Bonus: Making of a podcast - the equipment

Tuesday, June 15, 2021

Today: Find out the basics of how this podcast and other podcasts are made. Today we cover the most basic equipment you will need to record, as well as some recommendations for what works.

For examples of the equipment mentioned, check out this corresponding blog post: https://www.joekwonjoe.com/blog/2021/6/15/making-of-a-podcast-the-equipment

Your turn: We'd love to hear from you. Use the "Message" button on the Anchor app to share a story, question, or feedback related to this episode. Or email us at joe@connectioncounselor.com

Learn more: Details about the book, online course, YouTube tutorials and more can be found at www.connectioncounselor.com/executive-presence-place

Music: Earning Happiness by John Bartmann is licensed under a CC0 1.0 Universal License

“Remember, it’s not what you say, do, or wear. It’s how you make people feel that generates executive presence. Nothing. Else. Matters.”

Hello, this is Joe Kwon, the Connection Counselor, and welcome to the easy peasy way to make a podcast - part 1. Today we'll be covering equipment, and this is bonus material for Executive Presence Morsels, the podcast that we're launching on July 5th.

And what I wanted to share is, I get questions a lot about how to do a podcast. I've been doing several for several years now, “Why It Works,” “The Big Lie,” and most recently “Si-Suite” with ALPFA, which is a Latino non-profit that I'm on the board of for the New Jersey chapter.

And so a lot of people are interested in podcasting. They enjoy doing it, and they're thinking about doing it themselves. So I just wanted to share a little bit about my process and how I made this podcast and also how I make the other podcasts, but in a way that's very accessible. Non-technical. So if you're interested in doing this yourself, you'll have a little bit of a steer and you can sort of get going without having to spend, a week or a month researching on the internet. You can just get started with this information.

So hopefully it'll help you and you'll enjoy creating and generating podcasts as much as I do. Cause it's one of the favorite things that I get to do creatively and also semi-professionally, as well. So today we're going to talk about equipment, right?

So if you're going to record a podcast, you need equipment to record it right at its most basic level you need a microphone or something that has a microphone to record what you're saying. And secondly, you need some equipment to store that recording, right? Because your headset or your microphone typically will not store that recording itself. You need a phone, a tablet, or a laptop to actually store that recording so then you can do things later to it and then make it into a podcast and have that post.

So today we're going to keep it simple. We're just going to talk about the actual, equipment that you need to record the audio. So there's two ways you can go about this, and I've done, both of these ways, so they both have advantages and disadvantages.

The first way is not what most people think about, right? When most people think about podcasting, they think about buying a semi-expensive or really nice microphone. And then it's sort of mounted on this boom arm, and then it's got like strappy things to keep it from shaking and all sorts of weird attachments. And that's great.

You can definitely do that, but if you really want to get started, you don't need to spend hundreds of dollars to do that. You can actually do it much more easily. All you need is a microphone that can give you a clean and clear recording of your voice. So plenty of options here, I'll share some that you can use.

First, what I don't recommend is using your laptop or phone or iPhone or Android phone microphone, just because the audio of that generally is not that great for recording. In a pinch it'll definitely work and depending on what you're doing, people may not really notice or complain, but typically you want something that's more of a dedicated mic for speaking into.

So, if you really want to go easy and cheap, you can just use the microphone on headphones that you get that you use with your phone, right? As long as you try it out and record it. So it could be like your iPhone kind of white headphones, the ones that don't really fit in your ear, the wired ones and it has a little mic on it. You could use that. Or another version of that, that you have for your phone.

Or you could just use the kind of headset that you have, um, you know, maybe for work with the boom arm, uh, or the ones that you see, uh, for those of you who are old enough in the Time-Life commercial, you know, the woman in the call center has that boom arm.

You could use that. And that works great too. And the nice thing about that is it's dedicated to, your voice and a call. And so it doesn't pick up a whole bunch of sound around you outside that and, and the boom arm with the mic is situated kind of right in front of your mouth. So that makes it kind of easy.

There's two other ways you could go about it. One, you could have a dedicated mic that just goes right into your phone or device, and record that way. So this way it's not your device’s mic, but it's a microphone that hooks into your device.

I use to record this Executive Presence Morsels podcast, what I'm recording right now, it's a great little mic called the Shure MV88. And that has a lightning attachment that goes right into my iPhone, so I don't need any dongles or anything. And then for those of you who are on Android or a device that doesn't, that isn't an iPhone, there's the Shure MV88+, which has different attachments, so if you have a usb-c or other attachments, you can also use it. So that one, you don't need to have an iPhone to use, but they're essentially the same microphone.

And the great thing about this is it gives you some more settings in terms of how you record, in terms of how it sounds and how wide you're recording.

And also some basic equalization to play around with that. So, the reason why I use that for this podcast that I'm recording now, is it’s super easy. And it's just kind of like run and gun. I just plug it in to my phone and I start recording. And I get a pretty clean and good recording without too much muss or fuss.

Uh, for some of my previous podcasts, I actually use a headset, the type you might use for a conference call. And that gives really great quality as well. And I love that. And then sometimes there's a lot of background noise in my house or outside, and it doesn't pick up a lot of that. So that's also a great option.

I'll share a link in the show notes, with different recommendations or places where you can go to check these out that way you don't have to research for hours on end. So use it for inspiration or if you like any of those, definitely go ahead and check them out. And I'll include a range of prices from inexpensive to yeah, if you really want to get, get high-end, I'll throw in one or two there as well.

Now that you have the equipment for recording. Oh, before I forget, there's one additional way you can record, which again is mic’s like the Blue Yeti, or some really sort of fancier, more dedicated mic’s. You can definitely do that and it'll give you a nice recording.

Just one warning on some of these mic’s. If you think about a microphone, like when you go to karaoke or you're on stage and you're giving a speech, you know how the mic is like an ice cream cone and you're talking into the top of the ice cream cone?

Some mics are designed to be that way, whereas other mics and a lot of the mikes that people are using these days, like the Blue Yeti, they're not top address mic’s which means the top of the microphone. They're side adress mic’s.

So it's almost like you're talking into the side of the ice cream cone. Still the top, but on the side, not on the very tippy top. And I've noticed a lot of people, either when I’m a guest or on their podcast, or I just see, they're actually using the microphone incorrectly and their voice isn't getting recorded as well, because they're talking into the wrong part of the microphone.

So whatever microphone you get or use, just make sure you read the instructions and understand most importantly, where you're supposed to be talking into the mic because it's not always the same based on the type of microphone that you're getting.

So hopefully this has been helpful for you. July 5th, we're launching our daily podcast, Executive Presence Morsels. We're going to be delivering it five days a week delivered in the morning, so you can get those insights and think about and apply them during the day.

So five days a week for the next year, that's my commitment to you to deliver. And I would love to hear from you before we launch our first episode. It's really easy to record a message on Anchor.fm. I'll include a link in the show notes here where you can record your thoughts, questions, story, suggestions, things you'd like to hear, whatever you would like to share with us for Executive Presence, Morsels. I’d love to hear from you.

And as a bit of appreciation for you listening to this bonus episode, I will include a preview of our show. So you can take a listen. So see you on July 5th. I'm so excited to do this with you! This is Joe Kwon, the Connection Counselor. Remember, you can change your life, one connection at a time.