How three podcasters divide up their time to research, produce and promote a podcast episode

It’s easy to get excited about starting a podcast, but it’s hard work to keep it going. Successful podcasters develop systems to manage all the tasks they need to complete, document their workflow, and set deadlines for themselves.

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It’s easy to get excited about starting a podcast, but it’s hard work to keep it going. Podcast workflows can involve more than a dozen steps. As a solo creator, you need to juggle all of the moving parts while also managing other responsibilities. “Podfade,” which is when a podcaster gradually stops releasing new episodes, is a common phenomenon. According to the Podcast Index, there are more than four million podcasts, but only 478,657 have published a new episode in the past 90 days. Successful podcasters document their workflow, develop systems to manage all the tasks they need to complete, and set deadlines for themselves. We talked to veteran podcasters Pam Covarrubias, Leah Lemm, and Patrick Cox to learn how they manage their time and workflows to consistently produce episode after episode.

Key takeaways include:

• Develop a system that works for you to manage and track podcast episode production work. Some podcasters prefer a visual approach, while others use a simple spreadsheet. Maintain a detailed list of tasks to keep yourself on track.
• Don’t just wing it when it comes to interviews. Create an outline of the podcast and a list of questions for guests ahead of time. This will mean less editing of interviews, saving you time.
• Outsource tasks that don’t require you to be present, such as creating show notes, editing, managing social media, or writing a newsletter. Use technology for tasks when possible, for example to generate interview transcripts.

Pam Covarrubias is a busy business coach and professional speaker who works to help people build sustainable businesses. She is also the founder and host of the popular show Cafe con Pam, a weekly podcast Oprah named one of the best Latinx podcasts 2020 and 2021.

Since 2016, Covarrubias has produced more than 270 podcast episodes about Latinx people and People of Color who break barriers. She monetizes the podcast through sponsorships as part of the Latina Podcasters Network.

A self-described recovering procrastinator, Covarrubias has been able to consistently and efficiently create new podcast episodes week after week by managing her time and workflow effectively.

“The secret to long-term success is to have a system and be consistent,” Covarrubias says. “I’ve basically created a system to make sure I’m not running everything. The system is running the process for me.”

What does a good system look like? Successful podcasters like Covarrubias create lists of tasks and prioritize them, track the status of each task, and schedule their tasks. They prepare for their interviews by creating a list of questions or an outline, which saves them time later when it comes to editing audio files. They use software to generate interview transcripts, which help when editing recordings.

When possible, they delegate tasks. You can outsource tasks where you don’t need to be present, like editing audio, loading it to your podcast host, creating show notes, and managing social media. The key is to find a production process that suits your needs, schedule, and style. The way you set up your system may depend on your publishing frequency, and whether you’re putting out new episodes weekly, twice-monthly, , or as a bingeable season.

“I often say our brain is a processor, not a storage unit, and so what’s important is to keep that in mind, and then choose what system is going to store all of our ideas and our projects and everything else,” Covarrubias says. “The system doesn’t have to be anything elaborate. It just has to work for you. Everyone works in different ways.”

As podcast expert Amanda McLoughlin notes in a Medium post about organization, task management, and workflow for creators, publishing a podcast requires dozens of small, tricky, detailed steps. “Getting any one of them wrong could mean disaster,” McLoughlin says. “Even when you do everything right, things can still break for no reason.”

Organization, checklists, and smart communication also help reduce errors. McLoughlin suggests that every podcaster document their workflow.

“The first step to organizing your podcast life is understanding what, exactly, there is to organize,” she says.

The next time you produce a podcast episode, write down every step as you go. If you work with a team, McLoughlin recommends that you ask your colleagues to do the same thing. When documenting steps, it’s also good to keep track of the amount of time each task takes in order to help you budget time in the future.

Use this podcast workflow checklist, which is a Google sheet, as a starting point, customizing it to meet your needs. https://bit.ly/podchecklistcuny

A podcast workflow example:

Deadlines are helpful to get you to finish an episode, as several podcasters discussed in recent interviews for Descript. “Just making yourself finish something is really important. That’s why deadlines are so great, and so awful at the same time,” says Christian Koons, editor of the podcast Song Exploder. “Try to get as psyched as you can on finishing stuff and cherish that feeling and let it motivate you.”

Leah Lemm, a member of the Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe in Minnesota, is a podcast host, radio producer, singer and songwriter who shares community stories via podcasts with a mission of amplifying Native voices. She hosts and produces the podcast Wisdom Continuum with her husband. She also hosts the half-hour weekly radio show and podcast Native Lights with her brother. She plans to launch a Patreon program in the near future to support Wisdom Continuum.

Lemm and her husband released the first episode of Wisdom Continuum in November 2021. They strive to put out a new episode every two weeks, with breaks as needed. She estimates that it takes them an average of about 12 hours to plan, produce and distribute each episode. The pair has developed a rhythm and routine to consistently produce new episodes.

Every few months, they sit down and brainstorm ideas for the show, selecting topics they want to discuss. Then they develop a potential guest list for each topic. Between the two of them, they have a large network of people to call on. They look for guests who can talk about applying Native values to topics like work.

Her husband reaches out to potential guests and schedules them for a 45-minute conversation. “We realized that if we put a time limit on the conversation, we usually get to the kind of good stuff that we want for the podcast right away, and keep the conversation going. And then if there is more to talk about, we’ll do it on a different episode,” Lemm says.

Sharing their Google calendars so they don’t have to go back and forth to pick potential times to schedule a guest saves time for the pair. Lemm also likes to use Calendly, an online appointment management system, to schedule guests to avoid lots of email exchanges. She appreciates that when someone uses her Calendly link to confirm a podcast interview time, a Zoom link is automatically generated and shared with the guest, streamlining the process for everyone.

The couple develops a script they work out before interviews, with bullet points rather than verbatim wording, and questions arranged in the order they want the podcast to flow in. This saves time later editing, because less material needs to be cut out. They also make sure to have a biography of the person they will be interviewing.

Covarrubias leads a small podcast team. They work an average of about 25 to 30 hours combined for each weekly episode. The team looks at the calendar at the beginning of the year to brainstorm topics and guests.

The podcast manager on the team makes sure interviews get booked, questionnaires are filled out by guests, and artwork is created for each episode.

While Covarrubias doesn’t create an interview script with questions, the podcast follows a rough outline that is usually the same for each guest. The first part of the show explores the guest’s heritage, then Covarrubias asks how that heritage has informed the guest’s life. “We’ll take a coffee break in the middle and then we talk about what they do in the present moment. It doesn’t always happen this way. The majority of times it is pretty organic. I ask questions that I’m just interested in learning. It’s a very selfish interview,” she says.

Patrick Cox is the founder of Subtitle, a podcast about language he co-hosts with Kavita Pillay. Now in its third season, Subtitle launched in the fall of 2019. The 2022 season includes 20 episodes. Cox, who works on the podcast full time, has successfully funded Subtitle with grants, receiving two six-figure grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Unlike Lemm and Covarrubias, Cox frames his planning in terms of podcast seasons because he is applying for grants and must consider funding cycles.

“If I’m in a season, then that means I’m in the middle of a funding period. And I’ve got all these deliverables and deadlines,” he says. His funding cycle is about 12 to 14 months. “That simplifies things for me when I’m in a season. I’m going to get a podcast out every two weeks or whatever the schedule is,” he says. He sets up a production schedule at the beginning of the season, but long before the season even begins, he already knows the vast majority of the subject matter for episodes and has been in touch with some of the people he will interview.

“In order to get funding, I have had to put proposals together and say who might be a part of each episode,” he says. He writes a couple of paragraphs about each episode and includes a list of potential interviewees. Ideas come from conversations with people he has spoken to, for example someone who has a book coming out in a year where there is an aspect of the book that might lend itself to an episode. Or he’s just seen a news story that piques his interest and it’s evergreen enough that he can explore it in his podcast.

After Cox submits a proposal, it may take several months to hear back about funding. “A lot of that initial early reporting I’ve done for the show a year in advance will get set aside until I hear whether I’m receiving the funding,” he says. “When they say yes, I get things in gear before the funding period starts. I’ll get back in touch with people again, setting up interviews, contacting freelance producers and sound design editors, just to see who is interested in working with me.”

Cox is always thinking about his current or upcoming season, as well as thinking ahead about potential projects and grant proposals. “You’re always thinking of topics that interest you,” he says. “I get Google alerts about various things to do with linguistics. I’m getting this constant barrage of news stories, blog posts, and other things coming into my inbox, and then talking with people as well, hearing what they are working on.”

Budgeting and paperwork also take up time when you receive grants. “There’s a huge amount of budgeting to do. You have to budget internally for yourself, and you have to come up with a budget for the funder,” Cox says. “There’s an enormous amount of work to do for funders.”

Cox spends anywhere from 24 hours to 160 hours on a single podcast episode if it involves lots of travel. He estimates the average episode involves about 40 to 50 hours of work.

He consults with scholars when he begins to research an episode. He then starts talking to potential interviewees. If he is setting up a trip, he will search for local experts to guide him.

“I’m going to have certain questions I want answered, but I’m going to have all of these blind spots that experts know more about. That kind of setup of the field trip beforehand is key. Just going there and hoping for the best does not work. You have to have people with local knowledge around you. If they’re not around you, I’ve had situations where an expert will be available on the phone, so when I’m in the field, I can call and say ‘this is what I’m hearing. What else should I be asking? What am I missing?’ It’s part of the setup of the trip. It feels like a really important thing to do.”

He then works out a script for the podcast with his co-host, though it is not a verbatim script.

For Cox, planning ahead means interviews and field trips work like clockwork. All the prep work helps him feel confident he will get what he needs from interviews for the episode.

SP Rupert, host of the audio and video podcast Better Podcasting and 10-year podcast veteran, told Descript editing a video podcast episode takes him 4–5 hours, but used to take him about 20 hours when he was first getting started.

Lemm and other podcasters have found that reviewing audio transcripts helps speed up the editing process. She and her husband conduct their interviews over Zoom, working from separate offices in their home, each recording so they have high quality audio. Lemm then generates audio transcripts using the Rev app.

“I find that transcription is my best friend,” Lemm says. “I can look at it quickly and take the transcript and strike through stuff I don’t want. Then I send the audio to our audio editor so she knows exactly what to cut out.”

After the audio editor edits the tracks and adds music, Lemm listens again and might rearrange some things. “I really try now after years of doing this work to organize the interview itself in a way that allows for the least amount of edits,” she says.

During the interview, they use Zoom’s chat feature to communicate as co-hosts about follow-up questions so that they don’t talk over each other.

After the interview is over and recordings are downloaded, an audio editor makes edits. Lemm then listens and makes more edits based on her own sound preferences, for example editing out silence. After all the edits are done, she sends her husband the recording. He will either give her a thumbs up or make some suggestions, and she might make a couple more tweaks to the recording.

She then uploads the recording to her podcast platform, Libsyn, creating a description for the episode in show notes. “I recycle a lot of stuff. I don’t try to make too much work for myself. I’ll use a lot of language that I’ve already used in the script for the show notes. And then I’ll make sure that I add in links to people’s work or links that have popped up during the conversation in order to just have it there for anybody who is interested,” she says. She then updates her website, links to it in the show notes, and generates a final transcript made to post online later.

Covarrubias uses the online podcast recording studio app Riverside to interview her guests remotely. She says she always tries to play to her strengths, and interviewing is her biggest strength, meaning the interview usually flows well. After the interview, the audio is uploaded to the editing and transcription app Descript, which Covarrubias says is a great tool for team collaboration. She then has her producer edit the episode. They try to keep the editing of each episode as simple as possible. Filler words are removed. A guest may take a very long pause before answering a question, or may ask to rephrase an answer.

Hiring a producer to edit the podcast helped Covarrubias be successful, she says. The year she launched the podcast, she had one but wasn’t making money from the podcast and had to let him go. He trained her to edit the podcast herself. “I did it for a year, and it wasn’t working,” she says. She then hired a producer who has been working with her since 2017. “She would hold me accountable because she’d be like okay, where’s the next episode for me to edit?” Covarrubias says.

A transcript of each episode is posted online. Covarrubias notes that a human has to review the final transcript and edit it, particularly because of issues with apps transcribing Spanish words.

After interviews are done, Cox uploads the audio files to Dropbox, then transcribes them using Trint. He reads the transcript while listening to the audio, and takes notes on the transcript printout as he is listening. He strings out the audio file in the chronological order of how he thinks the story will best be told and then starts writing the episode.

“Quite often when I start writing, I realize that the order is wrong and I have to go back and fix that,” he says. “It’s a bit of back and forth, but then I eventually have a draft, and then I start showing it to people. If I can get someone to edit it formally, I will do that although I can’t always do that for budgetary reasons.”

Sometimes Cox has to edit himself. “It often requires that I set the script aside for a day or two and then come back and take a look at it again,” he says. Once he is confident he is close to a final version of the podcast, he will put all the tracks together, then add the midroll advertising and promotions to the podcast. He will send audio files to his audio engineer, who will tell him if she doesn’t understand something, or tell him when he needs to redo something, cut out an element, or delete repetition. She puts together a straight mix. After they have edited that, she adds music. Patrick listens again and sometimes suggests changes to the music or its placement in the podcast.

Once final edits are done, Patrick writes the show notes, which are also a blog post on his WordPress site. He has already selected an image to go with the show notes that will also pop up in people’s podcast feeds. Other images will be used for social media. They also publish a transcript on Medium. The online transcript and the podcast episode are published simultaneously overnight on Tuesdays.

Of all three podcasters, Covarrubias and her team spend the most time on marketing. Her social media team member spends about 10 hours a week promoting the podcast, and Covarrubias spends a few hours reviewing and approving social media posts and being on social media herself each week for the podcast.

“I talk about the podcast everywhere. It’s on my bio, It’s on my website. I mention it any time I speak anywhere. I tell people to follow and subscribe,” she says. “What’s cool about podcasts is that once people subscribe, they get a notification when the new episode drops.”

Covarrubias also collaborates with other podcasters to cross-promote their podcasts. “It’s great because then you cross-transfer audiences,” she says.

Lemm says she does not spend that much time at all promoting episodes. Most of the marketing for each episode is done through an ad in “The Circle,” a Native newspaper. There is also a link to the show on the newspaper’s website. When she does social media marketing, she gets the best results posting about new episodes on LinkedIn. A Native advocacy group based in South Dakota shares episodes, as do other organizations. “What really gets people listening more is the guest sharing the episode, and word of mouth,” she says.

Cox and his team start sharing the latest Subtitle episode on social media the morning after it is published, and ask their guests and others to share it. He started publishing an email newsletter last year to engage with his most loyal fans and provide people with updates about new episodes and other interesting language stories. “It helps in terms of getting the word out, but more than anything else the newsletter gives people a little bit more connection to the show, and in the newsletter we often ask people for their own recommendations or feedback,” he says.

At first the newsletter went out once a week. Cox realized that was too much and scaled it back to every other week. He also shortened it based on feedback from newsletter subscribers. The newsletter goes out on weeks when he is not producing a new episode, teasing the next episode. He hired someone to write and edit the newsletter, which he says has worked out well and eased his workload. There is a lot of back and forth between the team in terms of communication, mostly on Slack.

To track everything for a podcast season and each individual episode, Cox relies on spreadsheets. He also has a whiteboard-style calendar for the upcoming two months. “It’s helpful as a visual reminder of what is already in my Google Calendar,” he says. He also makes a list for each day of about 10 things he needs to get done for his podcast. He makes a list the evening or afternoon before the day in question. Some podcasters use whiteboards and Post-it Notes for story ideas or story structure, others for managing their whole business.

At any given time, Cox might be working on as many as six episodes at various stages of development. He will be setting up an interview for one, talking to a freelance reporter about doing an interview for another, all while managing travel, writing, editing, or setting up the technology side of things. “I’ll be jumping between those things through the course of a day, sometimes,” he says. “When I’m writing, I try to do it in two to three-hour blocks. But for other things, I will jump around quite a lot.”

When she was first starting out, Lemm made a checklist of all the tasks that needed to be completed for each episode. Now that she has produced a podcast so many times, she knows the flow of things by heart. Having a biweekly podcast makes things a little more manageable with her other work and obligations. While she and her husband brainstorm episode ideas a few months in advance, they work on podcasts episode to episode. They try to schedule their next guests immediately after they publish an episode. “I don’t like working too far ahead. I want it to be simple and consistent,”she says.

Lemm likes to work in weekly cycles. “It’s easy to want to work on everything all at once, right away. I’ve learned for the most part to let things sit,” she says. “They don’t need my attention every day. And it will still be fine. We’ll get it done.” She relies on her Google calendar to keep her organized, scheduling her interviews and other tasks. She creates to-do lists and adds them to her calendar schedule, starring things that are a priority to get done for the day.

Covarrubias uses the app Notion to manage her team’s weekly podcast workflow. Notion is a project management app that can be used by teams or individuals. “I manage my whole business using Notion,” Covarrubias says. “We manage the whole podcast from start to finish, from potential guests to published episodes, using Notion.”

She also uses her website as a portal for managing interview bookings and guest questionnaire forms.

“If you want to use a ruled notepad to keep track of things, that’s great too. Whatever works for you. I have a friend who still likes to use a paper planner, stickers, and highlighters. That works for her. As long as a system works for you, then you will use it.”

Additional Resources

Multitude, an independent podcast collective and production company led by Amanda McLoughlin, offers several templates to help you with your podcast workflow. The podcast episode template is useful for planning your podcast notes. Your podcast episode description can include the following elements:

• A summary of the episode
• A brief biography of your guest
• A blurb about your sponsors
• Links to how to find you online
• Credits
• An “About us” summary telling people about your podcast.

If you work with a team, the Multitude team meeting template can help you and your team set goals, and assign and track responsibilities.

Apps can save you valuable time when creating your podcast transcript. There are numerous transcription app options to choose from, depending on your budget and the features you are looking for. Journalist’s Toolbox recently updated its list of transcription tools, both free and paid. Trint, Rev, Alice, Otter.ai, and Descript are some of the most popular options among journalists and podcasters.

Calendly is an appointment tool for streamlining the scheduling of interviews and meetings. You can sync Calendly with your online calendar. Cal.com and ZCal.co are free alternatives. Another with free features is Bookafy.

Some podcasters like to manage their podcast workflow, episode outlines, and production schedules using a kanban board, which is a visual productivity workflow system that uses a board and cards to provide you with an overview of project tasks from start to finish. Some podcasters use post-it notes and a whiteboard, while others prefer apps like Trello.

Can’t afford a graphic designer for your podcast? Many podcasters use graphic design tools like Canva. The founders of the Daily Aus, one of Australia’s leading, social-first news services, use Canva to design their daily podcast and Instagram graphics.

Can’t afford to hire someone to create background or theme music? Check out AI-based tools like Aiva.ai. You can also try tools like Bandlab, which has free and educational discount plans, that let you create your own tracks using massive libraries of free loops and samples.

Zoom not your style? You can try out other free podcast recording programs such as Zencastr, which allows for multi-track recording and doesn’t require your guests to download an app to participate.

This is one of six case studies — launched by J+, the professional development arm of the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY — that aims to provide journalism creators building their own newsletters, podcasts, and other niche projects with in-depth analyses of what works and what doesn’t in the journalism creator ecosystem. This case study was supported by funding from the Meta Journalism Project and was written by Krystal Knapp, an Entrepreneurial Journalism Creators Program alumna.