Are Podcast Seasons Right For Your Show

Over the last few blog posts, I've been answering some questions submitted by an email subscriber named Mary. In this final installment, I address her question about seasons, which was:

Is there an average number of episodes you should have in a season?

For her situation, she plans on producing 12 episodes in the spring and another 12 episodes in the fall.

I am a big fan of seasons. Here’s why: If you build seasons into your show, it allows you to schedule breaks. And with the holidays upon us, seasons may be just the thing you've been looking for in order to take some R&R.

To answer Mary's question about the average number of episodes in a season: There isn’t an average number of episodes. In fact, it’s important to know this one rule as it relates to podcasting: YOU MAKE UP THE RULES FOR YOUR PODCAST!

When deciding to have seasons and determining how many episodes you want in a season consider these things:

1.    Can you batch record episodes for a single season? If so, what is a doable number? I am a big fan of batch recording! In fact, in the next newsletter I’ll share some of the reasons I think you should record your podcast in batches. For the purpose of answering this question, if you feel you can batch record eight episodes (or pull eight Lives from Instagram/Facebook), you have your answer. For your show, you’ve just created an eight-episode season.

2.    Can you create a season around any upcoming vacations/school breaks/launches/business stuff? If you know you have certain things coming up in your calendar in which you know you need to turn your focus away from churning out episodes each week and simply want a break. Figure out how many episodes you can produce before the break and make this number a season.

3.    Can you make the season around a topic? If you want to explore a specific topic and do a 3-to-10 episodes arc around it, make this a season. This way when people are searching for shows on a certain topic, you can refer them to all of Season 1 for more information.

If you still questions, let’s schedule a 1:1 consulting session and work out a plan for what you need plus how to put everything in place.