Podcast Intros and Outros – PCI 365

Speaker 0 00:00:00 It's okay to to tweak it here and there, but after a while, you wanna make sure you, you stay consistent. 'cause you lose branding. If, if say every every episode has a different intro music, that's just not gonna work. Well.

Speaker 1 00:00:15 You're

Speaker 2 00:00:15 Listening to Podcasts Insider, hosted by Mike Dell, Todd Cochrane, and Mackenzie Bennett from the Blueberry team, bringing you weekly insights, advice, and insider tips and tricks to help you start, grow and thrive through podcasting. All with the support of your team here at Blueberry Podcasting. Welcome. Let's dive in.

Speaker 1 00:00:34 Let, let,

Speaker 3 00:00:36 I'm Mackenzie Bennett, marketing specialist here at Blueberry.

Speaker 0 00:00:38 And I'm Mike Dell, VP of Customer Relations here at Blueberry. Today, we're all about the intros and outros for your show.

Speaker 3 00:00:52 Crafting a memorable podcast intro and outro is probably one of the more fun things for your show, but it's something that you get to decide and potentially work on with someone else who might be better at said music than you are. So I think it's something that you can refresh every once in a while too.

Speaker 0 00:01:13 Yeah. The thing about intros and outros, some people go way overboard , they'll play three minutes of music or something and talk over it and all this. And there is something about keeping it somewhat concise and making it, I don't know, how would you put that? Where

Speaker 3 00:01:39 You go, where are you headed here?

Speaker 0 00:01:40 Well, it's just like branding. Okay. So when you hear this show, you usually hear one of us start talking mm-hmm. and then you hear our theme music and it's always kind of the same.

Speaker 3 00:01:51 Yeah. You're, you associate that with us. Yeah, that's exactly what we want in our memorable intro and outro. You just, you guys just heard our intro and it has been the same for a while now.

Speaker 0 00:02:04 Yeah. We, of course, we switch up who reads the intro at every, every episode depending on who's hosting and all that. And that's kind of a thing that we do. And, and that goes along with the branding, but you wanna make sure that when people start playing your episode, 'cause a lot of times they throw you in a playlist and they really don't know which, what episode or what show that they're listening to next. And that's always a good thing. Another thing is it, when people build them, build you into their lives, they are comforted somewhat. I'm not reading off the notes here, but , like, I listen to a lot of shows and I know there's certain show comes out at a certain time, a certain day. And when I hit play on that episode and I hear that familiar how it begins, that's awesome. I like it. It then I know that it just feels good. It feels like, oh, this is what I'm supposed to be listening to right now.

Speaker 3 00:03:05 Yeah. Uh, I think one of those things too is finding, like you, you kind of have an idea of what your audience is going to like in terms of that intro, whether it is the music or if you're keeping it funny. If you're keeping it very serious, that is the information that you're gonna tailor it to. But also a really good way to get that information is to do an audience survey. You're doing this right off the bat, you're doing it based on your gut of what you think your audience would want. And then sometimes people look at their audience survey results and they are surprised

Speaker 0 00:03:41 . Yeah. Oh, for sure. And, and ask your audience too. That's the other thing, just flat out ask. It's, this is an audio platform. If we wanna know something about you that or have you answer a question, we're just gonna say, Hey, what do you think of this? Or that kind of thing. Some of audience members will, will email us or whatever, but don't be afraid to, to kind of get to know your audience and tailor what you're doing with your intros or outros to what kind of feedback you're getting. Don't change everything all at once unless you're doing a complete re rebranding. But, uh, we'd cover that in other episodes, but tweak this or that. Just get it, get it to where it's close enough every time that they know what show they're listening to or what show they just to, or something like that. And they don't have to be prerecorded intros either. That's the other thing.

Speaker 3 00:04:39 I think they're, yeah, you can have both or you can do just the live every time. It just depends on what you wanna do.

Speaker 0 00:04:45 Exactly. A lot of times that's with, with my personal shows, I always just, first thing they hear is my voice without music and sound effects. Okay. But then if I do have some sort of an intro, I'll do like a cold open, then an intro that might be prerecorded or have some music behind it or something like that. And then I go right into the content.

Speaker 3 00:05:08 Some other people will use that intro to really tell the story of how the episode's gonna flow. I think an example that I'm familiar with is from this American Life, where they have usually a handful of different segments that are incredibly different stories, but they all are on the same topic or very niche thought that they are doing for this episode. So they kind of, in that intro try to give you like a mysterious way of how are, how is all this going to come together for this thing that we're really trying to do a deep dive in. So I think that can be a fun way to start the show.

Speaker 0 00:05:54 They're the quintessential N p R style podcasts and that's what they do well.

Speaker 3 00:05:59 Yep.

Speaker 0 00:06:00 They create that intrigue at the beginning, like, well, how in the heck does hotdog and Frisbees relate? You

Speaker 3 00:06:07 Know, ? Yes. You, you often are able to forget what the topic is. You're just invested in whatever story is happening for this eight minutes. And then in the 30 seconds in between the next story, they're like, okay, here's what we were talking about again. Now here's a different example of it. So it's a fun way to tease for throughout the episode

Speaker 0 00:06:32 And you can include music and sound effects, but it's, it's a little tricky sometimes finding music that's legal. So remember that you make sure that you're getting it from a source that that allows it to be used in podcasting. Todd famously always says he, his first episode intro music was a C D C that is no longer online.

Speaker 3 00:06:56 No, it should not be

Speaker 0 00:06:58 , but back when all this started, we didn't know any better. So we were just playing whatever we had mm-hmm. . But sometimes you really don't wanna have anything distracting. Again with, like I said, with mine, I always like it to be my voice is the first thing you hear when you hit play. I do have a little bit of branding going on afterwards and like with this one, we have that cold open, so our voices, and it's most of the time one of us three , but sometimes if we have a guest, we might have a guest to be the cold open. You just never know.

Speaker 3 00:07:31 Oftentimes people will pay someone to record their, their intro, like they're just kind of the one that we were talking about earlier of that's what people recognize from like branding standpoint. And then you get into your own personalized intro and that is just the same thing as music. Make sure that you're paying for something that has all of the ways that is allowed to be streamed, downloaded, used in perpetuity. Make sure you're just legally set on that front because it can go poorly just the way that music can.

Speaker 0 00:08:08 Yeah. I have a friend who's a voiceover artist and whenever he is warming up, or not whenever, but sometimes when he is warming up for a session, he'll record intros for me . So it's kind of fun, you know, it just his little funny, uh, sayings and whatnot and he's very, uh, very comedic, but it's just fun. Every once in a while I'll get this, this file full of voiceovers from, uh, from Mark practicing . Yeah.

Speaker 3 00:08:34 So,

Speaker 0 00:08:36 But hiring somebody to do it there, there's lots of good voiceover people out there and in various costs. You, you can do it on Fiverr. I've had pretty good luck with that. To find somebody on there that you like the sound of their voice or, or you're going for a certain thing and then have them just do a, a dry recording for you and then you can put in music or sound effects or whatever to a prerecorded so that it can be on inexpensive and it adds a little bit of professionalism.

Speaker 3 00:09:07 It definitely does. We, we wanted to say for the outros as well, that this is your chance to leave a lasting impression on your listeners and that includes just like the intros, a prerecorded outro, as well as anything that you wanna add at the end after you've really discussed all of your topics or whatever it is. That combination is a call to action probably for your podcast saying like, please listen and subscribe or tell your friends or something like that. As well as that wrap up of your actual content.

Speaker 0 00:09:43 Don't be afraid to experiment a little bit. That's the other thing, especially when you're first starting or, or whatever, experiment a little bit with the intro until you get what you like or what your audience likes. It's okay to to tweak it here and there, but after a while you wanna make sure you, you stay consistent. 'cause you lose branding. If, if say every, every episode has a different intro, music , that's just not gonna work. Well,

Speaker 3 00:10:14 Honestly, that reminds me of when people use different artwork for each episode. But if it's, if it's something that you're gonna do, do it. You can be known for that or you can be known for not being on top of it.

Speaker 0 00:10:29 Yeah. Yeah. One of, one of the other things with outros in general is a lot of times your listeners will get used to how your outro start, how you, how you wrap things up. And that might cause them to bail out early. So changing it up a little bit sometimes for the outro might be, might be fun. Surprise them, Hey, I got something else here.

Speaker 3 00:10:54 Yeah.

Speaker 0 00:10:55 The best practice for intros and outros is just definitely try to be consistent, at least with the intro. Sometimes the outros fun to play with, but you know, once, once you get nailed down what you like, hang with it for a while. I mean, you can make increment incremental changes now and again, you know, that's, that's cool. Or a total rebrand once in a while probably doesn't hurt anything. 'cause it doesn't take very long for you, you know, your listeners to get used to the new music or the new this or the new that I watch a YouTube channel that I think they've changed their intro about once a year.

Speaker 3 00:11:34 That's not bad.

Speaker 0 00:11:35 Yeah. And you know, it's kinda like, oh, what, what, that's what's happening here. And then two, two or three episodes in, I'm like, eh, it's okay.

Speaker 3 00:11:43 . I mean, yeah. We, we are all used to it with TV show intros changing from season to season. This is very similar. And then also it's fun to include, like, I, I think that everyone that worked on the episode should be included in the credits, whether you actually verbally say that on the podcast or keep it on the show notes. But I think everyone should credits

Speaker 0 00:12:10 Tag in our blueberry system.

Speaker 3 00:12:13 Yeah. The blueberry, it's a, it's a podcast 2.0 feature, right? Yes,

Speaker 0 00:12:17 Yes. And, uh, you can producer, chief bottle washer, host guests, whatever, you could put a bunch of different titles in there and they'll show up on the, the podcasting apps. But it's really nice. Put it right in your show notes as well.

Speaker 3 00:12:32 I think it's just the right thing to do. , you know, give people their due

Speaker 0 00:12:37 Right here. Here's a question we didn't cover here in our notes, but I, I've got a question. Do you absolutely need an intro or an outro?

Speaker 3 00:12:49 You mean like a prerecorded one

Speaker 0 00:12:51 Or any sort of intro? Outro. What about just flipping the mic on start talking?

Speaker 3 00:12:57 People are gonna have to be much better on the mic than they expect they should be. , it's, it's not easy. It is very difficult going right off the cuff like that, like diving into it. You have to entice them

Speaker 0 00:13:15 Or say something simple. Like, if we wanted to change this one to just, just not have much of an intro, we could just say, Hey, welcome to podcaster, blah, blah, blah. Here we go. Instead of having some big production. And, and that's, that's a thing. And a lot of people think, oh, I gotta have theme music, I've gotta have this, I've gotta have that. Well what about just reading it?

Speaker 3 00:13:39 I would still call that an introduction though. Yeah,

Speaker 0 00:13:42 Yeah. But I mean, a simplified one instead of, you know, something highly produced like, welcome to the show today we're talking about this and let's go . Yeah. You know, or

Speaker 3 00:13:52 Whatever. I think that's perfectly fine, especially for people who are just anxious to get started and feel like they're like, oh no, that's, that seems like a lot to do. Just do that. Go with this version that Mike is explaining right now. It is absolutely doable. Just going straight into the topic, difficult doing, hi, this is so-and-so with the show and starting. Great.

Speaker 0 00:14:14 No, well that's probably the, you know, at least you wanna identify yourself 'cause somebody might just stumble upon it and not know.

Speaker 3 00:14:19 Yeah. I would be curious to know like how long into an episode when you were doing an intro, do people drop out? Like if they are trying your show for the first time and they just absolutely hate the introduction and they immediately scrub through it just to look for the actual subject topic because they know that for like TV of how long are people gonna last and how long do you have to, like how many episodes do you have to hook them? That type of stuff. I would love to see numbers on that for a podcast, but I don't know how that happens.

Speaker 0 00:14:56 Yeah, I don't know either. But it would be interesting. Anyway, the final thing here that I'll actually read, Crafting Engaging Podcast intros and outros is an art form that requires creativity and strategic thinking and a deep understanding of your audience. Remember, your intro and outro are bookends to your podcast episodes, leaving lasting impressions on your listeners, experiment, refine, and make them as memorable as your content itself. How's that for reading? Wow. Mm-hmm. . So I think we've got this one covered. Let's listen to the outro here in a sec.

Speaker 3 00:15:37 Sounds good, Mike.

Speaker 0 00:15:38 Catch you next week.

Speaker 2 00:15:40 Thanks for joining us. Come back next week and in the meantime, head to podcast insider.com for more information to subscribe, share, and read our show notes. Check out the latest suite of services and learn how Blueberry can help you leverage your podcast. Visit blueberry.com. That's blueberry without the ease because we can't afford the ease.