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Welcome everybody to the podcast answers podcast. That's right. It's another week, another episode.

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If you've never heard of us before, we help people start and grow their podcast answering

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any podcast questions along the way. So guys, we would love to answer any questions that

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you have. So if you've got questions, make sure that you type them in the chat if you're

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listening live. If you're not listening live, why not? Guys, we do this episode every week.

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We do this show every week and we record live and we have a lot of fun. It's a lot of fun to do

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live. So join us every week. You can find us on YouTube at youtube.com/atpodcastanswers.

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So today we're going to be talking a little bit about the ideal length for your podcast episodes.

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What are the ideal length for your podcast episodes? Is there an ideal length for your

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podcast episodes? We're going to find out. We're going to talk a little bit about that. So

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without further ado, let's get into that. So there is really no ideal podcast episode length.

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It all depends on a few factors. Content format and audience preference. So that's really

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That's really what it boils down to. Content, content format, and audience preference.

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And so here's a couple different sides. Again, you can have... The nice thing about

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podcasts is you can do whatever you want, right? There's no... I mean, yes, legally, you're going

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to have some... You may have ramifications if you slander somebody, but there's no...

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there's not going to be any ramifications on a short episode or a long episode. It's all preference

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and it's all what you want to do because you are the podcast host. So if you want to have a bite-sized

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episode or a mid-length episode or a long-form episode, you can do that. But there are a few

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things to take into consideration. So bite-sized episodes. What do I mean by bite-sized episodes?

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So these are typically shorter episodes ranging from a few minutes to somewhere around 20

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minutes.

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They work well for tips and tricks types of shows, kind of like this one.

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So this one, if you've noticed, is between 8, 12, 15 minutes.

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Kind of just depends on what kind of content that I have to put forward that day.

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But it's fairly short.

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The other one that's kind of short like that is Pod News.

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Pod News is two to three minutes every day.

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That's a daily podcast, but it's really short.

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And the nice thing about that is they're easy to work in to your content schedule.

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So your listeners are going to kind of format you into where they fit, where life fits for

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them.

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A lot of times people listen on their drive to work, drive from work when they're doing

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dishes, things like that.

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And a lot of times those chunks of time are fairly small, you know, between a few minutes

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to 20 minutes.

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And so with Bite Size episodes, it's really easy to fit your podcast into their life because

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they may have only a few minutes each day to listen to you.

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And so Bite Size episodes work really well for those type of shows.

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Yes.

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So the next type of episode is a mid-length episode.

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And these episodes typically fall within the 20 minutes to 45 minute range.

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They allow for more in-depth conversations and discussions like interviewing and storytelling.

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This is a good link for those type of shows because it allows you to get all of your content

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out.

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It's not so long that people have to listen in more than one setting because a lot of

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times you, if you have to listen in more than one setting, people are either not going to

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listen to the whole thing or they're just going to forget about it and go to something

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different.

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So maybe a while before they get back to your episode.

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And then if your episodes start to stack up because they're so long, they're, they could

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delete them.

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They could not listen to the whole thing just because it's, it's really easy to, to get

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behind.

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And if you feel like you're behind, you're going to go ahead and try and shortcut that

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somewhere.

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And so you're going to probably delete some of your older episodes.

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I do that.

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I've done that.

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If I'm gone for a week and I don't have a lot of time to do my normal podcast listening

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schedule routine.

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A lot of times that I just go and go, okay, I'm, it's out.

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I'm out because I can't listen to all of that content.

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So mid length episodes, again, those are the 20 to 45 minute range.

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And those are allowed for a lot of in depth conversation, but interviews, but

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not too long.

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And so the thing you have to remember about this is, is with a mid length one,

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you need to, you need to get into your show fairly quickly.

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Cause if you're going to be interviewing somebody,

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It could take a lot longer than the 20 to 45 minutes that you have interviewing.

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And so you don't want to waste 10 minutes talking banter in the beginning of your show

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with your co-host because you don't want, because you'll get all of that, you'll waste

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half of your episode with listening to that.

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So we don't, we don't want to do that.

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So then the last thing is long form episodes.

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And these are the, they exceed the 45 minute mark.

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They can extend up to hours.

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So long form podcasts, those I'm thinking shows like Joe Rogan Experience, the No Agenda

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podcast, things like that that can range long, that can range a long time.

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And those can be hours long.

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And so these are really good though for interview based podcasts that dive into that or something

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that dives into really complex subjects that can take a long time to bring out the content

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in those episodes. These can be good for sometimes when a story just doesn't fit into a small

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podcast episode because you can't get it. Sometimes, you know, some podcasts episodes

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that I've recorded, the story that I'm talking about or the person that I'm interviewing,

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their story can't fit in 20 to 45 minutes. It just, no matter how hard you try, you just

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can't do that. So some of the downfalls though of a long form content podcast is...

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People may not listen to your whole show because they listen while they're driving

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or their drive is just not that long. If you have a show that has many topics though, what you can do

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is you can make use of the chapters. And this is where I would say is a good thing to do because

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if you have chapters and you bounce from topic to topic to topic,

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It's good to put chapters in your podcast and I can talk about chapters on another episode how to do that

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And show you guys an example, but the nice thing about chapters is then in some podcast apps

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It allows you to skip to that point. So let's say you're not interested in the first 25 minutes of topics and you know that maybe

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Um, how to grow corn and you don't grow corn

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And so you can skip to a different part of this episode talking about growing beans because you grow beans and so

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That's one of the things I would say take advantage of if you're going to do a long form show

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definitely put in the chapter markers in there because it's something that allows your listeners to go back in and

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Listen to just the parts that they need if they're not gonna fit into a small spot like that. So

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Guys remember the content and engagement level are crucial factors though because it is important to prioritize, you know

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Quality over length if you're not gonna don't try to just ramble on to you could because your format is a

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45 minute show, you know in this episode for me, this is probably gonna be about 10 to 15 minutes and

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Sure, I could make it in two 45 minutes, but it would be really really long

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So I don't I don't think that you want to do that. So remember your quality is

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Remember quality pride prioritize that

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Overlength to you know, ensure that your donate your duration aligns with your audience's preferences and expectations

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I would say regularly assess your listener feedback and analytics can help gauge your ideal length too because you may have

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Your listeners saying we don't want the long episodes

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We really don't like them or especially if you normally do a long episode and they you give them a short one and they go

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Hey this whoa, I like that. That's it fits better into my show. So my way I listen to podcasts

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so guys definitely make sure that you're always

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assessing your listener feedback and analytics too because

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You can you can definitely get

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Some analytics from Apple podcast that will tell you you know people are dropping off 20 to 45 minutes

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but it

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You know me but you're you know people are constantly dropping off at that 20 minute mark

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You know that that's kind of your ideal length too

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So well not required for podcasting because you can do it however you want it is helpful to keep your episodes roughly the same

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length every time your audience builds you into their schedule and

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And if one week you're 10 minutes and the rest you're 90, people are going to have a tough time

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fitting that into their schedule because they're used to a certain amount of time, but then next

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week it's really long. So it's, again, you can do what you want because this is your show and you

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are the producer of the show. There's no 30 minute marks like there is in television. You can do it

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it how you want, but if you're going to be doing a 30 minute show, be consistent in your

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30 minute show. Again, it doesn't have to be exactly 30 minutes on the dot. It can be

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29, 28, 27, 30, whatever, but roughly the same. So that way people know what to expect

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every time you drop an episode. That way they're not having to try and fit you into their schedule

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because if they have to work to fit you into the schedule, they're going to drop you like

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a hot potato and they're gonna not be listening to your podcast anymore. So guys definitely

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get into a rhythm of trying to get your episodes roughly the same length every time you go

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record an episode. Also, another good idea too is if you have a mid length show and

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you have a great interview, let's say, you know, you have an hour and a half interview

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but your mid-length show normally goes 45 minutes.

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So what you can do is you can actually either give them, you can cut out and make a normal

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episode, so make it a 45 minutes, and then do a bonus episode where you're an uncut

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version like they do with the movies.

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You see this all the time, uncut, raw, unedited, or the director is a version.

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Something that's going to be longer than normal, but it's going to be good, great content.

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So you can give them that bonus episode where you're saying, "Hey guys, this didn't quite

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fit all into our normal format of our show, but here's the long interview of, you know,

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as a separate bonus.

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You don't have to listen to it if you don't want, but if you want more content from this

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interviewee, check out this bonus episode."

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Or what you can do too is you can cut it in half, release the second half as a second

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episode.

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So a second normal episode.

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So you can say, "Hey guys, this is a great conversation.

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We're going to continue this on the next episode and then just continue on like that.

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You can do that after the fact, like after your podcast is done, you can edit it, cut

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it down, say your outro and say, "Hey, we're going to do this again," even after the interview.

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You don't have to do that during the interview.

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Then you can start a new episode, introduce it.

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You can say, "Hey, if you've not listened to this previous GAS Part 1, go back and listen

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to that first because this is a continuation of that."

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You want to definitely hear the conversation that we had the previous week.

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I would say, guys, a challenge for this week is for you to decide what length you want

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your podcast to be.

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If you have not started your show yet, look at your topics and kind of see how long you

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think your show might be because your topics might be.

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If you have already started your show and established your show, take a look and see

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what your audience likes.

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Ask them.

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You can look at Apple Podcast stats and see when people drop off of your show.

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You can kind of see how long they're listening.

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Maybe it is time to reformat your show. Maybe it's time to come in not necessarily branding

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or the way that you do the show, but you're format your length. Maybe it's time to take

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your hour and a half podcast down to 20 minutes to 30 minutes because your people are going

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to listen to that more and be more likely to finish your episode.

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So guys, we want to thank you for subscribing. If you have any questions about podcasting

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that I can answer, please go to podcastanswers.com/contactandask. I would be happy to make an episode

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about it. Or if you need help with your podcast, I'm available for one-on-one consulting, editing,

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pretty much whatever you need help with in podcasting, I'm available for. So with that,

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go ahead and go to podcastanswers.com/contact, guys, and have a great week.

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