You may have a great topic for your podcast, and great content, but for a podcast to be its best, you should come up with a specific format for your show and, for the most part, stick to it.
There are many things that make up the format of a podcast. The two that I’ll cover in this article are the parts, or segments that make up a podcast, and the style you decide upon.
Segments: If you listen to a radio show you’ll often hear news at the top of the hour, then sports, then weather, back into music for a several minutes, then a commercial break, a listener’s phone call, back into music, etc.
All of those parts combine to make up the show. And while podcasting gives you the freedom to do whatever you want, whenever you want, most people are more comfortable when they have an idea of what’s going on — in this case, I’m talking about your listeners.
Familiarity allows your listeners to not think about the format and just go with the content. And while you don’t have to lock yourself into something really precise, it’s a good idea to map out how your show will generally flow.
Here’s how one of...