Podcasts are an easy method of communicating your message to listeners. They are a friendly and intimate communication method – allowing participants to express themselves. Podcasts are a good for raising the profile of people within our company and help to create a more personal connection with your audience. When done regularly, they provide an engaging touchpoint.
Recording, hosting and distribution
We work with Woosh Entertainments Ltd, experts in sports podcast production, to record and edit podcasts.
All our podcasts are hosted on the Spreaker podcast platform, which allows enhanced distribution of our podcasts through mainstream podcast channels. The hosting platform also provides us with enhanced reporting KPI ability on our podcast performance.
Podcast best practice
- Do not write a script word for word as this will make the podcast sound robotic. Instead, create headings and bullet points for the speakers to talk through.
- Content should come across as conversational. Clear talking is required, not too slow
- Agree a style for your podcast – is there a ‘lead/host’ participant who is asking questions to their guest, or are all participants asking each other thought provoking questions.
- Check with compliance about any warnings that may be required to be read out on your podcast – either at the start or end of the podcast. Discuss whether you want a voice over artist to record any warnings you may need to record – or if this will be recorded using an Aegon colleague.
- It's a good idea to do a test run a few days beforehand to see how the content will work and if the participants can get the flow going. This will help identify if there are any areas/key messages where there’s not enough content, or whether the conversation doesn’t flow – you can rectify where necessary. Set up a second test if required.
- On the recording day – dial into the meeting 15 minutes in advance of the recording start time – this allows participants to get set up, relax and complete sound checks.
- The podcast studio will do a sound check at the beginning to ensure speed, clarity and volume are all at the required level, and microphones/headsets are working.
- Make sure you allocate some time with the studio at the end of the podcast to review the content – this allows you to edit sections that you want to change while you have the participants in the studio/on the call.
- Think about where you will host your podcast – Aegon webpage article or relevant product page on the public website, linking to the podcast on Spreaker.
Podcast process
Please note that for any images used with podcasts on Spreaker, APS should be briefed using the creative brief, and asked to create images of the following sizes: 1400 x 1400, 985 x 275.
Step 1
Fill in the creative brief, including information about who the speakers are and what the podcast is about. Email this to the digital optimisation team with some options for recording dates (in case the studio is not available on your required date).
Step 2
Digital optimisation team will create a MOS job and send an action to the stakeholder to upload the podcast script.
Step 3
The digital optimisation team will send music options for the stakeholder to select and set up ‘podcast rehearsal’ with speakers on Teams (if required).
Step 4
Digital optimisation team will set up the recording meeting on Teams.
Step 5
After the recording session, the studio will send the podcast file to the digital team via WeTransfer. The digital optimisation team will forward this on to APS and send them a fast track action to upload the file to the MOS job. The file will have basic edits - for example, any times sentences were restarted or sound effects already requested will be added.
Step 6
The podcast owner will review and, if required, send back any further requested edits. This can be done by writing down time stamps on a word doc to send back to Woosh. This will be repeated as many times as necessary.
For example, starting 0:10 'The quick brown' and ending 0:20 'the lazy dog'.
Step 7
The digital optimisation team will send a MOS action to the podcast owner requesting podcast details and a banner to be used on Spreaker platform.
Step 8
Once podcast is approved, the digital team will upload the podcast to Spreaker and provide a link to the podcast owner.
Podcast analytics
Spreaker provides podcast analytics through their platform. These can be requested by emailing the Digital Operations Team.