HelloCast
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Compiling Show Research

Preparation separates the pros from the amateurs in just about everything, right?

The entire point of HelloCast is to make it easy for you to work ahead of schedule. Planning everything in advance. Here are a few good practices (some basic, some more advanced) for compiling your show research and pulling it into HelloCast.

Working on Episode Topics

Alright, you’ve got an idea for a topic on your podcast. How can you make sure you’ll cover it in a unique way on your podcast?

Whether you run a sports podcast, a book review podcast, a true crime podcast, or just a casual conversation podcast with friends, having a unique opinion about your topic is the best recipe for success. But having a unique opinion or angle is only great if you can articulate it convincingly and/or in an entertaining way.

You can add your pre-show research to a dedicated section in HelloCast to make sure you’ve thought through every angle your guests would expect — and the angles you want to challenge your guests with.

Here’s an example of a couple notes we added for a past episode we released:

(When it comes time to record your podcast, you can click on Show Notes to begin typing in your notes as you go, which will also auto-save.)

Working with Guests

First, make sure you complete every field in the guest profile in HelloCast. Doing this gives you a chance to see what social platform(s) your guests gravitate towards: Twitter? Instagram? Facebook? LinkedIn?

Next, build your guest’s bio in HelloCast as well. Some guests have a pre-written bio that can send you and they’d prefer you use. With others you may need to build that from either their byline with articles they’ve written, or whatever they use for their bio on social channels like Twitter or Instagram.

(An important note on using HelloCast for this: As you type in your notes, that section will auto-save as you type.)

Most importantly, to make your guest feel special and that you are, in fact, prepared, get the latest on your guest by following these two steps:

  1. Review their social profiles for recent tweets, articles, photos, and comments. You may find their most current thinking on the topic you want to talk to them about; people that they read or listen to or share ideas from; trips they’ve taken to speak at conferences or to unwind; and there’s so much more you can potentially uncover.
  2. Do a Google search for your guest to additionally find any podcasts they’ve already made a guest appearance on, or to see what they’ve recently published as far as articles on third-party sites go.

You can also use a service like Podchaser, which catalogues not only podcasts and their creators, but allows podcasters and their guests to log their appearances in an organized fashion.

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