091: 3 Tips to Overcome Podcast Overwhelm
There are a lot of moving pieces when it comes to creating a podcast. Not only do you have to come up with content and then record the episode, but you’ve also got editing, show notes, graphics, marketing … It can definitely be overwhelming.
In today’s episode, I’m sharing the cause of podcast overwhelm and three tips (plus a bonus) for how to make the process run more smoothly.
Having a podcast should be enjoyable for you, and with these tips, you can reduce stress and overwhelm and put out content that you are really proud of and excited to share.
What’s in this episode of Podcast Your Business:
[02:28] Why podcast overwhelm happens in the first place and how to create a system that works for you
[06:30] The importance of strategically planning ahead and making sure all your marketing strategies are aligned
[10:14] How batch recording can help you feel less stressed and more prepared with your content
[15:03] Why hiring help makes a world of difference if you’re overwhelmed
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The Transcript for Podcast Your Business:
091: 3 Tips to Overcome Podcast Overwhelm
[00:00:00] Caroline Hull Being able to see every step mapped out has been huge for us and our clients. It's not just creating a graphic. You have to write the show notes, you have to approve the show notes. You have to pull quotes, right? Like there's all these steps. You can't just skip over them. And so when you're creating a system, you want it to be as detailed as possible. And one of the reasons why you want it to be so detailed is that way if you need to jump out and somebody needs to jump in, they know exactly what to do because they can see the steps lined out. They can see what needs to happen.
[00:00:33] Ready to start a podcast for your business and share your message in a way that feels wildly authentic. Welcome to Podcast Your Business, where each week we share how to start a podcast and make sure it's working for you and your business. I'm Caroline Hull, podcast manager and consultant, and I've seen the power a podcast can have. Ready to share your voice. Let's get started.
[00:00:59] So it's the day before your podcast episode is supposed to go live. You don't have anything recorded. You don't have graphics done. You don't have the email newsletter set up or show notes written. And it's about No, no, 10 p.m.. You just got the kids to bed, so you're going to real quick record something and get it ready to go. But by the time you get it all done, it's after midnight, you're exhausted and you have to wake up and do all the things that you do. Can you relate? Like today I'm having so much fun. This is actually the second episode that I've recorded today, and this is going to put me about four weeks ahead, which seems a little crazy, but it's actually going to be quite nice because we're getting ready to go out of town and I've just got a lot coming up with my family, so I'm going to make sure that this was not the thing that was getting pushed back because nine times out of ten, when life gets overwhelming, when your business is taking up a lot of your time, the thing that you're going to pause on is your podcast. And if you've ever listened to this podcast, you've heard me talk about consistency and why it is so important.
[00:02:28] And so today I want to talk about podcast overwhelm and give you three specific tips to help you overcome it. So that way, it's just not a part of your life anymore. And your podcast can run smoothly, episodes can be released that you feel really proud of and yeah, just not having to worry about it. So let's talk about why podcast overwhelm happens in the first place. As my little example at the beginning of the episode shows doing episodes, the last minute is a real indicator that something is not working. Now, that doesn't mean that you can't do the episodes last minute. Sometimes stuff comes up that you really want to talk about, and that's totally fine. But when you are consistently doing them last minute or skipping them all together, I feel like that's usually a major symptom to look out for. And this happens a lot with podcasters and especially podcasters who are business owners because like I said, you get super busy with everything else and the podcast inevitably gets pushed to the backburner. One of the main reasons, though, that podcasts overwhelm tends to happen is because you either don't have a system in place or you don't have a system in place that works for you.
[00:03:42] And so that is going to be my number one tip today. Create a system. Now, when I see a system that is actually going to encompass a few things. So obviously that's an actual tool that you're using. And we actually create our client dashboards just in Google. So we use an amazing spreadsheet that I am not going to share with you. I'm so sorry, but it's really pretty. Basically, it's a schedule in spreadsheet form and it's really easy to set up and this is like the most basic way to get started. Having the date the episode goes live, having the episode title, are the show notes written? Has it been recorded, you know, asking all these questions? But here's what makes a system work. One, you have to use it. You have to create the habit of going in and looking at it every day. But two, you have to have all the steps outlined in a way that makes sense for you.
[00:04:39] I have found over my years of podcasting and running an agency that the more detailed the checklists are, the more likely all the steps are to be done. We really pride ourselves on our checklists here at Wild Home Podcasting. They are the the life source of our business. But being able to see. Every step mapped out has been huge for us and our clients. It's not just creating a graphic. You have to write the show notes, you have to approve the show notes, you have to pull quotes, right? Like there's all these steps. You can't just skip over them. And so when you're creating a system, you want it to be as detailed as possible. And one of the reasons why you want it to be so detailed is that way if you need to jump out and somebody needs to jump in, they know exactly what to do because they can see the steps laid out. They can see what needs to happen. And so think about a system that would work for you.
[00:05:32] As I said, we create a Google sheet for our clients, but we also here at WHP work in Asana. So for me, my team has their own board in Asana who execute everything that needs to happen for my podcast. But then I have a board as well where I'm able to kind of look at and plan my episodes and see where they are in the process and set due dates for myself. And if you can get ahead and we'll talk about that a little bit more, but if you can get ahead, it's also a lot easier to to look at your podcast this way. And so a system just is really important. And honestly, I used to never be like a huge systems person. But as I'm getting older and as I'm managing more things in my life, I'm finding that having those incredibly laid out, detailed systems really makes a difference in your sanity and your anxiety around things.
[00:06:30] So tip number two, strategically plan ahead. Use your sales schedule and your marketing calendar. Sit down and come up with a next quarter of episode topics that you are going to cover. So you can do this again in a spreadsheet, you can do this in Asana, one tool that I've been exploring a lot lately is Airtable. But strategically planning ahead means taking a look at everything that you have going on in your business and aligning your content to it. I'm not going to dove too much into the strategy behind that because the last few episodes we've done, we've covered kind of the content and how to choose what content you're going to talk about, that sort of thing. So definitely go back and listen to those episodes.
[00:07:14] But the reason why I'm why I have this as a tip in here is because one of the places we get overwhelmed and one of the things that tends to happen with a podcast is we will just randomly pick episode topics because we aren't actually sitting down and planning ahead. We just like wake up one morning and we realize we have to record an episode and we pick a random topic, right? So if you're able to sit down with everything and think about your episode strategically, what content you want to share and going ahead and mapping it out, it's going to be so useful for tip number three, which we'll get to in a minute. But it's also going to give you a lot of direction with your podcast and a lot more intentionality. And so we're just we're being intentional about our episodes. We're planning ahead. We're making sure they're aligned. We know what we're going to be promoting on those episodes, and it just makes everything go so much smoother when you do this.
[00:08:09] I also really, really highly, highly recommend having a system where you're able to look at all of your marketing all together. How is your podcast episode tying into your Instagram, your email, whatever else you're doing, and having that all in one place? And again, I've been playing with Airtable a little bit and finding that I actually kind of love it for this function. I still love Asana with everything, but having the Airtable kind of spreadsheet to be able to do planning for everything and then plugging in to Asana has been huge for me these last couple of weeks.
[00:08:44] Hey, podcaster, if you feel like you're getting a lot out of this podcast, but you want even more, I have the perfect thing for you. The WHP Insider podcast is a private podcast for Members Only, which features two episodes per month, plus a monthly newsletter that takes a deeper dive into strategies and tips, specifically for podcasters who are using their podcast to help grow their business. This is something that up until now has only been available for clients of Wild Home Podcasting, but for a small monthly fee, you can join and be part of the club. So just head to WildHomePodcasting.com/Insider for more information. And I can't wait to see you there.
[00:09:30] And so that's going to take out the overwhelm, right, of knowing what to do. I want to insert a little disclaimer here that you can shuffle this schedule around. So I'm not telling you to create a quarter's worth of content ideas and stick to them. I'm telling you that by having these ideas in place and having a plan with the rest of your marketing, it's going to all tie together. It's all going to work. You're not going to need to look at what you need to post on Instagram or what is go in your email newsletter because you've got it all mapped out, tied together. It's going to change your life. So having a system and then using that system to strategically plan ahead is going to go really far in reducing podcast overwhelm.
[00:10:14] So my third tip, and I can't believe I'm saying this because if you've been listening to my episodes, you know that I backtracked on this recently, but now I'm realizing the error of my ways again. Batch record when possible. I actually stopped batch recording probably before the summer, and then I realized that that wasn't really doing me any favors at all and that I needed to go back to Batch recording. One of the things that has helped me with batching is this strategically planning ahead business I talked about in my number two tip. So I recently added a new kind of marketing venue to my lineup. I started a closed friends list on Instagram, and my vision for the Close Friends list was for it to be the place where people come after the podcast to talk about the episodes. Well, here's the deal. I cannot plan my close friends content and tease it if I don't plan my podcast episodes way ahead of time. And even like recording them ahead of time helps because then I know, okay, what are the things I'm going to pull out to talk about in close friends?
[00:11:24] And so it has forced me to go from planning ahead just a few weeks to planning ahead for a few months. And at first I was like, This is insane because it just felt so forward thinking and like, you know, is Caroline really this on top of things? But today I happened to have the opportunity to sit down and get a head on episodes, and I was able to sit down and record two episodes. And so now that is putting me a month ahead on my podcast recordings, which normally that's no big deal, but this month is going to be crazy for me. So this episode is coming out on November 14th and I'm recording it on October 20th, and I will have almost all of my November episodes done by the time November 1st hits. And again, this is going to be huge for me because November is going to be nutso crazy in my personal life. And I'm also launching close friends in the middle of all of this. And so making sure that it is all working together is really important so I can record and plan ahead and have everything laid out.
[00:12:30] And so while it seems a little over, like I don't know what the word is like, I'm over planning, I'm overdoing it. I am actually feeling a level of no anxiety and no stress about my podcast and my marketing content that I have not felt in a long time. I'm going to shout out Melanie here. She was on an episode of my podcast that we will link in the show notes, and she's the one who was like, Here's how you use this magical Airtable. So it's just been such a game changer. Now I do not expect that I will be able to batch record all the time. My life is crazy. I homeschool my kids. I've got a toddler. You guys know toddlers don't always nap when you want them to. So Batch recording may not always be possible, but when it is possible because number one, I have a system. Number two, I have strategically planned ahead. So number three, when I find myself with some time, I can sit down and easily batch record because I did one and two. It all works together, my friends, and it all makes such a difference in how I perceive my podcast, how I work on my podcast. Again, the intentionality and the quality of content is going to be so much better because I'm not just trying to throw up an episode, I am actually sitting down and able to create something that I am proud of.
[00:13:59] And one thing I have noticed in this is that my episodes have actually gotten longer because I've been planning ahead so well and being more intentional with them, not trying to squeeze them in the week before that they go live. So I know that I said at some point that you have to build your podcast around your life. And I mentioned how I had stopped batch recording. I am now backtracking on that and I am saying that even if your life is crazy, you need to try to batch record because it will make such a difference. And again, like, I'm I do have some interviews coming up and I don't know where I'm going to place those yet in my schedule. And so there is room for me to move stuff around, which is fantastic. And even if I batch record it and I want to move an interview between some episodes I've already recorded, then I'm even more ahead. Right. So there's a lot of opportunity to change things around and move things and rework things even when I batch record. So I just want to put that out there. And yeah, and that was tip number three.
[00:15:03] Oh, I have a bonus tip for you. So before we we sign off, I do have a bonus tip if you are so overwhelmed by your podcast. And I mean, it's just even with all of these three tips here, you feel like you're not going to be able to get ahead. My bonus tip is to hire help in whatever way that means for you, whether that's a VA to come in and do the posting and things like that, or if it means all the way up to hiring an actual podcast manager to manage and get your podcast ready every week. Hiring even just a little bit of help can make such a difference in what can be a pretty time consuming, overwhelming process, right? If you've been podcasting or tried to podcast, you know that there's a lot of pieces that go into it. And so even having just a little bit of help can make the world of difference. And so don't be afraid to ask for help if you need it. And again, like you may even have somebody on your team who can just take over a few tasks and that will free up some space. So that's my bonus tip hire help.
[00:16:05] So again, those three tips to overcome podcast overwhelm are create a system, strategically plan ahead, and batch record when possible. And if you want to dive even deeper into this and continue the discussion on how to make your podcast feel easier, we are going to be talking all about that in my close friends on Instagram this week. So after you listen to the episode, head on over to Instagram and join my close friends list. If you're not in the list. Simply DM me "close friends" and then let me know where you are in your podcast journey and I will get you added to the list and you can join us for the discussion on Thursday. And yeah, we'll just take a deeper dive into this so you can, you know, take some action, take some steps to overcome that podcast overwhelm. Thank you so much for listening. And next week is an all new episode.
[00:17:00] Thank you for listening to Podcast Your Business. For more podcasting tips, follow us on Instagram @wildhomepodcasting. If you are ready to launch, uplevel, or grow your podcast, head to WildHomePodcasting.com To get started today.
