Now is the perfect time to explore creating a podcast. We all have stories to be heard. Lauren Popish is the Founder of The Wave Podcasting, which aims to help womxn tell their unique stories through podcasting. The Wave offers educational resources, event-based community, and recording studio space exclusively for womxn. Their first womxn-only recording studio opened in Los Angeles in February 2020. Lauren’s passion for creating spaces that inspire comfort and confidence comes from her 10 year career in commercial interior design and real estate.
FWM:: How is The Wave Podcasting paving the way to entrepreneurial success?
We are a mission-based company that believes the world is a better place when all voices and perspectives are heard. That’s why we help women share their unique stories through podcasting. Initially, we believed we could best execute that vision by creating recording studio space specifically for women. Like so many other companies, we had to quickly pivot when Covid-19 forced the closure of shared public spaces. We now help women create podcasts at home through an array of digital resources. What hasn’t changed is our mission to diversify public media and our commitment to help women share their stories.
FWM: Tell us about “The Female Podcaster’s Guide to crafting, producing & growing an epic podcast.
We are so thrilled for the launch of this guide at the end of July because it is the first guide to podcasting specifically created for women. We have spent months researching the biggest questions and obstacles female podcasters face on their journey to launching a podcast. The result is an exhaustive end-to-end guide filled with templates, exercises, and activities for launching your next podcast. We are selling a limited number of guides each month so we can hold clients’ hands through the entire process by offering virtual office hours, Slack support, and accountability check-ins. The complete guide is $249, or podcasters can purchase the crafting, producing, and growing sections individually for $99 each. Guides can be purchased starting July 29th on our website at thewavepodcasting.com.
“Instead of competing for two seconds of someone’s attention as their scroll through their social media feed, podcasting allows you to speak directly into your potential customer’s ear for thirty to sixty minutes and build an authentic relationship with her.”
FWM: Is self-sabotage real?
In short, yes. In the early days of building The Wave, we interviewed dozens of prospective and existing female podcasters about their biggest pain points surrounding podcasting. In our research, we found that women have a disproportionate degree of imposter syndrome and anxiety when it comes to recording and sharing their voices. This ranged from a fear of being criticized for their thoughts and opinions to insecurity about the actual tone of their voices. In response, many female podcasters spend an unnecessary amount of time perfecting their podcast before launching, or in some cases, never launch at all. We knew that if we wanted to diversify the podcasting landscape by helping more women start podcasts, we would have to address the technical parts of podcasting as well as the emotional and mental self-sabotage of female podcasters.
FWM: What are the key factors for an engaging podcast?
The first thing we recommend to new podcasters is starting with a target listener in mind. Podcasts that claim to be for everyone don’t serve anyone particularly well and generally have difficulty growing. Being an expert within your niche and solving the problems of a very specific group of people through your podcast episodes is the best way to build a dedicated following. The second thing we recommend is remaining consistent in your episode structure and release schedule. If you can’t reliably release a new episode every week, then make your release schedule bi-monthly or monthly and make sure your audience understands that. Listeners want the reliability of knowing when episodes will be available and how the episodes will be formatted. Lastly, listeners expect good sound quality. This means investing in a decent microphone and making sure your guests have access to one as well. Using your laptop’s built-in microphone is not going to cut it as more and more podcasts compete for the listener’s attention. There are lots of low-cost equipment options that will give your podcast a professional polish.
FWM: Key aspects of The Wave Podcasting are 1-on-1 podcast coaching and a podcast studio. What are the other aspects that you offer?
Podcasting can sometimes be an isolating activity, especially during quarantine. That’s why we have a big focus on the community. We offer a Slack workspace for female podcasters that anyone can join through our website. Women share tips, ask questions, and get feedback on their podcasting process. We also have a Meetup group that previously held in-person events in the Los Angeles area, but now holds digital events to help women refine their craft and support each other in their process. This is also open to the public by searching for Los Angeles Women in Podcasting on meetup.com.
FWM: Is podcasting therapeutic?
After the newness and uncertainty of getting behind a mic wears off, I have found podcasting to be very therapeutic and almost meditative. There are very few things we do anymore where we are completely present and focused on the activity at hand. Podcasting, however, requires that you turn off your phone, limit any distractions, make your surroundings completely quiet, and tune in to your conversation. I have left recording sessions with long-time friends feeling more connected from an hour of conversation than an entire weekend away together. It feels so rare and precious to have someone’s undivided attention, and you can hear that intimacy in the episode afterwards.
FWM: Why should people pay attention to podcasting as a bridge to success?
It may feel as though everyone has a podcast these days, but in reality, there are only about one million podcasts on Apple Podcasts currently. Compare that to the 600 million blogs worldwide or 500 million Instagram accounts, and podcasting is revealed as a greenfield of opportunity. Building an audience is absolutely essential to getting your idea, company, or movement out into the world. Instead of competing for two seconds of someone’s attention as their scroll through their social media feed, podcasting allows you to speak directly into your potential customer’s ear for thirty to sixty minutes and build an authentic relationship with her. At some point, probably within the next three years, podcasting will become as saturated as blogging. If you want to organically build an audience of highly dedicated fans or customers, I would urge you to start a podcast now.
FWM: Do you have any additional comments?
As a podcaster myself, I know better than anyone that there are lots of reasons NOT to start a podcast—time, cost, lack of experience, fear—the list goes on. All of those excuses are worth overcoming when you remember this one undeniable fact: there is only one you, and only you can share your distinctive perspective with the world.
Once you do, there is a community of individuals – big or small – dying to relate to you through your interests, stories, learnings, and guests. And what more authentic way to share than with your voice?
Here is my pledge to you: I will do the work necessary to minimize all of the things that make podcasting seems unattainable. I will continue to provide studio space, educational resources, and events at an accessible price. I will also foster a community of support that helps you overcome that imposter syndrome every day. In exchange, I hope that you will commit to sharing an experience, story, or perspective that is unique to you through podcasting. Not just to promote your business, or school, or hobby, but to contribute to a larger mission of diversifying the perspectives in our media.
Website: thewavepodcasting.com
Instagram: @thewavepodcasting
Twitter @wavepodcasting
Email: lauren@thewavepodcasting.com
