The bad news is that I don’t have the perfect answer. The good news is that I can give you some rough estimates of the time it would take and then from there you can plan accordingly. Let’s figure it out, shall we?

Set Up Your Tools and Workflow

While recording your podcast you should be focused on the presenting the content clearly and with authority. In order to do this it is important that you set up and test all of your recording software and hardware beforehand. This may take some testing and even a few hours of tweaking to get it right, but most of this work is a one-time investment. It pays off to spend some time with your tools.

Pad, pad, pad

Whatever amount of time you think it will take to produce your podcast, you can just go ahead and triple it. And even then, it could take longer. Until you get more experienced with your tools and workflow it’ll be difficult to predict how long the process will take.

My recommendation is to take the length of the podcast you want to produce and multiply it by 3. So, for example, if you’re doing a 30 minute podcast, it would be prudent to budget 90 minutes for production. If you’re publishing a 60 minute podcast, plan on around 3 hours to do the production.

(This also includes any light editing or audio cleanup you decide to do. Heavily edited podcasts or those that consist of many different audio excerpts edited together could take much longer.)

The 90 minutes allows plenty of time for retakes, random software or hardware issues or interruptions (although you should be turning off email, phone and warning other members of your household that you’re in production mode).

Also, I’ll be the first to admit that three times your podcast length is probably on the high end, but find yourself surprised when it takes less time and with more experience, it certainly will.

More Experience, Less Time

Like anything else, the more you do it, the better you get. After publishing several episodes of your podcast, you decrease the amount of time it takes you to produce your podcast until it’s a well-oiled machine.

Pay attention to your mistakes and don’t repeat them in your next podcast. Learn your tools well and soon you’ll find that producing a podcast is not only easier but much more enjoyable.

This is a real guide for real beginners and it will guide you through the basics of podcasting. The Real Beginners Guide to Podcasting only teaches you how to podcast using online podcasting tools. Everything takes place inside of the web browser, so there’s no software to download or complicated audio lingo to understand.

At the end of guide, I’ve put together some video tutorials that will walk you through podcasting with each individual online podcasting tool. The goal is to have you successfully podcasting using one of the online tools and sharing those podcasts with the world!

What does Podcast mean?

“Podcasting" is a portmanteau that combines the words “broadcasting” and “iPod.” The term can be misleading since neither podcasting nor listening to podcasts requires an iPod or any portable player, and no broadcasting is involved.
From Wikipedia.org

That’s what the word means. But what is a podcast? A podcast is an audio program that is distributed over the internet.

Podcasts come in many flavors and varieties. Do you already have an idea for your podcast? It could be just you talking and/or playing some music. Maybe it’s an interview you recorded with your city councilmember or mayor and you want to share this with your community. It could even be a foreign language teacher demonstrating word pronunciation for students or a pastor’s sermons from a Sunday church service for the congregation.

Really, a podcast can be about anything. These are just some examples, but they show the variety of ideas and concepts.

Some Examples of Podcasts

Before we jump into learning how to podcast, you might want to briefly listen to some existing podcasts, so you can hear how different they all are and how they sound. Use the controller below to start listening to a short compilation of podcasts that I put together.

Podcast Free America Podcast Sampler

Featured in the sampler: Travel Commons, Coffee Geek, Elements and Audible Ajax.

Creating Your Own Pocast

Now that you’ve listened to a sampling of some podcasts, let’s get started with the basics about how to create a podcast. As I stated in the introduction, I won’t bore you with technical speak or try to teach you “how the pros” do podcasts. Instead we’ll start slowly and learn the basics and get a basic podcast recorded.

Did you know that you only need

• a computer with a built-in microphone


• an internet connection


• a cheap microphone or webcam (if you don’t have one built-in)

to create a podcast? Yep, it’s true! All of those other guides that you read talk about so many technical details that you have to wonder if they do it for your sake or for theirs. I’m guessing the latter.

Currently, you have a few choices of online tools for creating your podcast(listed in alphabetical order):

• Audioblog.com


• ClickCaster


• Podomatic

Choose a service. You can learn more about each service using the video tutorials below. You’ll need to sign up and create an account. Some of the websites are currently free (since they are still in the early stages) and others require a paid account.

Screencast Tutorials

These video/screencasts will guide you through the process of creating a podcast using the online tools listed above.

• How to podcast with Podomatic.com (video)


• More coming soon!

Stay in touch

Stay up-to-date with all things podcasting with my monthly newsletter SYNC Monthly (first issue goes out this week!). Subscribe now.

The latest episode of the ExpressionEngine Screencasts covers how to publish an iTunes-compatible podcast feed and manage your podcast episodes using EE. The screencasts are about 30 minutes long and are only $5 each and available from the Pragmatic Bookshelf store. 

• Learn How to Podcast


• Podcasting Hardware


• Business of Podcasting


• Podcasting Software

Visit the Gift for Podcasters Store.