Podcast Housekeeping: Do Your Podcast Cover Art and Description Still Fit Your Business?

Your podcast cover art and description are two of those things you make a lot of decisions about at launch and then mostly stop thinking about. They keep sitting there doing their jobs while your business, your offers, your audience, and even the way you talk about your work can shift around them.

Neither one needs to be changed constantly, and they probably shouldn’t be. But they do need an occasional check-in to make sure your cover still looks like your show belongs to your business and your description is still helping the right people understand what the podcast is for, whether they find you through search, AI, a podcast app, or someone pitching your show.

In this episode of The More Profitable Podcast, I’m walking through what to look for when you audit your podcast cover art and description, when those pieces actually need to be updated, and the behind-the-scenes details worth checking while you’re already in there.

0:58 - Why podcast cover art and descriptions need an annual check-in

2:20 - What your podcast cover art actually needs to do

4:52 - When your podcast cover photo needs to be updated

6:21 - Checking whether your cover art still accurately represents the show

7:14 - What to give a designer before updating your podcast cover art

9:39 - Why your podcast description matters for SEO and AI discovery

10:27 - When changes in your business should trigger a description update

12:23 - Writing your podcast description for prospective listeners, not just search engines

14:53 - Auditing the rest of your podcast storefront and distribution details

16:15 - Using your annual podcast housekeeping check-in to keep the show aligned with your business

Mentioned In Podcast Housekeeping: Do Your Podcast Cover Art and Description Still Fit Your Business?

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Ready to make sure your podcast still matches the business you’re building?

This kind of check-in is part of the work we do with our Podcast Production clients. We’re looking at more than whether the next episode gets edited and scheduled. We’re checking that the show still reflects the business, the audience you want to reach, and where you’re headed next.

If you want that kind of support around your podcast, book a call to talk about Podcast Production.

Transcript

We are going to talk about two pieces today that we think a lot about at launch and, for most folks, we kind of never think about again, and so we gotta check in with them. We're going to be talking about your cover art, and we're going to be talking about your podcast description. This should be a quick one. This is going to be easier than your first- and your second-week audit stuff, so if you haven't gotten that stuff done, there's still time. This week's going to be a little lighter. Let's get into it.

Welcome to The More Profitable Podcast with Stacey Harris. I'm Stacey, and this is the spot to learn more about the strategies, tactics, and tools you need to build your more profitable podcast. My team and I work every day with podcasters like you to shift shows from frustrating time sucks to productive members of your sales team, because your show should be built to generate and convert leads. So let's get into it.

What's interesting about our cover art is it's such a first impression, but it really is something we stop thinking about pretty quickly, sort of once we've made the decision. And here's the thing. Neither of the pieces we're going to talk about today, your podcast description or your cover art, need to be changed regularly, or really should be changed regularly. And we'll talk about the timing of each, but just because they shouldn't be checked every month doesn't mean we don't need to check in on them from time to time.

And that's one of the reasons I love this August check-in. I love taking this time, as we start to wrap up summer, as we start to finalize things for our Q4 push, we can take some time and check in on stuff like this. This episode and these two things are maybe the two biggest reasons that I like having this August check-in.

Again, these are, these are components that are just not top of mind when we are in it to win it, getting episodes out, getting content rolling. These get set aside. So I want to start by talking about cover art. Again, I want to, I want to, I want to be in and out with this this week, so let's start by talking about cover art.

Again, I recommend checking this annually, just like everything we're talking about today. But bigger than that, I want to talk about a little bit about its job. I think about the job that this podcast cover art needs to be doing.

Now, technically, it needs to do things like be 3,000 by 3,000. Logistically, it needs to be legible and clear, both in full size and teensy-tiny. Because open up Spotify. Open up Apple Podcasts. Open up whatever your preferred podcast platform is. Based on my stats, I'm gonna guess it's Apple Podcasts because that's where most of you listen from. But look how small those look, and so it needs to work in a lot of sizes.

So we've got technically, we've got logistically, but what does it need to do from, like, a brand experience, right? Well, we want this to be cohesive with the rest of our brand.

A huge mistake I see business owners make when they go to launch their show is they think of their podcast almost separate from their business. And they go in and they're like, cool, we can do something really fun here with, like, colors and, you know, graphic elements and whatever else. It's like, yeah, yeah, but it needs to be complementary.

If we're going to be using the podcast as a way to represent the brand, as a way to nurture leads, as a way to build awareness, as a way to sell our services and our offers, we're probably gonna need to make sure that it's clear that this podcast goes with this business. And so that means making sure it's cohesive.

It doesn't need to be dead on exactly the same branding. No. You absolutely have some, some room to sort of create a brand identity for the podcast that sits next to your brand, but it, it needs to fit inside of it. It's got to be complementary, and it's got to, it's got to go. I'd recommend using your same brand elements, your same fonts, your same colors, and extending sort of the language of your brand instead of going in a different direction.

When I hand over a design's work to our, our designer on our team, I'm almost always handing over a larger brand guide for the business and then saying, we need to build a podcast identity inside of these brand elements. And that's really the direction I'd recommend giving your designer as well. You want this to make sense that it is you.

In the spirit of that, let's talk photos. There's a reason you see most sort of personal-brand-fronted businesses using a picture of a person in their cover art. If you're a speaker, if you host a lot of trainings, if you're a coach and people are working with you, put your photo in the cover. Make sure that the photo reflects you accurately.

This is one that I'm going to be working on. I'll just raise my hand right now. This is what I'm going to be working on as I move into Q4, because it's been a minute since I did brand photos. I have not done brand photos in several years, and so that's something I'm going to be working on as I go in and I do my, I do my own work, is, okay, cool, it's time to update the photos. And after I update those photos, it'll be time to update the cover art and do those things as well.

So if you've got a photo shoot coming up, sweet. If you don't, maybe get some new headshots on the books if you're going to be updating your cover and you don't have anything recent. So we want a couple of things here. We want readability. We want to keep it simple. We want to keep it in alignment with our brand. We want to have our face on the cover so that we can be looking at us. We want to be making sure this artwork reflects the current version of the show.

So when you're sitting down and doing this audit, make sure that the show's visual representation is in line with what the show is. Once upon a time, you'd see a lot of people sort of put topics on their cover art. This was something I was guilty of for a very long time, is I had three sort of topics. It's like marketing, social media, and something else. I think podcasting, probably.

I still, I kept using that cover long after we were not talking about social media on the podcast. And so, guess what? It came time to change it. It lived outdated for a while, but it had to be changed. And so little things like that, let's make sure that we are accurately representing the show.

The last thing I want to touch on here is, if you're working with a designer on this, some things I would recommend having before you start working with your designer is some examples of cover art you like. If you have established brand identity pieces and you're working with the designer only on your podcast cover, you need to have those brand guidelines in a format they can use.

So, for example, when our brand identity was all built and created in 2019, we worked with a designer, and they built us a full PDF that says all of the information you're going to need. There are sort of texture samples, color codes, and little samples of it so you can see what it looks like, um, but, um, font sizes and when they're used, font names and when they're used, uh, some, like, sample setups. Just everything a designer could need to know to get on board with, how does this brand look?

If you don't have one of those, if you are looking to do a larger rebrand, then that's going to be something you need to work on. And I would actually recommend doing that before you start addressing your podcast cover instead of doing something totally differently, your podcast cover, and then working with a designer to establish your branding and then having to rebrand the podcast.

It's not the worst order to do it in. There are absolutely cases I can make for that being the right order, especially if you are new, new, new in business. Then working with somebody to build out a whole brand identity is not the best use of your funds. Just keep it simple.

But for most of the people we work with, and maybe this is the case for you, you're a lot like me. You've been in business for a while. You have some brand identity stuff. Oftentimes we find it buried deep in the depths of the Google Drive. But having those together and being able to hand those to a designer and say, here are some things that I like.

I also always pull things I don't like. These are some, you know, covers that I don't love. Here's what I don't like about it, X, Y, and Z. Here's what I do like about it, X, Y, and Z. And having that along with those brand guidelines is going to get you to cover art you want much more quickly than going to a designer and saying, I need podcast cover. So keep that in mind.

I want to shift gears now, and I want to talk about the podcast description, because this is the other thing that we sort of set it and forget it. And the biggest issue with that is this is a huge part of SEO discovery, of AI discovery.

When we're talking about these sort of different ways podcast listeners might be finding us, generally those tools are using the text because it's impossible for them to use the audio. And so when we don't have updated podcast descriptions, we can be telling those search engines and those robots to put us in front of the wrong folks. And so auditing this is important. You're going to need to look at it, again, at least once a year, but whenever you sort of make a change in your business, it's going to be good to check in on this.

Let's say you've got August on your calendar because we run this series every year in August, and you know that that's going to be your time to check in with a show. But it's February, and you just got done with this horrific client experience, and you're like, that's it. I'm done. It is fine. It is, it is finally time to refine who my ideal client is and how I want to talk to them, because I know I've had these good experiences and I know I've had these not-so-good experiences.

And the client type who represents those not-so-great experiences is who your podcast description is written to attract. We want to go in and we want to address that in February, not wait until August. So if you change your offerings, if you refine who your ideal clients are, take some time to give that podcast description a once-over.

This is not going to take a huge amount of time. This is not going to take hours and hours. You are not writing a full website full of copy. You will likely need to adjust a couple of sentences. This is not about you rewriting it from the ground up. This is about you tweaking and refining.

So I want you to check in on it when anything shifts in your business, but at least once a year, when we do this check-in in August, that's a good time to check in and, and just make sure. Because some of those client refinements especially happen without some big decisive moment, right? Happen without sort of just like, I'm burning it down. At least we hope so, right? So I want you to be looking at these things on a fixed schedule, but also, again, whenever, whenever we're checking in.

Now, I know I just talked pretty extensively about this being for robots and this being helpful for SEO and for AI discovery, but chatbots and Google crawlers are not the only things reading this podcast description. Listeners are. Prospective listeners are as well, when they're checking out your show, when they're seeing if you're, you're right fit, when somebody's going to be, and we all know this happens regularly, pitching your podcast.

So yes, we need this to be clear for robots and helpful for discovery, but we also want it to make sense to the humans who might stumble upon it. So make sure we're using this podcast description as a space to talk about who our listeners are, who our show is for, what it does, what we talk about, how we approach things, when episodes come out. I like to include that, with new episodes on Wednesdays or whatever it is.

But do it in a way that makes sense to the real-life audience member or prospective audience member who might be reading it, because we don't want this to just be, like, an info dump for the robots. We want this to be engaging, and we want it to be using the language our actual audience would use.

And again, this is helpful from a search perspective, because we got to be talking in the language they're Googling, right? But also, when they get there, when that prospective listener opens up your description, you want it to be someplace that they're like, oh yeah, this is what I've been looking for, not, oh my God, what is she talking about? This woman's way too smart for me.

That happens when we talk in jargon. That happens when we try to position ourselves as smarter than everybody else, when we're trying to prove how much we know. Yeah, that's usually the one that gets us.

And so be sure you're using their language. Best way to do this, start thinking about your client calls. Start thinking about your sales calls. Use the language your clients use in those conversations to describe the things you're talking about, their goals, their issues, their problems, how they think about your solution. Use their language.

Remember, this whole thing, the cover art, the podcast description, this is essentially sort of your, like, podcast storefront, right? This is your podcast shingle. You know, we're talking about hanging your shingle and, like, doing it Main Street style. This is that.

And so while you're in there and you're checking your podcast description and you're updating or uploading your new cover art, I want you to do a quick check-in with things like your show category, your host or author name. That's also keyword heaven, so more than just your name, but also, yes, include your name. Make sure your website's up to date.

We had a client sign with us. She had been working with a previous podcast producer. They had rebranded her show. We were taking over. We actually sort of re-rebranded the show because there were some things that had not happened during the previous rebrand. They had gotten a new website. None of that was updated. Everything was still pointing at the old website, old email addresses. They were not out to all the, like, possible distribution points, so there were podcast players her show wasn't available in.

Make sure those things are done when you're in here. This is just a good time to check in on the storefront behind the scenes overall, because there's not going to be a huge reason mid-year to check in on those things. So this annual checkpoint is a good time to check in on all of those pieces.

That's our, that's our show for today. If you need support in getting any of these done, like I said, we have worked with lots of clients. I'm getting ready to sit down with our production clients again to do this check-in when we do our Q4 planning and see if anything needs addressed.

If that sounds like something you want to do together, let's do it. Head on over to uncommonlymore.com/podcastproduction. You can learn about what podcast production with our team looks like, but most importantly, you can find a time for you and I to sit down and chat about what this can look like for you, so that we can make sure that everything in your podcast is aligned with what your business looks like now and what your goals are moving forward.

I will see you right back here for the fourth and final episode of our annual podcast housekeeping series. Don't miss it. Thanks so much for listening to the show. Remember that content consumption does not make changes, so commit to doing something from today's episode. Maybe it's taking action on what we talked about. Maybe it's reaching out to me and learning more about podcast strategy intensives or what podcast production looks like with our team. All of that is over at uncommonlymore.com.

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