77: The 3 Characteristics of Great Podcast Cover Art

Podcasting is about sound, right? I mean, your podcast sound is it's bread and butter. If you've got bad sound, it's pretty hard to have a great podcast. That's why I haven't really focused too much on what we're going to talk about today, which is what makes great podcast artwork. It's a question that we get a lot here at Grow the Show. And odds are, it's a question that you've had about your podcast artwork. Now, podcasting is about sound. It is an auditory experience. And oftentimes, because sound is the medium in which we play, sound is what I talk about the most. But today, we're going to talk about the visual component of your podcast, which for most of your listeners is only one thing, your podcast artwork. And it's a question that I get a lot from podcasters old and new, whether it's the more than 250 podcasters in the Grow the Show accelerator program or the several thousand who follow us here at Grow the Show, whether they're starting out or they've been podcasting for ages, a question that we get all the time is, what should my podcast artwork look like? Should I have my face on it? Should it be a crazy design? Should I have the words big or small? Should it be simple or complicated? What is the best podcast artwork to have? And so today, we're not going to talk about what the best podcast artwork is because there's no such thing. What I will talk about, though, is what goes into really effective, catchy, and memorable podcast artwork. My goal for you is if you are somebody who has yet to design your podcast artwork or you don't love your own and you're thinking about rebranding your show or redoing your artwork, consider what we're about to talk about. If you're somebody who likes your podcast artwork and it's working well, then don't worry about this. For the love of all things good, I'm not here to give you problems today. So if you're focusing on growing or monetizing your podcast artwork is fine, don't listen to this episode and think, oh God, I got to change my artwork to make it sound like Kevin says. No, only if you don't like your artwork or you're going through the process of designing artwork. Now listen to this. This episode of Grow the Show is sponsored by Riverside.fm, the leading platform to record studio quality podcasts. More than 70,000 other podcasters use Riverside, including myself, GuyRaz, GaryVee, Spotify, and even the New York Times. Riverside is not only great because it has unbelievably high recording quality regardless of your or your guest's internet quality, but it also gives you separate audio and video tracks for each person speaking. It's high tech, but easy to use. Unlike Zoom, you don't have to have anything installed on your computer and your guests don't either. And did I mention that the audio quality is way better? If you're recording your interviews remotely, get off of Zoom now and hop into Riverside for your next interview. Your listeners will thank you. Head over to Riverside.fm and use code Grow. That's GROW to get 60 free minutes of recording and 15% off a membership plan. The link is in the show notes. My name is Kevin Schmidland. I am the host of Grow the Show. Grow the Show is the podcast to help you grow your podcast. And today we are going to talk about what makes great podcast artwork. Podcast artwork is that little square tile that shows up in Apple podcasts or Spotify or wherever you listen to podcasts when you are on a podcast page. If you're listening to me in a podcast app right now and you pull out the app, you will see the podcast artwork of Grow the Show, which is a big old fat grow the show with a yellow background and a yellow arrow that points up into the right, which is where I want to point your download graph. And that's what it looks like. That's my podcast cover artwork. So let's dive in. What are the characteristics of great podcast cover art? So there are three characteristics in my opinion that all great podcast cover art has. Those characteristics are number one. It's clear. Number two, it's recognizable. And number three, it is eye catching. So what does it mean that it's clear? Well, this in my opinion is the most important piece of podcast cover art. It needs to be clear. And in my opinion, there are three ways that you can make your podcast art clear and simple. Number one, it's by making your podcast title the main and preferably the only text on your podcast cover art. The more random text there is, the more a potential listener is going to be confused and the more time they're going to have to spend figuring out what the title of your show is. A listener who is scrolling through their podcast app and sees your artwork as a tiny icon is not going to be able to read all the different things that you have on your podcast artwork. And so for that reason, you want number one, your podcast title to be the main and preferably the only text element. I don't even think you need to have your name right hosted by so and so you can, but it doesn't do anything for you. And secondly, the bigger you can make the text of your podcast name, the better. Because remember, your podcast artwork is going to often be shown as a tiny little icon that's next to your episodes in the app or next to other podcast artworks in the app. And so the bigger and more clear and simple and obvious, the text is of your podcast artwork. The more likely it's going to be clear, people are going to see it, they're going to know what it is. Finally, with your show name as the only text and with it nice and big in your podcast artwork, sometimes that's not enough to make it clear. Because you also have to use a font that is really easy to read. This is another one that I see all the time where people use a really cute, super fancy font and it's like impossible to read at a glance and so it totally defeats the purpose of the whole thing. So that's number one, how to make your podcast artwork clear. Number two is to make it recognizable. Another way to say that is that it should ideally be unique and it needs to be unique, not just in comparison to other podcasts, but it should also have elements that stand out as uniquely yours. The best way to pass the test on whether or not it's unique is whether if you quickly showed somebody your podcast artwork who already knew the show, if they immediately knew that it was your podcast. So for me, if you saw the Grow the Show arrows anywhere at a glance, you'd know, oh, that's Grow the Show, it's unique. And so the best way to select something that's unique in my opinion is to search for other podcasts that are in your niche and look and notice how they all look exactly the same. It's actually kind of funny how podcasters that are in the same niche tend to make their podcast cover art look all exactly the same. It's all the same color or it's all the same headshot with the same pose or it's all the same icon of a microphone. So literally just search for other podcasts in your niche, notice how all of them have the same cover art and then make yours different. That's all you have to do. Finally, making your podcast art eye catching just means that if somebody sees it at a glance, if somebody scrolling past, it's going to stick out. It's really going to stand out. What you don't want is podcast artwork that's really, really dull and doesn't pop and doesn't really catch the eye. It's not something that jumps out at you when you look at the podcast apps and you see tons and tons of podcast tiles. So using bold colors, using something that's really eye catching and that jumps out is something that I do highly recommend. So that's kind of it. In general, I just recommend that your podcast artwork is as simple as possible. The only text on the cover is the title of your show that text is large, centered and in charge. And it's something that's really easy to read, not hard to discern. It doesn't use a really fancy hard to read font. Ideally, you're using colors that are totally unique and stick out especially in comparison to other podcasts in your niche. And ideally, your cover art is something that is eye catching and that jumps out at people. That doesn't mean make it ugly. Just make it not boring. Now, probably the most common question that I get about designing podcast art is for you thought leaders out there. Experts, online coaches, business owners who want to put a headshot of yourself on your podcast art. And so I get that question a lot. Kevin, should I have a picture of myself on my podcast artwork? Now, this is completely my own opinion and there are other podcasting experts out there who have the opposite opinion who are really smart, who know what they're doing. We just agree to disagree. For me, I don't believe that you should include your headshot in your podcast artwork unless you are already famous and here's why. A lot of people will say, oh, I want to include a picture of me so that my listeners know what I look like and they get to know me so that the show is associated with me. And I get that that's cool. My argument is if you make a really great podcast, they will seek you out. They will make the show about you. But for those who don't know you very well, I can just speak from my experience. When I load up a podcast and I see the artwork and it's a headshot of somebody, my first reaction is this person wants to make their show about themselves. At the same time, when that person isn't somebody that I already know and like, that picture doesn't do anything for me, right? I don't already have a positive association with that human being. I don't have a negative association, but I also don't have a positive association. So all I see is a big picture of a total stranger that does nothing to compel me to listen to the show. If anything, it makes it less likely that I want to listen to the show because I'm not interested in hearing what strangers have to say. And most people I would argue also are not what I am interested in is what I'm interested in. So if the podcast title is about the thing that I'm interested in, then I'm like, ooh, I'm interested in that thing. I'm going to click on that podcast. And so overall, my recommendation is to make your podcast cover art about the podcast, not about you. Make it about the topic, the thing that you'll be talking about, rather than the person who is talking about them. Again, it's not a bad thing to have your headshot on your podcast cover art, but my argument is that for strangers, there's no gain. They don't know who you are. You're a total stranger. And so a picture of a stranger does not compel them to listen to the show more. It's neutral or negative. What will compel them to listen to the show more is big, easy to read letters that make sense and that are about the topic that they're interested in. They'll see that they'll read it. They'll be like, ooh, I'm interested in growing the show. I'm going to listen to this podcast. If instead when you discover the Grow the Show podcast, it was a big old picture of my face. You'd be like, I don't know who that guy is, but he's probably trying to be an expert. And he's probably doesn't know what he's talking about. So I'm not going to listen to that show my two cents. Okay, so you have an idea of what good podcast art looks like. So where can you get podcast art? Well, I'm going to be honest. It's not that hard. You can either design it yourself in Canva. Canva is an incredible tool to just do basic design. Another option is you probably know somebody who is a graphic designer. Virtually everyone knows somebody who is a halfway decent graphic designer or illustrator. So I would just link up with them. Or if you want, you can just hire somebody on Fiverr or Upwork. The Grow the Show logo was designed by somebody on Fiverr who charges like 80 bucks for brand design. That person has worked with incredible companies like Nike and a bunch of other big corporations, really affordable, really good designer. I refer people to that person all the time and the link if you want to use that particular designer is in the show notes. I highly recommend it. He comes from Fiverr. Awesome. Awesome guy. It doesn't have to be expensive and it doesn't have to be complicated. And really, if you're not sure about your podcast art, just use it. It's fine. I've seen tons of people waste tons of time getting their podcast artwork perfect and literally delaying the success of their podcast by six months or more because they just spend so much time optimizing their podcast art. I have seen people ask me which headshot they should use and they show me literally 12 different versions of podcast artwork and it's all a different headshot of themselves. And I'm like, dude, just use your title, pay somebody 80 bucks to make it look eye catching and simple and readable and move on. You're good to go. All in all, the success of your podcast is not going to hinge on your podcast artwork. So I go back to the disclaimer at the beginning. If this is not something that is already a consideration for you, do not go and change your podcast artwork. I'm not trying to give you more problems here, but if you're somebody that's branding or rebranding your podcast, consider what I just told you when making your podcast artwork. So if you want some feedback from me or from anybody on my team or in the Grow the Show community, post your podcast artwork in the Grow the Show Facebook group. And we would love to critique it and let you know what we think about it and whether or not we think it's time for a rebrand. My name is Kevin Schmidland. This has been Grow the Show and I will see you in the next one.