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Cover Album Design

Lesson 17 from: Launch a Successful Podcast

Kris Gilbertson

Cover Album Design

Lesson 17 from: Launch a Successful Podcast

Kris Gilbertson

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Lesson Info

17. Cover Album Design

Lesson Info

Cover Album Design

So let's go right into album artwork cause I know we already have questions that are coming in with that so again, the main three things to focus on are then going to be engaging colors, having a striking title and then dynamic image that really creates success for your podcast so if we look at let me go back over here for a second, so again I know I talked about mad money a lot, but I love the psychology of this album martin how simple it is so one thing I want to talk about a lot of times people have fonts that are dark and background colors that are dark you want to actually have a contrast between your colors now this works because red and yellow play well together and also it's very simple to read on def, you notice there's not a lot of other infante images around the this is your life, a podcast by michael hyatt great podcast and it's a great image grabs your attention and it pulls your eye down to the title of what the show's about. So when you're in itunes and um, I don't think...

I put an image in there, but what I what I like to do is once you've got your title once you've got your album art design and you have it back from your designer, take a screenshot of itunes and then put your album art in it, I know some of my students already doing this, I don't even teach it. I'm like yes, because you actually get to see what happens is, and I'm going to go into the specs on itunes on what the ramifications are for your album art, but what happens is what you get back from your designer is huge. It looks great on your lap when you open up your desktop and you're looking at it because it blows up, but in itunes, it's like teeny tiny. So what happens is it's a different it looks totally different, so what I want you to do is take a screenshot of the eye teens noon already right when you log in and then take your album art and squish it down to the size that it needs to be and put it on there so that you can see how it looks and how it actually felt pops and stands out more for you, then. Photo tips this is a really simple looking design, but it's, so effective and with photo tips, you have the you know the film, and then it's got that yellow background, so grabs your attention, but it also frames the actual show, which is great now the gainfully unemployed podcast very simple again as well if you notice a common theme yellow does really pop there, so, you know, yellows, brighter colors, it doesn't have to be yellow. But, you know, see how that resonates in your categories and what other people are using for their album art and maybe try to shift it up a little bit, just for a little difference. So why don't we take, if do you want me to go through the training and then and ask the questions? Okay, so the album art again, pray colors. Hi, contra. So what I mean by that is if you've got a black background, make a white or a red or something that's gonna pop on there don't have, like, a dark blue, and then, like another blue or purple or something. Where it's really hard to rico's again. Anytime you see album art when you're looking at itunes or stitcher or any of the platforms. It's your eyes naturally going to go toe where it's easier to read just like a confused mind, doesn't make a decision confused. I just, like goes where it's easier to toe, look at something to grab your attention and then have that high contrast and then have ledge a ble fonts and see this happen a lot where they're really, really hard to read, so make sure it's a legible, clear font and play around with that. Make sure that the designer that you hire we're going to give some great in the guides we've got some great resource is for great, simple reese artists, designers you goto fiverr, dot com that's f I v e r dot com for five bucks, you can have an album cover art does I made, and I think some of you guys have some great designers as well that you've been working with so really simple therefore you but make sure that they'll re edit and edit your show a little bit to make sure whoever you work with, that they're willing to give you a couple of it because you do want to play around with that. And then also, um, here's some different examples of some different types of fonts now if you haven't this website, I absolutely love if you goto my fonts. Dot com it is brilliant at actually being able to see what fonts or so have you ever been to somebody's website and you're like I want that thought I love that like what is that? So what you could do is that this website you could take a screenshot of the logo of the font now you're gonna have to do a screenshot of each little individual letter but you upload that into my fonts and it'll tell you back what all the different fonts are they also have what the font where you can actually go and I think that's the section of where you do that and you can check your fonts out then they also have the most popular fonts as well know these air premium thoughts that you can pay for their very inexpensive though but these top through I think all in the mac big carlson but what I like to do is play to see how they look on the colors as well so some of some people have natural eye for design and some people don't so this is how you can use this to see what what your images are gonna come back with before you go spend money with your designer as well again you know simple they're all easy to read they're all clear and concise and it's not too loopy or sketchy okay and then here's some other ones to proxima nova the black is the one that a lot of people using their youtube videos that works really well I see a lot of marketers using this and just some other designs other thoughts that you can use custom thoughts tohave your font stand out so it's not always the same traditional thoughts as well okay, so again yellows are brilliant having that bright versus dark and then having a clear image again if you get your album art back and you already know that it's a little bit too much make sure that you keep it simple so what you want to send your designers you want to send him that you want to some of the dimensions? Well, I think I'm getting ahead of myself one second, so oh, stay away from layering on this a lot of times people will have like their face and then they have their take line they've got something over here they got something over there and it's just all it's discombobulated and it's really hard to read so the okay here's what we talked about so the design rule of thirds so back in design school they teach you about spatial understanding with design and the rule of thirds works really well and you'll see what I'm talking about here this is to make sure that your designer doesn't send you back something that's over layered and where you think it looks good but it's it's very confusing for the ice if you notice here. There's always a rule of thirds going on where the top is a little bit bigger here for michael's podcast, you have the main show and then the bottom is where it's it's, representing his name. Now mad money is more focused on the centre see of the top, the middle they're all specially designed there. So on lewis's, you've got the left with logo, the image that some people would put like the face and the logo right in the center and it if it's overlapping too much it's, hard to actually look at and then online made easy with amy of her picture. Her eyes are looking over at her image as well, which is right that's a great tool marketing to be able to use that to direct people to have them look where you want them to look, and then also the money girl. They always have the same branding and the same layout to make it very simple and easy to read. So the album artwork that you want tohave, you wanna have a fourteen hundred by fourteen hundred pixels? Now itunes has changed this. If you don't have that when you launch your show, they won't actually showcase you in the main new and noteworthy section so there's the main new and noteworthy and then there's the one that you could go into each one of your categories so the mean is really where you want to be showing up when you launch your show so and then you wanna have it less than five hundred kilobytes for the size of the actual image because this just shifted where if it's too big that it could mess up your feet but it also it cannot get approved we've been seeing some shows having problems with that to make sure that you have the actual side the file size of the image and just ask your designer to do that if you don't want to do that on did show your pretty face have your image have your head shot out there now this doesn't have to be a uber professional head shot a lot of people are so concerned if they don't have like the perfect you know headshot there remember this is a work in progress and you can change the album art what I don't want you doing is having being concerned about this and then not launching because of your album art I give you all of this to help you be successful, but just getting out there are launching and moving forward is the key to success, okay? So and then you wanna have your magnetic title you want to have your take line or your benefit strategies and then you're brandon image or colors now think about it as well if you already have a brand if you want to incorporate colors that are already a part of that that's a great way to continue with your brandy just make sure it follows these type of principle so it's not so it can attract your listeners and then your website address if you want and then keyword meta data taking so this is where you can name your album file that j peg that you're going to be saving with more key words what I love about itunes they have changed some other search features, but what happens is you can still be found in multiple ways and you can layer you're seo your search engine optimization with your keywords through a lot of different layers in podcasting, which will go over a little bit more today. But this is a great way to either if you want to write for your name or that main keyword to save your album art with that key word as well. Ok, so let's go over the questions that we have right now on album cover design well, I'm glad that you let us get through this because you answered a lot of those questions that had come through, but there was a specific question from jonah asking their focus is on coffee, smoothies and other health drinks, and they're thinking colors orange and brown or possibly black. Do you? What do your thoughts on those colors? What was the brand or what was the coffee smoothies, health drinks? Okay, um, I'm such a visual to see it helps I think what I would suggest is play around with different colors, play around with different styles and with your with your logo, see what pops for you and then also your community, who you're already connecting. What that's where what I was talking about earlier with the pre marketing haven't image that has maybe four different styles of it and then share it with your community, and they will tell you what resonates with them or email it to your list, whatever makes the most sense to get some feedback on that, but what I like to do is I like to have different options, and I'm going to be changing my album art up. I I was looking at different ways to incorporate it, make a different, make it better, and then change it up a cz well, so you can play play, play around with that for sure. But you did cover a lot of the specifics on the pixel size, the dimensions and all that stuff. But we did have some questions here. Late comer was curious about finding the graphic designer toe work on something like this. Now, has this gotten popular enough where there are designers who focused solely on album art covers? Is that something you should be looking for? I've actually you coached some designers into using that, so I will put I have some resource is inside some of our guides for that. But there are if you look at some designers today, if you let them know about podcast album cover art. If you search for that, you confine designers that way and I'll have a resource is in there. But if you want to go to fiver for that, you can search just itunes album. They should have some designers in there and then he lands. I love being able to use them for different designs and that's. Why I give you the specifications so your designer knows exactly how it looks. What I also want to let you know is when you tell your designer, let them know this this is the one of the problems that I see with a lot of designers is they see the fourteen by fourteen hundred and think it's so big, but what happens is it's really shows up about fifty by fifty pixels and itunes, so I know that sounds incredibly small, but what happens is you want to make sure your designer is using the full scope of that square. So what happens is you'll get designs back where it's, just in the center and it's spatially looks beautiful big, but when you actually get it on itunes, it's really hard to see, so you want to let them know to play with and to the borders of that square, and to make that really stand out and let them know how it looks. I often send them a screenshot of itunes so they can see it, and then I'll send them examples. Well, one thing I don't talk about his research album, arts that you resonate with, like before you even go into designing like we did yesterday, researching the podcast we like, go look in itunes and different categories. Look outside your industry and other branding, go get logos from top brands that you really like that's going to help your designer really put your album are together to really help you with that moxie margot of moguls and chat suggested something that I thought was interesting. They said that their charts on line to tell you what different colors convey to you so yeah, yes, it's a great. So okay, let me so ninety nine designs dot com is a great place to go hit design stone with great designers that already understand design principles, then there's also color scheme and I might have to look that up. I might have the wrong girl, there's there's um, companies out there that based on who you're looking to attract, they will figure out the colors that will track that listener that prospect into your business. It's color design is so psychological that's why I spend so much time on this, even though it sounds so simple, this is what we'll get people to come and dear show is based on effective design and coloring that talks to them that speaks to your prospects. So I think it's color schemes dot com color scheme err might be what it is so often look some of those up, but we can find those for sure and get sent it out to the community, but great question, because that that is really, really powerful to have people already know the psychological triggers of colors isn't that incredible to no, I mean it's, it's really exciting how that works okay, so let's do let's do this then um let's we're gonna do is we're gonna go into the breakdown of how podcasting imaging works now this is just the foundation of how this is set up. So like we talked about earlier how we go from going into itunes looking at album art, seeing it clicking on it now your job is to convince will not to convince but to really convey what your show's about and if it's for that listener to keep tuning in and listening teo that's where you have that ninety seconds to grab their attention and really bring them into your show so producing imaging you know, in production that's what image in this called it's just on the front end on the middle of the buffer like when you see the hollywood movies and they've got the imaging that comes in or on radio shows and they've got that radio at it you know, at the beginning that's what grabs that's what indigenous so it's very, very simple to produce just make yourself sound very professional by doing this and that's what we're going to go through right now then we'll go through leader today the script to actually write that out so that you sound professional that your copy sounds professional and then we'll show you how to produce an edit that and actually put that together so the first part is having fade in music into your introduction. So that's a script we're going to go through in the next training section where the third one today, but so you want to have music that goes into your introduction, and then you want to have a call to action, and then your music fades out. Then you go into your main programming. Now, this is this. We're going to keep this very simple. You could make. This is advanced as you want, with a lot of things going on in your show, with sponsors, and a lot of other added in, or you can keep it very simple to start. I suggest, keep it simple so that you can keep the production up and keep moving your show going forward. So having your intro, having a content of your podcast, and then your outro that's the structure of a whole. Put together show so same with the fade out for for the outro so the next thing that what I want you to do this is really fun but you can get lost in here for hours so this is where you're gonna go pick your music uh so this is you actually get a pick that style of music that's goingto tracked your listeners get them engaged and what I love about the the enter on the outer is like pumps your listener upto want to like know what your content as gets him engaged so a couple different places that you can go you can go toe audio jungle dot net I love this site they have music that's organized in all different categories different genres so as soon as you log in you actually can click on the top and it will actually have a drop down where you can see all the different categories for different musics thatyou want to select so business side you khun go either rock and really pumped up I mean dave ramsey has some really pumped up rock music or you can go mohr towards that corporate classical we're not classical when they have a general it's called corporate that has funky but it's not too intense so you really want to pick music so so were first engaged by colors in the design then it's about that auditory learning style now so you pick music that resonates with your brand. I have a lot of spiritually healers that wants their podcast, and they have some really cool shocker music at the beginning of their podcast. The other thing that you could do to is you could have music playing throughout your entire podcast. So brenda brochard, who just launched the charge that's actually based on his like some of his best content, they keeps it short, nine to ten minutes, and then he has music over laid over it, the whole background for his teaching and training so you can incorporate that if you're doing the whole long show, I don't do that on my interviews, I have it on the beginning and the end, and then my interviews, I just paid it in, but I'd keep that just the actual interviewing that's going to be your personal preference, I said just on interviews not to have all of that because it takes away from the content, but you can you can decide to play without if it's shorter definitely you can add that him then there's premium beat. This is another great website you can go to and find great, great song, so for audio jungle there typically going to be anywhere from five dollars to twenty dollars premium beacon any firm ten to forty and hire you could also buy music packs like pick all different types of music that you want, and then incompetent hq is another great website, that's all free, though, so they're not as high quality of some of the other ones, though for what you want to pay for. But what I suggest is when you go in and start chucking out your music, go set a block of time because what happens is you could be in there for four, five, ten hours. It's so funny, a lot of my students when I helped them with their podcast, contrary, when we launched their podcast for them, they're like, chris, can you just do this for us? We've been in here for like ten hours, and I'm not kidding you, it's ah it's really fun, but you'll find a lot of different tracks, so go pick two genres that you want to go look into so or three so I usually do, like corporate and acoustic or whatever makes more sense and audio, jungle and premium beat are both categorize that way to make it very simple, for you picked two genres and then pick your block of time. And then what? I d'oh, this is how we do it cause a lot of people will like what about this? What about that? If you immediately don't like it, click off of it. Go to the next one. And then if you if that resonates a little bit there's a way, you can save it favorite that and on lee favorite five and then take a break and then come back and listen to him, and then you can pick pick your your music. Otherwise you just get overwhelmed because there's so much great music out there there's so many amazing artists on dh. Then save those artists in your favorites files as well for other music that you want to use later because you can repurpose this content. You can use this music on your videos on youtube all over the place on dh. Then it makes it makes it a lot easier for you. We're time effective to get it done. And remember, you could always change this. You could always change your album art. You can always change your music on your intros throughout your music. It's all interchangeable. Teo to change that up, and I do suggest that after a few months change that music up, change your intro up a little bit, or how your form out of your show is because you're loyal listeners well, I mean, some of them, like chris, I just skip over that, but I listened, and then I heard this so it's funny, so you want to change that up a little bit. T keep it fun for your loyal listeners. Okay, do you mean to change it every few months as you go along? I think I think it's, I think it's effective to help them change that up a little bit. So because what happens is your loyal listeners will be so used to you doing that. So for me, I do. First friday raffles. I actually give out gift cards when people leaving a review on itunes for my podcast. So I give shoutouts every single podcast. And then, on the first of friday, I actually mail out a gift card for all different places. What happens is some of the listeners have. Mystic because if they skip over it, then they come back and realize it. So for me, I want to make sure you change that up, but for others it's also, just for even if you're not doing that, you may have a new style or you're offering to call the action in the beginning of your podcast that they're used to that same music because that's what's gonna trigger they're here, they might not listen to it, and it's could be great information for them culture podcast I listen to they do a different song almost every time and they do something funny or they do some sort of remix or whatever and they don't have an intro they just go right into the content. And now it's become so popular that, you know, they use soundcloud, so they go on to their soundcloud accounting. They tell you who the song is because so many people were asking so know that gets people listening to their show from the very beginning because it's something different every time exactly and changing that up it's definitely it is a little bit more works in the beginning just getting your show going in your foundation that's great! And then you can start to evolve that and change that, but incorporate that's the great thing about this is that it's your own production studio it's your own style that you gonna bring your personality and to just make sure it's royalty free music if you're taking I mean, you will get a lawsuit on your hands if you put saline dion on your your show, whomever, so make sure that gets found later so and if you have released rights to that, then that's perfect, whatever that clip is, it's not like instagram, where it's just a teeny seven second clip, because these are a little bit longer to be clear intros you're out, trust could be anywhere from thirty to ninety seconds, and then, if you have sponsors or other things, you're engaging music with that's. Why you want to make sure you're using those type of, uh, royalty free music platforms? Chris? Yes, any advice for people who want to use their own music on this? Because I know we've had some musicians in the chat room who are asking, is that a good idea? Is that a good way to sort of promote your music? Is absolutely I would highly suggest that. And again, like we're talking about yesterday about that storytelling side of it, same thing that musicians have of what they conspired for their lyrics in their music, that's a great way, and I don't know how they're using their podcast, but you could have where they talk about it and then they go into the music and you can hear the sound track just like what daft punk did, where they actually told the stories and they have the music woven throughout the whole podcast made it a really engaging experience, and you actually connected with the music even more so based on that story that that developed absolutely so let's. See here, okay, I think I just went over this so yeah, block out one hour time, pick your maid to genres and that pick five songs for that category and then pick your main one and then I always say, just come back later just to make it easier because you'll get caught up and its so funny, you'll love one song, and then you come back later, like now, that totally doesn't speak to my brand anymore, so you get a little kind of in the rabbit hole with that, um, picking your music. So listen to the entire track. So this is track framing. This is where we're actually going to pick your best sound the clip for your actual entering outro. Now I suggest if you're not a you know, into a like editing and doing a lot of this that right away you're going to want to find a team, we're going to talk about a little bit later toe have someone outsource and do this for you to make it very simple ah lot of us are not techie people, I'm really not a tech person, I'm all about talking and communicating, but this side of it you can actually outsource, you can use the lance, you can find other people that could edit this type of style, but if you are doing this yourself, this is really powerful, because when we go into the entrance script later today, you're gonna have a natural crescendo and what you're talking about and getting people that listen in on your podcast and you're going to go into your called action so well, you can have that kind of line up with the music. It's actually sounds like a professional hollywood studio your produced it for you, so what you want to listen for is listen, once you pick your music, listen to the entire track all the way through and when I want you to listen for is there's the melody, there's, the refrain and then there's, where there's always chris sent crescendos a music where it goes up and then it starts to come back into that that refrain. So look, listen for those and listen to the repeating frames and then based on how long your intro is that you record you, khun set that music up to follow that the right way, and then all you're gonna do a spade in and faded out. I'm going to show you how to do that and edit that yourself, but it actually sounds really good because we've all heard tracks where we know they've cut out the music and it stopped or it doesn't line up, right? So that's, why you want to pick that right track and you can see it when we go into audacity later today, when you drop in your your the song it's actually gonna be purple lines that I'll show you and you can actually see when it goes up and down visually, so you're already going to kind of know when to cut and howto at it. But that's really important because it makes it a great listener experience for your listener as well makes it engage with that and the same type of thing if you're doing any type of youtube videos or any way that you could incorporate that when your voice, when you change it, makes it really professional. Okay, so, like, I was talking about earlier, so focus on the melody with the solid fade out. So no cliffhangers lot of people just chop that off it it's like it's, like jars your body, like when you think about your eye, ear buds in your ears, I mean it's, like right there, next to your braid. So you want to make sure it's a smooth experience again, align the crescendo section with the melody with that mane. Benefit so wherever that meat like, you know, we talked, we'll go into this when we go in the formula, but when you're explaining what you're doing, you go into your expertise and then actually into what your benefits are that can line up and then make sure that you keep this lesson two minutes cool to be around forty five seconds, you don't need the great thing about a podcast is your natural personality is going to bring people in, and they're gonna decide whether they want to keep listening. So it's not a heartfelt it's all it is is your positioning so it's basically letting people know who you are, what your credentials are couple sentences, what the benefits are tuning in, and then where to go find out more about you and you couldn't change this format up, you know, some podcast how people just come right in and go right into the content they do this a couple of minutes in, but for people that are just getting started out to grow their audience, I really especially if you're doing the expert show, this really helps people know who you are. I've had a lot of students that have told me the research they've done, they've gone out to find people and they found great podcast, but they're like, I don't know anything about this person who it is. I don't know where to find out more about him, and I can't find him because if you just haven't image and then you have you talking out podcast there's not there's, not enough information in there. So is our responsibility and our job to let our listeners know where to find us and make it simple? Remember, make it really easy for them to engage with you so again, keep that short. Now you can have. If you have longer shows, you can have a little in the middle, you can have ah, station identification, we actually let people know what they're listening to it again. Or if you've got sponsors, you can add them in the middle roll and then at the end, you want to have your outro a gun or lets people know recaps it, maybe you give shoutouts. I like to give shoutouts because we're all motivated by recognition. We love to be recognized and it actually your listeners will love this. They'll start to share it more, and they feel even more connected to you because you're talking directly to one person at that point, so it really engages them. Um, let's, see her? Okay, so rule of thumb for your track framing make sure that the, um the fade in you khun dio you could make this longer or shorter, but I typically like to general rule of thumb your fade ins about five to eight seconds. You don't want it too long because if you're taking up too much space, then into people wanting to listen and then they want to fast forward over it that's making it a not user friendly podcast and then your intro twenty to thirty seconds, maybe thirty seconds sixty just general rule of thumb there and then your fade out again now that's gonna overlay your fade out music can go into you talking into your next segment or wherever you're taking your listener into and then, um, outro same thing, so you're gonna have the fade out that'll be over laid from the end of your show into fifteen, twenty seconds of your outro now you're outro is just going to be a shorter version of your introduction. Now some people like to actually make this a ton more contact. Now this is going to come back to who your listener avatar is because a lot of people may need to get to know you like you, especially they're coming in, and then they want to hear maura about what else you have to offer different things. That's, where you, khun dio like what abel was talking about, not selling director from the podcast, but where you can provide more value of where to go find out more about the product of what you were just talking about. So, hey, you like this that's, what we talked about over here just that's, where you're gonna have more of a mini commercial as well. Um, and then, you know, some people like chris program he'll have, like, remember those cds when we have, like, the secret song on the cd you had to, like, let it keep playing, he'll do that. He'll have a bunch of space and then he's like you loyal listeners, I've got, you know, so you could you could play around with that. I suggest in the beginning, if you're just growing, your audience getting started, kuroda growed community and grow that up. But you're gonna have a lot of fun with that you could have, you know, engages however you want some people play. I know louis has artist that the play, the music at the end of the podcast and just let it fade out for, like, ten minutes just with music on and then also this leaves room for sponsors, too. So you're not up on the front, just, you know, talking from your soapbox for the first ten minutes, and then you get into content, so make sure that you let people know that. And then also, if you have a different episodes or different things that you're talking about, you can let them know what the episode is about at the beginning. Hey, this we're gonna be talking about this where we're gonna go remember marketing you tell him what you're going to tell him. You tell it to him and then you tell them what you told them. So this is setting you up for success because we all need to hear things over and over and over again. Teo, go and take action from so that all that's really how the imaging goes, yeah. So I think I've heard sort of pre canned intros and outro does the same thing each time. And then I heard once that change per podcasts or per episode, do you recommend one of the other? Well, I suggest if your just when you're first getting started and getting your show going, I liketo have where you already have that done, because it's going to make your production a lot easier because when we go into this later on there's two there's, two types there's podcasters that they're getting started getting that set up, and then when you want to involve your show and have mohr engagement and change that up, when you have a team that can that can take care of that for you. So I suggest in the beginning to set that up for success for yourself by having that intro now true and then but you can evolve that you could change that up every single week if you want to change that introduction called action where you're driving people and driving your traffic. But in the beginning, this is just to help you get your mind around how this goes together and having that script. So it's not just getting on a mic and bumbling through the first sixty seconds of what we're talking about for the podcast and can get can you give some examples of the called action? Yeah. Perfect so again, if your goal is to drive traffic back to your email is just letting them know where your community is that where your main website is to drive traffic back to that's what I do a lot for me growing my email less that I have had over five thousand percent increase just from email subscribers because of the podcast that's on lee where I direct I don't sell I don't do anything like that so that's my goal now if for some of you want to grow your facebook community, I know when I get my twitter id out people are like, oh that's great I want to connect with you there so you know you could get your social media links or if you have maybe one of those episodes you've been talking about something over and over with a theme and now you've got your product that you're cheering with them, then you can go, you know, sign up for a free opt in I like to do where people drive to go to get an email opted not directly over to go buy something because the podcast listener is there to really engage with you understand more about you and if they like you they're going to go find out more I mean that's part of the process at as they go through their sale cycle with you so email options just a simple squeeze page what we mean by that is just where you have what the benefit is of the product and then a name and the email and that's all that's on that page so it's really simple you can send people over to amazon that works great too especially with the age of kindle now for books they're so cost effective most of them are you know ten dollars so great way that people go connect with your content there another thing too is if you have that membership site like that continuity program like bridget was talking about yesterday is having where you can have him go sign up for a free trial seven days thirty days give him a taste they could get a sample of what you have for your actual product and then that turns into a paid continuity membership program month after month I know scott smith actually is a podcast motivation to move and when I interviewed him he has a six figure business just from a twenty dollars a month membership site the only way markets that is from his podcast to driving traffic back and one of my clients rhonda she actually took that process and used it and when she first launched her podcast and in six weeks she had people one hundred percent options actually into the membership program after the free trial so I think hurt I think her child's like ten dollars, a month? It could be wrong, but it teaches people how to get there book out of them, so it was very simple. They gotta go test out the platform, see if they like it, and then they get to keep than it's already set up on auto pay, so those were some great examples of where you can engage the content or if you're called action is for strategy sessions. If you're at a point where you want to bring on higher coaching clients, you could be talking about one main principle on your show and say, hey, if you want to learn more about this, if you want to deep dive and you want to get a strategy session with me, go here tow x y z and you can have them fill out a strategy form and a great website for that as wufu dot com w u f o dot com and that's, where you can actually it's so simple I mean it's like click and point you add their name, email whatever questions that you want them to answer, you take that code and put that in on a blob, a block page or a page on your website, so then you're you're all could just be whatever that is dot com forward slash apply or something very, very simple so that's where you could take to get your listeners and bring them into your community to be leads on dh follow up with what you're what you're learning that's exactly what stephanie did actually well, she had people emailing her in as well, so even just giving your email address out I mean, the podcast listener they're very they feel like they're a fly on the wall with you, so it doesn't have to be as as so professional is, I think a lot of people try to try to make it in that sense where you can actually say hate email me over here at x y z that's what she gibson does he's, a top social media coach up in canada, and he says, if you want to book me for your next keynote speaker, email me at x y z and just sends traffic toe over there so you could make it as formal or informal as you want. But make sure your authentic and real it's kind of like what we talked about when if you go onto youtube today and you like we're all professional and you know nobody watches that they don't want that they want like the real you were like, when you know you're tripping and you're fallen, so have fun with that okay do you have questions just on that note? It's perfect yeah, I was listening to a lot of podcast last night intros and outrun just to kind of compare and well I listened actually tio guerilla marketing with wendy which was really fun intro some of the interest some of them had other people speaking. So what is your opinion on that? You know, this one guy and he's definitely not english and he had this english person roland welcome to love love la on all the sun he comes on and I thought that was confusing. So what are your cause? Is that good for branding? Is that not? You know really all right? Yeah because because I don't know what is your thoughts? Yeah, no, I know it was going to talk with a little bit later, but it's no it's perfect so you can have a voice over where someone reads her intro and your script or you can do it yourself so that's going to come down teo for your brandy? What in your expert position and some people want to be removed, so when they come in they look maura's the expert and it's not to say that you can't do that position with yourself, but it's a stylist show that you want and also what industry you're in two of how you're wanting to position if you're in corporate and you really want to come in as the expert. You're gonna want to probably have a professional outro or intruder, male or female. How? Maybe, you know, sometimes if you wanna have the opposite of what you are to introduce you and have that credibility there, you know? I mean, I have what? My uk client, she has a scottish accent from somebody else that she wanted toa have do it. So it's it's having fun with it. But then it's also knowing your positioning so that's where that could come into and how you want people to connect with you that way. So just, uh, would you get that done? Are there? Yes. Yes. I have some researches for that. It's a professional voice over is that I refer out and then also for there's people on fiber that could do that. I'll put a bunch of people that they can go on, connect with that that could do that record that and make it sound so professional for you in a lot of them will mix your music and do what I just taught you and put that all together for you. So then all you have have to do is take that mp three for your intro on your outro and that's. That's all put together, and then if you want to change that up later, you can go and do that. Yeah, like sometimes I find it kind of jarring sometimes when it's totally different. Yeah, but it was I went into a podcast one day and it was like an american thing, and then the guy ended up being filipino and I just threw me because then I thought, oh, to them were, you know, our accents or foreign so someone's, you know, using us, but I think I like because my show is heavily interview based, and I don't do a ton of talking. I actually like doing my intro because it becomes that familiar voice that people get to know and for and I'm the same way because it's, the expert positioning, sometimes you need a little extra room for that for them to connect with you. And then also, I used my podcast work, private coaching on that side, so I need I want to have that where they can resonate with because mine's interview a lot, too, and I do a little majority about listening, so that can help you connect with your audience even a little bit more, and I do my shout outs myself, so it really creates creates that connection. Questions coming on chat via music and stuff like that zane had asked what how does it work with professional music if it's something that you're discussing as like a news discussion point and it's a popular piece of music such as this landy on peace you brought up you know amy that's a great question the discussion part obviously I mean people can always critique and talk on that I'm just concerned if you're gonna play a segment of that just be careful because podcast you're streaming them free and it isn't to our content when you use it that way if you could get our, uh royalty free if you could get a I know some people just throw it in there but I just want to protect you from having anything happened because today in today's age especially with what's happened in the change in the music industry you want to respect that so I would you could reference it may be a short clip like seven seconds like what they do on instagram where that's still ok but not playing a really long song so you still want to check that out though with the professional music just truth suppose somebody did want to get a license sing don't have anywhere any resource is maybe in one of your books or someone else that you would direct someone teo if that's something that they did want teo get legal right yeah, I've never done it myself, so I don't want to exactly say how to do that. But we can look into that for I know, I know wendy has actually done that a lot with some other music, so I'll ask her, and we can get some notes on that for you just to make sure it's the right information for you. Yeah, um, so now with with podcasting being such an on demand media source, uh, a lot of people going to listening to it, kind of back to back to back episodes, so would you suggest maybe having a different outro song so people kind of know, okay, this one's done. I'm listening the next one. Or do you want to stay consistent with that? Actually, what happens is when they plan the player, it'll stop, and then you go into the next one so that your intro will do that. But, yeah, you can change that up and because they can create play less where it just goes, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom if you want. I listen differently. I mean, I just go in for that one show, and then I'll come back and finish it up, and then I go. I usually go to a different podcast, then that's how I listen, so but you can definitely do that and change that up for that experience. It wouldn't be like confusing for people like, well, it's hard to tell how people listen. I mean, we all listen totally different. Some of us want to go back to back with those episodes and create those other of us going like what I do in cherry pick different areas. So if the changeup is kind of what we were talking about earlier, if you want to change that music up, it will shock the listener a little bit too kind of wakes him up. So is changing that up. I would definitely suggest that. Yeah, wei, have a couple questions here on sound effects. First off, I love the names here in the chapel. We have one here today. I think this is ipod from yesterday. But today they are I podiatrist, which is so clever. I love that. So they specifically say how do you feel about sound effects during the podcast, and they reference the mad money podcast, where they do use a lot of sound effects and giver also said what's, a good way to input sound effects into the middle of the show. Is this something that people should be doing? I know a lot of us have that vision of sort of cheesy am radio broadcast with lots of sound effects, but could this work for some people? Absolutely. I mean your show, even just in the first couple of minutes, you can switch it up and change up if you're going in tow, talking about you know what the show's about, and then you're going to be talking about a different program or the person that you're interviewing you can, you can have a a lot of fun without a lot of creativity. You just want to make sure it's fluid for the listener, though, so it's not just jarring in the middle. If you're doing interviews, I don't suggest throwing sound effects it because that will have war of a cheesy effect unless you've got a light background music that you want include just be careful of that because your interview they'll share your podcast if you produce it really well for them and I'm gonna bring on robb walsh later on who's the vp lips and that's actually the podcast you heard yeah, yeah he's amazing and say we'll talk about some different things of is to make your quality your podcast incredible but with that being said, you could have a lot of fun with it. You can play around with it and mad money I mean that's what he's known for, you know, boom disruption just like what bridget was talking about disruptive marketing that's what people need we need to be like jarred out of our essential state now podcasting is a little different cause people are tuning in and more attentive even though they're running or they're doing other things there's something so powerful about that subconscious, that connection piece that happens. But if you do it tastefully, I think part of it, if that's your branding and you wantto be that that stand out audio side you can have fun with that. Just make sure it's fits for your brand and what your overall goal is if it if it distracts people too much where it's not helping that I would so just edit that out yeah. So for the technophobes, are you gonna break it down a little bit more? You know, we're going to go into that later on the fourth, the last section today, we're going to show you how to add it and how to do that, okay with with different programs. Okay, absolutely. Then I'll have some bonuses that actually going to even more programs and more for video as well. So we'll go into that later today. I'll show you absolutely this's a lot of the big thing that I noticed with a lot of my clients is it's it's, not the technical side that holds them back. And it's funny, because liz, when I was talking about with live your life now she was all worried, you know, she was all worried about the technical side, about making it perfect. And she realized the problem that was holding her back. Her breakthrough happened when she went through all of this to realize that's what she needed to know what she was going to talk about. She had confidence in her subject. It was it had a great brandy behind it and that's why she had success when she launched. So I don't want you to worry so much about the technical side of that. Something that you're holding on to right now because we will go through that. But there's also great people you could connect with in different places, toe audio at it because podcast have become so popular. I mean, we have a whole division that helps people with that. So there's, a whole way to get out of that. And where you got to just focus on being the content provider, being the talent showing up and having fun. So if that is any apprehension, right now, we will cover that as well, to make it easy for you.

Class Materials

bonus material

Heil Mixer Set-Up.pdf
Leaving a Review in iTunes.pdf
Listener Avatar Exercise.pdf
Podcast Class Master Guide.pdf
Stephanie Donengan Case Study.pdf
Blue Yeti Podcast Mic Test.mp3
RE20 Podcast Mic Test.mp3
Rhode Podcast Mic Test.mp3
Launch a Podcast Slides.pdf
Podcast Hosting Blueprint-CL.pdf
Video SEO Whitepaper.pdf
Module 3.2 - Recording Your Show.mp4
Module 3-3 - Hosting Your Show.mp4

Ratings and Reviews

a Creativelive Student
 

This is the best $149 I've spent on my blogging/podcasting journey so far. The course was so rich, so jam-packed with information and ideas. I am on fire with ideas (couldn't get to sleep last night because so many ideas were rattling around my brain!) and truly inspired to go out there and do it. I'll be posting my podcast launch on the Facebook Group when the time comes. Thank you, Kris!

Student Work

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