Bringing Back The Magic To Your Boring Podcast

It’s hard to make an engaging podcast when you’re bored. It won’t take long before your audience knows something is off. Here how to beat back the boredom before it beats down your show.

February 10, 2021

Article

What do you do when you get bored with the podcast you're making right now? Yes, I said when you get bored, not if you get bored. Because people—especially creative people—tend to eventually get bored for doing one thing for too long.

I once worked for a company for a little over 13 years, which is a quite long time for someone with as short of an attention span as me. During my tenure with that company, I changed titles five times. I lived in three different States. And my work address changed 10 different times.

I look at the long-term podcasters who’ve been producing the same show for more than a dozen years with a mix of admiration and wonder. Because at some point, whether that’s in six months or in six years, I get bored. And yes, getting a fat paycheck can sure help keep that boredom at bay. But only for so long.

Such is the bane of multi-passionate creatives, a term Stephani Fuccio taught me just this morning. That definitely describes many podcasters I know. Some of us are pretty good about dealing with boredom in healthy ways. But for those that aren’t, here are some ways you can deal with boredom when it enters your podcasting life.

Change It Up!

If you’ve listened to or read my words for any length of time, you know I'm a big fan of change. Change is good and healthy for your podcast, so try these on for size:

Change the format of your podcast. Not the topic, but the way you present the content. Try different bed music. Re-arrange your segments. Try scripted certain parts. Or try an unscripted version of a section.
Change the voice(s) on the show. Bring on a co-host. Or perhaps get rid of a co-host and try a solo show for a few episodes. Or maybe a season.
Change the focus of your podcast. Again, not the topic, but niche-down further to better refine the focus on your topic. Or maybe side-niche, a term I might have just made up where you shift your focus to something adjacent to what you’ve been covering.
Add a new segment to your show. My show is nice and short, but I'm thinking about adding in some additional content at the end of my episodes. Yes, perhaps even some syndicated content. (BTW… I have content you can syndicate to your podcast if you’d like.)

Start Something Brand New

Many of us have room to do more than one thing. And with all the experience you’ve gathered from the time you’ve been podcasting, there are likely offshoots you could explore to keep your head in the game. You could:

Team up with other creatives you respect and admire. I love to collaborate with other podcasters and production companies. It keeps me fresh by exposing me to new ideas and lets me stretch my creativity.
Become a service provider. You know that thing you do on or for your show that you do better than anybody else? Other people—podcasters and beyond—may want to offload that job to someone just like you. If you find it fun and exciting, offer it up to others!
Explore not-podcasting mediums. Not everything you think about has to be put into a microphone. Maybe some of your ideas are better suited in a Medium article. Or perhaps a Substack newsletter. Remember that only around a third of the population listen to podcasts regularly. Your ideas are likely worthy of reaching more people.
Try producing a live show. No, not a live version of the show you’re already growing bored with. Something brand new! New live audio and video services are cropping up all the time. Jump in and try your hand at making a show without a net!
Start another podcast. Ideally on a completely unrelated topic so that boredom doesn’t creep over. There's probably more to your personality than the one thing you are podcasting about right now. Considering you already know how to podcast... make another one that’s just for fun or as a creative outlet.

Call It Quits

If none of that sparks an idea, maybe it’s time to throw in the towel. There’s no shame in retiring from podcasting and sunsetting your show(s). All things come to an end. And if you later decide you want to make your comeback—great! Podcasting will welcome you back with open arms. I’ve quit podcasting twice now. The first in a huff, and the second time by my own design and on my own timeline. And yet here I am again, this time four times a week!

Fighting Boredom With Your Friends

I’m not big on asking for help, but that’s not a personality trait I wish on others. As I become more open and personal, I’ve learned that sharing my concerns with others has been a big help. Who knew!

So if you’re just not feeling it anymore, or if twinges of boredom are encroaching into your podcasting world, rally your own support group around you. Share with them how you’re feeling and bounce some of the ideas from this article off of them to see where they think you might best beat back those feelings of boredom.

Hopefully, this article gave you some good ideas on dealing with the boredom we all normally will feel. No, you don’t have to pay me for this advice. But you could buy me a virtual coffee if you are so inclined. BuyMeACoffee.com/evoterra makes that super easy.

I shall be back tomorrow with yet another Podcast Pontifications.

Cheers!

Transcript

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It's hard to make an engaging podcast when you're bored. It won't take long before your audience knows something is up. Here's how to beat back boredom before it beats down your show.
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Hello and welcome to another Podcast Pontifications with me, Evo Terra.
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What do you do when you get bored with the show you're making right now? Not what do you do when you get bored - actually, yes. I did say that. When you get bored, not if you get bored, when you get bored, because people eventually tend to get bored with the things that they are doing, whatever it happens to be.
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I'll get personal for a moment and say the longest job I've ever had for the same company lasted a little over thirteen years, which is a long time. However, in that time I changed titles five times. I lived in three different States and worked out of ten different addresses. So yeah, I got bored a lot.
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Now, there are people out there who tend not to get bored as quickly as I do. Even podcasters who will do the same thing, the same show year after year. And that's great, but that isn't me. Because at some point, whether that point is six months away or six years away, I'm eventually going to get bored. Even when there is a big fat paycheck attached to the thing which I'm doing when I get bored, that's not enough to keep me involved. And I think many people are out there, especially creative people like that could be podcasters.
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So how do you deal with boredom when it comes up? What do you do with that? How do you harness that, other things and make it go away? Well, I've got a lot of different things. I'm going to bucket these in three different categories. Some things you might think up so that when the boredom hits you things, you can keep going.
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Number one , the first bucket, is all about change. You know, I'm a big fan of change, right? So the first thing you can do is you can change the format of your podcast. Not the topic. Don't change the topic of your podcast. I mean, sure you could do that. But again, we're talking about just little changes here. Change up the format, do something different. Try new bed music. I don't know, just, you know, change up the style of the show.
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You could either bring on a co-host or perhaps get rid of a co-host and try things solo for awhile. Try that, if not for the whole show, at least for the first section. Maybe you do change your focus again, not your topic, but niche down on the thing you're talking about, whatever your podcast is about. Can you ratchet that down even further?
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Or maybe if not notch it down, is there something adjacent to that that is also interesting that you would also like to explore more of? Can you side niche, I guess? What about experimenting with a new segment of your program?
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Like mine's nice and short. I'm thinking about putting in some, a couple of segments at the end of my program. Maybe even syndicated content. Yes, you can syndicate this content if you would like it on your show.
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So change is one thing you can do.
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Or, also another great way to keep boredom down that I use quite a lot is by starting something brand new. Yeah, I collaborate with other podcasters or other production companies all the time. And you can do the same thing. You can collaborate with other people to make a new program.
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Or maybe you could actually become a service provider. That thing you do on your show that you do better than anybody else, do other people want that? Could you offer those services out and the thing that you find fun and exciting, keep that going, even though you still keep doing your show?
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What about exploring new mediums? Like writing articles, posting them on medium or starting a sub stack newsletter, all by itself that's around your topic, the thing you do talk about, probably. Doing something different. Maybe a live show? We have new live opportunities that are coming up all of the time to do them. Exploring these new mediums while you're continuing to do your podcast is one way to keep that boredom down.
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Or maybe start a show on a brand new, completely unrelated topic. There's probably more to your personality than that one thing you are talking about. So you know how to podcast, make another one. Have fun. Make just a creative outlet. Especially if you're getting a big fat paycheck from your current show, but it's kind of boring you. Do something for fun.
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And the last thing you can do, the third bucket here, is a quit. You can retire from podcasting. You can sunset your career, if you will. Great. And if you change your mind, eventually you want to come back, of course you can come back. I've come back to podcasting twice now after long absences. You can totally do it.
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Or you can just look back at all the fond memories that you had over the years as a podcaster. That's fine. Lots of things, well, everything eventually, comes to an end. You get to pick perhaps when that happens.
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Now, that was a lot of content that I just threw at you for some ideas of getting bored. I've written an article that has all of those details down. That is probably the best way for you to go through that once again, see which ones fit for you, and maybe even share them with another friend. So yeah, find the article. There'll be a link to the article here in the episode details of your podcasting app. There should be a little link that says episode webpage, click that, and that'll take you right to the full article, which you can share with people.
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Unless you were, of course, writing furiously, writing down notes. And then I guess that's okay. You can do that, too. No payment required for these thoughts and ideas I bring to you. However, if you would like to go to buymeacoffee.com/evoterra and show your support that way, why that's always appreciated.
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That's it. I shall be back tomorrow with yet another Podcast Pontifications.
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Cheers!

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