Think for a moment about your very favourite podcast. The show that you wish yours could be.
What are the gaps currently separating your podcast from that show?
Chances are they’re significant.
Your favourite podcast might record in a professional production studio while you record in the closet of your spare room under a pile of blankets.
They might get the biggest names on the planet as guests while you struggle to find anyone willing to come on at all.
They might have a way of always hitting on a fascinating revelation or insight while your episodes are hit or miss.
These gaps exist for all of us. And they can either be discouraging or motivating depending on how we choose to view them.
Our challenge then, in order to reach the level that we want to be at, to create the podcast we know we’re capable of creating is closing the gaps.
It’s hard to close the gaps, however, when we don’t know exactly what they are.
This means the first step to improving our podcasts is identifying all the areas in which we could stand to improve.
Where are the problems that need fixing?
Where is the show not as good as it has the potential to be?
What do other shows do better and what can we learn from them?
Once we have a list, it simply becomes a matter of closing the gaps one by one, crossing them off our list as we go.
It’s not easy. It’s not sexy. But it’s straightforward.
Find the problems, and then fix them.
