5 Strategies To Take Your Podcast Recording To The Next Level

Recording your podcast is a skill that falls under the broader scope of audio recording.

Although you may not need some of the more advanced skill sets required in pro audio recording, you must have some decent knowledge of basic stuff at least.

Either you’re just recording the podcast or you are also doing a video alongside, your audio quality goes a long way in shaping your audience’s experience.

When you put out a podcast, there are two things you want. You want people to find and listen to your good podcasts.

You also want people who have listened to always come back for more. No matter how good your content is, if your audio quality is subpar, you will have a hard time keeping a loyal listening audience.

Here are 5 strategies you can apply to take your podcast recording to the next level:

1. Consistency Is The key

There are a number of things you can do to get better results. But none of those will work unless you are committed to applying them over and over.

Consistency is of great importance. You may be wondering what exactly you need to be consistent with. The answer is simple: Every element of your learning process.

There was a time you probably didn’t know the first thing about podcasting, but here you are, trying to take your recording skills to the next level.

What changed?

You learned something. There are various avenues that you can explore to learn everything you need to know, and some are even free.

Take YouTube as an example. You have different podcasters that do reviews, product comparisons, and unboxing videos of different podcasting gear.

Simply watching these guys can have a tremendous impact on the quality of your work. However, you have to be consistent with it. It may be a little hard at the beginning, but once you master it, it’ll be so easy afterward.

The best thing about being consistent is that you may not even notice how you’ve improved, but after some time, you suddenly realize how far you’ve come. Therefore, be consistent with learning, and see the amount of progress you will make.

2. Organize Your Workflow

This saves you a lot of time and energy. Have a defined work pattern.

There’s a huge mistake that some podcasters make while recording, especially when they have some knowledge of audio editing.

They just do the recording without any prior planning or thoughts, since it will be edited after recording. This is not a very good approach, and the reason is simple; your podcast will not sound natural.

For every single podcast I listen to, I feel like I have an idea of who the podcaster is. That’s how personal podcasts can be.

If you can manage to connect with your audience this way, there’s no telling how big your career can get. You cannot get this level of connection when your podcast does not sound natural.

It’s best to have a very good recording and make it better by editing, than having a recording that sucks and try to fix it while editing.

Organize your process such that nothing gets in the way while you’re recording. Set everything up so that your mind can be focused while you have good takes.

3. Keep Things Simple

Learn to take things one step at a time. I know you’re eager to sound like a pro podcaster who has been doing this for over a decade, but sometimes you just need to chill!

This is important in every aspect of podcasting; Buying new gear, setting up your space, and the actual recording process.

You really don’t need to buy radio station grade gear when you’re just starting out. Chances are you don’t even know what to do with them yet. Expensive gear will be useless if you don’t have the skill level required to use them well.

Also, you need to be efficient with everything you have at your disposal; equipment, space, time and any other thing available to you.

Always remember that your goal is for your listeners to hear and understand everything you are trying to communicate. Anything outside of this is extra and should be treated as such.

4. Use A Good Mic

Like I mentioned earlier, you must treat your recording equipment like they’re the most important gear, because they are really are.

The first non-human element in your recording chain is the microphone. If there’s any hitch at this point, there’s little or nothing you can do to salvage such a situation. This is why it’s important to use a good mic for podcast recording.

What makes a good podcasting mic?

First, the inbuilt mic in your laptop is not good enough to use for recording your podcast. It just won’t cut it.

You will need to get a good external podcasting mic for the job. Fortunately, you do not have to break the bank to get a decent mic. Of course, you can upgrade as you get more following.

The truth is that there’s a reason why expensive mics are expensive, and when you choose to go for an upgrade, you will hear the difference in sound quality.

For many devices, the higher the price, the easier it gets to use them. For microphones, it’s the opposite. high-end mics usually need professional handling to serve you better.

In fact, if you’re using a very expensive mic, chances are you’ll have to fix your room acoustics too. So, the more sophisticated the mic, the more skill is needed to use it effectively.

5. Room Acoustics

This is also an important part of your recording because the quality of your room acoustics can directly affect your podcast recording quality.

Here’s how: The room where you record your podcasts has walls, right?

When you talk, the sound travels through the air and hits the walls. The sound then bounces off the wall and comes back into the mic or any other structure on its path.

To have a quality podcast recording, all you need to do is control the amount of reflection in your immediate recording space.

You can do this by placing acoustic panels on any immediate hard surface around. The amount of acoustic treatment that you’ll need depends on the type of podcast you run.

If it’s just you talking, you may not need so much; just an acoustic screen will do. However, if you are recording the conversation of two or more people, you need a more expansive plan, because there is a greater tendency or room reflections.

Conclusion

If you are a podcaster already and you seem to be having cold feet, you must know that this is the time to really buck your ideas up.

The relevance of audio has soared in recent times, and audio content has never been more sought after, as stand-alone content.

Before now, audio mostly played a supporting role to other content. This is why it’s important to have good quality podcast recordings. It would be really cool if, in the future, people checked out your old stuff and they sound good.

About the Author:

Hi, I’m Jennifer, a passionate singer and an audiophile from Detroit, MI. I blog at SoundMaximum. I’m on a mission to help music creators to create fine music that helps them position uniquely in the saturated music space.