January 6, 2024 • 25 mins
In Episode 06 of How to Start a Podcast, you'll learn how to edit your podcast episodes and how to choose your editing software.
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Episode Transcript
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Alban (00:00):
I don't care how much Dear John, the Taylor Swift song
(00:04):
speaks to the vibe of yourpodcast. That is not your theme
song. I know I probably couldhave the FBI show up your house,
you might go, you will go tojail. You will get kicked out of
Spotify and Apple podcasts andyour shows not going to get out
to the world.
Gilon (00:24):
Welcome back to how to start your podcast. I'm Gilon
and Alban is here with me.
Alban (00:28):
Hey, everybody, and in this episode, we are going to
edit your podcast episode Therecorded in the last one.
Gilon (00:34):
I mean, we're not editing it, you're going to edit it.
We're gonna tell you how toedit. And we will
Alban (00:38):
teach you how to edit the podcast that you recorded prior
to now that's accurate. Yes.
Great. Great intro, guys.
Gilon (00:47):
Good job, people. So you recorded your episode. That was
great. You could just uploadthat audio, but we strongly
advise against it. That's, Imean, we just don't need to do
that. We should probably edit itfirst. You're great. But you're
not that good yet, kid. Here wego. We need to edit this audio.
So what's the goal of editing?
Right? Like, why should you evenedit your audio?
Alban (01:08):
Well, the benefits of editing are that we can take out
a lot of distractions. And wecan just clean up what we
actually want to say we there'slots of times we stumble over a
word, and maybe you went backand reset something, maybe the
beginning like we did on thisepisode, we already are at like
three minutes of us trying toget into a groove with the
(01:32):
actual content of the episode.
So it's not uncommon, you wantto clip off the front of the
recording, you maybe you'reclipping off the back, you're
adding you know your intromusic. So it's just to clean
things up. The goal is to cleanup the audio. It's not
perfection, like there's that aTolstoy quote, if you look for
perfection, you'll never becontent. And I think it's pretty
(01:53):
easy for us as podcasters toapproach our first episode, like
we are recording a story forThis American Life, or cereal or
like, I don't know, whateveryour favorite podcast is, you
will not sound like that. Inyour first episode. Those
podcasts have entire teams ofrecording experts, and expert
(02:15):
storytellers, and audioengineers and everybody
involved. So don't hold yourselfto that level of perfection.
Instead be kind and say, Hey,I'm just here to clean this up a
bit. And make it sound a bitbetter.
Gilon (02:34):
Right? Like you're a beginner in your closet. Let's
be real, right? And no,everybody starts somewhere,
right? If I actively avoidlistening to my first episode,
because I just can't in my soul.
I don't, I don't want to see thegrowth. But growth has happened.
Right? So you gotta have astarting point. So don't be hard
on yourself. Be compassionate,be kind, you're starting. You're
a beginner. Kudos for startingright. Some people don't show up
(02:57):
and you're choosing to show up.
So edit with that in mind. Sosome tips for editing we've
talked about, if you listen tothe last episode, having an
outline outline was superimportant, right? Hopefully you
stayed on track with youroutline. So you're not doing a
ton of editing. Now, like today,you are your future self that we
talked about. So either you'rekicking yourself in the pants
wishing you to listen, or you'relike yo, salon, and Alban really
(03:20):
saved me some time, I'm so gladI had an outline.
Alban (03:23):
When you're editing this episode, it's good to keep in
mind all the steps, we talkedabout writing an outline,
focusing on the separate tracksand the recording environment.
All those things like you willnotice that now in the editing
process, why those werecritically important because it
is so much nicer to avoid audiomistakes in the front end,
(03:45):
rather than trying to solve themon the back end. And so anything
you noticed that could beimproved, we'll write that down
so that in your next recording,that you actually are going to
take that into account, andreally get a much better audio
recording to help on next edit.
Gilon (04:03):
And I would definitely say you want to be mindful about
the first 30 seconds to a minuteof your audio, right? People
have short attention spans,they're listening to your audio
giving it a try. You want tomake sure that you tell them who
you are, what this podcast isabout really quickly so that
they know okay, this works forme or this is actually not what
I was looking for prettyquickly,
Alban (04:22):
right? We're trying to get a good hook. Like, what's
interesting, what is surprisingabout this, what are you going
to learn, you want to make surethat people know for a fact, I'm
in the right place. And ifthey're coming to be
entertained, like beentertaining, and put the very
most entertaining bit at thefront. If they're trying to
learn something, make sure youtell them this is what you're
(04:44):
going to learn at the front end.
People should be able to listento like 30 seconds a minute and
go I know exactly what is goingto come up in the rest of this
entire episode. We've seen it onour YouTube channel a ton right
where we can actually see thetruth drop off rates of when
people stop listening. And thefirst 30 seconds, it's like it
falls off a cliff, like a thirdof people give up in the first
(05:07):
30 seconds. But if you make itto a minute, even on a 15 minute
video, we know you're probablygoing to make it to the end. And
so it shows how criticallyimportant this first 30 seconds
to a minute are. With yourpodcast, it's exact same thing.
Make sure you tell this is whatyou need to know, here's what is
going to be delivered the valueof this episode. Don't take
(05:30):
seven minutes of banter beforeyou start talking about what's
actually going to be discussed.
Yeah, that's
Gilon (05:38):
really important real estate that you don't want to
misuse or miss out on andcompletely because you haven't
been intentional with thatspace. So some editing pointers,
what are important things tomake sure are present when
you're editing.
Alban (05:52):
Well, one you should be thinking about is a theme song.
So you probably didn't, youknow, sing in the beginning of
your episode. Or maybe you did,maybe you did, but you edited
that out. And now you want toput in some music. And the
reason music is really good isbecause that along with your
podcast artwork are two greatways to brand your podcast. Just
(06:14):
think about how powerful musicis as setting the tone, and the
feeling and the emotion forsomething. Well, you are going
to pick one song to brand yourshow in the exact way that you
want to. If it's salsa musicthat's very different than like
a Lo Fi beat. And that's verydifferent from like, some upbeat
(06:36):
pop song. Like they all havedifferent vibes. And if so if
you have like a true crimepodcast, and you want the
ominous music, don't put in somelike happy go lucky. You know,
music is disjointed, from thecontent of the podcast,
Gilon (06:52):
right? Your music is definitely like a vibe check
moment, right? So it should aswell as your title and your
cover art. explain to people whoyou are, why they're here, it
should all be cohesive asbasically what you're saying,
right. And so making sure thatyou have the music that
accurately reflects your topic,your type of podcasts, even the
way that you're going to betalking about your subject
(07:14):
matter can be really importantto convey through your theme
music. So where are some placesthat you can find music? And on
that note, before we talk aboutfinding music,
Alban (07:23):
let's talk about where not to find it. Yes. Alright, so
I don't care how much like, dearJohn speaks to the Taylor Swift
song speaks to the vibe of yourpodcast, you don't care. That is
not your theme song. Why not?
Because Taylor Swift, her, maybeher lawyers are going to get
your podcast taken down, you'reprobably not going to get sued,
(07:45):
you're probably not going tohave the FBI show up your house,
you might go to jail. Justkidding. You will go to jail,
you will get kicked out ofSpotify and Apple podcasts, and
your shows not going to get outto the world. So make sure that
you have the rights to music,don't use copyrighted music. So
we should talk about some placesto find music. But don't look
(08:08):
around on Spotify and otherplaces for your favourite hit
track.
Gilon (08:13):
The big thing is no copyrighted music you need to
own be licensed to just aboutanything you upload, honestly,
but especially music becauseSpotify don't play at all, you
will be surprised how quicklyyour content will get pulled
down. So some places to findroyalty free music is really
what we're looking for. TheYouTube Free Music Archive is
one such place. And it's a nicelittle playlist of music that
(08:36):
you can add in there. Where else
Alban (08:38):
one of the nice things about that is that you aren't
just searching by title, thetrack, but also like the mood
and the type of music so you canreally filter down anything in
there, you're able to usePixabay copyrighted free stock
music, and it's just a communityof music creators. You can also
look at like the Free MusicArchive, it's just another
(09:01):
really large library forpodcasters with lots of free
music. The downside to pickingfree music though, and this has
happened to me before is yourmusic will get used on other
podcasts and in YouTube videos.
And in ads on Facebook. Likeyou'll start to hear your music
everywhere.
Gilon (09:21):
One of the things that I did was I actually went to like
a place like Fiverr and gotsomeone to create the theme
music because I definitelydidn't want to hear my music on
someone else's podcast,especially for it to be like so
integral to the branding of mypodcast. So that's an option
too. If you're interested inlooking at music that you'd be
willing to like pay for
Alban (09:39):
if you want to spend a little bit of money places we
recommend are like Audio Jungledotnet you're starting at like
$5 a track, you can licensemusic. And if you're paying $5
That means everybody else isprobably not spending money.
Just that little bit of a hurdlewill stop a lot of people. I
think there's some where you canactually decide if you want to
have the exclusive rights to asong You're gonna pay quite a
(10:00):
bit more, but just it being a $5charge I guarantee is going to
stop a lot of people from usingthat music. Another one that we
like a lot and we use for ourown stuff is sound stripe. So
sound stripe is more importantif you're going to have music
that's different in lots ofepisodes. So think back to the
(10:21):
scripted fiction, maybe you'rehaving a lot of sound beds,
which is the music beneath thetalking to kind of sets the
mood, well, those sound beds areprobably going to be changing
every episode. So whatsoundstripe does is you get to
pay a subscription $19 a month,and you get access to tons and
tons of music to use in all ofyour content.
Gilon (10:41):
Yeah, so it's a really nice resource if you're willing
to spend some money on it, whichis not a bad place to spend
money.
Alban (10:46):
Yeah. And we'll just talk again about the copyrighted
music a couple of myths thatlike, these are myths, put your
lawyer hat on. Alright, soputting my lawyer hat on. I am a
lawyer, I am not your lawyer.
This is not legal advice. Thisis just good advice for like,
don't get sued. Some peoplethink if you're not making money
off your podcast, you can put inTaylor Swift songs. That is
(11:07):
incorrect. You cannot that is amyth. People have these beliefs
are like well, if you only play10 seconds or 30 seconds, you
can get away with it. Again,that is a myth. It is
copyrighted. That is stillplagiarism. So urban legend,
that is people will claim Well,it's fair use. But they forget
fair use is a defense tocopyright infringement, people
(11:28):
can still sue you. And then youwill argue to the judge that it
was appropriate. If you'rearguing to a judge that you're
allowed to use some music,instead of spending $5 at audio
jungle.net You have made a verybad decision. So like, just get
away from all of thiscopyrighted music, because even
(11:49):
the really big podcasts thatwhen they're licensing music,
it's a big ordeal. And soreally, if you're thinking I'm
going to use copyrighted music,you're probably not it's going
to be really expensive. It's acumbersome process to go
through. The licensing for musicframework really has not been
figured out for podcasting yet.
(12:11):
So maybe someday in the future.
But right now, we're not usingthat stuff.
Gilon (12:16):
Alright, so we're still editing, right? So when we're
editing, how do we decide kindof what to give our attention
to? Because everything can feellike a big deal when you're
editing, right? So like, whatshould have priority in editing.
Alban (12:27):
So this is the same way that I edit writing, start with
the content, start with the bigideas, should this whole section
actually have been said earlier,like I'm moving big parts, I'm
deleting big parts. I'm editingfor content first, not
distractions. Later on, I willthen come back on my second pass
(12:48):
and edit for distractions. Sowhat does that mean? In reality,
if you start listening to yourpodcast, and the first thing is
like, Oh, I think I heard alittle cough, I'm gonna edit out
that cough. Hope there's an um,I'm going to edit out that I'm
going to edit out that secondarm, okay, there's three times
in a row and edit them all out.
And then you realize, oh, weactually redid the intro where
we didn't have any of thoseissues. Well, now you've already
(13:11):
you're 20 minutes in on editingout stuff from a whole section
that will be deleted. And that'snot uncommon that you have big
chunks that might get taken out.
So edit for content, if you'rethinking about it as if you're
editing, writing, edit theparagraphs first, and then go
and edit the sentences in thewords. And so first one, we're
(13:34):
trying to make sure it's atleast understandable and
cohesive. And then we will goback and actually do all that
filler, word removal and audit.
You know, there's little audiohiccups.
Gilon (13:46):
Yeah, I like to think of this as like, did you accomplish
the mission? Right? Like, didyou get the content out that you
wanted to get out in the waythat you wanted to get it out?
Let's edit for that first. Andthen we have the luxury of going
in with a fine tooth comb andsaying, Oh, well, I said, um,
three times, you know, in thespan of two minutes, let me go
and then kind of pull that out.
And this really just make surethat you spend your time wisely.
As well as you focus on themajors and minor on the minors.
(14:09):
Major on the majors minor on theminors. Yeah, there we go. There
it is. Because editing is a partof podcasting. But you know, as
you're starting a podcast,you're not always certain where
all of your energy and time isgoing to go. Editing can take up
a good amount of your time. Andso when you listen through, you
really want to be listening forthe content piece first. And
then you have the luxury of likeI said, going back in with a
(14:32):
fine tooth comb and hittingthose smaller pieces that you
may be going to person that willnotice right, other people may
not notice that but for your ownpeace of mind. You might want to
get some of those arms thatsilence or those things out of
the way.
Alban (14:44):
If you find yourself running into a lot of these
filler words. You talk more likeme then, like former President
Barack Obama who had no fillerwords like in any speeches, then
what you want to look at is thescript. And the script has this
thing called filler wordremoval.
Gilon (15:02):
Voodoo.
Alban (15:02):
It's awesome. It is so cool. This is like total magic.
Because it's transcribed yourepisode, you say, Hey, do I have
filler words and like, Oh, Ifound 64 arms and you go,
delete, delete, delete, delete,delete all, and it takes them
all out, and they're gone, anddoes a really good job of
finding and removing stuff. Sothere's some you have to be a
(15:25):
little more careful with, like,the word like, often uses a
filler word, but sometimes usedcorrectly in the sentence. So go
through and remove those. Andthat's where we're editing out
distractions. But again, we'retalking like humans here, right?
Now use the example of formerPresident Obama, he actually
learned to add filler words into be more relatable, it's okay
(15:48):
that you have some filler words,it's not the end of the world,
you just sound like a humanbeing when you talk that way. So
don't stress yourself out toomuch.
Gilon (15:56):
And this is one of those things where, you know, we
talked about your future self,like, don't be so caught up in
your head while you're recordingto try to like, get around some
of these things, right? Like,just talk like yourself, be
yourself. The editing is whereyou can clean that up, right? So
then we've got all these piecesin our editing software, we've
got hopefully, Non copyrightedmusic, and then we've got you
(16:18):
know, our audio and all thatgood stuff. What is a good way
to kind of mush those piecestogether? Can we just stick them
one next to the other? How do weneed to like seamlessly
transition from all thosepieces,
Alban (16:30):
sometimes they fit perfectly well next to each
other. But there's some YouTubevideos, you can watch where
like, you can tell, there's justlots of hard cuts, and almost
looks like glitchy how quicklythe person's faces jumping
around the screen and like howtheir cadence changes and their
voice, the tone is different. Ifyou're finding that that's how
(16:51):
it sounds, when you're lookingback at this audio recording, or
listening back to the audiorecording, then you want to look
at fading the tracks, fade thefirst one out. And then as the
next one starts fade that onein, it will make things feel
much more cohesive and naturalwhen you're dealing with totally
(17:11):
different, you know, sectionsthat were recorded, maybe 20
minutes apart, are now rightnext to each other, fading in
and out makes it seem much moreseamless.
Gilon (17:20):
And if you don't know how to do this, because you're just
now learning about how to starta podcast, you can definitely
hit up our good friend, YouTube.
And whatever your editingsoftware is, you can just put
that in to the search bar andput fading next to it in the
search bar and someone onYouTube will show you how to
fade in and out with your audio.
Alban (17:36):
If you're using any of the software, we recommend that
person will probably be Travisbecause he's got a bunch of
tutorials for all of this. So wewill be sure to mention those at
the end of this episode. One ofthe final tips, I guess, is
creating a punch list. So first,listen through is for content.
And we want to write a punchlist. So when you walk through
(17:58):
you build project, maybe a houseor remodel. At the end, you have
the punch list. And it's likeall the small things, you still
need to pick up and clean. Youneed to repaint this wall, I
need to fix this pipe. And whatthat allows you to do is say
okay, here's the final list,let's go knock that stuff out.
Because what you don't want todo is be the person who's
editing as you're noticingthings, the first podcast I ever
(18:23):
recorded. I went through andwrote down a list of like 60
things that need to be fixed.
And then my editor wrote rightback to me and said, You are out
of your mind, if you think thisis going to happen on the
timeline that you want. That'sgonna take me like eight hours.
And you want this tonight went,Oh, okay. Well, if that's how
(18:43):
hard it is, then how about takeout these four things, because
the rest really weren't a bigdeal. And so you want to write
the punch list, so that you havea good feeling for like, which
of these things needs to beremoved, which things are
critical, and which can I maybeimprove the next recording, but
I don't have to get this right.
Gilon (19:04):
And for my overachievers out there, I see you and I
already hear your wheels turningin your mind. Don't try to make
this punch list while you'rerecording. It's very easy to get
caught up and go oh, I'm goingto need to like edit that out
later in the middle ofrecording. Don't do that. Stay
present and wait until you'redoing the editing. To be able to
write out your punch list. It'sreally important to stay present
(19:24):
while you're recording. Becauseyou might miss something if you
decide to try to pick up in themoment the things that you're
going to want to edit out.
Alban (19:30):
And one warning here.
This spot like where we areright now editing the first
episode is I would bet one ofthe most likely places for
people to stop podcastingbecause we all are passionate
about what we're talking about.
We enjoy buying the equipment.
We like recording, and now theprocess of listening to your own
(19:52):
voice and editing it and it'snot sounding as good as the best
part. Cast we've ever listenedto, we get really hung up in our
own heads, we start beingperfectionist, a lot of self
doubt starts creeping in. And westart being very critical of
ourselves and what we built. Ifthis is your first podcast, it
(20:13):
probably is. Why would youexpect to be very good at this
yet? Right? You know, you arevalid, that you're doing this,
this is a great thing for you todo. You can't let these thoughts
of like how people are going toperceive it influence. You're
just have to get this out there.
If you want to help. Go listento your favorite podcast, like
(20:35):
listen to the very firstepisode. And it can't be someone
like one of the NPR shows whereeveryone on it was our hidden
expert. Go listen to yourfavorite indie podcast first
episode, it will be so muchworse than episode 30 or
wherever you are. And that cangive you the confidence to
remember, this is just normalimposter syndrome that you're
(20:58):
feeling. Everybody feels thisway I felt this way. The sound
your own voice is weird to youthe first time you hear it in a
recording. Editing your ownvoice makes you very critical of
yourself. This is all normal.
But the only way to improve isto actually publish episodes,
start getting feedback and startgetting better. So don't get
(21:18):
stuck here. I could tell so manystories of people I've seen year
after year at podcastingconferences that have never
launched because they are hungup on this exact step so don't
let this one be the one to tripyou up. If you can get past
this. You will get past anything
Gilon (21:36):
Alban definitely did to real heavy into his life coach
bag, his podcast there, tip himon the way out. But it's so
true. It is absolutely so true.
I joked about actively avoidingmy first podcast episode,
because I'm sure there are somany pieces of it. I'm sure tons
of plosives. I'm sure I soundlike someone that I am not. He's
you're trying to figure all thethings out, right. But you're
(21:57):
starting and you're going to bea beginner, there's no way to be
great without beginning. Youhave to begin this is a
necessary step. This is part ofthe process. And so I double
down on all the things Albansaid, you do just need to start
you need to put it out there.
And once you start, you'll havemore momentum to keep going. If
you can kind of battle that selfcritical bully in your head.
(22:19):
Final Episode, right? We haveedited, it sounds great, because
we started. It sounds great.
We're gonna export it so that wecan upload it to, you know, our
hosting site, what have youanything that we need to be
mindful of, in that process,just export
Alban (22:35):
it as a mp3 or a WAV, pretty much anything you throw
Buzzsprout can be fine. Butthose are two that we would
recommend for different reasons.
They're both good. You may seeother tutorials at this point,
say, hey, you've got anythingabout ID three tags. Id three
tags are just metadata that putin your mp3 file. Your podcast
host should be able to take careof this for you. So if you
(22:57):
upload a podcast episode toBuzzsprout, we will do all that
work for you on the back end. Soif you keep seeing the step show
up, no, you can safely disregardit. So export the file, and
you're going to be ready infuture episodes to upload it to
your podcast host Travis, beforewe go on to the next episode,
what should people be checkingout and thinking about with
(23:19):
editing their episode where allthe tutorials that we promised
them?
Travis (23:24):
I'm so glad you asked Alban. So we have a lot of
tutorials on our YouTube channelthat can walk you through how to
edit your podcast episodes in avariety of softwares. We have
mentioned audacity we'vementioned GarageBand and Alvin's
personal favorite descript. Wehave software tutorials for each
of those that I've linked in theshow notes if you want to know
how to do that fade in and fadeout how to add tracks how to mix
(23:47):
things together all the thingsthat we discussed in more. Each
of those tutorials will walk youthrough how to do it in that
particular software. So justcheck the show notes for this
episode to find the links forthose. And then when it comes to
music, we just actually posted avideo recently on where to find
music that is safe for yourpodcast. And we mentioned some
(24:07):
free options. And then also somepaid options, give you some
examples of podcast music thatyou can download and essentially
cover everything front to backthat you could ever possibly
want to know about using musicin your podcast. So if you
scroll down in your phone in theepisode show notes, you'll see
links to descript audacity andGarageBand tutorials how to edit
(24:27):
your podcast there. And thenalso the video where we cover
how and where to find podcastmusic for your episodes.
Gilon (24:34):
Thanks so much Travis. So hopefully, you'll get into those
resources get sharper onediting. And so just in
preparation for next episode, weare talking about podcast
artwork, why you needed, why itshould be great what the
requirements are, how to designit and some fancy tips and
integrations we have to help youget that done. So definitely
come back for our seventhepisode of how to create a
(24:54):
podcast podcast and thanks forlistening as always keep
podcasting
I don't care how much Dear John, the Taylor Swift song
(00:04):
speaks to the vibe of yourpodcast. That is not your theme
song. I know I probably couldhave the FBI show up your house,
you might go, you will go tojail. You will get kicked out of
Spotify and Apple podcasts andyour shows not going to get out
to the world.
Gilon (00:24):
Welcome back to how to start your podcast. I'm Gilon
and Alban is here with me.
Alban (00:28):
Hey, everybody, and in this episode, we are going to
edit your podcast episode Therecorded in the last one.
Gilon (00:34):
I mean, we're not editing it, you're going to edit it.
We're gonna tell you how toedit. And we will
Alban (00:38):
teach you how to edit the podcast that you recorded prior
to now that's accurate. Yes.
Great. Great intro, guys.
Gilon (00:47):
Good job, people. So you recorded your episode. That was
great. You could just uploadthat audio, but we strongly
advise against it. That's, Imean, we just don't need to do
that. We should probably edit itfirst. You're great. But you're
not that good yet, kid. Here wego. We need to edit this audio.
So what's the goal of editing?
Right? Like, why should you evenedit your audio?
Alban (01:08):
Well, the benefits of editing are that we can take out
a lot of distractions. And wecan just clean up what we
actually want to say we there'slots of times we stumble over a
word, and maybe you went backand reset something, maybe the
beginning like we did on thisepisode, we already are at like
three minutes of us trying toget into a groove with the
(01:32):
actual content of the episode.
So it's not uncommon, you wantto clip off the front of the
recording, you maybe you'reclipping off the back, you're
adding you know your intromusic. So it's just to clean
things up. The goal is to cleanup the audio. It's not
perfection, like there's that aTolstoy quote, if you look for
perfection, you'll never becontent. And I think it's pretty
(01:53):
easy for us as podcasters toapproach our first episode, like
we are recording a story forThis American Life, or cereal or
like, I don't know, whateveryour favorite podcast is, you
will not sound like that. Inyour first episode. Those
podcasts have entire teams ofrecording experts, and expert
(02:15):
storytellers, and audioengineers and everybody
involved. So don't hold yourselfto that level of perfection.
Instead be kind and say, Hey,I'm just here to clean this up a
bit. And make it sound a bitbetter.
Gilon (02:34):
Right? Like you're a beginner in your closet. Let's
be real, right? And no,everybody starts somewhere,
right? If I actively avoidlistening to my first episode,
because I just can't in my soul.
I don't, I don't want to see thegrowth. But growth has happened.
Right? So you gotta have astarting point. So don't be hard
on yourself. Be compassionate,be kind, you're starting. You're
a beginner. Kudos for startingright. Some people don't show up
(02:57):
and you're choosing to show up.
So edit with that in mind. Sosome tips for editing we've
talked about, if you listen tothe last episode, having an
outline outline was superimportant, right? Hopefully you
stayed on track with youroutline. So you're not doing a
ton of editing. Now, like today,you are your future self that we
talked about. So either you'rekicking yourself in the pants
wishing you to listen, or you'relike yo, salon, and Alban really
(03:20):
saved me some time, I'm so gladI had an outline.
Alban (03:23):
When you're editing this episode, it's good to keep in
mind all the steps, we talkedabout writing an outline,
focusing on the separate tracksand the recording environment.
All those things like you willnotice that now in the editing
process, why those werecritically important because it
is so much nicer to avoid audiomistakes in the front end,
(03:45):
rather than trying to solve themon the back end. And so anything
you noticed that could beimproved, we'll write that down
so that in your next recording,that you actually are going to
take that into account, andreally get a much better audio
recording to help on next edit.
Gilon (04:03):
And I would definitely say you want to be mindful about
the first 30 seconds to a minuteof your audio, right? People
have short attention spans,they're listening to your audio
giving it a try. You want tomake sure that you tell them who
you are, what this podcast isabout really quickly so that
they know okay, this works forme or this is actually not what
I was looking for prettyquickly,
Alban (04:22):
right? We're trying to get a good hook. Like, what's
interesting, what is surprisingabout this, what are you going
to learn, you want to make surethat people know for a fact, I'm
in the right place. And ifthey're coming to be
entertained, like beentertaining, and put the very
most entertaining bit at thefront. If they're trying to
learn something, make sure youtell them this is what you're
(04:44):
going to learn at the front end.
People should be able to listento like 30 seconds a minute and
go I know exactly what is goingto come up in the rest of this
entire episode. We've seen it onour YouTube channel a ton right
where we can actually see thetruth drop off rates of when
people stop listening. And thefirst 30 seconds, it's like it
falls off a cliff, like a thirdof people give up in the first
(05:07):
30 seconds. But if you make itto a minute, even on a 15 minute
video, we know you're probablygoing to make it to the end. And
so it shows how criticallyimportant this first 30 seconds
to a minute are. With yourpodcast, it's exact same thing.
Make sure you tell this is whatyou need to know, here's what is
going to be delivered the valueof this episode. Don't take
(05:30):
seven minutes of banter beforeyou start talking about what's
actually going to be discussed.
Yeah, that's
Gilon (05:38):
really important real estate that you don't want to
misuse or miss out on andcompletely because you haven't
been intentional with thatspace. So some editing pointers,
what are important things tomake sure are present when
you're editing.
Alban (05:52):
Well, one you should be thinking about is a theme song.
So you probably didn't, youknow, sing in the beginning of
your episode. Or maybe you did,maybe you did, but you edited
that out. And now you want toput in some music. And the
reason music is really good isbecause that along with your
podcast artwork are two greatways to brand your podcast. Just
(06:14):
think about how powerful musicis as setting the tone, and the
feeling and the emotion forsomething. Well, you are going
to pick one song to brand yourshow in the exact way that you
want to. If it's salsa musicthat's very different than like
a Lo Fi beat. And that's verydifferent from like, some upbeat
(06:36):
pop song. Like they all havedifferent vibes. And if so if
you have like a true crimepodcast, and you want the
ominous music, don't put in somelike happy go lucky. You know,
music is disjointed, from thecontent of the podcast,
Gilon (06:52):
right? Your music is definitely like a vibe check
moment, right? So it should aswell as your title and your
cover art. explain to people whoyou are, why they're here, it
should all be cohesive asbasically what you're saying,
right. And so making sure thatyou have the music that
accurately reflects your topic,your type of podcasts, even the
way that you're going to betalking about your subject
(07:14):
matter can be really importantto convey through your theme
music. So where are some placesthat you can find music? And on
that note, before we talk aboutfinding music,
Alban (07:23):
let's talk about where not to find it. Yes. Alright, so
I don't care how much like, dearJohn speaks to the Taylor Swift
song speaks to the vibe of yourpodcast, you don't care. That is
not your theme song. Why not?
Because Taylor Swift, her, maybeher lawyers are going to get
your podcast taken down, you'reprobably not going to get sued,
(07:45):
you're probably not going tohave the FBI show up your house,
you might go to jail. Justkidding. You will go to jail,
you will get kicked out ofSpotify and Apple podcasts, and
your shows not going to get outto the world. So make sure that
you have the rights to music,don't use copyrighted music. So
we should talk about some placesto find music. But don't look
(08:08):
around on Spotify and otherplaces for your favourite hit
track.
Gilon (08:13):
The big thing is no copyrighted music you need to
own be licensed to just aboutanything you upload, honestly,
but especially music becauseSpotify don't play at all, you
will be surprised how quicklyyour content will get pulled
down. So some places to findroyalty free music is really
what we're looking for. TheYouTube Free Music Archive is
one such place. And it's a nicelittle playlist of music that
(08:36):
you can add in there. Where else
Alban (08:38):
one of the nice things about that is that you aren't
just searching by title, thetrack, but also like the mood
and the type of music so you canreally filter down anything in
there, you're able to usePixabay copyrighted free stock
music, and it's just a communityof music creators. You can also
look at like the Free MusicArchive, it's just another
(09:01):
really large library forpodcasters with lots of free
music. The downside to pickingfree music though, and this has
happened to me before is yourmusic will get used on other
podcasts and in YouTube videos.
And in ads on Facebook. Likeyou'll start to hear your music
everywhere.
Gilon (09:21):
One of the things that I did was I actually went to like
a place like Fiverr and gotsomeone to create the theme
music because I definitelydidn't want to hear my music on
someone else's podcast,especially for it to be like so
integral to the branding of mypodcast. So that's an option
too. If you're interested inlooking at music that you'd be
willing to like pay for
Alban (09:39):
if you want to spend a little bit of money places we
recommend are like Audio Jungledotnet you're starting at like
$5 a track, you can licensemusic. And if you're paying $5
That means everybody else isprobably not spending money.
Just that little bit of a hurdlewill stop a lot of people. I
think there's some where you canactually decide if you want to
have the exclusive rights to asong You're gonna pay quite a
(10:00):
bit more, but just it being a $5charge I guarantee is going to
stop a lot of people from usingthat music. Another one that we
like a lot and we use for ourown stuff is sound stripe. So
sound stripe is more importantif you're going to have music
that's different in lots ofepisodes. So think back to the
(10:21):
scripted fiction, maybe you'rehaving a lot of sound beds,
which is the music beneath thetalking to kind of sets the
mood, well, those sound beds areprobably going to be changing
every episode. So whatsoundstripe does is you get to
pay a subscription $19 a month,and you get access to tons and
tons of music to use in all ofyour content.
Gilon (10:41):
Yeah, so it's a really nice resource if you're willing
to spend some money on it, whichis not a bad place to spend
money.
Alban (10:46):
Yeah. And we'll just talk again about the copyrighted
music a couple of myths thatlike, these are myths, put your
lawyer hat on. Alright, soputting my lawyer hat on. I am a
lawyer, I am not your lawyer.
This is not legal advice. Thisis just good advice for like,
don't get sued. Some peoplethink if you're not making money
off your podcast, you can put inTaylor Swift songs. That is
(11:07):
incorrect. You cannot that is amyth. People have these beliefs
are like well, if you only play10 seconds or 30 seconds, you
can get away with it. Again,that is a myth. It is
copyrighted. That is stillplagiarism. So urban legend,
that is people will claim Well,it's fair use. But they forget
fair use is a defense tocopyright infringement, people
(11:28):
can still sue you. And then youwill argue to the judge that it
was appropriate. If you'rearguing to a judge that you're
allowed to use some music,instead of spending $5 at audio
jungle.net You have made a verybad decision. So like, just get
away from all of thiscopyrighted music, because even
(11:49):
the really big podcasts thatwhen they're licensing music,
it's a big ordeal. And soreally, if you're thinking I'm
going to use copyrighted music,you're probably not it's going
to be really expensive. It's acumbersome process to go
through. The licensing for musicframework really has not been
figured out for podcasting yet.
(12:11):
So maybe someday in the future.
But right now, we're not usingthat stuff.
Gilon (12:16):
Alright, so we're still editing, right? So when we're
editing, how do we decide kindof what to give our attention
to? Because everything can feellike a big deal when you're
editing, right? So like, whatshould have priority in editing.
Alban (12:27):
So this is the same way that I edit writing, start with
the content, start with the bigideas, should this whole section
actually have been said earlier,like I'm moving big parts, I'm
deleting big parts. I'm editingfor content first, not
distractions. Later on, I willthen come back on my second pass
(12:48):
and edit for distractions. Sowhat does that mean? In reality,
if you start listening to yourpodcast, and the first thing is
like, Oh, I think I heard alittle cough, I'm gonna edit out
that cough. Hope there's an um,I'm going to edit out that I'm
going to edit out that secondarm, okay, there's three times
in a row and edit them all out.
And then you realize, oh, weactually redid the intro where
we didn't have any of thoseissues. Well, now you've already
(13:11):
you're 20 minutes in on editingout stuff from a whole section
that will be deleted. And that'snot uncommon that you have big
chunks that might get taken out.
So edit for content, if you'rethinking about it as if you're
editing, writing, edit theparagraphs first, and then go
and edit the sentences in thewords. And so first one, we're
(13:34):
trying to make sure it's atleast understandable and
cohesive. And then we will goback and actually do all that
filler, word removal and audit.
You know, there's little audiohiccups.
Gilon (13:46):
Yeah, I like to think of this as like, did you accomplish
the mission? Right? Like, didyou get the content out that you
wanted to get out in the waythat you wanted to get it out?
Let's edit for that first. Andthen we have the luxury of going
in with a fine tooth comb andsaying, Oh, well, I said, um,
three times, you know, in thespan of two minutes, let me go
and then kind of pull that out.
And this really just make surethat you spend your time wisely.
As well as you focus on themajors and minor on the minors.
(14:09):
Major on the majors minor on theminors. Yeah, there we go. There
it is. Because editing is a partof podcasting. But you know, as
you're starting a podcast,you're not always certain where
all of your energy and time isgoing to go. Editing can take up
a good amount of your time. Andso when you listen through, you
really want to be listening forthe content piece first. And
then you have the luxury of likeI said, going back in with a
(14:32):
fine tooth comb and hittingthose smaller pieces that you
may be going to person that willnotice right, other people may
not notice that but for your ownpeace of mind. You might want to
get some of those arms thatsilence or those things out of
the way.
Alban (14:44):
If you find yourself running into a lot of these
filler words. You talk more likeme then, like former President
Barack Obama who had no fillerwords like in any speeches, then
what you want to look at is thescript. And the script has this
thing called filler wordremoval.
Gilon (15:02):
Voodoo.
Alban (15:02):
It's awesome. It is so cool. This is like total magic.
Because it's transcribed yourepisode, you say, Hey, do I have
filler words and like, Oh, Ifound 64 arms and you go,
delete, delete, delete, delete,delete all, and it takes them
all out, and they're gone, anddoes a really good job of
finding and removing stuff. Sothere's some you have to be a
(15:25):
little more careful with, like,the word like, often uses a
filler word, but sometimes usedcorrectly in the sentence. So go
through and remove those. Andthat's where we're editing out
distractions. But again, we'retalking like humans here, right?
Now use the example of formerPresident Obama, he actually
learned to add filler words into be more relatable, it's okay
(15:48):
that you have some filler words,it's not the end of the world,
you just sound like a humanbeing when you talk that way. So
don't stress yourself out toomuch.
Gilon (15:56):
And this is one of those things where, you know, we
talked about your future self,like, don't be so caught up in
your head while you're recordingto try to like, get around some
of these things, right? Like,just talk like yourself, be
yourself. The editing is whereyou can clean that up, right? So
then we've got all these piecesin our editing software, we've
got hopefully, Non copyrightedmusic, and then we've got you
(16:18):
know, our audio and all thatgood stuff. What is a good way
to kind of mush those piecestogether? Can we just stick them
one next to the other? How do weneed to like seamlessly
transition from all thosepieces,
Alban (16:30):
sometimes they fit perfectly well next to each
other. But there's some YouTubevideos, you can watch where
like, you can tell, there's justlots of hard cuts, and almost
looks like glitchy how quicklythe person's faces jumping
around the screen and like howtheir cadence changes and their
voice, the tone is different. Ifyou're finding that that's how
(16:51):
it sounds, when you're lookingback at this audio recording, or
listening back to the audiorecording, then you want to look
at fading the tracks, fade thefirst one out. And then as the
next one starts fade that onein, it will make things feel
much more cohesive and naturalwhen you're dealing with totally
(17:11):
different, you know, sectionsthat were recorded, maybe 20
minutes apart, are now rightnext to each other, fading in
and out makes it seem much moreseamless.
Gilon (17:20):
And if you don't know how to do this, because you're just
now learning about how to starta podcast, you can definitely
hit up our good friend, YouTube.
And whatever your editingsoftware is, you can just put
that in to the search bar andput fading next to it in the
search bar and someone onYouTube will show you how to
fade in and out with your audio.
Alban (17:36):
If you're using any of the software, we recommend that
person will probably be Travisbecause he's got a bunch of
tutorials for all of this. So wewill be sure to mention those at
the end of this episode. One ofthe final tips, I guess, is
creating a punch list. So first,listen through is for content.
And we want to write a punchlist. So when you walk through
(17:58):
you build project, maybe a houseor remodel. At the end, you have
the punch list. And it's likeall the small things, you still
need to pick up and clean. Youneed to repaint this wall, I
need to fix this pipe. And whatthat allows you to do is say
okay, here's the final list,let's go knock that stuff out.
Because what you don't want todo is be the person who's
editing as you're noticingthings, the first podcast I ever
(18:23):
recorded. I went through andwrote down a list of like 60
things that need to be fixed.
And then my editor wrote rightback to me and said, You are out
of your mind, if you think thisis going to happen on the
timeline that you want. That'sgonna take me like eight hours.
And you want this tonight went,Oh, okay. Well, if that's how
(18:43):
hard it is, then how about takeout these four things, because
the rest really weren't a bigdeal. And so you want to write
the punch list, so that you havea good feeling for like, which
of these things needs to beremoved, which things are
critical, and which can I maybeimprove the next recording, but
I don't have to get this right.
Gilon (19:04):
And for my overachievers out there, I see you and I
already hear your wheels turningin your mind. Don't try to make
this punch list while you'rerecording. It's very easy to get
caught up and go oh, I'm goingto need to like edit that out
later in the middle ofrecording. Don't do that. Stay
present and wait until you'redoing the editing. To be able to
write out your punch list. It'sreally important to stay present
(19:24):
while you're recording. Becauseyou might miss something if you
decide to try to pick up in themoment the things that you're
going to want to edit out.
Alban (19:30):
And one warning here.
This spot like where we areright now editing the first
episode is I would bet one ofthe most likely places for
people to stop podcastingbecause we all are passionate
about what we're talking about.
We enjoy buying the equipment.
We like recording, and now theprocess of listening to your own
(19:52):
voice and editing it and it'snot sounding as good as the best
part. Cast we've ever listenedto, we get really hung up in our
own heads, we start beingperfectionist, a lot of self
doubt starts creeping in. And westart being very critical of
ourselves and what we built. Ifthis is your first podcast, it
(20:13):
probably is. Why would youexpect to be very good at this
yet? Right? You know, you arevalid, that you're doing this,
this is a great thing for you todo. You can't let these thoughts
of like how people are going toperceive it influence. You're
just have to get this out there.
If you want to help. Go listento your favorite podcast, like
(20:35):
listen to the very firstepisode. And it can't be someone
like one of the NPR shows whereeveryone on it was our hidden
expert. Go listen to yourfavorite indie podcast first
episode, it will be so muchworse than episode 30 or
wherever you are. And that cangive you the confidence to
remember, this is just normalimposter syndrome that you're
(20:58):
feeling. Everybody feels thisway I felt this way. The sound
your own voice is weird to youthe first time you hear it in a
recording. Editing your ownvoice makes you very critical of
yourself. This is all normal.
But the only way to improve isto actually publish episodes,
start getting feedback and startgetting better. So don't get
(21:18):
stuck here. I could tell so manystories of people I've seen year
after year at podcastingconferences that have never
launched because they are hungup on this exact step so don't
let this one be the one to tripyou up. If you can get past
this. You will get past anything
Gilon (21:36):
Alban definitely did to real heavy into his life coach
bag, his podcast there, tip himon the way out. But it's so
true. It is absolutely so true.
I joked about actively avoidingmy first podcast episode,
because I'm sure there are somany pieces of it. I'm sure tons
of plosives. I'm sure I soundlike someone that I am not. He's
you're trying to figure all thethings out, right. But you're
(21:57):
starting and you're going to bea beginner, there's no way to be
great without beginning. Youhave to begin this is a
necessary step. This is part ofthe process. And so I double
down on all the things Albansaid, you do just need to start
you need to put it out there.
And once you start, you'll havemore momentum to keep going. If
you can kind of battle that selfcritical bully in your head.
(22:19):
Final Episode, right? We haveedited, it sounds great, because
we started. It sounds great.
We're gonna export it so that wecan upload it to, you know, our
hosting site, what have youanything that we need to be
mindful of, in that process,just export
Alban (22:35):
it as a mp3 or a WAV, pretty much anything you throw
Buzzsprout can be fine. Butthose are two that we would
recommend for different reasons.
They're both good. You may seeother tutorials at this point,
say, hey, you've got anythingabout ID three tags. Id three
tags are just metadata that putin your mp3 file. Your podcast
host should be able to take careof this for you. So if you
(22:57):
upload a podcast episode toBuzzsprout, we will do all that
work for you on the back end. Soif you keep seeing the step show
up, no, you can safely disregardit. So export the file, and
you're going to be ready infuture episodes to upload it to
your podcast host Travis, beforewe go on to the next episode,
what should people be checkingout and thinking about with
(23:19):
editing their episode where allthe tutorials that we promised
them?
Travis (23:24):
I'm so glad you asked Alban. So we have a lot of
tutorials on our YouTube channelthat can walk you through how to
edit your podcast episodes in avariety of softwares. We have
mentioned audacity we'vementioned GarageBand and Alvin's
personal favorite descript. Wehave software tutorials for each
of those that I've linked in theshow notes if you want to know
how to do that fade in and fadeout how to add tracks how to mix
(23:47):
things together all the thingsthat we discussed in more. Each
of those tutorials will walk youthrough how to do it in that
particular software. So justcheck the show notes for this
episode to find the links forthose. And then when it comes to
music, we just actually posted avideo recently on where to find
music that is safe for yourpodcast. And we mentioned some
(24:07):
free options. And then also somepaid options, give you some
examples of podcast music thatyou can download and essentially
cover everything front to backthat you could ever possibly
want to know about using musicin your podcast. So if you
scroll down in your phone in theepisode show notes, you'll see
links to descript audacity andGarageBand tutorials how to edit
(24:27):
your podcast there. And thenalso the video where we cover
how and where to find podcastmusic for your episodes.
Gilon (24:34):
Thanks so much Travis. So hopefully, you'll get into those
resources get sharper onediting. And so just in
preparation for next episode, weare talking about podcast
artwork, why you needed, why itshould be great what the
requirements are, how to designit and some fancy tips and
integrations we have to help youget that done. So definitely
come back for our seventhepisode of how to create a
(24:54):
podcast podcast and thanks forlistening as always keep
podcasting
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