Staying on top of a consistent podcast schedule can be quite a challenge. Identifying compelling ideas for your audience, researching, scheduling interviews, recording…it’s definitely a process. But before you get all stressed out, there’s actually a wealth of existing content that you already have that can give you a huge head start on production and cut your time investment in half!
Yes, I’m talking about content repurposing…it applies to podcasts too. It’s easy to overlook the media you’ve captured from things like live events and webinars (just to name two), but in this post, we are going to explore some ideas on how you can take the content you’ve already produced and remold it into an amazing podcast episode that will engage your listeners. All while saving you time, money, and (quite frankly) the hair on your head!
Turn Your Blog Feed Into An Episode Generator
Everybody’s got a blog these days – I’m sure you’re no different. And with the content being published on your blog regularly, there’s a huge backlog of relevant content to pull from for your podcast episodes.
So, how can you do this? Blogs are a written format. How does that translate into the audio world?
It’s simple, start thinking of your blog as a general abstract for your next podcast episode. From this, you can build a well-thought-out episode that showcases your personality and expertise. Here’s how:
- Choose a Topic: Select a blog post that’s currently relevant and compelling for your podcast audience.
- Create an outline: If written properly, your blog post should already be well-structured. Deconstruct the blog into an outline that you can use to build your episode. Identify the key points you want to cover and mark down any additional ideas that would add to the audio storytelling.
- Add personality: Take advantage of podcasting’s unique ability to highlight personality. Look at your outline and think about an expert in the field who would complement the presented ideas. Maybe have them on as a guest to talk about the subject. You can even look at previous media recordings that may be aligned with the topic and use clips to reinforce the ideas you’re presenting in your episode.
- Record your episode: This is the easy part. Now it’s time to record. Just sit back and have a great conversation! Don’t forget to keep your outline in front of you to stay on track.
The Webinar Cycle - Using Webinar Content To Fuel Podcast Episodes To Convert On Webinar Leads
Yes, I know that might sound confusing, but bear with me. Webinars have been a go-to for content and lead-gen strategies for years. Audiences tune in to gain access to industry experts and learn from their cutting-edge ideas and strategies. And as a podcaster, the best part is….they’re already recorded! Let’s take an already proven/successful webinar and transform it into a must-listen podcast episode.
Format Your Episode Into A Clip Show
You’re probably asking, “But Devin, why would I give free access to gated content like my webinars and broadcast that to the world?”
Great question – You don’t have to! Ultimately, you’ll want to review the webinar and identify key clips you’ll want to highlight on your podcast episode. Think of this as a clip or highlight reel of the main event. You can then inject commentary between the clips to add more context, insights, and intrigue to the presented ideas.
The best part of this is you can use the episode to fuel your on-demand webinar campaign! Throughout the episode, you should remind your audience that this is just a taste of what they can get from the full conversation and that they can sign up for the on-demand webinar at the link in the show notes. Next thing you know, you’re converting podcast listeners into qualified webinar leads!
Trade Shows & Conferences: A Goldmine Of Exciting Podcast Content
Trade shows and conferences allow businesses to share ideas, learn from industry experts, and stay updated with current trends. And whether you’re an attendee, sponsor, or showrunner, you have a unique opportunity to fill your episode schedule with exclusive content your audience can’t get anywhere else.
What exactly am I talking about? Well, your podcast audience will fall into one of two camps:
- They attended the show: If you’ve been to a live show before, you know how hectic things can get. Schedules fill quickly and it’s next to impossible to experience everything the show offers. Your podcast episodes can now give these folks an opportunity to experience something they may have missed while at the show.
- They didn’t attend the show: FOMO is real, and for these folks, you’d be giving them a slice of the live show, allowing them to experience a portion of it themselves.
Either way, there’s real value here for your audience. So how do you create podcast episodes based on live shows you’re attending this year?
First, if you are the showrunner, check out our blog post on how to turn your live event into a full podcast series. We have clients who base their entire podcast strategy around this idea and can fill out the entire season’s worth of episodes using only the content from their events.
If you’re not the showrunner, you still have plenty of options:
- Session Recaps: While using recordings of sessions is probably something you can’t/shouldn’t do, you can definitely reference sessions on your show and build episodes based on what you’ve learned. You can even reach out to the speaker of the session for comment or invite them on for a full episode. This strategy would require you to go into any given session ready to take notes so you can easily reference key points when recording your episode later.
- Show Floor Interviews: With trade shows and conferences bringing people together, it’s a perfect opportunity for you to connect with a guest and record an interview for an episode. Some of the best podcast conversations come from live shows as everyone’s gears are turning from the sessions they’ve attended and the ideas they’ve shared during networking.
If you need inspiration, check out the B2B Marketing Exchange Podcast, who successfully build entire seasons based on the conversations and content from their live show!
Conclusion
There’s no secret sauce here. Repurposing content has been a strategy for content creators for years. We are just taking those strategies and applying it to the podcast format. There are tons of businesses with media sitting in their archives that are ripe for the taking.
So whether it’s blog posts, videos, webinars, or trade show recordings, you have a wide range of content at your fingertips that can easily be repurposed into compelling podcast episodes for your listeners. Don’t sleep on these great content opportunities!
