0:00

[MUSIC IN - GHOSTHOOD FEATURING SARA AZRIEL “LET’S GO” BEGINS] MARY: Podcasting as an industry is an audio only platform. That's the way it started. And still today, the majority of its listeners still prefer audio first. But what is the industry doing to support listeners that may have hearing challenges? How can you adjust your podcast to include a wider audience? One of the first things people will think of is to use transcripts, and I think that is an excellent idea. However, not all transcripts are created equal. There are a few things that podcasters might not think of when they think of creating a transcript for their episodes. So for today's episode, we're gonna dive deeper into transcripts because the landscape for transcripts is changing for podcasts, and I think we're moving in the right direction. So let's dive deeper into how transcripts can ultimately help you as a podcaster and your listeners, too. This is episode number 78 of the Podcaster's Guide To Invisible Voice.

0:02

<< WOMAN SINGS: So so so so let’s go >> So welcome back to the show. Thanks for listening.

0:04

[INTRO MUSIC ENDS] You know, it's been, I would say at least two years ago that I've been doing more research into transcripts. When I started my podcast, I didn't have transcripts. But yeah, about two years ago, I started to include transcripts in my episodes as a testing ground for all sorts of things, including workflow. How much work does this make for me to do when I'm producing my podcast, which already has a lot of moving parts, too? Like, do we need to add another layer of work to what we're already doing? Short answer, yes. So we're going to get into that in this episode today. What are the goals of transcripts in a podcast, and how effective are they for all groups of listeners?

0:06

[MUSIC IN] So, in March of this year, 2024, Apple Podcasts finally announced that transcripts will be included with their iOS 17.4 update. So if you haven't gotten that update yet, I would highly recommend you go and do this and check out what this new experience is with transcripts in Apple podcasts. And as of this recording, transcripts are only available for English, Spanish, French, and German podcasts, and it looks like they are looking to expand other languages. So this is just the start. And since Apple is one of the largest players and influence in the podcasting space, it's great to see that they are doing things to support both listeners and creators as well. When they do something, others listen. They have a lot of influence in this space. So having transcripts in their app now is a huge improvement for the industry as a whole. And to keep podcasting open as well to certain standards and making sure that the creators aren't left behind. And of course we can get into the weeds of that. But that's another story for another day about open podcasting and RSS feeds and all of that. But, you're not here for the technical news updates.

0:08

So breaking this down, I believe Apple has made this move to include transcripts because of various factors. But I think mainly there are legal requirements for accessibility, which includes providing a text alternative for your audio. And yes, although there are legal requirements, many countries have accessibility acts. We'll link to that in the show notes so you can see in your country. So it's not just a U.S. thing, it's not just a Canada thing, or a UK England thing. This is something that worldwide, there are different countries that have these acts. And yes, it's a legal thing to do, but it's also just a smart thing to do. Like why not open up your podcast to more listeners? We don't even know the possibilities that a podcast transcript can have for future listeners and learners as well. [MUSIC ENDS]

0:10

So let's break this down first. Why are transcripts important in podcasting? You will see a lot of answers. And yes, I would agree that transcripts are great for SEO and accessibility. These two points seem to be the main points when people think about transcripts in podcasting, but it can really go beyond that too. And now that Apple podcast includes transcripts, it actually uses transcripts as the third section for search results. So part of the SEO is that Apple will look at the title first, then the author field, those two things have always been in play for SEO, and now the transcript. So I will bet that other podcast listening apps will include transcripts in their app and have that as a searchable field. So people are going to take note, because this is a great move for organic discovery of your podcast. But like most things in podcasting, there's two parts at play here. What does it mean for a listener, and what does it mean for the creator, like yourself? So let's talk about the listener side of things first. [MUSIC IN]

0:12

As a podcaster, you are responsible for your listener's experience. So how they are hearing things, how loud things are, can they hear things? Is it audible? Is it understandable? Is the music too loud? All sorts of different things, such as how you record your podcast, you're responsible for. And it creates that listener experience, whether it's going to be a great experience and they will come back for more or a lot of things that you don't even realize that's happening subconsciously in the mind and they're like, you know what? This is hard to listen to or it just doesn't feel right to me. I don't want to listen to this anymore. So you are responsible for that listener experience, and that listener may need some accessibility features because they are hard of hearing. And that's one of the main points people always point to for accessibility. It's for the people that are hard of hearing and they need this alternative text. Yes, that's true, but think of some examples in the world where it first started as an accessibility thing, but now listeners or viewers of all types use those services. One example is closed captioning on TVs. It took a long time and a lot of effort and protesting to make sure that there was something that people can read along with watching the TV, because for accessibility, those who couldn't hear very well couldn't enjoy television in the same way. But today, I mean, I use closed captioning all the time. It wasn't just for my parents. It's sometimes when the speech is really, really quiet and you can't hear the dialogue or there's a heavy accent, and I'm like, is that what they said? We're gonna pause, rewind, turn on that closed captioning and read the subtitles. Or, you know, something as simple as the dishwasher is running in the kitchen in the other room and it's too noisy and I can't hear everything great. So let's put on that closed captioning. Another example are curb ramps. You know, that section of the sidewalk at intersections where there's a little bit of a ramp. Now, these were originally created for people who needed wheelchair ramps. It's an accessibility feature, but the amount of time that I myself have used these ramps because my kiddo was still in a stroller, I've got my bike and I need to get on or off the sidewalk, my dad with his walker. So it's not just for a sole, single purpose. Accessibility features over time is really useful for the general public as well. Also think of non-native speakers, people who have English as a second language. They would benefit from following along on a transcript or translating certain sections of a transcript to their own language so they can really get the nuance behind what is going on in the episode.

0:14

Same for noisy environments. You know how sometimes on social media now there's a lot of videos with captioning on it? Same sort of thing. I mean, sometimes I don't want to listen to something, I just want to read it or follow along. Like the bus is really noisy, so I always can't hear things very crisp when you're on the bus. So having a transcript along with the audio is handy. Also, for a listener, they might want to search for topics in a section of audio to get a better understanding of what the person is saying. So from a listener point of view, they just want to learn more. They want a different way to be able to understand what is happening and get a better comprehension for the context of the episode. These are all great reasons from a listener point of view who may want to transcript along with the listening experience for your podcast. [MUSIC ENDS]

0:16

Okay, but what about the creator side? Like I said earlier when I tried this out, like a lot of people in the podcasting space always thinks, oh yeah, that's gonna be a lot of work. I mean, I can just throw it in AI and get it generated good enough. I mean, there's gonna be some mistakes, but at least it's there. There's something there. But one of my philosophies is, if you're going to do it, do it right. Because is that really beneficial for everyone to have a transcript that isn't even accurate? So as a creator, having an accurate transcript can mean a lot of things that can be beneficial for your show. For one, you can actually reach a wider audience. Like we're saying, transcripts can be part of that SEO experience, the search engine optimization. So if you're searching for something, it's going to show up because it's been in your transcript. There was actually a case study of traffic for the podcast, This American Life. After implementing transcripts, they saw a 4.18% of all unique listeners landed on the podcast website via a transcript page. Over 4% of unique listeners because of a transcript. I mean 4%. Just think about how many listeners you have. Now increase that by 4%. Don't you want that? But like I said, accurate transcripts are the way to go, because if someone is typing in some jargon or certain words that you use in your industry, spelling a name, it all has to be searchable. If it's spelled wrong, it's never going to come up in your SEO.

0:18

So if you're just going to do the AI, plunk the transcript that's automatically generated onto your website, I mean, yeah, it could still work, but it won't have the same effectiveness. Having it spelled correctly is key, and that takes time. That is human effort because names are commonly misspelled all the time. I mean, just think about like, my last guest, Erin Moon. Moon, sure, last name, easy to spell. But Erin could be the male form, A A R O N. She spells it E R I N. I once knew an Aaran. That's like A A R A N. That's the way she spelled it. So spelling is key to create your own accurate transcripts. It's not just about the spelling. We're also talking about speed and cost within your budget and the ability to edit. So we're talking about time here. All of those elements goes into creating a transcript. Will you be doing it yourself, or will you be handing that off to someone else to do? Maybe someone within your own team or someone like us at organize sound productions. We can create those transcripts for you when we edit the show and put all your pieces together. How much time and how much budget do you have to create these transcripts? And when you are creating Your transcripts, you want to go further. If you have the bandwidth and the resources, you want to make sure part of your transcript is that accuracy piece. Right?

0:20

So you want to develop your own format. Think about use cases from screen readers to comprehension, formatting plays the part, and I'm still learning lots about this as there isn't a one standard for the podcasting industry. And so when searching, there are different formats based on platforms such as transcription for videos, also known as captions. They format things differently. So I don't think there is a one size fits all for podcasting right now. But here are some things that we do that I think could be helpful for creating your own formatting. Use speaker names. So what we like to do is have their name and usually just their first name, because we introduce who the person is with their full name in the beginning. So when you have the different, um, speakers come in, you can just have their first name and then a colon. I like to add that instead of just having like, Speaker One, Speaker Two, as a person who is reading through the transcript, who is that again? Like, who was Speaker One again? Was that the host? Or have you labeled speaker one the guest? I don't know. So using their first name is great, and it really identifies each person. Audio descriptions is something that people might not think about. This is usually something that's missed in a transcript. For a listener to really understand the context and to be with you in that interview or that episode, audio descriptions are really helpful. They help the reader understand what's going on. So I equate this to on TV, how they have closed captioning or described video. Closed captioning is usually what is said on screen, but described video also includes the sound effects, what's happening in the background, the music that's playing, that really immerses you into what you're reading. And in this case, the reading of the transcript for your podcast.

0:22

Is there a laugh? Because this can show sarcasm? Is there music or lyrics that play an important part of the story? Have you included sound effects? What are these pieces? It needs to be in the transcript for the audio descriptions. I like to add audio descriptions in square brackets, which denote additional information or context versus like regular brackets, you know, the round ones. Usually people use that for like, sidebars or little bits of information. But I find the square brackets are usually a common place to add for audio descriptions and other notes for the transcript. Transcripts are also great, but not when they are just one large chunk of text. Apple podcasts actually does this well with their new transcripts. The formatting of the transcript, um, needs to be broken up so that when you follow along, like on Apple podcasts, they have it karaoke style. So like, the words get highlighted, it's broken up so that these large chunks of text are easier to read. So I would recommend like, breaking it up into smaller thoughts or chunks to help with comprehension. It's not about how many sentences should be in a paragraph, but what is this thought? And can we break it up so that it's easier to read and grasp concepts?

0:24

And one of the great things for you as a creator of a podcast, transcripts can help you learn, whether it is compiling your own research, so that you can write a book or create presentations, develop trainings and talks. You can use this text form to grab sections of the audio and also repurpose them for quotes, not just for social media, but like, you can use those quotes within your website, your trainings, your presentations, and things like that. And especially if you have an interview, you can learn from those guests in a totally different form. You have their words on a page that you can scan through and highlight and distill for yourself. If you need to do more research, you need to do more learnings. Or you know what? This was a great nugget from them. My listener is going to learn so much from what they said here, [MUSIC IN]

0:26

and then you can highlight that and share that with your listeners. So I can really get a lot deeper into transcripts, but I want to hear from you, what are your goals with transcripts? And if you include transcripts in your show already, how do you do that? What's your process and what was your why on creating transcripts in the first place? Are they just AI, automatically generated, or are they accurate? I'd love to know, how has transcripts helped you as a podcaster? Or maybe as a listener as well? Do you use transcripts when you're listening to other people's shows? Let me know. You can drop a voicemail as usual on my website, visiblevoicepodcast.com. Look for the purple send voicemail button on the right hand side of your screen and you record that straight from your phone. Or also, an email is also lovely, right? We're talking about transcripts, so the text is good too. Send me an email with your feedback at [email protected]. And like I said earlier, if you need a transfer of this episode, it's always going to be on my website. So you go to the episode page at visiblevoicepodcast.com and scroll down in the transcript will be right there at the bottom of your screen. So thank you so much for listening today and yeah, let me know what you think about transcripts in general. I can't wait to hear from you. [MUSIC ENDS]

0:28

On the next episode of the podcast, we'll continue this theme on accessibility for podcasts. We're going to talk to Joel McKinnon about all of this and also explore how the AI explosion can be a good or bad thing for podcasters and dive a little deeper into his own podcasting journey. This should be a good one because it's going to expand a lot on what we just talked about today, so we'll talk to you then. << GHOSTHOOD FEATURING SARA AZRIEL “LET’S GO” BEGINS >>

0:30

MARY: Thank you so much for listening to the podcaster's guide to a Visible Voice. If you enjoyed this episode, I'd love it if you share it with a podcasting friend. And to reveal more voicing and podcasting tips, click on over to VisibleVoicePodcast.com. Until next time. << WOMAN SINGS: Let’s go >>