picture from flickr.com by OllyHart

For the past several years we’ve been podcasting our Sunday church services at North Valley Baptist Church. Podcasting is a great tool for churches. It allows people to download and take sermons with them on their iPods, mp3 players, and other portable devices. Podcasting is fairly simple and very inexpensive. This post will take you through the steps on how to create a podcast for your church.

1. Determine the content of your podcast.
There are podcasts on just about any subject you can think of – from knitting to narcissism, from yoga to yodeling.  Figure out what you want your podcast to be about. For our ministry we have four podcasts (NVBC preaching audio, NVBC preaching video, GSBC chapel sermons, Revival Time Radio Broadcast). For the sake of this tutorial, we will cover how to create a podcast of your sermons.

2. Buy Your Equipment
To give your podcast a professional sound, I would suggest recording an introduction. It doesn’t have to be long, but it should sound professional. People will judge your podcast many times by sampling just a few seconds of it.  I would not suggest using the built in mic on your computer.  Here are some items you will need to record:

A. Microphone
For several years we’ve used the Shure SM58. You can buy these for around $99.  You most likely have these at your church right now. For better results and ease of use, you could purchase a USB microphone for about the same price.  Blue Microphones produce a great USB mic called Snowball. Another good alternative would be the AT2020 USB Microphone from Audio-Technica. It is priced at $120.

B. Pop Filter
I would definitely suggest spending the $19 or so to purchase a pop filter. This is used to remove the popping “P’s”, hissing “S’s” and other sounds from air hitting the microphone.  For other tips on recording your voice, watch the video linked at the end of the article.

C. USB Interface to capture the audio into the computer
A USB Interface is not necessary if you use a USB microphone.  However, if you are using a standard XLR microphone, an audio interface will bridge the gap between analog (your mic) and digital (your computer). We’ve used M-audio’s Fast Track for a couple of years and it does a decent job. If you are getting your audio from a sound board and you are on a tight budget, you may want to use something like the Behringer UCA202 USB Audio Interface. For the best results, Apogee’s One or Duet would equip you with studio quality results at a price premium.

D. Audio Software
To create the professional sounding intro and outro, you will need some type of audio editing software to create the intro and outro and add it to the sermon. We use Apple’s Soundtrack Pro. It is a great program. If you want something free, there is always Audacity, an Open-Source, free audio editor. Although, I’ve never used it, I’ve heard great things about it. The best part of all, it’s free.

3. Record Your Podcast
Once you have the equipment, you can record your voice onto the computer, add music to your intro/outro, and then place them at the beginning/end of the sermon. We choose to record a new intro for every podcast to keep it fresh.  Here is the sample text of our podcast intro, “You are listening to the North Valley Baptist Church podcast for Sunday evening January 31st. Dr. Jack Trieber preaches a message entitled, ‘You Decide.’”

4. Create the RSS for podcast
RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication. Don’t worry about the meaning, just know that in order to have a podcast you must have an RSS feed. To create this, you could do it by hand coding everything (I do not suggest this. We did this for a while, and it is a far cry from fun.), or you could buy a program to do it all for you. We’ve chosen the software route, and use Lemonz Dream Podcast maker for Mac. It makes it very easy to create a RSS for podcast. You simply fill in the title description, etc. and it writes the code for the RSS. If you are using a PC, I don’t have a recommendation, I looked for quite a while and found none that people recommended. Here is a list of PC software for podcast creation. If you know of a good PC podcasting software, please leave a comment below.

5. Upload your audio files and RSS xml to your web server
After creating the RSS, you now are the proud owner of an XML file that has your RSS. Congratulations! Simply upload the xml file as well as your audio files to your web server. If you are unsure how to do this, I would suggest contacting the person who handles your church website.

6. Submit your podcast to Apple iTunes
Once you’ve uploaded your xml file, all you have left to do is submit your podcast to iTunes. Simply open iTunes, go to “Podcasts.” On the right side there is navigation that includes “Submit a Podcast”. All you have to do is click the link and enter the url for your xml file. It may take a few days for Apple to approve your podcast. Once it’s approved your podcast will be available via the iTunes to download on millions of computers, iPhones and iPods around the country and world.

7.  Advertise or they will not listen
Just because you have a podcast, do not assume the multitudes will flock to it.  Because there are so many podcasts, advertising is very important.  Utilize as many avenues as possible to get the word out.  Advertise on your website; send out an email; promote from your pulpit; place in your bulletin; and use your imagination to implement this powerful tool into your ministry.

Podcasting is an effective  tool that every church can use.  You are able to expand your influence for little to no money.  So, what are you waiting for?

I hope this tutorial helps. Do you have a podcast already? What hardware/software do you use? I would love to hear about it in the comments.

I would like to thank Stephen Russ and Isaac Young for their help with this article and for maintaining our ministry podcasts.

Additional Resources

What is a podcast?
Microphones 101: A beginners guide to Macs and Mics (good info even if you are a PC user)
Great video giving tips on recording your voice and microphones

North Valley Baptist Church’s Podcasts