Your ultimate guide on how to get all of the right assets to launch your podcast
Podcast artwork is a tricky beast. Of course, all artwork is subject to personal taste. Some might want to have really abstract or hand drawn or text-heavy artwork. But if you ask us as podcast marketing experts what makes your artwork a success? It is this:
- Faces. Your artwork is always going to look the most striking if it has the host’s face. Most podcasts are driven by personality, so lean into it.
- Clear text. You need your artwork square to look amazing even when it is tiny – so always check that the font isn’t too small or illegible!
- Brightness. You want your artwork to have a thumb-stopping effect. Quite literally, you want people to stop scrolling once they reach your artwork in a long list of others.
We have a whole guide on more things you need to consider when creating your show artwork, but there is one more crucial part to it that we want to focus on right now – point 1. The photoshoot that will get you the faces you will later use for your artwork is a vital component of your success and we have some tips to make sure you are getting all of the angles from your single photoshoot to save you time, budget and give you the most for your show, too.
TIP 1: Don’t Shoot JUST Faces – Have a Full Body Shot, too.
Your artwork might only feature your face from shoulders up, but you need to give your designer more than just that angle to work with to create your square, promotional and episodic artwork. Think about different platforms: most have their own formats and safe-zone requirements. To make sure you are still putting up high quality images (instead of stretching your square to fit a banner on LinkedIn for example), ALWAYS include a full body shot in your photoshoot, too. This will save you in the long run as it will keep in mind the safe zones of your artwork and keep your actual face out of reach from the cropping tool.
TIP 2: Focus on Reactions, Reactions and Even More Reactions.
Now that you are all dressed and ready for your photoshoot and maybe even already have the perfect shot for your actual artwork – focus on getting LOADS of reaction shots. These are shots that will vary in emotion from surprise to disgust, anger to pure joy and they will be your saviour when you start to create episodic artwork and any YouTube thumbnails too. We know shooting these can be a little bit awkward, so practise in the mirror before you go in so you can have just the tiniest bit more confidence as you pose in front of the camera. Also, make a list of all the emotions you want to capture, or run through your last 20 podcast episodes and react to the subject matter of each to achieve more nuanced reactions.
TIP 3: Don’t Neglect Your Social Shots.
Final part of this is of course getting some content for your grid(s). Think about your Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, X – what kind of shots might you need for these platforms? These could be reactions, they could just be some nicely lit (and faked) selfies for you to put up alongside some quotes from the show, or maybe they are just pictures of the set with you just leaning on tables and/or sitting on chairs in different poses. The general rule – the sillier you feel doing it, the more shots you will have to play with later when you are editing your assets. So don’t be shy! These template photos are going to put you ahead of most podcasts – we can promise you that.
TIP 4: Love Your Pictures.
Sounds very obvious, but do try to get photos that you actually like of yourself. You will need to see them more than once (and probably across a whole season – if not longer), so take your time and make sure you are happy with them. A huge part of that is getting a photographer that you feel comfortable with to shoot the pictures, so don’t be afraid to ask to meet with someone for a bit of a vibe check before you commit.
Do you want us to organise your artwork photoshoot and make you the artwork, too? Not a problem!