Creating Podcast Episodes That Listeners Love | Lindsay Graham

Anyone can start a podcast or become a podcast guest, but creating episodes that listeners finish is rare! Thankfully, there’s a framework you can follow that listeners love! In this episode, Alex Sanfilippo and Lindsay Graham share a 4-step framework that makes every minute compelling without adding complexity! Get ready to create episodes that keep listeners engaged from start to finish and that they’ll want to share!

MORE FROM THIS EPISODE: HTTPS://PODMATCH.COM/EP/381

Chapters

00:00 Introduction and Background
04:57 The Importance of Preparation
10:09 Crafting an Engaging Beginning
15:13 Maintaining Momentum in the Main Segment
22:54 Ending with Impact

Takeaways

Preparation is key to a successful podcast episode.
The beginning of a podcast should hook the audience immediately.
Maintaining momentum is crucial to keep listeners engaged.
Ending a podcast on a high note reinforces the message.
Planning helps articulate the intent behind the content.
Spontaneity can enhance a conversation if prepared for.
Avoid raising questions in the listener's mind during the episode.
Authenticity is the niche that attracts an audience.
Every segment of a podcast should have intention and purpose.
Use storytelling techniques to create engaging content.

MORE FROM THIS EPISODE: HTTPS://PODMATCH.COM/EP/381

Transcript

Hey everyone, Alex Sanfilippo here, host of Podcasting Made Simple. And I am really excited today. I've got a close friend of mine, Lindsey Graham, joining today. Lindsey, welcome. So glad you're here. Good to see you. Thanks for having me. Absolutely, man. I've been looking forward to this for a long time because I know this topic is going to be really impactful for the podcast hosting guests that are going to be tuning in. Before we get started though, I want to hear a little bit about your background.

And then I have a funny story on how we met because it's funny to me, at least I hope some other people find the humor in as well, but just a little bit about like what you do in podcasting and yeah, why don't you go and share that real quick here? Yeah, sure. So I am a podcast professional. I do it full time and I've been doing it full time for gosh, almost eight years. Yeah. So I'm the host of several, you know, history focused podcasts, American history tellers, American scandal, history daily.

I have a podcast production company that does all the work for those shows, but some other history shows too, history that doesn't suck and tides of history. And then all the other assorted business and work that surrounds that sort of stuff. But yeah, it's been a long, long journey. I get called in a podcast OG occasionally because we started so early in 2017, 2018, but I actually had my first podcast in 2005.

So I will take the OG label. You know, I didn't know that about you till recently. I was like, no way. You did something early on there, took a bit of a break, came back with a vengeance, clearly. I heard an episode of History Daily. I listened to it recently. I'm a little bit late here. You sounded a lot like Ryan Reynolds. Can you just? yeah. It was so funny. Just tell everyone that story real quick, because it made me laugh.

I believe you probably listened to the April 1st episode from two years ago in which I somehow convinced the Ryan Reynolds to show up and narrate for us. He was very generous and dropped into my DMs on Twitter one day just to say how much he enjoys history daily. Apparently he listens on the walk home from dropping his daughters off at school.

And that's all he wanted to say, one creator to another, I guess. I mean, once you get Ryan Reynolds like in your phone typing at you, I was a little, starstruck, but also needed to, to, to grab the opportunity. And somehow I wrestled his arm and convinced him to do our April Fools episode. And by the way, so funny. I mean, I'm not going to spoil it. Everyone should go like find it. You can find it pretty easily. The way he started off made me instantly like he's got a

voice it if you've heard it you know it right and it doesn't sound like Lindsay but anyway I'll leave that for another time now the story of how we met so this is going back years this is probably 2019 maybe 2020 I'm not even sure the year we were both in some sort of podcasting group I can't even recall where it was but there was an opportunity for people to be a mentor and be a mentee and so I signed up for both I'm like I'd love to be a mentor but also love to learn so I'll be a mentee as well and I get this email it says you're assigned to Lindsay you are going to mentor Lindsay I was like great don't know who Lindsay is

We get on a phone call and then you reduce yourself, Lindsey Graham. And I knew your voice because I've been listening to your podcast. And I'm like, Hey Lindsey, so like, what am I supposed to teach you? Right? Like you got one of the most popular voices in all of podcasting. I'm like, what are we doing here? And I was kind of like, it's great to meet someone who's show I've been listening to. It made me laugh so hard to be in that position. I'm like, I don't know what I'm supposed to tell you here. Like I was a lot newer in my journey than you were.

Well, you know, I signed up, I think it was the podcast Academy. have a mentor program and I signed up for both mentor and mentee for the exact same reasons. It's like, I would love to help out where I can, but I also know I need to learn. you know, like your expertise, your center of influence is completely different from mine. And, and that's, that's an opportunity for growth. So I was glad that you signed up. Yeah, it sparked into a great friendship. So I'm thankful for that part of it for sure. So.

All right, for today, I want to get into the topic, kind of frame it a little bit here. There's a difference between a podcast that you're just producing, creating the podcast, right? And one that people actually want to hear. And this matters for both a guest and host. Like this isn't just one side. So guest is not like, well, the host job is to make it a good podcast, right? Like if you're doing most of talking, it's going to be sometimes mostly on you. But the whole idea here, the goal of what we're talking about today is to learn how to create content. So create a podcast episode that people actually want to listen to from start to finish.

And again, we're going to cover both sides here as a guest, as a host, how we can kind of work together to make that happen. Before we end this episode, like later on in the conversation, I'm actually going to share a really cool resource and service that Lindsay has. They can help a lot of us podcasters keep our content even more engaging. So stay tuned for that. That'd be really cool. But for now, I want to transition into the four points we're going have today. So my one, there's four steps involved in this and Lindsay, there's probably like 20 or 30, realistically, we still break it all up, but we're going to keep it somewhat high level and simple today and really impactful for people. I am going to share this. The first one.

is not what most people are gonna think. So I'm gonna go and dive in these four points now, but point number one is what I'm titling before the episode. Before you ever get to the green room, before you ever hit record, as a guest and a host, you've got some work to do if you want the episode to actually be good. Lindsay, I'm talking about the planning and the research process. Can you talk a little bit about how important this is before we ever get to the microphone? Yeah, absolutely. You know, all those aphorisms about planning are correct, right? You know, if you fail to plan, plan to fail.

know, planning is just practice, really. And as we all know, another aphorism, practice makes perfect. You have to come into any effort with intention. It is going to be very rare that you, anyone, is just talented enough to show up, then excel. So, you know, my podcasts are much more involved on the pre-production side. When I get in front of a microphone, that's actually one of the very last steps, really.

what we are doing instead, and we don't have lot of interview guests. so there's a bit of a difference, but I think the philosophy is the same. We know well ahead of time, not only what the episode is trying to achieve, but how it's going to achieve it. We have prepared through rigorous research and a lot of writing and revision, that attempt of what we're trying to achieve. We know what the episode means in terms of the context of the season that we're producing.

And we know what the season is trying to accomplish in terms of the podcasts. Each one of those things has, I guess, a mission statement to it. We know exactly what even, you know, this paragraph is trying to accomplish in this act of this episode, of this season, of this podcast, right? Every single portion of the show has intention and purpose. All of that is planning, of course, right?

So what you do ahead of the episode, I think is the episode. It's not even just as important as the episode. It is the episode because any conversation, any piece of communication, any creative effort is rather meaningless if it doesn't have a message, if it doesn't have intent. Why would anyone listen to you if you can't articulate what you're trying to communicate? If you don't, you know, there's a

a saying I like about AI, but is applicable here. Why should I take the time to read what you've written if you didn't take the time to write it? Right? This is a transaction between you and your audience. And if you don't put in the work, I don't know why your audience would either. Man, that is well said. And I think that definitely applies really well. And yes, like a lot of your podcasts, narrative focus, like not necessarily interview style, but like there is something to be said for

doing the same idea with an interview, right? And for me, this is something I learned from you. I try to go chronological order of the conversation. Like today, I didn't start off being like, so like what's first? And then we talk about the beginning of the episode, right? Which is our next step. And then like later on go back to, well, is research important as well? Right? Like I tried to think, okay, like this is a conversation we're having. It's more of an interview even. And I want to figure out the steps so that people that are listening can kind of follow along. And I think that that happens before you get started. Cause once I'm here and once I start talking, it's kind of too late to backtrack, right?

Unless of course I'm gonna be moving text or audio all around, right? Like, which I guess some people can do that that's not a problem. But I think it's so important that we show up prepared with an idea. And because it is a conversation, you can't be totally like married to every piece of it. To me that matters. Like, you can't be like, here's the 10 questions I'm gonna ask no matter what. You might spark interest. You could hear something in your guest voice that you're like, wait, I need to actually dive into that. It might go a different direction, that's okay, but you've done your prep. So you have an idea of what you can always bring it back to. So.

I think that this is such an important point. I don't know, did you have anything to follow up with that, Lindsay, we move on to the next point? I want to make sure I left some space there. No, no, but I think you've introduced some interesting aspects. Spontaneity, surprises, you need to be prepared for those things. And hopefully you get your hand at a diamond in the rough, right? So one of my favorite quotes from Dwight Eisenhower is that, the plan is worthless, but planning is everything.

All right, so when you get on the battlefield, when you're there on the front lines, what, you know, all the X's and O's and little arrows that you drew, your plan really will not go to plan, right? It's not going to work out because the real world is much messier than whatever, you know, a simulation you can approximate in your head. But the process of planning makes you aware of what you're trying to accomplish in the conversation, makes you aware of the themes, makes you aware of your audience's interests.

so that you are not one, simultaneously distracted by a shiny object that your guest brings, but two, can also latch onto something that maybe was a little hidden, but fits your theme, and you can dive in to investigate it, even though that wasn't in your plan to begin with. I love the quotes, Lindsay. These are great. So good. For second time, we're gonna keep on moving here. So we're gonna move on to the second point here, which is what probably everyone thought the first point would be, right? So we talked about this idea of preparation, this idea of before it ever starts.

Number two is the beginning of the podcast episode. So the beginning, this is when you're first starting off, it's what people hear immediately. And first off, thankfully it's not quite social media. Like I think you have like one second to get someone engaged on social media. People are listening with intent. They're gonna give you a little bit more time than that, but it doesn't mean that you can't be intentional. And I'll be honest today, I'm having a bit of imposter syndrome even talking about this because I don't know if I start these conversations off really engaging. Like I try to kind of bring it in and keep it back and forth, ping pong a little bit with Lindsay today.

But sometimes I don't know, like, it interesting enough? Is it something that's gonna grab attention really? And at the end of the day, that's the idea. We want people to basically say, okay, this is good. Kind of like lean in more and more, right? Instead of being like, they're just kind of going back and forth and talking about nothing, right? Like, it's so important that we start our episodes off really strong. Can you talk about this intentionality that we have to have, Lenzi? Yeah, so this is one of the most artificial portions, I think, of any piece of, you know, media really.

We are lucky that in podcasting we're given a few extra seconds than short form video, for instance. We don't really have to stop the scroll as much. If someone clicks play on our episode, they're going to be engaged for a little bit, but they do eventually have to get hooked. The hook is real. It needs to be there. All right. So how do you do that? video and short form social, there's all sorts of formulas to do that. And those work, but

What I think is interesting here is that it is a bit artificial. All of those hooks, especially artificial, you know, the click-baity stuff. But what is authentic and artificial at the same time? What can possibly be something that you replicate over and over again once you've tested it and figured out that it works and it proves to be consistently interesting? This is going to be difficult, but you need to do it every single time because you are trying to get that hook in.

That's an algorithmic necessity, right? So one thing you can do is lean into your own listening behavior. Try and figure out what is engaging to you and why it is. One of the things that we probably all understand as podcast consumers, or just media consumers, is we like familiarity. We like to be on the inside of something. So if you develop a shtick,

It's something that works, a formula that you start with a horrible dad joke, first sentence out of your podcast every single time. If that works enough and you've stumbled upon it, well, okay, that's the artificiality you're looking for. Every single time I'll start with a dad joke and my audience expects it, and now if they don't hear it, they will actually be disappointed. It doesn't need to be a dad joke.

In some of my podcasts, I have heard from listeners that there's a certain background music that we use in every single introduction that they look forward to because they know what's coming and it helps amp up the storytelling. So it could be a production element. It doesn't really need to be content, but it is artificially chosen and it's done every single time. In many of my podcasts, we open with a cold open, a short story.

that has some sort of relevance to the larger story, but it is deliberately chosen to be action-packed or suspenseful or somehow thrilling to catch the listener's attention and to open up a curiosity loop as the creators like to say, right? But in the end, it's the same thing, isn't it? I planned for it. It's intentional. It's doing something that I know I want to do. I could fail at it. You know, I could be wrong, but...

I'll figure that out and replace it with something else. And then once I've got the formula, stick to the formula. I think that that's really wise. It's not going to be the same thing for all of us. I'll be real. If I did dad jokes on this podcast, people were like, this podcast is all podcasting, it dad jokes on it. Wait, Alex, aren't you not a dad? Oops. It might not really land. I've got a buddy and he has a podcast that's about playfulness. And he starts off with a corny joke. It might not be a dad joke, but something corny. He opens it up.

And then somewhere during the episode, he like closes like the loop on it. And it hooks people. For me, the first episode I ever heard of his show, the joke was so funny that I haven't forgotten it. And so it's like years later, I still remember it. The point here is to do something that's unique, that's different, that works with your personality, keeping in mind that most people who listen to a podcast are going to stay away through if they like you, the host, if they like the guest. And I think that many hosts do a good job picking guests. They're gonna be somewhat aligned with them. So I think it's a really good point. It's about getting creative, trying something.

coming up with that thing that is, yes, artificial, but that is authentic to you, I think is really important. I love this point, man. I wanna move on to the third point here. This is the main segment of the episode. Lindsay, I didn't know what to call this part of the episode. It was like the body of the episode, which is like more of a coding term, I suppose. So main segment of the episode. Hopefully that makes sense. This is like the meat of it. I don't know there's a technical word for it. Is there or am I just, I know? Yeah, I don't know. mean, body of the episode sounds good to me.

I should have stuck with that. That was my gut instinct. Oh well. All right. So the body of the episode is working on now. So this is like the whole thing. And what I found is there are some podcasts that start off really strong. they pull in a segment from somewhere in the middle of it. It's like a real hook and they kind of roll it into that. Like I've heard some really engaging stuff, but the problem is the longer the episode seems to go, the less interesting, the less engaging it gets. We've all seen movies that have this, don't know if a flaw is the right word or problem. It starts off swinging and you're like, this is going to be great. And then you're 20 minutes in and you're like, my

goodness, is it going to turn back around or should I just shut this off? And I think that many of us, our content gets less and less engaging, maybe even boring for some. And what I want to talk, have you talk about Lindsay is like, how do we keep up the momentum that we build from the beginning of the episode? Like how do we keep that going without like our energy depleting completely, right? Like, or it being so much that people just can't even stay engaged with it. Yeah. You, you remind me of, of, uh, something that filmmakers point out in script writing that there's a real problem with a failure in the second act.

Right? So many screenwriters will have a great idea, you know, an amazing opening sequence, maybe some, you know, giant action set pieces and a fantastic conclusion. But getting the characters from, you know, where they're introduced to the finale, there is this bit in the middle, the second act, and it's the hardest point to you to pull off. And mainly it's because it's all about transitions and changes.

and motivation for these characters to move from this part of the story to this part of the story. And it has to be realistic. has to, you the audience has to follow and believe that characters that were one way this in the beginning are now, you know, a different way in the end, right? But that's exactly why we listen to stories. We want to be on the journey. We want to feel the change. So I think for your listeners who are much more conversational, I would apply the same rules. Go look up.

you know, three act structure, read a bit of screenwriting theory of how to put in a story arc, how to start at the beginning and end at the end and figure out what the transformation is in the middle. Now, if you start thinking that way, I think you will do a couple of things. You might do a couple of things. One, you could deliberately segment your conversation into acts.

and tell your audience what you're doing. It's like in the first part of this conversation, we're gonna get to this and that, and then we'll move on to another thing, right? That's signposting, that's doing two things. One, being very clear about what your intentions are in the conversation, setting up a theme or a thesis, but also you're prompting your audience to listen for what's next, right? It's like, all right, I'm interested in this, but I know that this other thing that I'm interested in is gonna come, right? So there's a bit of anticipation.

But just letting a conversation organically happen without knowing that I need to ramp up or change or move, this thing needs to breathe, it needs to live. And it can if I hit this topic and then segue to this topic and the theme is tied for X number of reasons and I will explain those reasons or ask my guests to say, do you think the theme is tied for these reasons? You said this in the first part.

We're about to start talking about this in the second part. What do you think these similarities are? You know, there's all sorts of ways of doing it. But to go back to the very beginning of our conversation, all of this is planned, right? I know that I need to have contours to my conversation. I know that there needs to be slight pauses, slight breaks, some alterations, some changes in direction, some ups and downs, because that's what's interesting. A straight line on a flat plane

is only interesting to those studying geometry. I think about this idea of the segments and I like that. I think a lot of hosts do this even if it's kind of subconscious level. I will say for the guests, this is important right here. A lot of times the hosts, they're so familiar with your story now that they will accidentally leave gaps as they're transitioning between different parts of it. Your job as the guest is also be thinking as a listener. Like if we go from like, right, Alex, you had a corporate job for 15 years. Tell me about starting PodMatch. It's like, hold on there. There's a gap there, right?

how did you leave that job, right? And so what you want to do is make sure you kind of close that loop before you allow it to move on. You can't just be like, now, hold on, we got to go back. You find a way to tie it in. Be like, well, to continue where we left off, I actually ended up leaving that job on this day at this time, which kind of repelled me into starting what you just asked about, which is pod match. So now let me explain, answer your question about how I got this thing kicked off. As a guest, you've got to do that. Well, let me interject because you've brought, you've come back to like storytelling. What you've just described is that someone dropped the inciting

incident. They skipped it. These characters, if they go off on a heroic journey, we need to know why, what propelled them into action. If you are acute at all in storytelling, you will understand that there are critical moments. For me, my entire career, it was getting fired from my insurance job. I didn't just wake up and decide to be a podcaster, but that's the inciting incident.

And so for an interviewer or an interviewee, you can't let those things drop because that's the contour of the story. Yeah. The other thing I want to mention here, is the last point here on this section. We'll kind get into the next one, but I think that there's somebody said, and Lindsay, I believe I learned this from you actually, like there can't be questions happening in the minds of the listeners. Like it's got to be explained. And there's a lot of inside language on podcasts these days. And like, for some people like me, there's one podcast was listening to it and the guest and host kept on using this abbreviation I had never heard of.

I think it was at the gym, I wasn't in a place to like look it up. And I don't think I got much of the episode because I kept on thinking like, what could that mean? Right? Like it's raising questions. And I think that for a lot of us, again, because we've done a research or we know our topic, we still do mindful that somebody listening, we have to just assume they don't know anything about this. Lindsay, I believe I learned this from you and it kind of goes off what we were just talking about. But any idea or advice for somebody that's like, maybe struggle with that a little bit. Yeah, you're reiterating one of my golden rules of audio. Raise no questions.

Audio consumption is this real time, almost stream of consciousness thing. And even though we have a pause and a rewind button, no one's going to use it. Instead, they're just going to go, what? And as soon as they say what, then they're focusing on what they thought they heard and not what's going on right now. And so you've got a double what, which turns into a triple what, you and then you've lost the entire thing. And it's so much easier to, for someone, a listener, once they get confused and asking questions in their head,

to just hit stop and then get distracted with something else rather than pay attention to your content. It is imperative that you lock in, that you hold their attention completely. And this means raising no questions. If ever you could properly explain something, set it up a little better, make no assumptions about your listeners' expertise, you don't wanna be overly pedantic and you don't wanna patronize your listeners. You hope that your listeners are intelligent, informed people.

But maybe they're not paying 100 % attention. Maybe you do need to say, at first use, like everyone knows what the FBI is, right? But the first time I bring it up, I'm going to say the Federal Bureau of Investigation. And then I'll say the FBI. Other acronyms are much worse, right? Especially in a jargony situation. But never raise questions. So good, man. We got Lindsay's golden rule today, everybody. Come on. That's a win. We could end right here now.

Moving on to our fourth and final point here, this is ending the episode. So the end of the episode. I actually, I gotta confess here, man, I gave a keynote presentation recently and I was very prepared except for the very end of it. And I think I said something along the lines of like, so yeah, that's all I got. Thanks everybody. And like, I missed a big opportunity to like end with the same authority and power I had through the whole presentation. I just didn't ever think about my ending.

I think when I was even practicing, like, and then I'll just kind of segue into my finisher, my closer, right? And not that we need some powerful statement, but maybe we do. Can you just talk about the very end of an episode? Like how do we end it back on a high note with some energy makes someone say, can't wait for the next one. Yeah, well, I would just reflect, try to remember how many movies I've seen that end with, so that's what I got. Not many, I don't think. I don't think I got enough for a movie. Right, or any story ever.

Usually, I mean, we're looking for summation, we're looking for closure. Even when the intent is to have the ending be ambiguous, that's still intentional, right? You want the audience to walk away with, to mull over what they've just consumed. You are a virus. You're trying to infect your audience with an idea, right? So this is your very last opportunity to remind them what that idea is. Whether it's...

whole series of podcasts or a 30 minute keynote or something, this is your absolute instance to leave them with the crystallization of the idea. It doesn't have to be explicit. You don't have to say, and so that's what I think about B2B SaaS opportunities, but it should be final and it should be of a piece, right? One of the reasons why, you know, so that's what I've got, if you don't mind me picking on you, is a bad...

piece of content is because it has no relationship to the rest of the content. You've broken the spell. You just became an ordinary regular guy and not the authoritative speaker, right? So when your content ends, just make sure it ends, but it ends well with intention and reinforces the message you're trying to convey. I like what you said. It crystallizes it. Like the whole thing you just did. I needed to hear that before I gave that keynote. So thank you now for my next one, Lindsay. I appreciate that.

Listen, we're to bring our conversation to an end here and we'll get your final thought in a minute here. But real quick, everybody, I mean, obviously look up Lindsey Graham, like the Voice of History podcasts, like go look up any of them. think I've listened to most and I'd say they're very good. I do want to mention something that Lindsey has. I kind of teased at the beginning here, but if you're a podcast host or podcast guest that has stories to tell, Lindsey's obsessed with creating narrative content that just keeps people engaged, like keeps people's attention. And so he's developed this program called Thrum and it's T-H-R-U-M-M.

Thrum.audio. Look this up. This is relative free music for podcasters, but composed with the idea of a narrative purpose. And I've listened to some of them. They are beautiful. I'm going to find a use case for myself, even just when I'm doing a solo talk for YouTube, or I'm telling a story. I'm excited to dive into it myself. So Lindsay, thank you for putting this together. It's very cool. So again, that's thrum.audio. Take a look at that, everybody. I encourage you to check it out. And now, Lindsay, as we bring it to a close here, any final thought you can share with us today?

Yeah, you know, I think probably most creators are a little anxious about the changing world, the pace of change and the pace of consumption, you know, differences and audience movements and technological platforms. It's especially in podcasting, you know, makes us a little unnerved. And so I just like probably many people go looking for advice. You know, if I want to break into video podcasting, for instance, how do I do this? And there's a

10,000 videos to tell me exactly how I should game the algorithm or what microphone or camera to buy. I can lose myself in the how-to literature of before I do anything. of course, the point of this is to create, not to learn how to create, right? But I did come across a piece of advice that I think I need to take to heart and I hope everyone else does too. So many podcasters are told that they need to find their niche, right?

They need to niche down or there's riches and niches, right? This one creator I stumbled across and unfortunately I can't remember who it was. They said that the niche is you. You are the reason not only you are creating, but the reason your audience is showing up. If you are, and it sounds, you know, a little kumbaya, but if you are authentic, if you're interested in what you're doing, there probably is an audience that will be interested in what you're doing as well.

I needed to hear that, you know, so that I don't fret so much about the technicalities, the formatting, you know, everything. What am I doing? I just need to do what I think is interesting. I could be wrong and maybe no one is going to show up, but no one is going to show up for certain if I just tick boxes. If I try to follow a formula without any organic human intention behind it. So you are the niche.

Remember that and try to exemplify it. Wow, that is powerful, man. That's really insightful. That's something I'm going to personally chew on myself quite a bit. And I believe that's going to impact a lot of people. Thank you. Lindsay, thank you for being here today. Thank you for sharing your wisdom. This was amazing, man. I'm really grateful for your time today. Well, thanks. I always love talking to you. And I'll be on the phone when I need more mentoring. Sounds good. Thanks, man. Appreciate you.