How to Start a Podcast: A Guide From a Working Studio

Starting a podcast is easy. Starting one you are still making six months later is the hard part. Plenty of shows stop after a handful of episodes, and the reason is rarely the microphone. It is usually no clear format, recordings that are harder to make than they should be, and an audience that never had a reason to come back.

We have been making the Flexxed Podcast since 2019, and we run a podcast studio in Darwen that people hire to record their own shows. This guide is what we would tell a friend who asked us how to start a podcast, in the order we would tell them.

That is an episode of the Flexxed Podcast with It’s Me Fraz and MC Molegrip, recorded as a multi-camera video podcast.

Step one: decide what the show is

Before you think about kit, answer three questions in a sentence each.

Who is it for? Not “everyone interested in business”. Something like “people running a small gym in the North West”. The narrower the listener, the easier every other decision becomes.

What do they get from each episode? A story, a laugh, one useful idea, an interview with someone they would never get to talk to. Pick one and make it the promise of the show.

What is the format? Solo, co-hosts, or a guest each week. Each has a different workload. A guest show needs a steady supply of guests and a way of booking them. A co-host show needs two people who can reliably turn up at the same time.

Write the answers down. When you are stuck on episode seven, they will tell you what episode eight should be.

Step two: pick a length and a schedule you can keep

The right length is the one your content fills without padding. A tight 25 minutes beats a rambling 90. Listen back to your first recordings honestly and cut anything you would skip as a listener.

The schedule matters more than the length. Weekly, fortnightly or monthly all work, as long as it is the same every time. An audience builds around a habit. A show that goes quiet for six weeks and then drops three episodes at once teaches people not to wait for it.

A simple trick that saves a lot of shows: record three or four episodes before you publish the first. That gives you a buffer for the week when a guest cancels or someone is ill.

Step three: get the audio right first

Listeners forgive a lot. They do not forgive bad sound. If people have to strain to hear a voice, or the room echoes, they stop listening, often within the first minute.

The basics that matter most:

• One microphone per person. Sharing a single mic between two people puts one of them in the distance. Each voice on its own mic, on its own track, gives you control in the edit.
• A quiet, soft room. Hard walls, bare floors and big windows bounce sound around. Rooms with carpet, curtains and furniture sound far better than empty ones. This is the single biggest difference between a home recording and a studio one.
• Consistent distance from the mic. Speakers who lean in and out change volume all the time. Stay roughly a hand’s width away and keep it there.
• Headphones on. Everyone should hear what the mic is picking up, so problems get noticed during the recording, not in the edit.
• Record a test. Thirty seconds, played back before you start. It catches a muted channel or a buzzing cable before it ruins an hour of conversation.

You do not need the most expensive microphone on the market. You do need a room that is not fighting you.

Step four: decide whether it is a video podcast

A lot of podcast listening now happens on YouTube, and short clips from episodes are how many shows get found on Instagram, TikTok and Shorts. If growth matters to you, video is worth considering from day one.

Video adds work: cameras, lighting, a background worth looking at, and a longer edit. The payoff is that one recording becomes a full episode on YouTube, an audio feed for Spotify and Apple, and a stack of vertical clips for social.

If you go down that route, think about it like this:

• Multiple camera angles. A wide shot of the table and a camera on each speaker keeps the edit moving. One static camera for an hour is hard to watch.
• Lighting that flatters. Soft light from the front and a little separation from the background does more than a better camera.
• A set that says something. The background is part of the show’s identity. Keep it consistent between episodes.

Here is where we started: episode one of the Flexxed Podcast, from 2019. Every show begins somewhere, and the first episode is never the best one.

Step five: record like it is a show, not a chat

The difference between a good episode and an average one is often preparation.

• Plan the running order. Three or four topics or questions, in order, with a rough idea of time for each. You can wander off it, but you need something to come back to.
• Brief your guest. Tell them what the show is, who listens and what you want to talk about. Guests who know what is coming give better answers.
• Start strong. The first minute decides whether someone keeps listening. Skip the long introductions and get to the interesting part quickly.
• Record more than you need. It is easier to cut a slow ten minutes than to make up for a thin episode.

Step six: edit, publish and keep going

Editing is where the episode gets its pace. Cut the false starts, the long pauses and the tangents that go nowhere. Balance the volume between speakers so nobody has to reach for the volume button. If it is a video podcast, cut between angles to follow the conversation.

To publish, you need a podcast host. It stores your audio files and generates the RSS feed that Spotify, Apple Podcasts and the other apps read. You upload once and the host sends the episode everywhere. Video episodes go to YouTube separately.

For each episode, write a title that says what it is about, a short description, and cut two or three clips for social. Then do it again next week. Consistency is the growth strategy most shows skip.

Recording at home or in a studio?

You can absolutely start at home. Plenty of good shows did. The trade-off is time: finding a quiet room, treating it, setting up and packing down kit, and fixing sound problems in the edit.

A studio removes that work. At our podcast studio in Darwen, near Blackburn, the multi-camera setup, professional audio and lighting are already in place, so you turn up and record. You can hire the room on your own, or with one of our crew on the desk. If you have never recorded before, having someone in the room for the first session is usually the difference between a good episode and a re-record. We can also do the edit, so you leave with an episode ready to publish.

It is also the room we record our own podcast in, so we know exactly how it sounds.

If you are ready to record your first episode, have a look at the podcast studio in Darwen, tell us the date, how many people and whether you want us on the desk, and we will take it from there.