What It Takes To Be An Award Winning Podcast

Jul 24

I’ve had the opportunity to be a juror on a few podcasting industry awards this year, and it’s been quite eye-opening. Being in a position to evaluate and weigh in on what makes a good podcast has been an exciting milestone in my career. Today, I dive into the key learnings I've gained from this experience and provide you with insights to help you create a more captivating show.

The Power of a Good Hook

One of the most crucial aspects of podcasting is capturing your audience's attention right from the start. As a judge, I found myself instinctively listening longer to podcasts that hooked me within the first 20 to 40 seconds. It's essential to have a compelling introduction that entices listeners to stay tuned. Think of it as a trailer for your episode, highlighting the value and intrigue that awaits your audience.

Consider the podcast "Diary of a CEO," which excels at creating a captivating hook. By incorporating snippets of quotes and intriguing questions at the beginning, the host piques the listener's curiosity and entices them to stay engaged.

Shorten Your Intros

Gone are the days of long, drawn-out intros with lengthy explanations of who you are and what your show is about. These intros often get skipped by new listeners and fail to serve as effective hooks. Instead, opt for a short and snappy intro that quickly introduces the episode's topic and value.

While pre-roll ads and sponsor acknowledgments are necessary, keep them concise. A brief mention of the sponsor and their value followed by diving straight into the episode content is far more effective in retaining your audience's attention.

Streamline Interview Podcasts

Interview-based podcasts often suffer from excessive small talk and meandering conversations at the beginning. While it's essential to establish a connection with your guest, avoid too much "faff" that doesn't add value to the listener's experience. Get to the point quickly and ask intriguing questions that captivate your audience.

While some podcasts thrive on conversational banter (such as celebrity gossip podcasts), it's crucial to align your approach with your show's purpose and target audience. Keep the focus on delivering valuable content and engaging discussions.

Narration Style Podcasts: Striking the Right Balance

Narration-style podcasts, particularly those in genres like true crime, often rely on a scripted narrative to guide the episode. However, it's important to strike a balance between creating an engaging story and ensuring coherence. Overdoing the narration can lead to a disjointed listening experience, leaving the audience confused about the episode's overall message.

Post-production plays a crucial role in maintaining the flow and clarity of narration-style podcasts. Ensure that the narration supports the episode's content without overshadowing it.

The Power of Audio Quality

As a podcast awards judge, I can't stress enough the importance of audio quality. With the abundance of podcasts available, listeners have come to expect a certain level of audio professionalism. Subpar audio quality, such as relying on laptop microphones or neglecting to invest in a decent microphone, can quickly turn off listeners.

Investing in a good microphone is a minimal barrier to entry for creating high-quality audio. Listeners are more likely to stay engaged and return for future episodes when the audio quality meets their expectations.

Elevating Your Podcasting Journey

The lessons I've learned as a podcast awards judge highlight the importance of creating a captivating podcast. By focusing on crafting a strong hook, shortening intros, streamlining interview podcasts, striking the right balance in narration-style shows, and prioritizing audio quality, you can elevate your podcasting journey.

Remember, your audience's time is precious, and it's crucial to provide them with valuable content right from the start. By implementing these lessons, you can create a podcast that stands out, engages listeners, and keeps them coming back for more.

So, whether you're a seasoned podcaster or just starting out, take these insights to heart and continue to refine your craft. The podcasting landscape is constantly evolving, and by staying ahead of the curve, you can make a lasting impact in this exciting medium.

Transcript:

[00:00:00] Brianna: Welcome back to my face. My name is Brianna. I'm the head honcho here at Bamby Media, and today I'm going to be discussing the things that I have learned from judging podcast awards. and it's been really amazing to be able to firstly have the opportunity to be this point in my career where I'm, I feel like I'm good enough to be able to judge people.
[00:00:25] Judging feels like such a harsh word, but you know, being able to weigh in on what makes a good show and, That's been really exciting for me to be able to do, but what I found was a few key learnings from having this experience that I wanted to share with you today to help you excel in your podcasting journey.
[00:00:44] I'm going to get straight into it. So the first one being you need a good hook. So when I'm listening to a show, what I found myself doing without kind of even realising it is wanting them to get to the point. if you don't hook me within the first 20 seconds to go, and I know this is, this is kind of the, the bane of people's existence now for creating content, it's like you need to be front loading everything, but I don't think that's a bad thing.
[00:01:13] It's like having a trailer at the beginning of every episode to just hook someone in to go, Hey, you want to listen to this? Like there's a reason why you should stay in this episode. A person that does this really well would be the podcast Diary of a CEO. he has a beginning bit where it's kind of snippets, little quotes that they've said, and maybe a few snippets of questions that he asks at the beginning that kind of make you go, Oh, okay.
[00:01:41] This conversation goes in a lot of different directions. I'm interested in these topics. Therefore, I'm going to stay and listen. If you don't have anything at the front that feels like you can hook the person in. What is going to make them stay past the two minute mark, the [00:02:00] one minute mark? Really think about that.
[00:02:02] What are you saying at the beginning of all your episodes to make it clear that it's worth sticking around for? So if we use myself as an example, even just for this episode, I was very clear very quickly what this episode was about so that you could make a decision quickly as to whether it's something you're going to need or engage with or whether you're going to move on to something else.
[00:02:23] So you've got to bring some personality to the front of your episodes.
[00:02:27] You've got to make it different to other people to really hook someone in and feel like they are tuning into something that is going to be valuable for them for their precious time. Off the back of that, the next thing is stop having long intros. So, the days of having a long, drawn out intro where there was lots of music and there was a big kind of standard intro that you would say why the show is who you are, the host, the kind of conversations you're going to have, those big intros that people have in the voiceovers that then are at the front of every episode, please ditch them.
[00:03:01] Ditch them almost immediately if you can. Because they get skipped anyway. And that's not a hook. If they're a new listener to your show, that's the point of having a trailer episode, that episode that sits at the top of all your podcast platforms where they can go, Oh, what's this show about?
[00:03:18] Click on the trailer and listen to that. Not the beginning of every episode, having a big long intro. It's very hard for people to stay engaged if you've got that sort of thing. And also front loading with a bunch of ads, pre roll ads, and thanking all the sponsors and all these things. Like it's good to have pre roll ads and a lot of the time they're necessary from a sponsorship perspective, but keep them short.
[00:03:41] have a nice meaty mid roll that you can really dive in and thank the sponsor. So if you have a sponsor or something that is at the front of the episode, try and keep it to like, this episode is brought to you by X, we love them because Y. Now let's get into it. You know, something like that.
[00:03:56] So it's really short. And then actually getting [00:04:00] into just the episode. Again, if we use myself as the example, you notice I have like nothing going on at the front. I just have a bit of music that's fading in and then out as I'm actually delivering the content. This podcast is an educational-based podcast.
[00:04:16] It's not really an interview podcast. It's not a funny podcast. It's something that's delivering you stuff that you just want to know, know, know. Right. And I keep them short for that reason as well. So be aware of who the target is and keep your intros short. The next thing I would say is interview podcasts need less faff.
[00:04:39] Do you know what faff is? So faff is when it's kind of meandering, especially at the beginning of interview episodes they're kind of getting to know the person that they're talking to. They're talking about the weather or how their week's been or whatever else.
[00:04:54] A lot of the time that's really not relevant and it's not interesting to anyone other than the person that's interviewing, you know, like those two people. It's interesting to them, it's nice to connect, but you can have that first conversation offline. Why do you have this person on your show? Get to the point quickly.
[00:05:15] Ask a question that makes the listener go, oh. That sounds kind of cool. I'm intrigued. This is a little bit mysterious. This connects with me. I want to listen to this conversation. I listen to a lot of shows where there's so much faffy talk where, unless I guess you're a celebrity gossip.
[00:05:37] It's a podcast where you're talking about the latest gossip and there is more faff and it's more conversational and it's intended to be that way. We're bringing it back to the intentionality of what your show is for, who it's for, what purpose it's serving. And if there's too much faff in your interviews, then I'm going to turn it off.
[00:05:57] Sorry, I'm going to turn it off. [00:06:00] I've listened to thousands of shows at this point, thousands of episodes, and the ones that really make me want to keep coming back to listening to them are the ones where the questions are intriguing. The next thing I've noticed a lot When you're doing a narration style podcast where you've got maybe like it's true crime or it's something where there's like you've interviewed someone, but you narrate kind of what you've asked. I hope that makes sense, you know, where you say, and then I spoke to blah, blah about the thing.
[00:06:36] And then she answers the question, you know, so there's that narration aspect. I feel like it's a little bit overdone. Or it's a little bit too scripted and trying to be too fancy, serious, whatever, for some shows that's required, like if it's a really dark and mysterious thing and it needs that narrator that really feels like it's building that kind of story around you, but Um, A lot of the narration ones, I also find that they've, it's like they've put the narration in because they feel like that's a cool thing to do, but sometimes it just distracts and it makes the interview or the podcast too disjointed that I don't get what the overall sense of that episode is supposed to be.
[00:07:17] So really, if you're doing more of a scripted show or a narration style show, post production is very important to make sure that you can still connect the dots. And have the narration support, not detract, from the episode, from what you're trying to display there as the show. And the audio quality is the last thing that I'm finding makes a massive difference and there should be no surprise.
[00:07:42] When I'm sitting there judging shows, I've got my judging hat on, if the audio quality isn't there, is it subpar, they don't have a microphone and they're relying on their, you know, laptop microphone inbuilt to do their podcast, to [00:08:00] record it. It's so easy for me to switch off, not because I'm trying to be mean, but there's so many different podcasts with great audio quality these days that it's hard for me to stay engaged when the quality isn't there.
[00:08:16] So that's something that should be top of mind for you. If you can't video your show yet and you're just relying on audio, that's even less of like an excuse, right? Because all you need is a microphone The barrier to entry to good audio is pretty low these days and it doesn't cost a lot so I expect a higher caliber in order for me to engage with the show for longer and your audience will feel the same way.
[00:08:42] They will accept crappy audio for a while, but if you're kind of 10 episodes in and it's still not great, you may run into some trouble with audience retention on that. So always be looking for ways to make your show a little bit better if you can. That's the main learnings that I've come across from the judging that I've been doing recently. If you've liked this content, please subscribe to it on YouTube and you can also hit the follow button on Apple Podcasts and Spotify and all those places as well. I love providing this content to you. If you have any feedback, if you have any questions, please reach out DM me on Instagram, reach out in the contact form on our website, put a comment in YouTube and I will absolutely get back to you and give you as much as I can.
[00:09:28] Thank you, have a lovely day.