Best practices for creating a storytelling podcast: tips from an award-winning journalist
Content provided by Aleksandra Bučko, award-winning journalist based in Serbia.
Photo credit: Storyteller RS
How do you write a story for your podcast?
I've been thinking about how I can tell you a story about writing one. About creating a story for your podcast.
I've been toying with a few ideas for a long time, but first, let’s rewind a bit in history…
Picture this: it’s my first year of University, taking a Bachelor’s Degree in Journalism, and I just had an encounter with an experienced journalist-now a columnist.
When I started my degree, I realized that it wasn’t exactly what I had imagined it would be. The political system in Serbia began to change, the media became more and more dependent (and limited) on Government funding), and the prospects for finding a job (the kind I imagined - in a highly regarded and objective media outlet, were unimaginable.
I met that colleague in a local market, and asked him: "Why are you a journalist?"
He replied that it was because everything inspired him: "When I see this pebble here, I think about what I could write about it."
I didn't understand it then - but 10, 11 years later - I do.
The speed at which journalism evolved, paths in the industry, and of course, the development of podcasts contributed a lot to this. Podcasts provide a new dimension - a new approach to storytelling. It’s different: it gives us the ability to connect with the community. Not by the audience, but by the community.
Aleksandra Bučko
Telling stories and finding our voice helps us do just that: to find and gather a community around our podcasts.
Creating a story
As a journalist with 10+ years of experience working in the media - both print, web, radio, TV and now multimedia journalism, I believe that anyone who creates a story - a novel, an article, or a podcast, should keep in mind that everything is actually in the story and the way we tell it.
I have worked on many topics, more or less interesting, but there are several stories that are very dear to me.
For example, my first audio documentary was about the life of two migrants with reconstructed illustrations of the events of their journey in Afghanistan.
In Serbia, in those first waves, in 2015 - 2017/18, we had a lot of migrants who wanted to enter Croatia or Hungary - countries of the European Union. Then, of course, extremist narratives that spoke very negatively about migrants who came only wanting to, in fact, pass through our country, started appearing.
I went to the migrant center to hear their story. But before the interviews, I thought about the angle of the story, and who I wanted to interview. I had a chance to interview a teenager, and a mother of three. These were people who lost their homes and safety, and whose stories we wouldn’t normally hear because the prevalent narrative was all about the ‘bad migrant guys’ who were committing illegal acts.
They told me their story from the beginning. I asked them about their motives, fears and feelings (because those elements were important to me - to show the inner struggle, emotions, and everything that makes us human). It ended up being a very interesting but difficult conversation.
I heard a 13-year-old boy (who should be going through puberty and thinking about partying) share how at certain moments in his life he goes to school and doesn't know if he will come home.
And a 30-year-old mother, a biology teacher who can't do her job and who doesn't have the freedom to move, dress, act - at least not the freedom I have.
Extremely brave people.
I got home, transferred the material and realized a few things: I have about 3 hours of material, I don't want the story to be all about the sadness of the situation, and their English isn’t always the most clear. I will have to be very careful on how I edit the material to make everything understandable to the audience, while respecting their stories.
Oh, and there’s an additional element that makes things a bit more complex: I was making a story for a program in the Ruthenian language - I will have to add a voiceover in a new language without their statements losing their emotions.
It was necessary to design an approach, to single out the strongest statements. I didn't want it to be a standard piece with alternating their clips and my own script, and the story had to be designed and laid out so that it would make sense without additional explanations and words. Sound effects and music played a big part there.
So then it was time to meet the sound designer.
We wanted that part to be created by us as much as possible. We recorded melodies and songs, we chose two songs, one that is regionally recognizable, and one that describes their life very well, which is a Ruthenian folk song.
Second by second, a 15-minute documentary was created on which we spent roughly more than 50 hours in post-production, not counting the preparation for the interviews and the time it took to record and conduct the interviews themselves.
The dos of storytelling
Of course, there are important aspects of every story - whether they’re put through the journalist lens, or not.
Let me introduce you to the 5 Ws + 1 H:
Who
Why
What
Where
When
How
Do you need to do them in this order?
Their order depends on the topic, but also on your storytelling voice. And sometimes that is not quite enough to tell the whole story.
I often see reverse diffusion or merging of two similar branches – journalism and novel writing. Combining the 5w+h formula with 3,4,or all 5 elements is fully dependent on the author’s approach and how they want to tell a good story. To write a good story you also need additional elements: character, plot, setting and tension.
When we add these four elements to the 5w+h formula (which are certainly an integral part of news pieces), then we get an interesting storytelling technique, because we stand out and birth a story, rather than writing out just facts, or releasing a plain, basic interview.
Some other things to consider when putting together a story:
The pre-synopsis - it can be more complex or in theses - is not important. It is important to have it so that you have a thread that connects the whole story, so that the topic makes sense, and it has a beginning and an end.
PRO TIP: you don’t need to share the story chronologically, but it does need to make sense to listeners following along.
The language you speak - this is also very important, but in the sense that you have to be careful who you speak to and in that sense what language you use. Is it formal or casual? Are you speaking too expertly? You’re not using the same language if you're making a story for teenagers, or for experts in a field.
Also, how long will you produce the story, and how deep will you go into it? Production time is very important. Because if you prepare episodes on a weekly basis, you won't have the same time to devote to that topic if you do it, for example, once a month. The more time you have for production, the deeper you can go into the matter you are working on, and address different and more interesting questions.
Something that we call slow production is very interesting to me - first we design the series, we work on it for a long period of time - we research the story, record interviewees, talk to informants. We create a synopsis, make sure we have everything ready. Only then do we go into post-production, and only after the entire series is finished do we release the episodes. It gives us time to really dig deep and flesh out the themes we're dealing with in that series.
Speakers / Interlocutors - If you have multiple speakers/ interlocutors in your story - how they talk and how you record them is very important. If they are extremely boring and put you to sleep, you have to create a balance in post-production so that the episode has different paces and keeps the listener engaged.
The angle of the story - this perhaps one of the most important elements of any story.
From which angle are you telling the story, and why did you choose that angle?
Think of any well-crafted wildlife show: if we're watching an episode about a lioness trying to catch a prey for her cubs and teaching them that skill – we're rooting for her to catch that antelope. But, when we look at the story from the antelope's point of view and how they struggle to survive the drought, they reach the water source, and there lurks danger from many sides - one lioness in the bush who wants to feed her cubs, the lioness will suddenly represent the enemy, the bad guy, or its nemesis.
PRO TIP: The angle of the story is often decided right at the beginning, but it can change if halfway through the process you learn new information.
What does it take to craft a good story?
Remember that less is more. In order for the story to be compact, it is important that it is well-thought-out in pre-production itself, that it is directed and arranged accordingly. No one likes to listen to a rambling podcast.
Find an angle that is important both to society (your audience) and to you because only then will you be able to tell a good story.
PRO TIP: A good way to find out is to ask yourself, ‘Why should they (audience) care about this topic?’
Also, what is left unsaid is equally important. Assess what information wasn’t properly conveyed, what wasn’t sufficiently explained to the audience - these are ‘missing pieces’ in your story.
Missing pieces can guide your listener into the next episode, or provide an opportunity to revisit the topic in the future.
About Aleksandra Bučko
Aleksandra is an experienced, award-winning audio journalist with a track-record of working in the audio industry, which includes the prestigious Public Broadcasting Service of Vojvodina, in Serbia.
Skilled in script writing, audio storytelling, multimedia journalism, Aleksandra is the Founder and editor-in-Chief of Fabrika kreativnosti.
Want to connect? Visit Fabrika kreativnosti, or follow Aleksandra on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/fabrikapodkasta/