitytopodcast.com/blubrry], Libsyn [https://theaudacitytopodcast.com/libsyn], Podtrac [https://theaudacitytopodcast.com/podtrac], and other podcasting companies. The ADM came up with standards for measuring podcast downloads still in the extremely early days of podcasting.

The ADM eventually dissolved and top podcasting companies improved on the measurement standards within their own proprietary systems. Then along came the Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB), involving many of those same original podcast-hosting providers but also large distribution networks like PodcastOne and more.

As its name implies, the IAB is all about internet advertising. And the podcasting industry needed a standard way to measure podcast ad impressions. And thus, the IAB podcast measurement guidelines [https://iabtechlab.com/standards/podcast-measurement-guidelines/] were born with version 1.0 in September 2016!

What are IAB stats

IAB's podcast measurement guidelines are actually not rigid standards, but mere guidelines for podcast-analytics providers to use.

Like Elizabeth Swan said in Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl, “Hang the code and hang the rules! They're more like guidelines anyway!”

Without getting into the technical details, these guidelines are intended to filter out any kind of invalid podcast download in attempts to get an accurate count of how many people actually downloaded or streamed the episodes (and with the hopes, backed by survey data, that most of the people actually listen to most of those episodes).

(Sidenote: podcast “streams” are also downloads, simply not downloaded until the person presses play.)

These guidelines involve things like the following.

 * Ignoring all downloads from an IP address blacklist (such as data centers, bot farms, and such)
 * Ignoring all downloads from known invalid user agents (how a downloading app or service identifies itself)
 * Ignoring duplicate downloads that look exactly the same within a period of time (usually 24 hours)
 * Ignoring downloads that don't reach a threshold (one minute of audio)
 * Whitelisting some IP addresses known to have a lot of users—like public wi-fi, businesses, colleges, and such—and allowing such downloads to be counted separately with the reasonable assumption that it is separate people

The top goal is to count people, not simply downloads. Because it's only people who buy things from ads, engage with the podcaster, and listen to or watch the episodes.

These IAB guidelines get updated every few years. As of March 2024, the latest version is 2.2 still in proposal [https://iabtechlab.com/press-releases/iab-tech-labs-podcast-technical-working-group-announces-podcast-measurement-updates-for-public-comment/]

Do IAB-Certified Stats Matter for Your Podcast?

Transcripts have long been promoted as ways to make your podcast more findable and accessible. But it's only recently that podcast transcripts have become actually useful!

Although I didn't plan it this way, the timing of this episode is perfect because I just launched a new feature on Podgagement that automatically transcribes audio feedback from your audience [https://podgagement.com/]!

This topic is also very timely because of the release of iOS 17.4, which brings podcast transcripts into Apple Podcasts!

(As an affiliate, I earn from qualifying purchases through some of these following links. But I recommend things I truly believe in, regardless of earnings.)

1. Don't believe the myths about podcast transcripts

For many years, people have been promoting transcripts for the wrong reasons. I've also been pitched by many transcription companies pushing the wrong approach.

While there are elements of truth in these two common myths, the ways people often promote and understand these two ideas are where the information become myth—of “mythinformation”?

Myth 1: “Transcripts are good for podcast SEO”

People have often said that you should publish podcast transcripts on your website to make your podcast findable through search-engine optimization (SEO). But that's not the full truth.

Yes, transcripts are better than nothing or a mere paragraph or list of topics. But transcripts result in a lot of words and actually very little content, resulting in very low quality writing (probably even worse than AI-created text or writing from non-natives of the language).

For example, a two-cohost podcast transcript might look like this:

Jack: Welcome to the our podcast, where we talk about things to help you do stuff! I'm Jack!

Jill: And I'm Jill.

Jack: Before we get into this topic, how are you doing, Jill?

Jill: The weather is sunny today, so I'm great!

Jack: Great!

Jill: Yeah. What about you?

Jack: I'm fine, but I don't know what the weather is, but—

Jill: That's sad.

Jack: What do mean?

Jill: I mean, you're saying that you haven't gone outside or even looked out a window in a while.

Jack: Yeah, but it's okay.

Jill: So anyway!

Jack: Yes! Let's jump into this week's topic.

…

Note that in this fictional example, there are a lot of words, but you've learned nothing from this excerpt!

That kind of back-and-forth is fine in a conversation and can even sometimes be okay in a podcast. But it writing, it becomes worthless.

Compare that to how the same “information” could be written in a way that's valuable:



Actually, that whole exchange could be edited out of the written content because there's little to no value in reading that!

Search engines prioritize high-quality content that is readable, but unless you're a professional speaker performing a refined monologue, transcripts are neither readable nor high quality. So, no, transcripts are not the “magic bullet” to making your podcast perform well for SEO, especially if you're relegating transcripts to a downloadable file or a web page separate from your podcast episode.

Myth 2: “Transcripts make your podcast accessible”

It's true that people with hearing impairments still consume podcasts! Thus transcripts have been lauded as the accessibility solution podcasts need!

But the problem is that most published transcripts are still difficult to read or—worse—are buried in a link or download

How to Use Podcast Transcripts

Giving you the guts and teaching you the tools to start and grow your own podcast for passion or PROFIT!

danieljlewis

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