podcasting ZOONAR GMBH / ALAMY STOCK PHOTO


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challenge condensing the history of a nearly 30-year murder case that involved including many different voices into 10 episodes. That wasn’t his only problem. He also wrestled with the use of music in the podcast. “We tried it without music, but it had no emotional guide,”


says Jukes. “With music, you have the sense the story is going somewhere – even if you don’t know quite what’s going on. There was a lot of trial and error until we worked out what worked, what didn’t and also what we had enough time to do.” The length of individual episodes was also a vital consideration for Jukes and co-producer Deeivya Meir. He says that sponsors are typically looking for podcasts that are between 30-40 minutes long and, even though he’d raised £10,000 via a crowdfunding platform to cover the cost of producing the earlier episodes, he wanted to generate additional income via sponsorship to cover the time he and the team invested in producing the series as it involved a lot of interviewing and laborious research. Despite Untold’s tremendous success, Jukes says that


anyone who expects to get rich from putting out a journalism podcast should think again. “You have to think about your time. We crowdfunded it and we got some income from sponsors, but you have to get quite a big audience for it not to be a loss leader.”


Off the back of the success of the podcast,


Jukes has written a book about the case which is published in May. However, he has no intention of stopping work on the format that brought Daniel Morgan’s murder to the attention of a much wider audience than before. He is planning the next 10 episodes of Untold for this Spring, which promise to be just as explosive as the first series, and is confident that they will be a success as he believes there is a craving for good investigative journalism, particularly among younger people. “I was giving a lecture at a university earlier


this year about the phone hacking scandal and I’d just financed the podcast so I asked how many of the students – and they were all probably in their 20s – read newspapers on a daily basis and about three out of 200 people put up their hand, but when I asked them how many people listen to podcasts around 70 per cent of them put up their hand,” recalls Jukes. “So, as the newspapers decline, there is a huge market and hunger out there for insight, fact and commentary and podcasts can meet that hunger.”


Attitude, skills and technology


Finding the right story is essential for to grabbing people’s attention. Then you need fundamental journalism skills such as good interviewing techniques. “It also helps not to be


pompous, to have that ability to think and reflect aloud which carries the listener along with you,” says Kate Hoyland. The right equipment


doesn’t cost a fortune. Hoyland says the basic requirements are a laptop with some basic sound editing software like Audacity, which is free to download, or Adobe which is paid for. You also need a handheld


recorder and a good microphone – Hoyland recommends the Zoom H4n. All in all, she says, you


than between £200-£300 to get started. “One of the many


beauties of podcasting and radio generally is that it is quite cheap,” she says. Unless you’re incredibly


fortunate, sponsorship deals for podcasts are usually struck only after you’ve built up significant audience figures. Peter Jukes says a good


shouldn’t need to pay more way of raising funds to get


podcasts off the ground is through crowdfunding. “With crowdfunding you


have complete editorial control and you can also move very quickly,” he says. “It’s great being your own boss.” Although creating


podcasts isn’t technically very challenging, for print journalists who have had no broadcasting experience it’s probably worthwhile


investing in some basic training. Hoyland organises


regular introduction to podcasting workshops, including sessions at venues such as the Frontline Club in London. She says:“We offer a


one-day course for beginners and from then on it’s all about practice, finding a great story and great journalism”.


theJournalist | 13


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