Podcasting Essentials: How to Start Without Breaking the Bank | EP298

Are you dreaming of starting your own podcast but intimidated by the costs? You're not alone! In this week's episode, we dispel the myth that podcasting is only for those with deep pockets. We provide you with practical tips to kick-start your podcasting journey with minimal investment. You will discover that you can begin with what you already own—for instance, your phone’s earbuds can double as a microphone! 

We break down the essential gear you really need, including affordable suggestions for microphones that can produce great sound without emptying your wallet. Recording and editing software options are discussed in detail, highlighting free tools like Audacity that make it easy to get started. 

Hosting your podcast can be overwhelming, but we recommend platforms such as Buzzsprout that simplify the process, offering free trials to test your content before committing financially. Throughout the episode, we also touch on the importance of branding your podcast, ensuring it captures your unique voice and message without losing sight of what truly matters—your content. 

Finally, don’t forget our valuable insights on how to grow your audience organically without resorting to costly ads. Tune in to explore all the ways you can make podcasting accessible and fun. Ready to jump into podcasting? Join the conversation by listening now, and don't forget to subscribe, leave a review, and share your thoughts!

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Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction and Upcoming Event
• 2:37 Essential Podcasting Gear: What You Really Need
• 11:48 Cost
• 17:11 Software and Hosting Platforms: How to Choose
• 26:08 Branding Essentials for Your Podcast
• 33:42 Final Thoughts and Call to Action

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:57

You're listening to the Mindset in Action podcast, the place to be to grow and streamline your business. I'm your host, donna Eade. Let's jump into the show. Welcome back to the podcast, everybody. Now, before I jump into today's episode, I wanted to remind you that my event is coming up real soon, so so soon. It's crazy to me. We are meeting on the 3rd of April. It's an in-person event. I'm going to actually get to hug you guys. It's amazing and I'm so, so excited.

Speaker 1: 1:37

This event is all to celebrate the fifth birthday of this podcast, and it is also going to be an event that is going to give you tangible, actionable tips that you can take away and implement in your business. So we're going to be talking about productivity. We're going to be talking about planning. We're going to be talking about mindset. We're going to be talking about audience building. These two regular listeners will all sound very familiar because they are the four core pillars of this podcast. We are also going to be talking about podcasting and mindset. So I have six amazing speakers coming to talk to you. I say six, I've got five. I'm one of them. Shouldn't really be including myself in that, but hey, I'm amazing, it's fine. Six amazing speakers coming to speak to you. I have two amazing facilitators, catherine and Kat, who are going to round out our experience with some fantastic energy work. It's going to be really, really cool, and then we are going to also have an afternoon tea buffet and birthday cake. So, if you want to come, do some learning, do some networking there's going to be two open networking sessions Get to meet the speakers, get to ask some questions, really get involved. I would love to have you. The tickets are available right now at donnaeedcom. Forward slash birthday event or one word Link will be in the show notes and I hope to see you there.

Speaker 1: 3:03

Okay, so on to this week's episode. Now. I did allude to this, I believe, in last week's episode, where I was going to talk about starting a podcast and the money that you need to spend to get your podcast going. Because this is one thing that I think puts a lot of people off starting their podcast is they think that they have to have all of the gadgets, everything needs to be just right before they get started, and I've told you guys before that I literally started with the headphones off of my Apple phone, my headphones from my phone, and that's how I started with my computer and that was it, and you can start as simply as that. Now you may be thinking, yes, okay, that was all right for you, donna, but I want to be a bit more elevated. So we're going to talk about what the essentials are, that you do need, what you don't need to be spending money on, and ways that you can save money in setting up your podcast. So that is what we're going to be talking about. So make sure that you stay till the end. Find out all of the information and also, for a little glimpse into next week's episode, where I have got a guest coming on with me. So I'll tell you more about that at the end.

Speaker 1: 4:23

Hundreds and hundreds of pounds no, you absolutely do not have to spend hundreds and hundreds of pounds. There are a few must haves when it comes to a podcast. So the first is, obviously you need a microphone of some sort to be able to record your voice. So a microphone that is able to record, preferably onto your computer. It makes it easier for editing. I don't know how anybody does anything on their phone. It's just all far too small for me. I just my fingers are too big, the buttons don't work, so I can't do it on my phone, if you can. All power to you, but a microphone that will allow you to record your voice into your computer. Now this can be as simple as the headphones that came with your phone. I know these days they don't come with phones, but I'm sure you've got a pair of wired phones with the microphone on from a previous pair somewhere around, and they're pretty cheap off of Amazon. If you haven't got one Now, I would say they need to be the plug-in ones.

Speaker 1: 5:24

Bluetooth can be a little bit temperamental, a little bit slightly off with how quickly it records and gets your voice, so I would just go plugged in with this. So if you don't want to start with headphones, if you want to start a little bit more elevated than that, then I would go for a USB microphone. So this is one that you can plug into your computer's USB port. It's a plug and play. Don't have to download anything, don't have to like, do anything weird except plug it in. You plug it in and you're good to go. Except plug it in. You plug it in and you're good to go. Now there are XLR microphones and my microphone has an XLR port on it as well as the USB port those. You have to have another box in between your computer and the microphone to make them work, and that box can be a little bit pricey.

Speaker 1: 6:19

So for me, a USB microphone is more than good enough. This is what I use. I have used for a long time. My microphone will be linked in the show notes for you so you can go and have a look at it, but it is the one that I have always used and it works perfectly fine for me and for what I need. So for me I feel like that it's a no brainer that the USB microphones are good enough, especially when you're starting out, so that you're looking at under a hundred pounds for that starter microphone. I wouldn't spend any more than that on your first microphone and you know, like I say, I will link mine in the show notes. It was voted like the best podcast microphone for under £100 out there, so I would go for that one if you're going to buy a microphone. Otherwise, you can always start with your headphones, as I said.

Speaker 1: 7:15

So, talking of headphones, that is. Your next option is headphones. Are they essential? Do you need them? Your next option is headphones. Are they essential? Do you need them. You do need headphones, but you don't always have to wear them, is what I would say to you.

Speaker 1: 7:33

So I often see on YouTube where people are sharing their recorded podcasts, which to me is a videocast. When you put it on YouTube and there's a video, it's a videocast. In my mind, a podcast is audio only, but I won't get on that bandwagon too much, honest. But on those, what I will see is I will see people who are sitting in the same room with headphones on and there is absolutely no reason to wear them. There is absolutely no reason to wear headphones when you are in the same room as the person that you're talking to. You can hear them without your headphones. So that would be my first thing. And then the second thing is is it's often for looks? So in my email signature I've got a picture of myself, and I've got a picture of myself sat in front of my microphone with my headphones on, and I actually had somebody reach out to me and ask me what headphones they were, because they wanted to know what headphones I was using, and those ones were my Beats headphones, which I have probably used once for my podcasting. It's just for looks, guys. Just for looks.

Speaker 1: 8:37

Your headphones do not need to be you know hugely expensive headphones. They really don't. Your headphones are there so that if you are recording a podcast with somebody remotely, that you are hearing the person in your ears and your microphone isn't hearing them. Because if you don't have headphones plugged in and your microphone is plugged in, their voice is coming through your speaker and then it's going to get picked up by your microphone and so you're going to have this almost echo to what they're saying. And then other thing is, if you get a notification pop up on your computer, that will also get picked up by your microphone, but if you've got headphones in, then all the sounds from your computer are going to go into your ears and not into your microphone. So that is why you want headphones, and any pair of headphones will do for that, and I actually prefer my phone headphones for that job because it's they're smaller. I can hide them under my hair, you know. I can adjust them so that they are not so visible, and I would rather it didn't look like I was wearing headphones.

Speaker 1: 9:55

So for all of you glasses wearers out there, like me, who are like I can't wear headphones over my ears with my glasses on. It's painful, you don't have to. Ok, your normal earbuds will work for what you need them for. So don't go spending loads of money on headphones. You don't need them if you are in the same room as the person you're them for. So don't go spending loads of money on headphones. You don't need them if you are in the same room as the person you're recording with and you only need a set that you can hear. You know it doesn't have to be amazing quality. As long as you can hear the other person when they're speaking. When you're doing remote episodes, then that's fine, okay, so don't go spending loads of money on that. So so far we've spent under a hundred pounds.

Speaker 1: 10:40

Then you need your recording and editing software. So I use Audacity, and I have used Audacity since day dot. I am on a PC, so that works for a PC. It also works on Apple, so that works for a pc. It also works on apple, but apple also has garage band. So they're both free apps that you can use to record and edit voices. So those are your free options for that. Now, if you are doing remote recording of interviews, that's when you're getting into something that costs something. So you may already have a Zoom subscription as part of your business, you know, for one-to-ones meetings, networking, etc. If you already have that, then you just use Zoom. It is good enough. I have used it since day dot.

Speaker 1: 11:34

I have tried other things, things. There are other things that I think are better out there for the purposes of podcasting, but then I can't do the other things that I do with zoom. So for me it's one of those things where it's one cost and I can do my podcast interviews with that as well as everything else I want to do, or it's going to be two costs to elevate my podcast audio, but you know I'm going to have to pay two. Or I can't do the other things I need to do in my business, like my meetings and things, so there is a cost there. If you already pay for zoom, then there's no cost. If you don't already pay for zoom, then you can have a look at things like Riverside FM. That's a really good one for podcasting. That's the one that I would use if I was going to pay for something. So, riverside FM or Zoom, you can use both of those to record remote interviews. So those are your options there. You can also use OBS. So OBS is a free platform that you can use and you can use that if you want to record two voices in the same place. So if you were together you could use that as a way of recording two voices together. So those are your options there for recording, there for recording, then your hosting platform. There are some free platforms out there. A lot of them have gone now but most of them have some sort of free option, trial, something like that.

Speaker 1: 13:10

I use Buzzsprout. You will find a link for Buzzsprout in the show notes. It's the one I've used from day dot. I tried Spotify for my other podcast and I used the you know Spotify as a free version. So I tried Spotify. I didn't like it. I didn't like the way it worked. It is not a podcast host in its. You know that's not what it was made for, so it doesn't flow as easily as the podcast hosts do. So I didn't like it and I don't recommend it because of that, because of my experience with it.

Speaker 1: 13:52

But Buzzsprout I highly recommend. It gives you 90 days for free and if you click the link in the show notes where I share Buzzsprout with you, you will also get a $20 credit when you do start paying. So 90 days for free is three months and that gives you, I think, two hours a month, which certainly in your first month. A lot of people tend to have shorter episodes to begin with. I would say you don't want to be going over half an hour anyway, so that gives you one episode a week when you start out. So I would recommend using Buzzsprout because it is the one I know.

Speaker 1: 14:35

I've never had any problems with it. Their customer service is great. I've always had great responses where things have like gone awry usually at my own fault, I have to say and they've helped me figure it out and work out what I've done wrong. So they are really, really helpful, the guys at Buzzsprout. So I would highly recommend that. Like I say, it gives you 90 days free to start and then if you use the link that I've got in the comments below, then you will also get a 20 credit when you start paying.

Speaker 1: 15:07

But it's really good for the fact that you can try it for three months and see is this something that I'm enjoying? Is it fitting in, you know, does it work well for me? You're not necessarily going to get the monetary results or the return in terms of the number of people that are subscribing or getting on your email list, things like that. You know that stuff kind of takes time, but it's more am I enjoying it? Is this something I wanna continue with and give a good go to before you start paying, and I think that's a great way to do it. So I highly recommend Buzzsprout for your host. There are lots of others there's Podbean, libsyn, there's a lot of others out there, and they're all pretty good, but I've just had a really, really good experience with Buzzsprout and highly recommend them.

Speaker 1: 15:53

So then, the other thing that you definitely will need is cover art and branding for your podcast. Now, this could range from DIYing it, which is going to cost you nothing, up to, you know, going to a brand designer to get a whole brand done for your podcast. It really depends on where you're at in your business and what you want to achieve with your podcast as to where you land on that spectrum. I would say for most people, canva is a really good option. Go to Canva, have a look type in podcast cover art. It will give you loads and loads and loads of options. What I would say is something that Marie Louise, who is the host of the lovely Canva crew membership that she has always said please don't ever just use what you see and just put your name on it. Change the colours, change shapes, change the graphics, change the stripes for swirls, you know. Edit it, make it your own, make it fit with your brand. Don't ever just take something off of Canva and use it verbatim, because that's not cricket. It's not cricket to start with, but it's just not going to be completely you, so you need to change it.

Speaker 1: 17:13

The other thing with a lot of the podcast covers on Canva is a lot of them have microphones on. You don't need a microphone on your podcast cover. People will know that it's a podcast. They don't need to see a microphone on it. It's just a bit cheesy and a bit outdated. So if it's got a microphone on it, take the microphone off. It's taking up valuable real estate.

Speaker 1: 17:36

What you have to remember with your cover art is that it often ends up tiny, tiny little thumbnail on a phone and you need to be able to read the title of your podcast and see a photo of you or you know something that represents what your podcast is about. So try and make it as clear as possible. A lot of those cover arts can be quite busy, and you don't need it to be busy. You need it to be clean and simple. Choose colours to go with your brand and away you go, so that can cost you nothing. So where we've looked at that, the essentials you need, really, we are starting, at least for the first 90 days, for nothing. Buzzsprout is $12 a month at its lowest option after that, and that gives you three hours a month so you can make your podcast episodes a little bit longer after three months and you get three hours a month on that tier of $12 a month. So $12 a month from month three.

Speaker 1: 18:39

But other than that, you're looking at under £100 to get you started, and that's if you want to start with a microphone. You might decide that actually, for the first couple of months, while you're working out whether this is right for you or not, you're just going to use your headphones with a microphone attached, yeah, so those are your options there. So what don't you need to be spending money on when it comes to podcasting? Well, the first thing you do not need is you do not need a soundproof room. Okay, so I've spoken about this before. We do not need a music studio to get started with podcasting If you've got the space and you want to do it absolutely. But again I would say, give yourself that three months to see whether it's something you're enjoying.

Speaker 1: 19:23

So maybe you've got an airing cupboard that you just use as storage. It's not really used as an airing cupboard. I don't know about you, but my airing cupboard used to have the water tank in and a lot of houses don't have water tanks now. So it was the water tank and the water in there that was hot, that used to warm the airing cupboard and keep the towels nice and warm. It doesn't really happen so much anymore.

Speaker 1: 19:47

My airing cupboard I say in quotation marks is just a cupboard on top of the stairs. I can't use my cupboard on top of the stairs as a sound booth because it is built into the slant of the ceiling that goes up in the stairs so there's no flat bottom to it so I can't stand in there or anything. So I can't use that. But maybe you have one that is at the top of your stairs. That is just a cupboard that you could stand in. If it was emptied of shelves and rubbish and goodness knows what, that would make a great little sound studio.

Speaker 1: 20:21

But you know it's got to fit in with what you've got going on. You can't just get rid of all of your linens and say, well, I need a soundproof studio, so I've got to put foam all over this cupboard and then where are your towels going to go. So only do that if you have got the space to do it. You don't need a very big space. Like I said, that kind of airing cupboard size is perfect. You'd stand up and do your podcasts. Perfect. You'd stand up and do your podcasts, put in a little shelf that you can put your laptop on and have your microphone on, and away you go. You would probably need a light in there, especially if you're going to do interviews.

Speaker 1: 20:59

But I would say the thing is, especially if you're doing guest episodes, is your guests aren't going to have a sound studio, they're not going to have a soundproof booth, they're not going to have that set up and therefore if you are in your booth whilst you're recording with them, it's going to be very jarring the difference between you and them. So I would always try to match my guests sound as closely as possible, although I still will bring in some things, because I just can't bear the echo that I get from a lot of guests. So I'm just like I am going to do the bare minimum to give me good sound, which is going to be not as good as my normal sound, but it's still going to be better than my guest sound, because they usually don't have the setup that I have, which is fine. But I would be aware that that will be even a bigger difference if you have got a soundproof room so you do not need to have a soundproof room cushions from the back of your sofa and when I say the back of your sofa I mean if you've got a sofa that is literally you can remove the back cushions, like the back of the sofa comes away. So I have one that's got about nine massive cushions that sit on the back of my L-shaped sofa and I can remove them all. So I bring in two of those, one either side, so you can either go and get two cushions that are that big if you don't have them, or you can just bring in smaller cushions but more of them. I tend to layer them up around my computer so that I kind of create a little booth for myself when I have guests, I just usually have one and have my microphone facing it so that the sound that I'm speaking goes into the cushion and that absorbs the sound, and that will help provide you with better sound quality. So that's what you can do for free.

Speaker 1: 22:52

You don't need expensive editing software so you can pay people to edit your podcast. You're looking at around £75-ish per episode for an editor. There will be people out there cheaper than that. There are people out there more expensive, but you're looking at roughly that, so you don't need to do that. You can edit it yourself. You don't have to use expensive editing software. Audacity is free and you can use that to edit Paid ads for growth. So you do not need to be spending money on ads, especially in the beginning. Now you can obviously run low cost ads to your podcast as a way of increasing your visibility. It makes for a great visibility advert, but you don't need to start with that. So, networking, getting guests on your show to reshare, repurposing your podcast on your social media platforms these are all ways to organically grow your podcast. And, of course, making sure that your SEO is spot on from the beginning that is really going to help your podcast to land with the people that you want it to land with. So that is a great way of doing it as well.

Speaker 1: 24:04

So don't go wasting money on things that you don't need. I know there are people out there that want all the fancy things, want the studio, want the microphone set up, you know, want all of the expensive headphones, the little boxes that do all the fancy stuff and they want all of that jazz and they spend so much time getting that organized before they get started and then when they start, they realize that they don't actually like doing it. So I don't want you to waste any money. Start with what you've got, and that brings us on to smart ways to keep costs low. So start with what you've got. Use an existing microphone or use your headphones that have a microphone. Leverage those free tools. So there are scheduling tools that you can use for your social media promotion. You can schedule in Buzzsprout. You get the 30 days free with Buzzsprout. Leverage what you can for free, especially in the beginning. You can also look at swapping services or collaborating to save money. So if editing is something that you really don't want to do, maybe you can get a trade with somebody who will edit your podcast for you in exchange for being the series one sponsor of your podcast. So you will mention them on every episode of the podcast and they will edit your podcast for free for however many episodes. There are ways to do that Batch record as well, because that saves you time and unnecessary expense.

Speaker 1: 25:44

So oftentimes when we are elongating the process by doing it bit by bit, that is taking up more time than if we just sat down and did it all in one go and that is taking time away from the money making activities that you could be doing. Six episodes over six weeks and it takes me three hours per episode. That's going to take however long. That is three times six, 18, 18 hours. But if I sat down and I did all my recording together in one session, it wouldn't take me the. I'm going to cut it into three.

Speaker 1: 26:26

So if it's three hours to do an episode, it's going to take me one hour to if it. If it's three hour, three hours to do an episode, it's going to take me one hour to record, one hour to edit, one hour to schedule. I'm just giving you a rounded number two so it's easy to work with. But if it takes me an hour to record. That's me setting up, getting myself ready, getting the script up, recording and then, you know, taking everything back, putting it on the sofa, packing away my microphone, all of that.

Speaker 1: 26:55

If I don't have to do that beginning and end bit more than once, then I could do six episodes and I'll probably save myself an hour in that, because it's going to take me five, six minutes to set up at the beginning, five, six minutes to take it down at the end. It rounding it up sort of 15 minutes in total with going through um, gmail, my google docs to find the scripts for them all and everything. If I've got all of that set up in one hit at the beginning and then I bash through six episodes and then I close it down at the end, that is going to save me time instead of setting up and taking down six times Again with the editing. If I'm sitting there and I'm batching my editing and I'm just going through and I just edit all the episodes, then I go in and add the beginning and end to each of them. That is going to be quicker than me opening up a single doc, editing that doc, putting the beginning on, putting the end on exporting it. I'm going to save some time by doing all of the editing first, then going in and quickly adding the beginning and end to them.

Speaker 1: 27:59

So things like that really are going to save you time, and your time is money. So if you can save yourself, you know, three hours of podcasting time by batching six episodes instead of doing them individually, then you'll be able to take that three hours, and that's three hours you can spend with a client. That's going to be money in your pocket, so really important to think about how your processes work with your podcast as well. So I hope that has given you a good idea of how you can start a podcast for little to no money. It really is one of those things that it doesn't have to be a huge expense.

Speaker 1: 28:37

My ongoing costs for my podcast are my hosting, and I do pay for the AI add-on to that just because it saves me time. If I didn't pay for it, I could use ChatGPT to do what the AI within Buzzsprout does, and that would be for free. However, I would have to do a bit of cutting and pasting for that, so I don't want to do that. So there are your options. You don't need a fancy microphone to get started. You don't need fancy headphones to get started. You do not need a soundproof booth to get you started. Start with what you've got and grow from there. Okay, so that is it for this week's episode. I hope that has helped you.

Speaker 1: 29:23

If you've got any questions, please do reach out to me. You can find me on LinkedIn under Donna Eade. That is where I spend most of my time these days. You can dm me on instagram and I should be able to pick it up. I don't spend a lot of time over there anymore, but that is you know where you can find me to ask questions. I also have a facebook group called start a podcast uk with Donna Eade. You can come and find me over there and ask questions and find out more from other podcasters. And yeah, that's it.

Speaker 1: 29:56

So we will be meeting in person on the 3rd of April. Do come to my event. I would love to say hello and thank you for listening in person. It's DonnaEadecom forward slash birthday event and next week I have holly scott she is an interior designer coming in to talk about how we can design our spaces for better productivity. So come and join me for that one. That's going to be episode 299. Guys, you know what that means, don't you? So I'm really excited for all of what is to come, with us hitting 300 episodes, with us hitting a fifth birthday on the podcast, and that is why it's so important to celebrate with this birthday event. All the links are going to be in the show notes, and all the links are also on the blog post as well. If you can't find the show notes, go down to the bottom of the blog post. They will all be there as well, and I will see you next week with Holly Bye. For now.