The Easiest Way To Create Podcast Show Notes

André Bastié
André Bastié
Posted in Podcasting
2 min read
The Easiest Way To Create Podcast Show Notes

The easiest way to create podcast show notes is to have your podcast transcribed from audio to text and then follow this template.

Last week we talked about the crucial reasons why you need show notes: to boost credibility; to build relationships; and to increase accessibility.

Hopefully, we convinced you that show notes should be part of your post podcast production process. After all, you’ve done all the really hard work of creating your podcast, with a little more effort you can maximise the ROI of your podcast and ensure that you reach even more listeners and subscribers.

But what if you don't fancy yourself as a writer or you simply lack the time to creat show notes?

Don't worry. These easy steps will help you create great podcast show notes in less time than it takes for a cup of percolator coffee to brew.

Get Your Show Transcribed

First things first, get your whole podcast transcribed. Converting the audio to text is going to massively help you create great show notes quickly.

There are several ways to convert audio to text, but we recommend using an automatic transcription service provider like Happy Scribe. Happy Scribe can covert your podcast to text in a matter of minutes, accurately, and inexpensively.

There are several benefits of seeing your podcast in text over listening to it as audio. First, it is quicker to scan text than listen to audio to find information that you might want to include in your show notes. Then once you have found what you want to include, a simple cut and paste process can insert that text into your show notes with minimal effort. Without that text, you would need to manually listen, pause, type, rewind and listen again to what was said. This not only takes hours but you risk typing what the interviewee said incorrectly.

Additionally, after you have created a series of podcasts, search functions of the text of your podcasts make it is to cross reference different podcasts that you have created. Linking content in this way can help increase your audience. All good things.

Create a Template and Follow It

The purpose of podcast show notes is two-fold: to generate listeners and to deepen the relationship with your current audience.

To achieve both of these objects your show notes should me more than just a repeat of the description you uploaded to iTunes or Spotify.

But what should that include?

Well I’m glad you asked. My friend at the Nathan Seward Show produces not only excellent podcasts, but excellent show notes too. They are engaging, informative and very well laid out. Moreover, they follow the same template, including the same types of information each time. The benefit of coming up with a template for your show notes is that it will save you a tremendous amount of time in creating them for each show.

Let’s look closer at what he includes:

A Google Friendly Intro

At the top of your show notes include the name of your show, episode number and and icons for all of your sharable links.

After this, include a 150 to 200 word Google Friendly introduction. This introduction should summarise the main idea of the episode and it should give some background on the guests that appear on your show. It should also include the keywords and phrases that you want to be appearing in during search results.

List of Show Topics

Including information about your episode in both paragraph and bullet point formwill help appeal to different audience types that will come across your show notes. For those who want to read, there is the Google Friendly Intro. For those quickly skimming to see if your show will talk about the information relevant to them, then the bullets are useful.

This bullet list should just be an outline of what you discuss in your show. Once again, using the transcript to read and joint down these bullet points will be much easier than listening to the audio of your show.

Something as simple as saying: ‘In this episode we will discuss:’ followed by the bullet list should suffice here.

Further Background on the Guest or Sponsor

Let's be honest with ourselves. Your guest or sponsor of your show most likely agreed to work with you, because they wanted some backlinks and promotion of who they are and what they do. Help them out in this regard, and show your appreciation for taking their time to be on your show by including some additional background information in your show notes. This can include links to their websites and social media pages.

Links to Additional Resources

Your podcast show notes should also include links to any additional resources that you mention. This can include websites, books, news articles, movies, research, and even related podcasts of your own.

Including clickable links about the topics and research you mentioned in your podcast, helps build a deeper relationship with your listener. For one, they can listen to your show without having to have a pen and paper ready to jot down this information. For another, your action of providing them with additional information that they are interested in shows that you care about them.

Embed Your Podcast

Finally, either include links and icons on where to listen to the podcast or actually embed the podcast into the bottom of the show notes.

Drop in a Memorable Episode Quote

The Nathan Seaward Show doesn't include this last element, but it is one that I like.

Scan through the automated transcription of your podcast and find one or two notable quotes to highlight in your podcast show notes. These quotes should be snippets of dialogue that either you or your interviewee said that provide a unique point of view and is attention grabbing. The aim is to use them to draw people into listening to your episode.

You can also use these on social media to garner additional interest in your show.

There you have it: an easy way to create podcast show notes. By getting your podcast transcribed from audio to text and using the template suggested above, you will be able to quickly generate additional content for your listener, which will hopefully translate into more subscribers and higher numbers.

Are there other elements you include in your show notes? Let us know in the comments below!

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