Speaker 1: Thanks to Riverside for sponsoring today's video. So you want to record a podcast, but the people that you want to record with don't live close to you. Whether you want the flexibility to interview guests across the world, or your co-host lives in another city, or maybe like me, you travel a lot and you still want to be able to create an awesome podcast no matter where you are. You don't need to stress because it is easier than ever to produce a high quality podcast completely online. And I'm going to show you how to do it. There are a few key components to a successful podcast. You're going to want high quality audio, high quality video, and a good quality interview, like good quality content and subject matter. We're going to cover all of that in this video. And honestly, I think it's more relevant than ever. I mean, podcasts have been around a really long time, but they're continuing to just get more popular, not just with creators, but also with listeners. Podcast listenership is higher than ever before. So if you're looking for an audience, then creating a podcast might be a good place to start. Let's get into how to record your podcast online. So how are you going to be able to record your podcast with you in one location and either your guest or co-host in another two words, Riverside. Okay. So it's technically one word and like one really great application, but you get the idea. Now, my friends, this is the sponsored section of today's video, but trust me, you're not going to want to skip it because this is going to be a game changer for recording your podcast. At least it has been for me. Riverside makes it super easy to get the best quality audio and video while recording your podcast remotely. Let me show you how it works. So just head to riverside.fm using like the link in my description. And when you get there, log in or sign up. When you open up Riverside, you're going to see the studios page. Now you can see, I already have one set up for my creator club podcast when I record interviews for it, but don't worry, I'll walk you through creating a new one. It's super easy. You're just going to go ahead and click create new. You can add your studio name. You can decide whether you're going to record audio and video or just audio, and then you can enter your studio right away. This screen here walks you through all the important steps that you want to take before you start recording your podcast. You can add your display name, decide whether you're using headphones or not, and select that so that Riverside can compensate for it. You can choose the microphone that you want to use, the camera you want to use, and the speaker you want to use. And then you just click join. Most likely you're going to want to send invites out to people, and that's super easy. All you need to do is copy this link. You can decide if they're an audience member, a guest, or a producer. Most cases they're probably going to be guests. You can copy the link or invite them by email. And everything is done just inside your web browser, so you don't need to ask your guests to download any specific app or anything like that. So I'm going to quickly grab my headphones because it's always going to be better audio that way, and invite a guest so you can see what that looks like. Now that my guest has joined me, all I need to do is click record and we can start recording our podcast. Okay, bye. Once you're finished recording, you're just going to look for this little upload section. You can see my upload just completed. So now I'm ready to go ahead and download my content or start editing right inside Riverside. Riverside also has some really powerful built-in editing features. So I can just start by clicking on edit and create clips, and I can choose whether I want to create a social clip like for my Instagram story or for a TikTok or a Reel, or if I want to edit like a full length version to upload on YouTube, for example. So let's just click on full length so you can see what the editor looks like. So let's just say at the beginning, you know, there's a little bit of chit-chat and I want to like cut that out before I actually start my intro. All I have to do is click and drag and I can start it off at the point where I actually want it to start. And if at any point me or my guest made a mistake, all I have to do is go to that point on the timeline and click split, and then I can really easily eliminate that section from the final edit. What's really cool about editing in Riverside is that you can really quickly and easily decide the layout of your clips, which would be something that would definitely take you extra time if you were using regular editing software. So if you just click on layout, you can swap between grid or grid with gaps, and you can choose your background color, or you can use the AI features, which will detect who the speaker is and then automatically show them as the main frame while they're talking. And when you're happy with your edit, you can click export and then download it to your computer so you can upload it wherever you want. If you want to use Riverside to record and edit your own podcast, then definitely check it out using the link in my description. And thanks again to Riverside for sponsoring this video. So as you can see, Riverside is going to be the best tool for recording your podcasts online because you don't lose any quality in terms of your audio or video because of internet speed or anything like that, because it's recording locally before it uploads to Riverside, where you can then edit and download it and all that stuff. But the thing is, if your webcam isn't great, it's not like Riverside can come to your home and like replace your laptop camera with a 4k one or something. So I wanted to share some tips for locally improving your audio and video so that you can get the best results possible when you record with Riverside, or just for your content recording in general, you don't need to buy any new tech to be able to use this strategy. So you might not know this, but you can actually use your iPhone as a webcam with your MacBook. And it's super easy to do. And it's going to really, really improve the quality of your video. All you need is a lightning cable and you can plug your phone directly into your computer. And I'm just using this little tripod. It's a Manfrotto tripod with a phone adapter. I'll link it in the description. And then all you need to do is open up Riverside. And when you go to switch the camera, you can actually choose your iPhone as your camera. And you can already see like, wow, that looks so good. So this is an example of me recording with my iPhone. And this is what it looks like when I'm recording using my webcam. Obviously you can see the field of view is very different, but the overall quality is as well. Like the iPhone camera just deals better with like the shadows. And it's just like, it looks crisper. I didn't need to download any external software or use any special apps for this. It's literally just a built-in Apple feature. So it's a really great hack for getting better video quality. Now, obviously if you're going to the lengths to make your video look better, you probably also want to have really good sounding audio. Now, depending on where you're at in your creator journey, you might not be ready to invest in really expensive gear. The nice thing about my video hack is that you probably already have a phone. You can just plug it into your laptop. So that's really great. But let me walk you through three potential options for microphones, depending on your current budget. The first option and the most budget friendly is just a pair of wired Apple headphones. You probably have a pair of these kicking around and these actually provide pretty good sound quality, like surprisingly good. Let me plug these in and just give you a sense of what it sounds like compared to not using them at all. So here is what my podcast recording looks and sounds like when I'm using my iPhone as my camera and I'm just using a pair of Apple headphones for my microphone. This is what it sounds like when I'm just using my laptop's built-in microphone. So as you can see a pretty solid option, if you are on a limited budget, you're definitely going to always want to wear headphones, but I especially recommend ones that have a microphone on the wire. So it's just a little bit closer to your mouth and actually sounds pretty good. Okay. Well, let's say you want to upgrade from just your headphone, but what I recommend next, basically any sort of mid range USB microphone is going to sound pretty good. This is the AKG brand one, which in full transparency, they sent me a little while back to test out and it's pretty good. I've tested a lot of different USB microphones at this point, and I don't find a huge, huge difference between any of them. This goes for around like 130 Canadian dollars. So like around a hundred US and you can find a lot of like decent options for that price point. So let's plug it in. So you can hear what it sounds like. Hello and welcome to my podcast filmed on my iPhone and recorded using this AKG USB microphone. Okay. But let's say you're ready to improve upon even a USB microphone. You want something that sounds super crisp, like professional studio level. If you're looking for that kind of upgrade and you're looking to spend a little bit more money, I would recommend the Vocaster one. So you plug this little device into your laptop and you pair it with an XLR microphone like this, which you can plug in. The nice thing about this device is you can manually set the gain so you can kind of adjust how it's sounding. Whereas something like your typical USB microphone doesn't have that ability. Usually with USB microphones, you can adjust the volume of the playback, like while you're listening to it, but you can't actually adjust the gain. This allows you to do that. So I'm just going to go ahead and plug it in. If you're curious about the setup, I actually have a whole video where I talk about this. So I will link that in the description. Hello, welcome to my podcast. So this is me recording using my phone camera once again, and the Vocaster one with this like XLR microphone. This is going to be your top of the line results when it comes to this kind of a setup. I think it's like closest to having like a legit studio. It sounds pretty darn good. And it's very easy to use the Vocaster studio with the microphone and the Vocaster one little hub here is going to cost you around $350, I think. So it's definitely more of an investment for somebody who's maybe been podcasting for a while, but I do think it gives you that next level up in terms of your audio quality. So all these adjustments to your audio and video quality are great, but they only do so much for you if the quality of your conversations of your interviews is good too. So here are a few very quick tips for you when it comes to planning for your interview podcast, because let's be honest, there are a lot of like mid-interview podcasts out there. I've listened to a lot of them because a lot of people think they can just jump on a call, ask a few questions and call it a podcast, but that's not going to help you grow an audience. Tip number one, research your subject. My biggest pet peeve is when podcast hosts open up the conversation by just saying, so tell us about who you are and what you do. The host should know that. And I know the audience doesn't necessarily know that, but I really think that when it comes to these basic kind of bio lines, like the host should be delivering that to the audience. So you should be introducing your guest saying why you're interviewing them, why we as a listener base should be interested in this conversation. Number two, ask questions that both you and your audience are curious about. I think too many people are using interview podcasts as like just an excuse to do networking and like, yeah, it is a great opportunity to meet people, but I think you need to think about who's going to be listening and what they're going to care about, what they're going to get out of it. Some of the best interviews that I've listened to on podcasts are ones where the guest is like actively sharing tips or advice or some kind of tangible takeaway. Or if not that they've got some kind of high level knowledge or like wisdom to share, because the thing is I'm only going to listen to an interview. That's purely about somebody's life story. If a, I know the person or B it's a really freaking crazy life story. So just keep that in mind. And number three, choose a theme or a purpose for the interview. Seriously, don't just do a generic, tell us your story, kind of an interview. There's way too many people doing that. And it's not interesting enough. You should decide in advance what the takeaway is going to be, like what the kind of learning lesson from the episode could be, and then write your questions in order to pull out that kind of a lesson or story from your guest and let them know in advance what kind of stuff you want to ask about. But I wouldn't necessarily give them like the exact list of questions or like ask them to write out their answers, unless you're doing like a very educational, almost tutorial style episode where you want your guests to be really prepared. And then that's kind of a different thing. So with all these different tips, you've got a great recording platform. You're going to have good audio, good video, and hopefully some high quality interview questions. You, my friend are ready to go out and start that podcast. And if you want some more information about the exact step-by-step of getting it launched, I actually released a whole series a while back. I'll link the playlist here so you can check it out next. I take you through every step that you need to get your podcast started. So as always, thank you so much for watching and thanks again to Riverside for sponsoring this video. I hope you're having adventures and following your dreams and I will see you in the next one. Bye.