Dispelling the "Audio quality is less important than content" myth

authenticity is important, but it still needs to sound good

Over on Twitter (yes, it’s still and forever will be Twitter, regardless of what the new owner wants to call it), I ran a poll for podcast listeners. The poll was simple - I wanted to know what the biggest thing was that would make podcast listeners stop listening to a podcast.

This stemmed from conversations I see online frequently, whether on social media, Reddit subreddits, podcasting groups, etc, where podcasters would say they never edit their show, and that content will always be more important than audio quality when it comes to podcast growth.

While I’m a huge fan of authenticity in podcasting, like naturally flowing conversations, pauses and umms, the vibe between hosts and guests, etc, for me this doesn’t mean these are mutually exclusive to good sounding audio. You can have both and still be authentic.

But, as mentioned, that’s me, and podcasters and listeners all have different things that they enjoy and don’t enjoy. Hence the poll.

Why Podcast Listeners Drop a Show

The options I asked when it came to what put listeners off were straightforward:

• Audio quality not good

• Host(s) inside jokes

• Goes off topic a lot

• Other (leave a comment)

I didn’t include ads as an option, since this is a much wider discussion when it comes to that (what’s classed as an ad, is an ad inserted by the podcaster or a platform, etc.), but I will be doing a similar poll around ads and listeners another time.

The results were pretty clear (click image to go to the poll and comments on Twitter):

There were 305 votes and, as you can see by the image, just over 54% voted for audio quality not being good as the main reason to stop listening to a show, more than all the other reasons combined.

While I thought audio might get a good chunk of the votes, I wasn’t expecting it to be so dominant. Some of the comments around audio included:

• If the whole thing sounds like amateur hour, everyone’s taking over each other and the volume levels are different, I’m just turning it off.

• I can't stand it when there's so many sound effects that you can't even hear the hosts. One time I shut it off because you literally couldn't even hear them over the noises. The sound quality was already horrendous to begin with.

• There’s NO excuse for horrible audio quality. There’s lots of tools available to enhance audio quality now. Make it listenable and less distracting to the audience.

• Bad audio quality always turns me away. The rest - depends.

From the three remaining options - inside jokes, going off topic, and other reasons - these were some of the answers received:

• I stop when the format changes and not in a positive way. Another new pet peeve is the ones who move to video as well and have too much video only content as in needing to watch something to get.

• Bad sound is generally a deal breaker no matter what but it drives me insane when a show just…..starts. No intro, no introducing the hosts, it’s just two random people talking. Instant shut off for me.

• A lot of goofy ass morning radio style sound drops added in post.

• When there’s multiple people sharing in the conversation, and one of the host readily interrupts or won’t be quiet long enough to let the guests comment or answer the question just asked. The “me-monster” hosts are way too impatient to be the focal point. Huge turnoff.

• When you can tell the episodes are highly edited to the point I feel I've missed out on something, or it's so obvious it's distracting. Also when they edit out the umms and arrrs I get why people don't like them, but for me I listen to indie podcasts for the human element of umms.

That last one is interesting, and a good reminder that while quality audio is important, you still need to let that audio breathe and be natural where possible.

So What Makes for Good Quality Audio?

Obviously, this can be subjective based on different leniency for different listeners, but through my role as Head of Podcaster Support & Experience at Captivate, where we work with thousands of podcasters daily, and my own time as a podcaster for almost the last decade, here are some quick tips and best practices.

Use the right mic

There are essentially two kinds of microphone in podcasting - dynamic, and condenser. Both have their pros and cons:

• A condenser usually offering a richer sound because of its ability to pick up more detail, but it’s also this ability that can be a con, because that extra sensitivity can pick up unwanted noise like fans, room noise, etc, if you’re not in a treated recording environment.

• A dynamic mic is more forgiving, so is better in a noisier environment when it comes to rejecting background noise, but they d tend to need more “gain” or power to run them, which means you need a decent interface or input for the audio.

Choosing the right mic for your recording space is a great starting point for good audio, and brings us on to the next point.

Good mic technique

You don’t have to have the most expensive mic (inexpensive mics will sound great in treated rooms - more on that next) but having good mic technique will help your audio sound great. This is how you address the microphone, and can help you negate plosives, sibilance, audio level disparity, and more. Here’s a quick video I made on this very topic.

Sound treat your recording space

You can have a $1,000 top-of-the-range mic, but if your recording space isn’t great, then the mic won’t sound great, either. On the flip side, a treated room can make even the most inexpensive of mics sound good.

Listen to your audio - are you hearing a lot of echo and reverb? If so, this is more than likely down to your recording space. Take a look at it - are there lots of hard surfaces like bare walls, hardwood floors, tables, large windows, etc? If so, your sound is bouncing off those surfaces, resulting in echo.

This is where treating your room comes into play - soften those hard surfaces by adding blankets to the walls, or acoustic tiles. Cover hardwood floors with rugs, and drapes for your windows. Add soft furniture like chairs, cushions, etc.

You don’t need to spend a lot of money, but if you treat your room as much as you can, your audio will improve no end.

Edit your audio

Editing is possibly the least fun part of the podcasting process, at least for most podcasters. I used to loathe it, but I have come round to both appreciate and actually enjoy (since it’s made me a better podcaster, and I pick up soundbites and nuanced conversation pieces I may have missed in the original recording).

You don’t have to spend a lot of time editing, or add a whole bunch of bells and whistles - what you’re really looking to do is make the listener experience the best it can be. So, this means:

• Trim the fat. If something isn’t adding to the episode, or a point is being laboured over, trim it down. Make the episode punchy, tight, and focused.

• Repair noises. A lot of podcasters can have mouth clicks, which can come from both dehydration and over-hydration. There are ways to negate this (eating a green apple before recording, for example), but even then mouth clicks and noises can be present. So use a mouth de-clicker plugin on your editing software, and remove these unwanted noises. This is also really important for listeners that suffer from misophonia, and helps their overall health and well-being.

• Level the volumes. If you have multiple speakers, or you have intro jingles, outros, ads, etc, then make sure all your audio is the same level. There’s nothing worse than a speaker being one volume, another being way louder, then an intro being super quiet, and an ad being loud again. It’s bad for listener hearing, and can easily be avoided with normalizing options that you can find on pretty much any editing software. Then export at -16 LUFS, which is pretty much the default loudness option for podcasts.

These are just some of the ways you can make your audio sound good from the off. While it can be tempting to go with the “I’ll just throw anything out there, it’ll be enjoyed”, this isn’t the case.

Even just small, incremental improvements, and using some of the tips above, will help you and your podcast stand out against others in your niche that are taking the “raw is better” approach. While that can work for some, it’s not the case for the majority of podcasters, nor for their listeners.

Take the time to tweak, improve, and optimize - your audience will thank you.