Podcast Hosting and Distribution
To start, let’s clarify what I mean by Hosting and Distribution.
A Podcast Hosting platform is where you upload your podcast episodes, it’s your podcast’s home.
Distribution is how your podcast is delivered to all the podcast apps like Spotify and Apple podcasts (other apps are available.) You connect them through your podcast hosting platform.
Podcast Hosting Platforms
There are many different hosting platforms out there available to choose from, some free and some paid.
Personally, I recommend Spotify for Podcasters (formerly known as Anchor) to my clients as it’s free. Let’s face it, as a business owner our monthly subscriptions can regularly get out of control so when you’re making your first foray into podcasting you may want to opt for free until you are sure that you like it and are going to continue!
There have been a few changes to Spotify for Podcasters since I published my podcast episode How Will I Publish my Podcast? so let’s have a look at the features:
Podcast Landing Page
this can be customised to include all the places your podcast can be listened to, your social links and your website. You can also set our page to receive voice messages from your listeners.
Comment on the episode (in the app)
I LOVE this new feature. It makes it super easy to get feedback. You can also edit the questions from the stand “What did you think?” and ask more specific things.
This feature is available to those even if you don’t host with Spotify. You will need to claim your podcast and log in on the browser to access these features and update them so that they populate in the app. I highly recommend you do this.
Automatic Chapters
An option you can toggle on/off and customise. This feature allows you to find key moments and share them with your listeners.
Analytics
You can see different sets of data, which to be honest will be very similar to other platforms except that they also have Spotify-only analytics.
Spotify is easy to use and the dashboard is clear and simple.
I use a hosting company called Captivate. I love this platform and all of its excellent features! Of which there are many! I won’t go into too much detail about these, but this platform is well worth considering if you are serious about podcasting.
They are an indie growth platform and even have an area called Growth Labs where they help you learn the skills you need to grow your podcast.
This is a paid platform (about £200 a year) which I think is an important investment for your podcast.
Here’s a low down of some of my favourite features:
Episode Planning
You can plan all your episodes here and not have them dotted about all over the shop. You can easily convert them into episodes to publish when they're ready. There are also handy short codes to include certain bits of information.
Dynamic Show Notes
I preset my CTAs and links for each episode and insert them dynamically into each episode. This basically means that if I want to update any information at any point I can, and it will auto-update across ALL my episodes. Cool right!
Bulk Ad editor
Easily include an Ad to your episode’s pre-roll and post-roll. I’m not an expert in ads in any way but this makes it super easy to do.
Guest Booking
Send your guests a link to book through Captivate. They fill in all their details and you can add it at the click of a button. My teeny weeny bugbear is that it doesn’t link up with your calendar (like Calendly does for example) but you can set parameters as to times/days you allow people to book.
Analytics
You get a broader look at your podcast across all platforms in a bit more detail than Spotify for Podcasters.
If you’d like to try out Captivate they offer a 7-day free trial. *This is my affiliate link and I get a bonus if you sign up through my link. I only recommend services/products that I use and love!
What else is out there?
These are just a few of what else is out there! I haven’t personally used these platforms but I know those that do.
Buzzsprout – the free package is not worth it as your episodes get deleted after 90 days!
Starts from $12/month
Podbean – Basic is free and prices start from $9/month
Alitu – This is not only a hosting platform, but you can record, edit, clean up audio, transcribe and get a website.
Cost $380/ yr. (paid annually)
My recommendation is to do your research. Find ask people who have a podcast what they use and ask them to show you around the platform and what they think are the benefits.
Distribution
As I explained at the start this is how your podcast is sent to all the podcast apps. This is fairly simple to do within your podcast hosting platforms.
Many of them have a 1-click submission, for example within Captivate I can 1-click submit to Spotify, Amazon Music, Podcast Index, Player FM, Deezer, Gaana, Saavn and Boomplay apps.
To submit to Apple Podcasts and Pocket Casts you need to do this externally.
This means you need to create a free account with these platforms and submit my podcast RSS feed (a file that contains all your podcast info, which you only get when you have published a trailer or an episode.
I recommend that you publish a trailer before your 1st episode so that you get your RSS feed to submit to Apple podcasts and any other apps that require external submission.
There is an approval process with Apple Podcasts (this is NOT iTunes) and can sometimes take a week to be approved. You will need to go back into your Apple Connect account (see here for details.) and hit publish once approved otherwise it will not show up.
Once you’ve connected them all up, your podcast episodes will be published there automatically.
I hope that you now feel confident about how to choose a hosting platform and what distributing your podcast means.
If you have any questions, please feel free to get in touch!
Email me at rachael@rb-va.com
Connect with me on LinkedIn
Listen to my podcast Podcasting 101 with Rachael