How To Write Compelling Podcast Show Notes To Drive Audience Connections
Podcast show notes are a must-have when marketing your podcast
Podcast show notes are a must-have when marketing your podcast. The easiest way to think of them is like a hub of information and resources relevant to your podcast recording. It acts as an individual summary for each podcast episode and collects useful links and resources so listeners can engage further.
Show notes make your podcast easier to digest, keep listeners engaged with a specific topic or guests, and allow them to ‘deep dive’ into new topics, as well as giving them calls to action and useful tools.
What Are Podcast Show Notes?
Podcast show notes are a written summary of what happened during your podcast with links and resources for listeners to find out more about your guests or topic. It helps to give listeners a flavour of what is to come in your episode, to entice them to tune in.
However, podcast show notes can take many different forms and lengths. Some are a simple summary with links, but others can be much more in-depth, detailing what happened during an episode with additional resources such as links to articles mentioned, guest bios and social media channels, videos, transcripts, and relevant calls-to-action.
Show notes allow your listeners to take one step further from being passive listeners to taking action.
How Are Show Notes Accessed?
Show notes appear attached to each podcast episode. You can add your show note text to your podcast distributor (e.g. Podbean, Anchor) when uploading your audio recording. The text is automatically uploaded along with your recording to various podcast listening sites such as Spotify and Apple.
The show notes generally appear under the podcast audio player, or if you are listening on Spotify, listeners need to click on each episode’s title to reveal the notes. It’s important to note that not all podcast distribution sites accept hyperlinks in their text notes areas, such as SoundCloud, so you will need to adapt your show notes if you use platforms like this.
What Are the Benefits of Writing Show Notes?
Podcast show notes help reinforce an episode’s message by complementing the audio content with imagery and text summaries, creating an in-depth look at a topic that can be consumed both audibly and visually. Their main benefits include:
- An easily digestible summary of the show’s content
- Central location for listeners to access materials and links referenced during an episode
- Persuade casual listeners to tune in to new and old episodes
- Attract and educate new listeners about the podcast via SEO to build awareness of the podcast
- Provide additional accessibility for people with hearing difficulties.
Let’s look at these in a bit more detail:
Show notes make it easy for listeners to learn more
When researching a guest or topic and during the recording, it’s likely you and your guests found and referenced relevant articles, videos, or other podcasts within the episode.
Providing the links to those resources within the show notes is the easiest way to help listeners access that information later on. Your listeners will appreciate the extra effort so they can find everything in one place rather than trying to remember every website you referenced.
Persuade casual followers to tune in
To persuade casual listeners to tune in to the latest episode, use show notes to highlight the main takeaways and why this episode should not be missed. Some people need a little extra convincing to hit play, and show notes are the perfect opportunity to get them there.
Cross-promote your back catalogue for more listens
Show notes also offer the opportunity to re-promote older episodes. Most podcasts are centred around a specific topic, so referencing previously published episodes is bound to happen. Including a link to past content helps both current and new listeners to consume your back catalogue, likely creating more loyal audience members.
Attract more subscribers with centralised calls-to-action
Throughout the lifetime of a podcast, there are multiple actions hosts want their audience to take. Subscribe, leave a review, buy tickets to live shows, sign up for a newsletter, or become a Patreon member.
Like including links to external resources in one place, including a section of calls-to-actions within show notes makes sure listeners don’t need to remember multiple URLs to take the next step.
Attract new listeners using SEO best practices
For each episode, write detailed posts highlighting the key takeaways using target keywords and SEO best practices so that your podcast episodes appear in Google search results. Think carefully about what keywords potential listeners might search for to find your podcast.
Use Google’s Keyword Planner or Ubersuggest to find keywords relating to your topic. You should also include keywords relevant to your industry or episode niche. By doing this, you will reach listeners who previously didn’t know you existed, and increase downloads for specific episodes and acquire new loyal listeners.
Remember that you’re ultimately writing for people who don’t want to read content that’s overflowing with search terms, so don’t go overboard with littering your show notes with keywords!
Use timestamps to help navigation
If you use timestamps in show notes, your listeners gain the ability to skip around your podcast like they would an article. They can jump right to the parts that interest them. This takes a bit more effort from the podcast producer as you’ll need to go through the podcast and carefully note down key moments and timings, which can take a long time if you have a long episode, e.g. 60 minutes.
A timestamp show notes list looks like this:
05:15 explanation of chatbots best practices
06:05 should you use pop-ups on your website?
Make it easy for followers to share soundbites
Show notes should include at least one memorable episode quote. It could be the main takeaway, a controversial guest statement, or a funny remark that entices users to take the next step and listen to the episode.
Podcast listeners like to discover new shows through trusted friends or online communities, making it easy for your loyal audience members to share these memorable moments.
How Should You Lay Out Your Show Notes?
There are many different ways of laying out the structure for your podcast show notes, but here is a quick and easy guide to get you started:
Starting at the top of the page:
1. A quick summary
Begin your show notes with a summary of the episode. Your goal here is to convince the reader to hit that play button and give them a clear idea of what your podcast is about and why they should listen. Hook them with a story, a provocative statement, or a thought-provoking question, how will this podcast benefit them? Keep it under 100 words.
2. Your main points
Create a simple outline that touches on the main points of your episode.
Add some context to each main point but don’t give away too much information; you still want people to listen to your episode. Don’t write more than a sentence for each point. You can also use timestamps here if you want to give that extra level of guidance. Timestamps are especially useful if you have a technical or industry-focused podcast where you actively educate listeners, as listeners can jump to the sections they want to learn more about.
3. Bios for your guests
Give a quick summary of your guests and keep it to less than 75 words. Please don’t give away any of the juicy information (like how they solved their big problem), so the reader must still listen to the episode—link to their websites, social media profiles, books for sale, their podcast episodes, etc.
4. Links to your resources
Add links to any data, quotes, tools, videos, or sources you mention. This will allow your listeners to verify what you say and learn more. Even if no one follows them, just adding links helps build your credibility as a podcast host. Keep these nicely collated all together in a dedicated resources section, so they are easy to find.
5. Charts, visuals, and videos
If you refer to any specific chart, graphs, images, infographics, videos, or other visuals during your episode, it’s helpful to include them in your podcast show notes. This is easier to do if you have a website for your podcast, as not all podcast distribution sites are capable of supporting images in the show notes.
6. Calls-to-action
Finish your show notes with some instructions for your readers. Instruct them to review your show and provide links to encourage them to subscribe to your newsletter, like/follow your social media pages, or listen to a previous podcast episode.
7. Audio transcriptions
Include transcriptions at the bottom of your show notes, so readers only have to scroll through them if they want to. A transcription really helps your SEO by adding a lot of content to the page for search engines to read. This is a great way to attract people to your website who may become listeners. There are many tools out there to help you transcribe your podcasts, such as Otter.ai, which really help speed up this process.
Examples of Great Podcast Show Notes
Sew Mindful podcast: Really full show notes with a summary, topic bullet points, and links and resources.
Marketing School: Fantastic example of time-stamped show notes and resources links.
The Culture Bar: In-depth show notes with guest quotes, short guest biographies, links and resources, and calls-to-action.
Content Makers: Short and sweet show notes providing an excellent summary of the episode and fantastic resource links.
Ffern, As the Season Turns: The simplest form of show notes, just a short summary of the content.
Final Tips on Creating Great Show Notes
Creating show notes as you go
Make small notes before, during, and after the recording about things that should go into the show notes. This will help to give your show notes structure, and also help you to pull out key moments, as well as easy to identify any resources guests might mention. This will make it easier to compile strong show notes afterwards.
Keep show notes easy to read
As you create your podcast show notes, keep your text skimmable and easy to consume. Use clear and descriptive subheadings throughout your content. Opt for bullet points wherever you can. If you need to use paragraphs, keep them short.
Strapped for time?
If you don’t have time to write long and in-depth show notes, focus on a short summary with two or three timestamp highlights to help listeners navigate your podcast and a few key resource links. You won’t get the same reach with SEO, but your podcast listeners will still get a lot of value from your show notes.
