Podcasts for effective science communication

Once you have an idea, try to distill it down to one concise sentence to focus test on colleagues before pitching to management. Find (kind) podcasting groups on your preferred social media platform to ask questions, and have some initial listeners give you feedback before you send your podcast out into the world.

There is a wide range of possible styles and formats when starting out with podcasts, whether you are on a budget and record on your iPhone or are looking to produce something that sounds more professional. Determine your preferred style, tone and format and what is possible according to your budget, episode frequency, number of guests, who will host, who will advise on episode content, how tightly edited the content will be, and who will do that editing.

Some common podcast formats include:

• Interview podcasts
• Co-hosted podcasts
• Scripted non-fiction
• News recap
• Educational
• Scripted fiction.

The Prevention Centre’s podcast uses a conversational interview format. Traditionally, this is where the host/interviewer asks  the interviewee questions about their expertise and encourages and leads them through their work in a structured way, so a less informed listener might follow its logic.

How long should each episode be and how often should we publish?

As a rough guide, a one-hour recording for our Prevention Works podcast will produce about a 40-minute episode that is carefully edited for sense and to remove filler words such as repeats, ‘ums’, and ‘you know’.

Since there are millions of podcasts, we suggest you search for your proposed name on several of the larger listening apps to check if it has already been used.

Your cover artwork needs to attract potential listeners’ attention and stand out in a crowded space. Podcast artwork should follow the following specifications (based on Apple’s podcast artwork requirements):

• Square image (3000×3000 pixels)
• Resolution of 72 dpi
• PNG or JPEG file types
• Colourspace RGB.

What is a story?

We tell stories in our everyday lives all the time. Podcast stories about science might take a little more consideration to create, since the story is not always apparent from the academic paper or conference presentation. It may help to consider your episode in terms of a challenge – which might be the health problem itself, or how the research came to fruition.

Finding your story

At the Prevention Centre, we use the same elements that journalists employ for finding a news story: we look for an issue among our networks. We always try and align these stories with trending topics in news cycle. The story or topic is not always new. It has often been covered many times before. The challenge is to find a new angle for the story or an aspect that hasn’t yet been addressed. Ask yourself: Is this new? Is this interesting? Is this surprising? Has this been told before? What is different in this story from what has been told before?

Some of the most powerful stories are those people can relate to, the ones that create empathy with your audience. These are not usually elements explored by science communication but they are the ones that your audience are more likely to remember.

If you are focused on the latest research around a topic, dig a little deeper into the ‘so what?’. What does this mean for policy decision makers? What does this mean for my neighbour living with diabetes, and how might a policy maker think once they hear a real-life example. You can also explore:

• Who is the guest, their expertise but also themselves as a person living and working in various communities?
• What’s brought them to this research? How did this work evolve from previous work?
• What is the challenge or conflict they are addressing? Who are the main players?
• What are the factors in solving this challenge, and how does it intersect with other health challenges?
• What does the research suggest/how are they hoping to solve the problem? Who did they collaborate with?
• How grounded is this research – that is, how might you or I experience the problem as we go about our daily lives?
• What are some of the solutions, and where will they go next with this work?

It is important that the narration sounds conversational and informal. It should sound like friends telling each other a story.

Write an outline of your episode

This doesn’t have to be a word-for-word script. Try building it around bullet points to improve the flow of the conversation and help you avoid rambling. How does the audience want to hear the issue unfold? Asking questions in order helps with later editing.

Our host reads the relevant research and crafts questions that she then puts in order of narrative unfolding, creating a logical flow through context, the wicked problem itself, the players in that problem, the proposed resolution of the research, and what might happen next.

She is ready to respond to what is said in the interview itself, asking supplementary questions. She will often also refer to the intersection of the current point of discussion with previous interview material, drawing connections between the issues as they are connected in real life, leading listeners back to previous episodes.

You will need to match the equipment with your podcast format depending on whether you are setting up for one-person or a three-to-four people. Since the hardware and software is frequently superseded, we recommend you research a podcast directory website or our resource list at the end of this page for the most current brands of microphones, recording software and other equipment. Ask others working in the field their advice and read up on the latest technology.

Editing has become a much easier process than it used to be, so it need not be too daunting. If you want to produce your podcasts in-house but don’t know about the equipment, it may be worth asking a professional podcast maker to set you up to start with.

Equipment you may need to consider includes:

• Podcast microphones, either dynamic or condenser, which are often USB connected to your computer

• Microphone connections, such as USB or XLR setup
• Microphone accessories, such as a stand , pop filter, boom arm, shock mount
• Headphones
• Online recording software, such as Riverside and Zoom
• Editing software, such as GarageBand, Audacity, Descript.

Pick a good place to record

If possible, record in a small, quiet room with lots of soft furnishings, such as curtains, rugs and carpet, as sound quality will be echo-y with hard surfaces like glass walls. It is not unheard of to interview in a walk-in wardrobe or a bedroom for this reason!

• Encourage guests to keep the microphone a handspan from, and about a 45-degree angle below their mouth

• Remove any jewellery that may create noise if you move, have a soothing hot drink or water ready for coughing or tight throat

• If you notice popping sounds, move the microphone slightly below the mouth, a couple of centimetres further away, to stop air from the mouth hitting the microphone

• Test record yourself talking at a consistent level and don’t worry about mistakes, and filler words like ‘um’ and ‘you know – you can edit these later.

When recording online, our producer uses Riverside.fm (but there are many other similar platforms) which you can connect to without needing to download any software. Zoom is used as a backup in case there are issues for the guest’s technology.

I also ask guests to do a backup recording on their phone, then I decide which sounds better, use Wavelab (or Garage Band or Audacity) to line up their recording and my own, then upload these to Descript.com for transcription and text editing.

It’s a bit of labour, as I tend to cut out all silences/room noise from their recording and mine, but it leads to the best quality.

If this sounds too complicated, just go with the Riverside.fm recording, and make use of Descript’s excellent add-on called “Studio Sound’ to improve the overall audio quality.

This arena is constantly changing and becoming easier, so a bit of background research on a trusted industry platform, like, say, Transom.org can go a long way. Or just crowd source what’s the go-to of the moment!

Dr Gretchen Miller, Podcast Host and Audio Producer

This is the most challenging part of the process and the most creative when you transform your recording into something that sounds natural but is actually tightly edited.

1. Write an engaging introduction and the sign off for your podcast.
2. Source some royalty-free music from Soundstripe, audio jungle, Blue Dot Sessions or Storyblocks to mix into the story either at the beginning and end or as a marker throughout the story to indicate a new part of the story or a change in voice.
3. In your first pass, edit for content, be prepared to change the structure of the story and modify the script, always reflecting on the podcast’s broader intentions.
4. In your second pass, focus on distractions such as ums, buts, ahhhs or simply external noise. Ask yourself if the audio contributes to the storytelling before removing it. Note sounds that communicate location or emotion, such as sighs, pauses, laughter, stuttering, or birdsong are important to keep. These are what make the audio story a different experience. They humanise the conversation, indicate place, and give it that intimacy that podcasts are so well recognised for.
5. Create a list of the audio distractions to check during your second pass, noting the time stamp for content you aim to revisit. This exercise will help avoid needing to edit from start to finish multiple times.
6. If you are still not happy, revisit your podcast series’ story objective. What are the main ideas you wanted to communicate or ask the listeners to understand or act on?
7. Export audio file: the usual preferred format is an MP3 mastered at -16 LUFS. Note LUFS is an abbreviation for Loudness Unit Full Scale, which refers to the maximum level a system can cope with.

You will need to source a podcast hosting service, such as Spotify, Omny or buzzsprout, to host your large audio files. New hosting services spring up all the time, and some are free, or are free for a limited number of episodes. Podcast hosts will store and distribute your podcast to directories so listeners can find them. Note, once you are listed in Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and Google Podcasts, your podcast is in front of 95% of all podcast listeners.

Some podcast hosts also offer a trial period and other benefits such as visual soundbites, which are video grabs of your audio animated over your artwork image. These can help boost promotion of episodes on social media.