Podcasting

  • November 3, 2025

    Capture Podcast Notes with Podcast Magic

    Just yesterday I was lamenting that I can no longer use PodHighligher, a service that will let you, “capture highlights from your podcasts in Overcast and sync them with Readwise, email, and more.”

    I no longer use Readwise, and use a bunch of podcasting apps. My current daily driver is Pocket Casts.

    Today, thanks to Podnews, I came across an incredible app called Podcast Magic that will let you just email a screenshot to them. They email you back a transcript and audio clip.

    I tried it and it worked like gangbusters. You can get unlimited* moments for just $20, and it was the easiest $20 I’ve ever spent.

    It’s from the makers of Sublime App. They reached out to me earlier this year and offered a free early adopter account. I haven’t given it a fair shake, but I will now…especially since I moved on from Readwise. It looks really great.

    And the best part is while they claim it only works with Spotify and Apple Podcasts, I found it also works with Pocket Casts AND Overcast.

    Check Out Podcast Magic

    *The unlimited Caveat is you get 1,000 and they reserve the right to charge you after that. But like…1,000 is a lot.

  • November 13, 2024

    What Potholes Have to do with Podcasting

    I lived exactly 1/3 of my life in Scranton, PA. I moved there (more or less) in 2003 as a freshman at The University of Scranton. I stay there through undergrad and grad school, then taught there and worked in the IT department.

    I moved away from Scranton in 2016. That’s 13 of my 39 years in the Electric City.

    There were a lot of things to love about it. I had a strong community there. I did work that I felt made an impact. The cost of living was low. My all-time favorite cigar shop, bar, and rooftop are all there.

    But something I don’t miss is the potholes that plague the city.

    The problem is so bad that earlier this year, they launched a website for people to report potholes.

    Since Scranton is located in the Northeast USA, at the base of mountains, it’s more susceptible to the freeze/thaw cycle. Here’s how The Keystone explains it:

    Daily temperatures can fluctuate between freezing and mild during the winter months. After precipitation, either rain or snow, the water seeps into the soil below the roadway. When it gets colder, the precipitation freezes and the ground expands, pushing the road up. Then, as the weather warms, the precipitation melts, and a gap is left between the road and the ground below it. When a vehicle drives over it, the road cracks, falls into the gap, and creates a pothole.

    The only thing you can do with a pothole is report it and wait for it to get fixed (or if you’re PENDOT, you can fix it).

    I feel like over the last few months, I’ve been going through a freeze/thaw cycle with Streamlined Solopreneur.

    Some episodes have done well — but some are very cold.

    My download numbers are down. Engagement hasn’t been as good as I hoped it would be.

    That’s not to say that things are bad — but I’d like them to be better.

    And I understand that competition is stiff in 2024. And that I completely rebranded my show a mere 7 months ago.

    Over those 7 months, some potholes have formed. And it’s time for me to fix them.

    I was on a call with my friend Carly and we were discussing what we feel is working and not working in podcasting.

    Recently, I was on a call with my friend Carly, discussing what we think is working—and not working—in podcasting.

    I told her I’m committing to a couple of experiments:

    1. Producing more solo episodes
    2. Adopting a format with a rotating group of co-hosts instead of constant guest interviews

    I believe that changing the format—especially when people are eager to learn and there’s an overabundance of interview shows—is crucial for my show’s continued growth.

    But that also means upheaval for my processes—and that’s OK.

    Sometimes you need to shake things up to improve your show or business, as long as you have a good approach.

    My plan is:

    1. Focus on capturing the content effectively and document the process.
    2. Test this new approach a few times to identify what’s repeatable.
    3. Develop my Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) by recording and narrating the process so my VA and I can assess.
    4. Adjust my automations and delegation to align with the new process.

    My suspicion is that the new formats will be easier, but there are some unknown variables I’ll need to consider.

    We’re coming up on the end of the year—a time of reflection and renewal for many. This is how I’m reflecting.

    What are you thinking about changing as we move into the new year?

  • August 18, 2024

    See You at Podcast Movement!

    The last few years, I’ve skipped out on Podcast Movement, and last year I had pretty hardcore FOMO.

    So I decided this year I wouldn’t make the same mistake (it being geographically close made the decision much easier).

    This week I’m heading down to DC for a week of podcasting talk and events and I couldn’t be more excited.

    If you’re going to be there, I’d love to say hello! There are a few ways to connect:

    • I’ll be around, wearing my yellow Streamlined Solopreneur hat — so keep an eye out!
    • I’m also doing a number of Brain Dates about automation. If one fills up, don’t worry! I’ll be adding more.
    • You can also send me a DM on the PM app, Twitter, or LinkedIn. I’ll have them all installed on my phone, push notifications on!

    My goal is to learn as much as I can about where podcasters spend too much time. And of-course meet awesome people.

    But there’s also a late-breaking development on something I’ve been thinking about regarding podcast-specific communities.

    There are lots of tools for this, including a new one I was excited about (I’m less excited now for reasons I may explain at some point). But nothing has really caught on.

    So as I noodle on this, I’ll be talking to podcasters about that too.

    If you’re not going to be there, don’t fret. I’m going to publish as regularly as I can over on the Podcast Workflows podcast feed. Listen and subscribe here.

    One last thing — my latest episode of the podcast is a new installment in the 3 Things series: 3 Things I’m Struggling with for This Podcast.

    It’s a good bit of introspection and I think you’ll enjoy it!

    Listen Here

  • July 29, 2024

    How I Prepped 9+ Piece of Content in 4.5 Hours

    In preparation for a recent vacation, I recorded and wrote a bunch of content to schedule in my absence.

    Today, I want to share with you how I churned out 9+ pieces of content over the course of 4.5 hours.

    Here’s the output:

    1. 3 YouTube videos
    2. 3 podcast episodes from those videos
    3. 1 blog posts
    4. 1 live stream
    5. 1 short form video
    6. Audio of live stream republished to a podcast feed

    And here are the tools I used:

  • November 3, 2023

    Testing a post-roll Ad for my newsletter

    I’ve been thinking a lot about podcast calls to action lately. I even talked about it on my new daily podcast, Podcast Workflows.

    Increasingly, I feel my stance on a pre-roll CTA, before you deliver any value, is bad. It’s like asking for the sale before someone knows who you are. It’s like asking blind date.

    Some people are OK giving it a try and hoping for the best. But most people want to know a little more before they’re in.

    I’ve also stated that calls to action at the end of the episode generally don’t work, as most people have left by the end.

    I still think that’s true — but I’ve decided to experiment with post-roll ads. Here’s why, and how I’m doing it.

    First, I’m limited this experiment to Podcast Workflows, in part because 4/5 episodes each week are less than 7 minutes long. Listeners are much more likely to stick around until the end.

    Next, I’ve specifically created a post-roll ad — calling attention to the listener that this is the last thing they’ll hear, by saying “ Hey before you go…”

    I tell them they just listened to something to help them improve their podcast processes, and I have something else for free that can help them do the same thing.

    I deliver the value, then I make the ask.

    Initial impressions are good. There aren’t that many listeners of the podcast yet — I want to build the library before I really start promoting it — but it seems like about 1/10 listeners are signing up after hearing the post-roll.

    I’m tracking this 2 ways:

    1. UTM codes on the URL: https://podcastliftoff.com/freebie/?utm_source=podcastworkflows&utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=postroll&utm_content=CTA
    2. A Gravity Form that passes the referring URL to a custom field in ConvertKit

    This combo allows me to create a segment of anyone who came from the Podcast Workflows podcast.

    I’ll mostly use that segment to quickly get a number of subscribers (since November 1st, when I rolled out the post-roll) are coming from the post-roll ad.

    My hypothesis is that I’ll capture about 5-10% of listeners this way, for the exact reasons I stated before: the episodes are short, so consumption is high, and I’ve delivered value.

    For other shows, my goal is still to find a good place in the mid roll for the CTA — but I’m guessing it will actually be better to do it towards the beginning, or more organically.

    I’ll use the same method to track efficiency: UTM codes and custom fields.

    In-fact, UTM codes will be such a crucial part of my linking strategy moving forward that I’m thinking of building a text expander snippet or shortcut to easily build them.

    More on that at another time though.

  • September 29, 2023

    SOP for Publishing my Daily, Mini Podcast

    I like to imagine that when Thomas Jefferson finished writing the Declaration of Independence, he sat back in the swivel chair he invented, smiled, and sighed a big sign of relieve.

    The same thing goes for when Walter Cronkite finished his first TV broadcast, JK Rowling finished Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, and Simone Biles stuck the landing in her last Olympic gold medal performance.

    Not that anything I’ve done is anywhere close to the same level of any of those things…but I’ve finally done it. I hit the proverbial “publish” button on my new daily podcast.

    I’ve been sitting on it for a while, saying that it’s not as good as I’d like it to be. That I don’t have as many episodes banked as I’d like. That I don’t have a rock solid process in place.

    All of those are poor excuses though. I so I finally hit publish.

    It starts Monday, October 2nd, a week where I’ll be away at a conference called CaboPress.

    …not that it matters much, because I have a whole process in place that I’m going to share with you — how I started, and where I’ll go from here.

    I also have some announcements about the membership at the end!

  • September 26, 2023

    Creating a Solo Episode – Recording and Editing

    I’m working on a longer form series on how I create solo episodes, which will likely go on Medium. But I’d like to publish the parts here, as I write them.

    As the baseball season winds down (for Yankee fans, anyway), I find myself thinking about the process of the sport as it relates to publishing my podcast.

    Like many things in life, both have a number of moving parts and contexts in which you want to change your approach.

    For example, in baseball, you have pitching coaches and hitting coaching. More granularly, they also have infield coaches and outfield coaches.

    You don’t want your pitcher to take the same throwing approach as your right fielder.

    The same thing goes for podcasting — I usually publish interviews for How I Built It. But once a month or so, I’ll do a solo episode, and the process is quite a bit different.

    For one, I’m not scheduling with anyone, so I don’t need to find a set time to record. I’m also not doing a pre-interview…but that research is replaced with topic research.

    Finally, I don’t usually send solo episodes out for edit.

    I’ll cover every aspect of the solo show here eventually, but today I want to talk about recording and editing. 

  • August 16, 2023

    Why Descript Buying SquadCast is Great for Podcasters

    Descript made a big splash on Tuesday by announcing they acquired the popular remote recording service, SquadCast.

    Something I couldn’t stop thinking about after Riverside, SquadCast’s biggest competitor, launched edit via transcripts is how it felt like they’re trying to eat Descript’s lunch.

    After all, Descript has made a name for itself as the easiest way to edit your podcast. Before that app, for most podcasters editing was a tedious fever dream of scrubbing wave files and hoping for the best.

    Then Descript came along and made editing audio as easy as editing a Google Doc.

    Brilliant.

    Riverside made its name as being an incredibly reliable, usually easy, way to record the highest-level quality audio possible…but they wanted to be a one stop shop.

    Meanwhile, it was starting to feel like Descript lost the thread. Studio Sound is a revelation, but then they redesigned the app to be more video focused. They started adding more AI features…like Eye Contact.

    What are they doing?

    So when they announced this acquisition yesterday, I was happy to see a great return to form.

    Descript + SquadCast looks like it’s going to be an incredible tool for podcasters to greatly improve their process. Record in SquadCast, automatically get those files in Descript, and use a familiar interface to edit AND publish…as seamlessly as possible.

    The best part is that SquadCast is included in Descript’s plans (at least for now). That makes it a very competitive, very compelling offer.

    Riverside is one of the few services I pay for annually, so I have until November.

    But I have a hard time seeing myself staying with Riverside. SquadCast being part of Descript effectively cuts my costs in half.

  • August 19, 2022

    The Profitable Podcast is Now Available for Purchase

    Earlier this week, I did a paid workshop to help people build the proper foundations to make their podcast profitable. That workshop is now available for purchase and instant download. You can get it here for $78. Here’s what you’ll learn:

    • To attract the audience brands want to reach.
    • 4 paths to revenue that aren’t sponsorship.
    • How to build a content pipeline your audience can’t get enough of.
    • The fastest way to launch a podcast website