9 Podcast Planning Templates You Can Obtain Proper Now

From brainstorming concepts to reserving friends and outlining present subjects, there’s a number of work concerned with planning a podcast episode. Podcast planning templates can assist you retain monitor of sponsors, handle your modifying and manufacturing course of, and even map out promotional content material as soon as your episodes go dwell.

These are a few of my favourite free choices for freshmen, seasoned hosts, and everybody in between.

monday.com: A podcast planning template for easy manufacturing

monday.com is one in every of my favourite project management tools in the marketplace. It’s an effective way to plan your podcast as a result of it has every part you want to keep organized and guarantee none of your manufacturing duties slip by the cracks.

It additionally has an important mobile app, permitting you to handle podcast planning from the palm of your hand.

You’ll be able to join monday.com’s free plan to unlock access to 200+ templates, as much as three challenge boards, eight customized column varieties, and seats for 2 collaborators. It’s an important place to begin or strive it out however most groups will probably must improve to a paid plan slightly rapidly.

Extra on monday.com: monday.com Review | monday.com vs Wrike | monday.com vs Airtable.

I actually like how the manufacturing stream is about up with this template. As a substitute of a single card for every episode that shows its standing, each episode has its personal listing of devoted duties.

For instance, the preparation part could embody duties associated to making ready questions for friends and outlining the episode construction. You may also have a post-production part for issues like modifying clips to be promoted on social media earlier than the ultimate episode is polished and able to dwell.

This sort of setup helps you to get as granular as you’d like with out cluttering every part up.

The template additionally helps you to estimate how a lot time every job ought to take. From there, you may enter the actuals and examine the distinction.

Total, monday.com and this template are stable choices for any podcaster, whether or not you’re working by your self or with a full staff. It’s simple to make use of, and the truth that you’re getting the complete energy of monday.com’s challenge administration platform is a bonus that may’t be ignored.

ClickUp: Podcast planning templates for any kind of present

ClickUp is one other all-in-one challenge administration and staff collaboration platform. Whereas this may appear to be overkill for podcast planning, there’s a free ceaselessly plan that’s good for organizing simply about every part.

Every template under is extra superior than the one earlier than it.

The fitting one for you is determined by how a lot you need to lean on the instrument, how many individuals you’re working with, and the way granular you need to be with post-production monitoring.

Extra on ClickUp:  ClickUp Review | ClickUp vs monday.com | ClickUp vs Notion.

Template 1: A beginner-friendly possibility for planning episodes

This template is nice for newer podcast hosts who simply want one thing easy to plan upcoming episodes.

It comes with all the fundamentals you want to keep organized. You’ll be able to create a backlog of episode concepts, categorize episodes, add audio information, and fasten hyperlinks to dwell episodes so every part’s centralized in a single place.

My favourite half about this podcast planning template is its simplicity.

It’s organized into 4 sections that observe a linear stream — deliberate episodes, recorded episodes, reveals which have been edited, and reveals which have been printed.

Due to its simplicity, you received’t should spend a ton of time determining the way it works. It’s only a matter of signing up and including your whole concepts. Inside minutes you’ll be extra organized and have way more perception into the place every part stands in your manufacturing stream.

The largest draw back is that it’s lacking performance for brainstorming, managing post-production duties, and scaling past a single channel.

This isn’t essentially a nasty factor, particularly for newer reveals. However greater manufacturing groups will probably must go together with one of many different templates under.

Template 2: Added options for managing various kinds of podcasts

This ClickUp template follows the identical core idea of the earlier one within the sense that each one episodes are organized by stage within the manufacturing course of.

Nevertheless it takes it up a notch if you’d like extra granular particulars about every episode.

You’ll see the progress standing of every episode up to date in real-time as you or your staff completes duties required to get it dwell.

This template comes pre loaded with 17 customized attributes that you need to use tag episodes and keep organized.

These vary from matter classes to listens, subscriber data, and extra.

You’ll additionally be capable of categorize every merchandise by kind. For every kind, you may outline a set construction that’s utilized while you add a brand new episode, so that you don’t have to stipulate all of the steps each single time you add one thing new.

Say you’re planning an episode that features a visitor. Should you tag that episode with this attribute, you may have your interview notes and questions obtainable by default on that exact card.

I additionally love the visible parts of this template. If you wish to have a broad vary of subjects to your present, the color-coded matter column clearly signifies whether or not you might have a very good mixture of concepts or too many episodes in a single class.

Whereas you need to use it to handle some post-production duties, like your social media marketing plans, it’s a bit extra restricted for this use in comparison with the template under.

Template 3: Essentially the most superior possibility for managing all pre and post-production duties

If in case you have a well-established present with a full staff working collaboratively to file, edit, and promote your present, this template has every part you’ll want to remain organized earlier than, throughout, and after manufacturing.

I don’t advocate it for solo podcasters and easy reveals or for those who’re publishing lower than an episode per week. You’ll find yourself losing time filling in particulars that don’t matter but.

However for groups producing episodes at scale, this template is a no brainer.

You’ll be able to arrange a number of boards for various parts of the manufacturing stream. By default, there’s a brainstorming board, backlog of matter lists, and even a spot to arrange requests out of your listeners.

As soon as reveals go dwell, you may pull in analytics to see which subjects are performing the most effective so you may replicate that success with future episodes.

From managing visitor outreach and relationships with earlier friends to planning social media posts and placing all episode belongings in a single card, this template has all of it.

There are a number of views, built-in statuses, collaborative paperwork, and a spot to retailer your whole attachments.

Your producers, editors, social staff, and designers will be capable of preserve monitor of all their work in a single place, giving managers and supervisors every part they should monitor progress and repair points earlier than they turn out to be bigger issues.

Though ClickUp’s free plan is ok to begin, you’ll must improve to a paid plan to make the most effective use of all of the superior capabilities of this template.

Coda: Extremely customizable podcast planning templates

Coda is a relational database and doc creation resolution with inbuilt challenge administration options. In contrast to challenge administration instruments, Coda is a clean slate that allows you to construct various kinds of programs to match your wants.

As your wants change, you may replace it to match your new workflows or add on to attach extra items of your corporation.

The free plan is great, particularly for those who’re working by your self. However the most effective half is Coda’s reasonably priced pricing construction that solely makes you pay for doc creators. Should you’re the one particular person creating and building paperwork, you solely should pay for one consumer. All editors and viewers are utterly free.

Extra on Coda: Coda Review | Coda vs Notion. 

Template 1: A full suite of templates to standardize your processes

Coda’s structure is nicely suited to bringing dispersed knowledge collectively in distinctive and inventive methods. Due to that, one in every of its greatest practices is separating your programs into a number of areas and connecting them collectively as wanted.

That’s precisely what this suite of templates helps you do.

Fairly than attempting to cram each factor of podcast planning and manufacturing into one dashboard, you’ll have separate areas for every part.

It comes with sections for brand spanking new concepts, episode planning, managing manufacturing flows, monitoring launched episodes, and extra. There’s even an area for conserving visitor data organized.

One of many included templates makes it simple to create SOPs that outline standardized parts for every stage of your manufacturing course of. This ensures that hosts, editors, social media managers, and everybody in between has clear directions each step of the best way.

If somebody is sick or leaves, anybody can bounce in and observe the identical SOPs to add a brand new episode to YouTube.

This additionally acts as a guidelines to make sure consistency for each episode — it serves as a reminder for issues like including the constant intro and outro music to every present.

From there, you may brainstorm new concepts, select and plan episodes, monitor manufacturing duties, and see a working listing of dwell episodes. There’s a full content material calendar and a spot to maintain monitor of manufacturing duties by part. You’ll even be capable of add present notes and interview questions so every part’s able to go.

The weakest a part of this template is the precise manufacturing stream monitoring. It covers primary job monitoring, nevertheless it’s primary compared to others.

Nonetheless, you may construct out extra granularity for those who want it.

Template 2: A collaborative template that turns artistic concepts into new episodes

Just like the primary possibility, this free podcast planning template from Coda combines a number of instruments and assets right into a single area. It comes with dozens of templates, together with a content material calendar, a spot to arrange dwell episodes, an space for sponsor data, and way more.

However what actually makes this template distinctive is the best way it’s arrange for brainstorming.

New concepts can come from wherever, together with whilst you’re out on a stroll, different teammates, your friends, your listeners, and even different departments in your corporation.

With this template, everybody has a devoted area to take notes. On prime of that, anybody can pitch concepts and work collaboratively to nail down these concepts earlier than transferring ahead to the manufacturing course of.

It helps you to arrange your individual inside approvals course of for episode concepts, and even pull suggestions out of your viewers submitted by way of social media.

By default, the template comes with a guidelines of 20 duties for every episode. Whoever completes a job can merely mark it as completed, and your entire staff will see it up to date in real-time.

If the default listing doesn’t be just right for you, you may simply replace it by including, eradicating, or modifying present objects based mostly in your processes. When you’ve up to date it, all new episodes can have your new listing included robotically.

The largest draw back is that this template doesn’t have a lot of a project-tracking factor past this guidelines and an editorial calendar.

You might want to make use of one other template or construct it out additional to have a full end-to-end resolution for planning, producing, and publishing episodes.

Stackby: An entire editorial calendar for podcasting planning and monitoring income

Stackby is a no-code work platform that mixes spreadsheets and databases right into a single instrument. When you could not robotically affiliate such a software program with podcast planning, it’s truly an effective way to plan episodes. Particularly for those who begin with a template.

It’s free for as much as 5 customers per workspace, making it an important alternative for smaller groups with no funds or bigger groups needing a versatile platform to work with.

This template features a full editorial calendar that has all the key data you want, together with the host, concept, episode quantity, standing, launch date, and extra.

You’ll be able to change between month, day, and week views, permitting you to zoom in and plan granular duties or zoom out to see a excessive degree launch schedule for the month. The calendar is clear and nicely designed, particularly in comparison with different instruments which have primary calendar views.

SEE: Uncover extra free editorial calendar templates for various platforms. 

This template additionally contains different challenge views, together with listing, pipeline, and Kanban for getting work completed.

One of many main standout options of this template is the flexibility to trace income from completely different sponsors. You’ll be able to simply preserve monitor of your agreements, tag every episode with which sponsors are included, and import listener knowledge to calculate how a lot income you’re getting.

Say one sponsor’s CPM pays $25 for a 30-second advert. The template robotically calculates the overall income based mostly on the variety of listens.

That is notably useful for those who’re working quite a few adverts from completely different sponsors, all with completely different terms.

The largest draw back of utilizing Stackby is that it limits file add sizes. Many episodes might be too large, so that you’ll must preserve these information elsewhere and hyperlink to the supply as a substitute.

Podcast planning templates for Excel, Google Sheets, Microsoft Phrase, and PDF

Easy manufacturing schedules or solo customers could not want superior software program to remain organized.

Should you desire to maintain issues easy, there’s nothing mistaken with utilizing a spreadsheet or doc as a substitute. These work notably nicely for those who don’t must collaborate with lots of people or care about aesthetically pleasing views of all of your episodes.

Template 1: A primary calendar to handle recording and publishing dates

Smartsheet is a strong app builder. It’s just like Coda and monday.com however constructed extra for energy customers. It doesn’t have a free plan, nevertheless it does usually publish free spreadsheets you need to use in Google Sheets or Excel.

They don’t provide podcast particular templates, however there are a number of generic choices you may simply adapt to work to your wants.

My favourite Smartsheet template for podcasts is a normal content calendar template that works for publishing any kind of content material, together with podcast episodes. It’s totally free and appropriate with Excel, Phrase, Google Sheets, and as a printable or digital PDF file.

It’s an important possibility for those who don’t want a lot other than visualizing your publishing schedule and planning at a excessive degree.

Whereas most content material calendars are for monitoring publish dates, you may simply use inbuilt coloration coded tags to schedule recording dates and even social media posts to advertise printed episodes as nicely.

The principle draw back of this template is that it’ll ultimately begin to really feel cluttered, particularly for those who begin including a ton of things.

It additionally doesn’t have any job monitoring capabilities for managing manufacturing work.

Nonetheless, it’s a very good place to begin for those who don’t publish typically.

Template 2: A printer-friendly possibility for jotting present notes

This template, additionally from Smartsheet, affords a easy solution to manage handwritten present notes to make use of throughout recording. You’ll be able to open it with Microsoft Phrase or Google Docs and print out as many copies as you’d like.

There are a number of methods you need to use this template, from mapping out content material pillars to noting completely different speaking factors for various segments of your present.

You can additionally write down questions, plan episode construction, sponsorship data, or key factors you don’t need to overlook. Positive, it’s extremely easy. However that’s what makes it so versatile for individuals who take pleasure in writing issues by hand.

It will also be tremendous useful throughout recording because you received’t want a computer.

The best way to create your individual podcast planning template

Should you can’t discover something that matches precisely what you’re on the lookout for, you may modify an present template or create your individual. Relying on how detailed you need to get, there are dozens of parts you may think about including.

At a minimal, I like to recommend the next.

An space for brainstorming

New concepts can come up any time. It’s necessary to have a straightforward solution to notice them down and preserve monitor of them with out an excessive amount of trouble.

It’s additionally a good suggestion to have some solution to flip these into full plans so you may monitor every concept by to completion, mark them for later, or write them off as concepts you aren’t going to file for some cause or one other.

Episode particulars

Every episode probably has a ton of particular data you want to preserve monitor of, together with the subject, audio system, questions, construction, sponsors, backtracks, and extra.

Ideally, your template has an space to maintain monitor of every part. This ought to be hyper-specific to the forms of data you care about. For instance, chances are you’ll need to even have a subject for the season or theme for those who manage that method.

Lastly, you may arrange an inventory of duties, an overview, or different notes for various episode constructions so that you don’t have to begin each from scratch.

Manufacturing workflow

Other than episode data, it’s useful to know the place every episode is in manufacturing. That is notably necessary for those who’re working with a staff, however even solo customers have so much to achieve from staying organized like this.

Your setup will be as easy or complicated as you’d like. For some, a easy stream with a backlog, in progress, recorded, modifying, and printed is greater than sufficient.

Others might want extra in-depth challenge administration capabilities like due dates, job assignments, progress monitoring, and extra.

Monetization and sponsorship particulars

Whether or not working adverts, mentioning sponsors, or promoting your individual services and products, it’s a good suggestion to determine this up entrance earlier than you begin recording.

You can additionally plan to pre-record snippets and add them in throughout modifying. Nonetheless you determine to do it, conserving monitor of all these particulars alongside your episodes and different information can assist preserve every part organized.

Submit-production advertising and marketing

What occurs as soon as an episode airs? Do you publish a couple of social media posts, ship out an electronic mail, or submit about it in your blog?

Publishing these forms of content material is not any completely different than publishing a podcast so it shouldn’t be too difficult to determine the right way to preserve monitor of different parts in the identical place. You can do the identical for those who publish the identical episode on a number of platforms.

Podcast planning greatest practices

Planning a podcast is so much simpler stated than completed.

Listed below are some professional ideas to bear in mind for those who’re struggling, working by your first few episodes, or on the lookout for a little bit of steering:

• Keep organized and constant.
• Don’t overcomplicate the artistic course of.
• Brainstorm as many subjects as attainable.
• Get snug throwing out concepts you don’t like.
• Define the stream of an episode, however don’t write a script.
• Resolve on episode size earlier than you begin.
• Schedule friends prematurely and at all times have a backup.
• Give your self loads of time for modifying and post-production.
• Doc every part.

The principle aim is staying organized and conserving monitor of all of the transferring items. If you are able to do that, you’ll be taught the remaining as you go.

Your first 20+ episodes received’t be good and chances are you’ll really feel utterly scattered — each are totally regular. Over time, you’ll discover vital enhancements in your delivery, banter, concepts, sponsorship plugs, workflows, and modifying capabilities.