The power of show notes to draw an audience
Show notes are likely the most important part of your marketing, because it’s the closest a “pitch” can get to the play button. Here’s some tips for making them sing.
By Liam Riordan, Producer
Show notes are often the neglected children of great podcast episodes. They’re usually written right at the end of the process, when you’re heavily focused on the audio polish and you’re sprinting at a publication deadline. Unfortunately, this means one of the best pitches available for your show often goes overlooked and undercooked.
Great show notes do a lot of heavy lifting: they outline the tone of the show, highlight the topics covered, and most importantly – they directly tell potential listeners why they should hit download.
So while we’re all in the business of creating great audio, don’t forget it’s the text (not the audio itself) that helps your ideal listeners find their ideal listening material. In the same way that putting a bit of extra effort into imaginative, intelligent editing can elevate the listening experience, that extra attention can yield the same results in the description box.
Here are a few things I always think about with show notes:
1. Start with story
Whether it’s a narrative-driven show or a news/topical podcast, every podcast is ultimately telling a story; that’s why we make (and listen to) them in the first place. Listeners are drawn to story, and that’s just as true before they download your show as it is once they’ve got their headphones on. So find a surprising, intriguing moment in the episode itself, and tell it out in writing. I find it works best when the moment is small and relatively self-contained, but also speaks to the broader themes or ideas of the episode at large. However you choose to bring story into your show notes, the most important step is then to tease the bigger picture, and convert that reader into a listener.
Here’s a great example from a show that consistently has sharp, concise, super hooky show notes, Planet Money:
It’s just four sentences (one of which is just one word), and it’s literally about sand. And yet it’s a master-class in carefully constructed writing.
“Sand. It’s in buildings, windows, your cell phone.” This is what a screenwriter might consider the ‘first act’ of these show notes. It sets up the ‘world’ by clearly stating the show’s topic, but it also sets up an unexpectedly dramatic contrast.
“But there isn’t enough in the world for everyone.” Already, a problem is introduced, and it’s a surprising one. If there’s one thing we understand about sand, it’s that it’s everywhere, so ubiquitous that it’s become a go-to metaphor for abundance.
“And that’s created a dangerous black market.” The final sentence ramps up the stakes created by the problem. Suddenly, a topic as banal as sand starts to really matter, and the mention of a dangerous black market teases a much bigger story than we initially expected.
2. Drop the radio-speak
This is common advice for podcast production. Given the similarities in mediums, it’s natural that a lot of the characteristics of radio would become the default characteristics of podcasting. But often it doesn’t work the same way, and that’s equally true for show notes.
The most common pitfall here is the word “today”, and other timestamps like it. Radio’s a live format, but podcasting is (or should be) evergreen. In most cases, “today’s episode” stops making sense before that episode’s even published, and apart from examples like daily news shows, a lot of podcast episodes aren’t even meant to be “today’s episode”, they’re meant to be “whenever you find them” or “whenever you need them” episodes.
3. Frame it for ‘YOU’
Podcasting is the most intimate form of media we have: you’re speaking directly into your listener’s ears. That intimacy can work in show notes when you write in the second person, directly addressing the listener. The right topic at the right time might lead someone to download an episode, but nothing pulls them in like directly telling them: “If YOU are like THIS, then YOU need to listen to THIS EPISODE.”
Marketing expert Seth Godin highlights why this is so important in his book This is Marketing. He says: “People don’t want what you make. They want what it will do for them.” So tell your listeners what you can do for them, and make it as clear as possible by framing for “you”. Like most things, what works in the show notes also works in the audio itself, so this tip’s also handy for writing scripts.
Take this example from a show Deadset Studios made with the University of Queensland called Doomscroll Remedy:
“I don't think anyone really wakes up one day, gasping for breath and thinking everyone else is a lizard.”
Like Molly, you probably know someone who has tried to convince you that vaccines are full of mind-controlling nanobots, or that 5G towers are really being used to brainwash us.
Maybe you’ve even heard some that actually make you stop and think: like, maybe something supernatural is going on in the Bermuda Triangle?
The framing in these show notes is especially important because, as the name suggests, Doomscroll Remedy is interested in real, actionable solutions to problems that listeners can implement for themselves. So framing the issue not as a big, unwieldy, far-off problem for someone else to deal with, the show notes effectively remind listeners that you are involved; you know people wrapped up in conspiracy theories, and you can do something about it.
4. Tone up
Finally, maximise the impact of your show notes by telegraphing the tone of your podcast. Just like the right music and artwork signal whether something’s going to be light-hearted or dead serious, the specific language and voice you use in your show notes tell listeners what kind of experience they’ll get out of your show.
You can go quite deep with this too. The right artwork doesn’t just tell you how heavy a show’s subject matter is – using the right colours can differentiate a fun and frivolous show about relationships from an expert’s academic dissection of the same topics. In the same way, using the right voice and tone in your show notes can help you target a really specific audience, right down to age range or fandom membership.
Here’s how two dramatically different sets of show notes can represent two dramatically different shows:
These show notes don’t just tease a great story. They also tell listeners exactly what type of story they’re in for. The mention of multiple dates, locations and names calls to mind police procedurals and hard-boiled detective tales, but they also tell listeners they’re in for an information-dense, detail-oriented mystery.
On the complete opposite end of the spectrum, let’s look at an episode of a show we worked on with iHeartRadio Australia, called Hooked, Hitched & Hung Up with Brittany Hockley and Laura Byrne. The show notes open with these lines:
“Remember that time the whole world scapegoated a 20-something-year-old intern but not her very married, much older, very presidential secret lover?
You might sort of know what happened between former US President Bill Clinton and White House intern Monica Lewinsky. But the story’s taken on mythical status over the years, blurring the memories of those who watched it unfold on TV, and making it a confusing mess for those who didn’t.”
The story of the affair between Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky is complicated and detail-heavy like the Casefile episode, but the tone of the show couldn’t be more different. Phrases like “very married” promise a more conversational, comedic listening experience than the tense, unnerving atmosphere of true crime.
Sometimes show notes can feel like the final hurdle in podcast production, but they’re really the first step in your marketing and promotion. Show notes are likely the most important part of your marketing, because it’s the closest a “pitch” can get to the play button. So if you’ve made a beautiful piece of audio, make sure the people who would love to hear it know what it is, and know it’s for them. Start with story, drop the radio-speak, frame it for ‘you,’ and set the tone.