No Episode Reruns! Find Out The RIGHT Way To Replay Podcast Episodes Without Annoying Listeners

Want your podcast and videocast to be seen, heard, found and rewarded in this noisy digital world, you are not alone. Join the nonprofit community at Podcasters United and podcast industry experts Tom Hazard and Tracy Hazard as they debunk all that outdated and bad advice you've been getting from the podcast gurus and find out what actually works. Today, get ready to feed. Feed your brand with smart cut tactics proven to cast your original voice to the world.

Hey, everyone. Welcome to feed you'd brand. I'm Tracy Hazzard along with my co host and partner, Tom Hazzard, and we are off today. So we're airing a recording and we thought that we would talk about something that lots of you do, we, which is air a replay, a rerun.

A rerun when it's a holiday or you don't have time to record a new episode. And we've been having a lot of customers do this recently, you know, one time or another. And you know what, we have some thoughts to share with you on doing that. Is it good, is it bad, or how to do it well, if you need to. Right, Tracy?

Yeah. We are headed into our 10th anniversary of running our original podcast. I mean, we don't record it all the time anymore. We record here and there, but we did over 655 or something episodes of it. And so at one point we were doing 20amonth. So we were a little exhausted and we thought we'd take a week or two off, I think over the holidays, one year. And we decided to air because there were so many episodes, we thought people wouldn't have found them. And so we decided to air them again. And we did what we call replays. And it was a disaster.

It really was. We got a lot of feedback is sort of the nice way to say it, from our listeners that were annoyed we were running an old thing again. And that really taught us a lot that our listeners, our longtime listeners, the majority of them really did listen to all our episodes and they didn't appreciate having one replayed to them and pitched as if it were new.

Right, Right. And so what we did was. And it's also because the podcast player apps are not conducive to replaying or re airing or doing any of that. It's not like you can move it up to the top or anything like that. It just doesn't work in that quite that same way if you're going to put it back into the queue again. Right. And so because of that, we really realize that the player apps and everything that we do from our show has to be listener first, focused. That's it. Like, it's simple. Everything what we do is conscious of the listener experience. And when you have a subscriber, or as I call them, binge listeners who've listened to all your shows, Right. When you have someone who's not only subscribed but binge listened to every single one, the last thing they want is something to repeat it back to them again.

That's right. I think you really need to put yourself as a host in the shoes of one of your listeners in the earphones up.

Yes. And you need to understand listeners are listening for a reason and they also are expecting you to show up for them every week on time, whether it's a holiday week or not, whether you know you can be there live or not. They're really subscribed to you because of what's in it for them. And they really don't have a lot of empathy or sympathy for you. The host being busy, being tired, needing, you know, some time off. They're feelings often are. Well, wait a second, you're prerecording these things anyway, aren't you? Why can't you just record a few more and publish them? Even though you're not going to be available to record on, maybe on your regular schedule, Right.

And so that's what we have to remember that, like, especially if we're doing a business podcast, especially if we're doing something where we want them to hire us as a coach, we want them to buy our books, we want them to do something in exchange for their listening time. Right. And the experience of listening. We want them to like us. We want them to then know, like and trust us and buy something from us. Right. Then we have to be more interested in them than they are in us. And the best way for us to show that, to show that we're interested is show up on their schedule, not on ours. So if they're listening on Christmas, if they're listening on Thanksgiving, if they're listening on whatever holiday you celebrate, Right. If they're listening on those days, then they deserve our time.

And I think we as hosts need to realize just because, let's say it is Thanksgiving Day, Christmas Day, New Year's Day, whatever that holiday might be, that we're thinking, God, well, yeah, I'm not going to publish an episode that day because it's a holiday. Who's going to listen? Think you might need to reset your thinking on this because, you know, they may have had to wake up too early On Christmas Day, if they've got kids and you know, who tore through opening presents and maybe got some good presents on their own, maybe got a new cell phone, maybe got a new cell phone case or a new headset, new earbuds. You know what? After the exhaustion of that morning, in the afternoon, you're sort of relaxing and spending a little personal time doing what they want. And they may very well want to go and listen to your latest episode, especially if they got an alert on their phone. Hey, a new episode published today of your podcast.

But imagine how disappointed they are if they go to play it and they're like, I heard that one.

Yeah, didn't I listen to that one earlier in the year?

Imagine that letdown. So we learned this the hard way by doing a month of replays when we shouldn't have.

Oh, well. And you know, there was another break we took when our daughter got married, remember? And we were overwhelmed and had too.

Much stuff to do, but we actually took a break. We didn't do any replays during that time.

Well, that's true, but I honestly, we had. We planned it better. We would have batch recorded a whole lot more stuff to publish during that month.

Right? Because here's another tip. Don't skip.

Do not skip.

You've worked too hard, you've worked too hard to build up your algorithmic value. The consistency and constancy matters. Do not skip your schedule. When you skip your schedule, it has a very large negative effect. And that goes across blog, video, audio, all of it, not just in one place. It's not just one little thing. Oh, I skipped it on that. It goes everywhere. If you start, if you slow down, it will be the same thing on social media. Any social media expert will tell you that when people slow down at the holidays, that's when new influencers rise to the top. Right? Someone who's gonna show up has a chance to bring their show up.

That's right. You know, what if I have that time and I want to listen to content and you don't provide any new content, guess what I'm doing. I'm going to look at who did show up and what other new show I could start listening to. So really it's your audience to lose is, I think, a way that I would say it. And that's the way I think of it, quite honestly.

So there are a couple of ways that we learned that you can do pseudo replays. Okay. And pseudo replays are just meaning that they maybe the message is still really core and important or Maybe it's a new message to the podcast listening subscribers that you have in this show. So maybe you have multiple shows. So Tom and I have two shows, right. We have. I have the binge factor and we have feature brand. We could do a cross promotion between the two. So we could swap shows. It's brand new to my feed your brand listeners, although there's a percentage of overlap, of course. But as long as I'm upfront about it that that's what it is, then they'll be like, oh, okay, I don't need to listen. But, you know, they at least knew that that's what I did, was create this swap. Right. So you could do something like that. You could do a swap with another host. You could do a cross promotion of something you did as a guest appearance somewhere. Just make sure it's not too self promotional. Right. Like anything that's a webinar or anything that's just all about you and not about training and learning something. Because sometimes I'll go and I'll give a talk on somebody's like, podcast about AI, something that's a little bit outside of the realm but might be very interesting to our audience here. That might be a great guest appearance. Now, when you air something that is a cross promotion or from some other person's show, or if you do, in fact, and I'm going to talk about that in a minute, we'll talk about how to actually update and replay an episode or portion of one, then you must put a new introduction on it, a personalized message. Don't just slap your intro on it and turn it on. They need to have context for why you're playing that and why you chose that episode for this particular day.

Yeah. Don't leave it up to the listener to interpret and try to guess and understand. The context is incredibly important. And this, for this particular portion of this episode, what Tracy's sharing with you, really please understand, I want to put some extra emphasis on this point. The context, why you're sharing it, airing it, playing it for your podcast audience. Don't leave it up to them to guess and, you know, figure out the reason why. Spell it out for them, acknowledge the elephant in the room that this was recorded maybe for another purpose or at an earlier time. And then the good reason why you're sharing it with them. This is critical.

Yeah, so we did do a couple of replays at various times, and we did a few of them because we were prompted by a sponsor, had Hewlett Packard when we were doing our WTFF show. And so we learned a couple of really great ways to do updated replays. And one of them was to do this very nice frame up as to why you're replaying the episode. And then it brings it back into context and adds something new to it. So if I did remember the episode, I've gotten something new for maybe 5, 10 minutes and then I can drop out and don't have to listen to the rest of the episode. But I don't feel annoyed by it. And that's really critically important as a listener. I got something new to say. This brought this episode top of mind for a reason. And so we did a couple of these because we had done an episode in the 3D print podcast where we were talking about 3D printing things in disaster zones. So like you might need replacement parts or drones so that you could fly them over for, you know, replacement parts for those drones. So you fly them over disaster zones. And they needed something on site because they couldn't get equipment, they couldn't get things in. And so a disaster had just happened and the person who we interviewed couldn't really do a full update because he was in the disaster zone. So he couldn't do an interview again. But we wanted to bring up that episode again because they needed donations and it was really important and valuable and it was going to help a hurricane zone or I think it was a.

Hurricane at the time or might have been an earthquake. I forget.

Yeah, an earthquake or something like that.

But anyway, I think it was in the like Dominican Republic or something like that, wasn't it?

Yeah, exactly. And so we did a frame up of like, what. Where they were. He gave us a bunch of information and we got a status report. So we created our own preview portion to the episode with a status report on how the company was doing what they were doing and then an update about what was going on in this particular disaster and what they were providing in terms of services and assistance and how badly they needed donations. And then we replayed and added on the episode itself, the interview itself, if somebody wanted to do it. It got great replay. And we did not see a bunch of drop off because people were like, I kind of remember it. Let me listen to it again. And so we actually had really great plays on it. And so it can really rejuvenate, especially if you've got a very large catalog. Cause at that time we had like, you know, 500 episodes or something. So putting that episode in, it's a good reminder when you've got that big a catalog.

Yeah, that's a great example, Tracy. And so obviously, you know, each of your shows is going to be different and you know, may not have that same type of an update or something grounded in the moment that you can share. But, you know, many of you might. And regardless of what the reason is, what's new, what's been updated, even in our podcast, here, feed your brand. There are new things happening all the time. There are things changing in the industry, and there are episodes we did in the past that still while providing valuable info. You know what, there may be new and updated info today. And that's your opportunity to record something short, to rejuvenate and make something old relevant again. And why someone might want to listen.

The other way we did it, Tom, was when we did the stuff for Hewlett packard. They chose 12 episodes that we had done in the past that were really keyword valuable to them, right? Because they wanted the blogs, they wanted to be associated with them, they wanted us to update that information. And we took it and we re edited the episode and added the context onto the front of it. So we also cut in the episode, we didn't cut a ton, I'd have to say. We cut a few sections that were outdated and we just redid them very simply. And it was not a lot because we already had the blog. So it was just like, cut out this section and give the editor's instruction. And it was like, cut out all that copy and you're done. Like, it was not hard at all. It was very simple edit. And that really helped doing it. I almost did that here just as a way to show you how that is. So we were going to do this context piece for like 10 minutes and then we were going to replay the episode that was called our podcast Replays. Worth it. But I took a look at the video, Tom, and the camera was before I had my good camera and it was just not a good video. And I was like, no, we just take such good quality video to replay something that's not good quality would have been so bad. So I was like, okay, if we can't use the video, then there's no point in us not doing it because we need to simulive. We need to replay this live. So that's why I didn't re air the portion. I didn't do that here. I intended to because I thought that would be kind of, you know, very meta and ironic.

This is great thing to discuss, you know, and share with our audience because you know, what Times change, right? And technology changes. And there may be a different reason, not necessarily that the content was bad and would be replayed, but here you're sharing. You know what, our video quality has increased. And this is completely true. What we did years ago for our video quality is not up to our standard today. Back then we didn't care as much about video or it wasn't as important to have as crisp and sharp video as we have now. Today it's a different day and video is the currency on social media. And if you've got a crappy looking video, especially in like YouTube shorts or some of these social channels, what are they going to do? They're going to swipe and go on to the next thing, right?

Well, and that's the other part is it was going to be like more work to get these shorts cut out of it because they didn't exist before. So it's not like that. We had to redo all the social media assets that are going to go along with this episode anyway. So we might as well have it be completely new. So that's why we did this. But we are recording this in advance. So normally we live stream every single week. Right.

And there's a certain energy of going live that we're missing right now because we're pre recording this. It's just a little unusual for this show, although not unusual at all for.

Most podcasters and for our other shows. So it's not like we're not comfortable doing this like we, we're comfortable doing this all the time. But we are going to what you call simuli it, meaning that we will take this recording and we're going to livestream it out the same day at the same time so that even on social, our audience who normally expects a coaching call is getting one. Now the only thing that we have done is said to our client base, don't call in because we're not answering questions today, but we'll answer twice as many next week and we'll stay longer. And so they're fine with that. Right? So that's not going to be a big deal for them.

But we have some of our customers that are much more accustomed to going into our Zoom events area and getting on to, to Zoom to watch rather than watching on social media. They'll still be able to do that. We're just not going to be answering any questions or you know, there won't be interaction in the chat. But they can have the same experience. But if it's easier for them to go to YouTube and catch the live or go to LinkedIn and catch the live. Obviously they can do that. And I think it's important to show up on a regular basis. And now we're going to do it in our live. Even though we won't be live, we'll be showing up live. I mean essentially streaming live. But Tracy, in this case for this episode, is the podcast episode going to be scheduled to publish on that same date? Because usually we show up a few weeks, you know, or more later on a podcast. Yep.

That's the only special is that our podcast listeners get a bonus holiday treat today that they are getting it live at the same time that it's going live on our are everywhere else. So it's actually off our schedule though because we Normally publish at 2am on the Wednesday but we will be publishing at noon Pacific time on it. So they'll actually get it at exactly the same time as everybody else. So it'll be slightly off schedule for.

The day, which I think is actually really nice. Again because you know, you may get that alert in your listening app if it's Apple podcasts or whatever. Hey, there's a new episode of feed you'd rant available and it's not going to give them that alert at you know, 6, 7, 8 in the morning like it might. Usually they're going to get it afternoon on that day, which is probably more appropriate on a holiday.

So I have a question for you Tom. Is this sort of a hack for it? And we are doing that in our feed for feed your brand. So I'm just going to be straight out up front with you because we want to make a clear cut connection between our we call them the preview episodes. They're the ones. If you're looking at our podcast feed, it says next up. And so this one will say next up. You know, don't replay podcast episodes yet. Right. Like that's what it says in the next up. And then two days later because we air that on a Monday, two days later there's an episode that publishes. But because we're recording, editing, doing all the things, it takes us two weeks to complete the episode and then re air it. But we've been back dating them so we put it so that it goes in order in our feed next up. And every Wednesday you see it. But it takes two weeks for it to get in there. Right. If you think about it in order.

Sure. So what's the question?

So our listeners out there are getting a new episode, but it has two week old date. Do you think they're annoyed by it? Do you think it bugs them? Do you think they wonder what's going on?

My guess is they may not even really realize that. That it is backdated. I mean, it may depend on the listening app that they're using, though. My listening Apple podcast is just going to tell me when there's a new episode available. I'm not really paying attention to the date. It's a new episode of this show. I haven't heard yet. Okay, I want to hear that. That's my guess. But I'm not sure. What do you think?

Well, I mean, to me, if I was. I mean, I'm a completionist and a binge listener, right? So I go through the list, right? So if it was out of order, it would confuse me. But the reality is that it shouldn't be out of order because it's the next episode that publishes, right? So it shouldn't theoretically be out of order. But the next ups are going to show after it. But I will probably have already listened to those and I know their previews, right? You know, so I don't think I'd be annoyed by it. I think I'd be like, I wonder what's going on. Especially if I was a podcaster myself, I'd be like, wonder what they're doing?

Well, one of the things that you can do, and this is just a short, quick tech tip for you podcasters out there, because I believe, Tracy, we did this in the past on your the Binge Factor podcast at one point when for whatever reason needed to backfill some dates with content. And this is for a few different reasons, we did this. I won't go into that right now, but you can publish a new episode live today. So it's at the top of the list. It's the latest episode, and then, you know, all your subscribers are going to get it. But then a week later, two weeks later, whatever time that you want that to happen, you can then go in and edit that episode and change it to move it back in the lineup, to backdate it a few weeks, a month, two months, whatever it is, so that your catalog has this consistency. And so that's another approach.

Absolutely is another approach. And this is what I was thinking, because this is one of the things that we did with the. Even though we rerecorded and like I said, we updated those episodes, but it had been a consideration with the Hewlett Packard model that we might have actually just redated and made it a new current Date.

Moved it up.

Yeah, moved it up. Because if we made it a new current date and your subscribers hadn't listened to it yet, it would appear at the top of the list and appear to be new to them. And so that's also something you can do if you have a really large catalog, is to move some of these replays around to the current date. If I've already listened to them, it's not going to serve it back up to me, so it's not going to annoy me. But if I'm brand new to the show, I'll see it at the top of the list. I might be intrigued enough to click on that. So that is another option. But it does mess with your overall consistency in your catalog. So you don't want to miss out and have a week where you don't have anything in it.

My belief, and this is only Tom's opinion, and some of you out there can disagree with me and happy to have that little, you know, discussion or debate, is that it's more important to show up on that weekly basis for your listeners so that in a way that they realize here there's a new episode for them and they can listen to it. What the date of it is and what happens to it in your lineup after they listen to it, I think is far less important. You just want to show up in specific, serving your audience on that consistent basis, although it would take you a little more work. And obviously you have to be intentional and remember to do it. So if you're not one of these very organized people that you know will remember to do this, this may be problematic. But if you publish one new today, and they're going to backdate it next week back a few weeks. So in the lineup, it's in a certain order for your past episodes, it obviously takes you a little more labor and, you know, remembering to do that, it's not going to be automatic. Right?

And you can't do it with video. The date that you publish your video is the date that it is. And that's the reason why actually we chose to do this for the podcast and our blogs, is so that the date of the video, the audio and the blog all match. That's exactly why we backdating. We're backdating in the podcast here so that it all lines up together to the original air date of the live stream and the video date.

So I do think that's important. And currently with YouTube in particular, and a future episode, I may have some alternate recommendations for video on Spotify. So little tease. And stay tuned to that because they're doing some things different. It's just emerging. But for YouTube, which is certainly the bigger video destination right now, once you publish it, that's it, that's his date. You can't change it. You can only decide to delete it and replace it, which I don't think is a good strategy in most situations.

Although it really frustrates our technical, our detail oriented clients. Right. It really frustrates them when they don't match up. And that's part of why I wanted to make the video, the audio and the blog all match up. From a consistency standpoint, it's easier to find it, but you also know you're on the right episode. It's not out of order. And so for those people that are our listener base, I just, I wanted to make it easy for you. I wanted you to make you feel comfortable because I'm all about the listening experience. Right. And that's where we started in this episode. We all want to make this the best listening experience for you as possible, with the best practices and the most professional video and other things that we can do and the most relevant information for today. And we want to do that because it shows that, that I care more about you than I care about my business. And that means you're going to want to join me and you're going to want to work with me and you're going to want to show up on our next call and you're going to want to consume our next podcast.

Great point, Tracy. Yeah. So there are definitely choices for us podcasters to make here and what we're going to do. There's not just one way to make something old new again, Right? There's, there's more than one way. But, you know, you want to really be considering it from not just your own perspective. That's where you might get into trouble or have a little backlash you didn't expect, right?

Absolutely. Well, we appreciate all of you joining us for this entire year that you have been, or however much of the year that you have, and we look forward to having you join us again in the next year. This is going to be our end of the year episode, our holiday episode. But whatever you celebrate, spend time with your family, spend time on you and enjoy whatever time you have, we are going to. That's why we're prerecording this. But we're still making sure that we can be here for you, we can be energized for you. We can give you 100% of who we are. And that's what we're here for, right? That is exactly. We're here to demo what we recommend.

And provide support to help you reach your goals.

So we look forward to the opportunity to support you in the next year and in whatever capacity we can. Don't forget, just because we're not actually live here, we will still see the comments. So make sure to comment and engage with us and we will message you back and we will reach out and we will answer your questions wherever you put them. So enjoy and thank you so much for being a feed your brand and podcasters United reader. And remember that you can get everything for this blog post for this episode, all our resources, and I'll link to that really scary video that I chose not to re air.

Oh, let's do it.

Yeah, so you can see it.

We need to give that reward to the listeners you tease to it that we should show them, you know, how dated it might be or, you know, not up to today's standard. Right.

A little blurry.

Right?

But not in like the good romantic way. Not the one where I look younger.

The glow. Yeah, no, it just looks blurry.

And also I think you'll be able to see that I had lost quite a bit of weight from that picture too, so that's part of personal. But anyway, we will replay that so you'll be able to. We'll link it into the episode blog post so you'll be able to see that as well. So thanks everyone for listening. We really appreciate you. And we'll be back next week with another updated episode before we go live again in the new year.

But this is the last of 2024, right?

This is a wrap for 2024.

All right, so. So let's all have a great time ringing the new year and we will see you in the new year.

Everyone heard something valuable today but didn't get a chance to write it down. No worries, we've got you covered. We partnered up with podcastersunited.org where podcast hosts like you can get free resources, free masterclasses, the largest podcast tip library assembled, and free promotion opportunities. While you're there, don't forget to follow us on YouTube and on social @United Wepod so you can get feed your brand live. Until next time, keep podcasting.