So @stereophobe and I get a fair number of questions about how to promote an audio drama, and for #audiodramasunday I wanted to highlight one of the most important things a production can do. Namely... hire a graphic designer!

Seriously, along with actually creating a well-produced podcast, having an intriguing opening five minutes of your first episode, and writing a decent press release/kit, it's up there as a thing that will make your podcast stand out.

There is a HUGE difference between having cover art that looks professional and one that looks amateurish. Honestly, I think a big reason why @Archive81 took off in its first season was that we have a good logo. Let's take a look:

The title is prominently featured, it looks good no matter what size it is, it gives a general sense of theme/mood of the show, it makes for cool merch, and it seems professional. The reason it seems professional is because we actually hired a professional!

@BeckyFrass! She's great. You can hire her too: https://www.beckyfrass.art/ 

Same thing for the Left of the Dial logo. It looks cool because we hired a professional artist/graphic designer and we went over exactly what we wanted the cover art to convey (a grindhouse movie/road trip aesthetic).

(ANOBELISK designed that, by the way, you can hire them too: http://anobelisk.com/ )

Compare this to the logo for the podcast I made in college. Still proud of the podcast ( @stereophobe voices the main character, there's some cool action scenes, it's now a Patreon reward), but the logo straight up sucks ass.

The font's weird, what the hell is "A Radio Podcast", it doesn't really give off the vibe of mystery and action I'm going for. It looks like a college project. Which it was! In short, I did a bad job designing the logo. Because I'm not a graphic designer!

And I'd argue that this divide between good and bad isn't necessarily a question of personal taste. It's more about professional and amateur.

For example, I personally am not a huge fan of comic-book style logos or logos that feature character portraits. (Just my opinion, I think they look weird when you're browsing podcasts on an iPhone)

But there's a big difference between a comic-book style logo that looks like it was drawn professionally and one that looks like it was made as an afterthought.

And honestly, as much as you'd like to say that people shouldn't judge a book/podcast by its cover... that's what covers are there for! So people can judge whether the media is something they might like.

One of the absolute coolest things about audio drama is the fact that independent creators can compete with podcasts that are backed by the person pictured here:

Like, it's genuinely super exciting to me that shows that began in a small apartment with a sock over the microphone for a pop screen can have SIGNIFICANTLY more downloads than shows with mAjOr HoLlYwOoD tAlEnT and the deepest of pockets.

However... the idea that everyone's competing on a level playing field is, obviously, complete bullshit! Some podcasts just have more access to resources, which means they're more likely to get press/attention/downloads, which means certain stories are more likely to get told.

I should get back to my main point before I go on a rant about capitalism/equity/all that fun stuff.

ANYWHO, the fact that your podcast is going to be on the same Spotify/Apple Podcasts/Stitcher page as [not going to say anything specific, but you know what I'm talking about] means that your logo needs to be as good if not better than theirs.

Which, unless you or a member of your creative team is a graphic designer, (in which case... I guess you're set! Go team!) means hiring an artist. Which means paying money to an artist.

(Oh, by the way, make sure that in your contract to the graphic designer, you specify that it's a work for hire and that you own the logo. So you can sell merch!)

It annoys me when people say that podcasts have really low barrier to entry. They don't! If you want a podcast to sound good you need good equipment, a quiet space, podcast hosting, and paid actors.

I think what people really mean when they say podcasts have a low barrier to entry is that podcasts have a really low barrier to entry 𝓬𝓸𝓶𝓹𝓪𝓻𝓮𝓭 𝓽𝓸 𝓽𝓮𝓵𝓮𝓿𝓲𝓼𝓲𝓸𝓷. Which is completely accurate!

Don't know this for a fact, but I'm guessing that the budget for the first season of the Archive 81 podcast is less than the budget for craft services for the Archive 81 Netflix adaptation.

But, if memory serves, we ended up spending around 2k on the first season of Archive 81. Which is not nothing! And the first Season of Archive 81 was specifically built not to cost that much money.

(Lots of the season is just two people talking to each other making it easier to record, Dan and I play two main characters, it's found footage so there's a slight forgiveness for tape quality)

But because that barrier to entry isn't nothing, there's a temptation to cut corners on your graphic design. Which is vitally important BECAUSE you are competing with podcasts that don't have to cut corners at all.

(Also, your graphic design is also super important in making your press kit and website look cool and professional)

So yeah... hire a graphic designer and work with them to make a interesting logo because that's gonna be people's first impression of your podcast.

Dan and I were lucky in that we were able to finance our podcast out of pocket, and then expand our ambitions once we had resources due to ads/Patreon/IP sales. (In case anyone was wondering, merch has never been a big resource-generator...

we offer it mostly because it's cool to see fans with Archive 81 mugs and crop tops)

Funding a podcast is a whole other tweet-thread, one that I'm not necessarily the most qualified person to make.

But the main point is... FIND A GOOD GRAPHIC DESIGNER BEFORE YOU LAUNCH YOUR PODCAST.

I mentioned ANOBELISK and @BeckyFrass, but please reply with cool graphic designers you know and love and could make a good podcast logo.

Anyway, feel free to ask questions!