Pause, Strategize, Plan & Relaunch
As most children in the US head back to school - schedules, planning, and organization have been on my mind. It seems I am not the only one. In fact, after last month’s newsletter, a reader asked,
“What's the best way to pause a podcast in order to
strategize a new direction and plan upcoming episodes?"
Taking a Strategic Break
There are several strategies you can employ if you wish to take a break. In fact, I’ve discussed the benefit of building seasons into your podcast in a past blog post. You can read it here.
Some other options include: republishing archived episodes. The archives option allows you to keep pushing out content while you take a needed break.
However, there's some work to be done with this strategy. Choose from a Good, Better, or Best Approach.
The Best Approach
Determine the episodes to republish and decide if you want to add on a quick intro (one that you can re-use for all the archived episodes) that says something like "Hi, please enjoy this week's best-of episode. I'll be back soon with brand-new episodes. Until then, connect with me at...." Include some kind of call-to-action for listeners to connect with you on social media and/or your website in the meantime.
A Better Approach
If the Best Approach feels like a lot of work, consider aiming for Better which includes adding a word in the re-published episode description and title such as "Re-airing" or some other word to signal it's an archived episode. In the first few lines of the description, write something like I mentioned about enjoying the archived episode. Use the original show notes for the rest of the description.
A Good Approach
Simply take the break! If your body, mind, and spirit are yearning for a break, it’s okay to press pause. Record a short episode that says the podcast is taking a break so that you can refresh yourself and come back with amazing new content in the weeks to come. There is nothing wrong with pausing a podcast so long as you let your listeners have some inkling of what is going on with the release of episodes.
In Summary
Outline the strategy.
Highlight the episodes you want to re-air or record a “we’re pausing” episode.
Work with a VA or podcast manager to schedule everything up in your podcast host.
You can also do a mixture of incorporating seasons into your podcast AND re-airing archived episodes at various intervals during your season hiatus. This way you are keeping the feed "fresh" periodically.