465. Content Editing Is Where You Build the Listener Experience

0:05 Good morning podcasting. Morning Chat. Today is Tuesday, March 3rd, 2026 and today content editing versus production editing. What are we really doing when we sit down to edit a podcast? Is it clean up or something much bigger shaping the entire listener experience? So if you're listening live on Clubhouse, hit the share button, bottom left hand, side of the screen and share it. However, Clubhouse lets you. And if you're catching us via podcast, YouTube, LinkedIn, Facebook, please share this episode with a fellow podcaster. And now give us about 30 seconds and we'll get things rolling. Thanks for being here.

1:21 Good morning again podcasting morning chat. Thanks so much for being here. I am your host Mark Ronick and currently on stage with me my Co host Dr. Faye Ashley feller producer Ashley Ralph E stepped E step wow welcome back Mark BC babbles, Sid meadows, Nick Naul back and we also have from the audience joining us already on stage. We've got Tim, Dave and Nikki as well. Thank you to those of you who've joined us on stage already bright and early. Right before we went live, I asked if they would come up and join us because I know that they are editors. And that's, as you might have heard from the intro, what we're getting into today.

2:02 But before we do, I have to check in with Sid because Sid, I believe, is coming to us from the beautiful Bahamas. Sid, is that the case? Are you, are you on the beach? Where are you right now? You're in Nassau at the Baja Mar. We're here for a little awards trip for my wife's company and we leave on Thursday, headed back home early Thursday morning. So yeah, we're having a little fun in the sun. Is she supposed to win an award? No, she's, she's not technically a salesperson, but everybody likes to bring her out on sales calls. We're here with about 30 people that work there and they're partners, friends, spouses, they're plus ones, whoever they might be.

2:43 And so, yeah, just having a nice relaxing week, a few days. Awesome. Well, enjoy and thank you for joining us while on vacation. Very cool to have you here. And yeah, this today's topic, which is coming from the mailbag, I think that there's a there's a question that I have that I think this whole topic will also pertain to people like you, Sid. I'll explain in a minute to podcasters like you, I should say. So we'll get to that in a second. Thank you for being here. And yeah, let's do it. Let me grab the mailbag. Grab something out of the mailbag. My very makeshift sound effect that I'm very proud of. All right, this comes from Vicki L from the Washington, DC area. Vicki says I heard your episode last week and how you shared your content editing trick using ChatGPT. That was on Friday's episode.

3:35 She says I'm still curious what's the difference between production editing and content editing? I hear both terms used but don't really understand the distinction. Will you and the team explain? Here's what we're going to do. I'm going to ask some questions around this. Break that question down a little bit. This is what I meant by this might also apply to someone like Sid, because I know Sid doesn't do any editing himself. He's got a team and several podcasters. Several people that listen to our show probably do the same. And I know that if you're one of those people, you may hear this question and say, well, I've hired an editor, so should I even care about this topic?

4:24 I'll just answer that question, and the answer is yes, in my opinion, you got to understand how the sausage is made. You can't just eat it. Otherwise you're going to be at the mercy of your editor. You're going to have to assume that, yeah, my editor knows exactly what they're doing and I don't. So I have to just hope that they're going to do it right. But if you understand, and yes, we will get to what content editing is, if you understand the differences between content editing and production editing, I think that that helps you shape your show the way you intend it to be and the way you want your listeners to experience it. Ralph, did you want to add on to that? I did.

5:08 Good morning. Mark. I, I want to add to that because I have a team that works for me. And one of the big things that I needed to understand was what they're going to do. And I really need to go back and visit what they're doing. And, and I just trumpet what you just said because we can't as a content creator, just leave it to a team to go do it. We need to be involved in that process because we've got to give them direction. That's one of the cool things about the team I work with. There's about eight people on our team at this point. Each person has a task that they're really charged at. But once a week we still have a meeting. We go over, OK, what's our goal for this week? What are we planning to do this week? What is the overall feel that we want the audience member to get? Mark. So I, I think you nailed it 100%. It's it's great that we can we can hire people, we can help have people to do stuff for us, but we've got to be intimately involved in that because ultimately it's our brand, it's our voice.

5:54 And we want to make sure that we're the captain of what's going out there. Yeah, exactly. Thank you, Ralph. Yeah. And I do this with my clients all the time. Look, when one of the first things, when someone hires Ironic Media for production, one of the things I asked them is, do you want this to be edited content editing or do you want more production editing? Because there are, and we'll, again, we'll get into the definition. So I'm going to bite my tongue for a second. And I know that there are people here on stage that want to chime in as well. Alex, let's go to you first. Go ahead. Knowing the process is so important for one reason and one reason only. When you're doing your interview or when you're doing your podcast, you can set it up so much easier for those cuts if you have a good outline and you have what you need.

6:45 It just makes it easier and then you can just time code it, cut it, and then away you go. There is two types of editing. There is just getting it out and then there's trying to get those 10 clips or whatever clips it is understanding that full process. You as the host can set it up so it makes it easier for the editor, whoever it is. Yeah, thank you, Alex. Spot on. Thanks. I appreciate that. And I know BC wants to chime in as well. Go ahead BC. And I think this also goes back to the part of our conversation on Friday where we were discussing, you know, what would or would not be an overburden of information for the new podcast, for the new client. And I think for me, this is kind of why I err on the side of, let me just take that first discovery call or the 1st post onboarding call to really expose them to the scope of what that is.

7:38 Not just for the production content part of it, but also for every other creative aspect that's going to be involved that is inherently linked to one or both of those processes. Yeah, absolutely. Thank you BC. So let's jump in then when you hear the term content editing, what does that mean to you? Let's go to Ashley. Ashley, go for it. Good morning. Good. Morning. I would say content editing is molding, shaping the conversation so that it's easier and more digestible to follow, and even more compelling, even if that means moving particular sections of dialogue around. We hear Dr. talking about stingers all the time. Sometimes when you've gone through multiple passes of editing, you'll find something like, oh, I can't allow the audience to wait to hear this.

8:31 I've got to stick that at the beginning. And that gives you, you know, what we know of as stingers? And you know what? Now we didn't actually spin the wheel, but that's OK. Whenever there is a term that's used that we sometimes deem as maybe confusing or not really well explained, we'll always hit that wheel of jargon button. But yeah, she said Stinger. So let's real quick take a pause and say, what is a Stinger? The Stinger is going to be that quick, sometimes only two second opening clip of a video that captures the perfect quick little phrase or notion that will lock you into the rest of the 30 to 60 minute video clip of the podcast. Someone sound a really spicy or hook moment and it's going to pull you in.

9:26 You're going to listen to the clip and you're likely going to go look for the full episode. I think that it could be that I feel like there, that's also it feels like maybe a hook when we when we say that definition. But let me see. Let's keep going. Dr. What did you want to add? When I first started in podcasting someone said the word Stinger to me and that just stuck. And to be fair, people call this cold open. Several different things. Cold open hook, sizzle, teaser. I've heard it referred to as a bunch of different things, but I'm sticking with Stinger. And so you're agreeing with BC, OK, here's a ChatGPT definition, one that is trained on the podcasting morning chat specifically it says in podcasting a a Stinger is a very short piece of audio, usually music, sound design or quick branded phrase that signals a transition. And now that's how I learned it.

10:29 In radio terms, it is a Stinger, right? So look, I don't think there are, well, there are probably is technically right or wrong answers, but we use these terms that for ourselves, right? So like that's how Dr. defines A Stinger. That's how BC defines their Stinger. But I think traditionally it is, as I said, that very short piece of audio that signals some kind of transition. I feel like what you and BC are describing are more of a hook or cold open, you know, so cold open meaning when you press play on that podcast, when you first press play, you get that little clip that's a highlight from the episode to really help the audience, you know, settle in and understand what they're going to get into.

11:20 BC and Ashley, do you look for certain things? You have a certain formula that you use when you look for your stingers. For instance, for me, I look for anything where the guest says something like, well, most people think blah, blah, blah. But I, you know, or anything with a statistic is a good Stinger for me. Anything like that. Do do either of you have any kind of a formula that you look for? I've always been video podcast. I've never done just an audio podcast. So I've oftentimes focused on depending on the story being told, if I noticed my guest having certain visual reactions, and I kind of clock that part in the recording and decide from there how to frame it visually for social media to where it's like, I can put beeps in there and, and block out certain things that I say and capture my guest's reaction as, oh, this is something of intrigue.

12:22 I've got to go find this and listen to the UN beeped version of this conversation and try to draw people in that way. Thank you BC All right, that's fair. And Ashley wants to chime back in. Go ahead, Ashley. I feel like I'm going to be saying in defensive descript a lot today, but in defensive descript there is a feature where like you can go through and you see the transcript and like UV see, I go through it. I visually, I look for something like a reaction. And to your point, Dr. you know, an interesting fact or something shocking that they say that's just, you just know it's going to get someone's attention. And what you can do is you can make another composition. They call it in descript, which is another file that that is separate from the main file.

13:08 And what I like to do is I put all my Stinger contenders in a separate file and I'll go through and I'll just go through process of elimination to figure out which one is going to be the one. OK. Thank you, Ashley. I am so proud of somebody that knows actually how to use the script. I think that's a whole episode unto itself. The fact that you can figure out the features without actually having to have a new download of updates with it is amazing. I know Alex has a hate hate relationship for descript. I just stopped using it it it does so many wonderful things.

13:50 I can't get it to work. But that's a separate conversation. But God love it. Go ahead BC. Yeah, I was also going to go back a little bit to talking about where we kind of learned different terms from. I think it's going to be important for clients to realize that your producer, well, I should say not all producers learn the same things from the same space, right? Funny enough, I never even heard the term Stinger until hopping onto this show as a commentator. Dr. was the first person I've ever heard of used the phrase singer because from radio I've heard, I've heard terms like quickie, transition, other things like that take your mind out of the gutter. It's not what that means. So I took in answering that question earlier.

14:30 I took the concept I've learned from Dr. to say, well this is what I understand a Stinger to be. I did not know about that before hopping onto the show. Yeah, exactly. And I think you're right. I think that it is important to understand the lingo that your producer is using, right? And it could be different than what you hear us talk about here. So I think having those conversations and, and really understanding the terminology between you and your editor or producer is really important, is really valuable. Did anyone else want to chime in before we give a real definition of content editing? OK, so here is how I understand it. It's the intentional process of shaping a conversation so the audience experience is the clearest, strongest, most engaging version of the message.

15:21 It's deciding what stays, what goes, what gets moved, and why, all in service of your audience. So different from editing out all the umm's and Ah's. Yes, you could make an argument that helps the experience because let's face it, there are sometimes a lot of guests and in some cases hosts as well that uses a lot of filler words. I know that I'm guilty of some myself, but I think it's when they are overused that doing some production editing to get rid of those does help shape the experience. I guess maybe what it what it really is more of is storytelling.

16:01 You're shaping the story by editing chunks of the story out, or maybe like Ashley said earlier, moving pieces of it around to help tell the story better or in a more engaging way is probably the more appropriate way of saying it. But I'm curious if anybody else thinks differently or wants to add on to that. And if not, I'll keep things. Mark, I just wanted to add one thing here because I think a lot of new content creators might think editing is only the audio side, cleaning up the audio, making it listenable. And if you're looking for somebody to do editing, you really need to understand the difference here because there is definitely a difference between content editing and just audio cleanup. I think it's really important to emphasize that because if you're looking to hire somebody to do that, some money guy, I'm always thinking about the money side of this. You better understand what you're buying because if you're only buying the audio cleanup, there are great AI tools that do a lot of that stuff.

17:01 But if you're looking for somebody to to edit the content, you're going to pay more for that because that's somebody that's going to have to spend more time finessing your information, finessing your content. So I just wanted to to throw that in there, Mark, because I think it's real easy to get struck in this trap of, well, you told me you were going to edit. Well, better understand from the front end what editing actually means. Yes, agreed. Thank you, Ralph and Nick, you're disagreeing with me a little bit. Just a little bit, I think the UMS and the odds would kind of fall under the content because I personally feel like the kind of editing is editing the actual message, the actual words that are being said. It's editing the content and your production editing. That's going to be the things you do to improve the visuals, improve the sound that the end users going to hear.

17:49 Like. EQ, compression, that kind of thing. That's kind of where my mind was going with it. I could see the argument. I can understand that it does help shape the experience a little bit. I I do feel like it's there's a deeper meaning to it. But yes, I could see editing out the filler words since it does contribute to the experience. It probably can fall under that term content editing. Sid, I saw you wanted to chime in. Go for it. Content editing it should only be done by the podcaster. That's my opinion. I mean, because I know the conversation that was had. I understand the message that I'm trying to get across with my guests and I'm the end of the day, I'm the expert on my show.

18:32 I'm the person that's got the experience to know what the topic is and those kind of things. If you rely on someone else to content edit, and I believe what you're doing is allowing them to change the meaning of the show, allowing them to change the meaning of the conversation, the direction of the conversation without realizing it. So I think that's all content editing, which occasionally has to be done because of whatever rambling, you know, somebody taking 7 minutes to answer a question, whatever it might be. But I think that the ownership of the editing of the content relies with the podcaster or the creator. That is interesting. Yes, thank you, Sid. I'm going to there's several people who want to chime in and I'm going to go to Nikki first. Nikki, what did you want to add?

19:15 Good morning. As far as? Organization One thing that I'm going to try for my podcast is to think of my podcast in segments. And this came from the conversation that we all had yesterday on structure, how we format our podcast, how we how we create an experience around it as opposed to it just being like AQ and a interview. And I said, you know what, I think I'm going to have segments. So if I do an hour long podcast and I think of the editing process along with that, what I can do is I can chop the podcast up into like 15 minutes segments to add up to that hour. And then if I want to go out and seek sponsorship or if I want to go out and you know, post a clip on YouTube or something like that, I actually have a very clean clip because my podcast itself is structured and it's not just a clip.

20:01 I shouldn't call it a clip. It's not just a clip. It's an actual segment of the podcast. And so that's what I'm going to be doing in the editing process, is just looking for nice clean ways where I can segment my podcast into these different sections so I can send it. Out for sponsorship or different? Things. Yeah. I appreciate you bringing up that point, Nikki. I think that's, you know, I don't even know by definition if that falls under content editing or not. I suppose it does because it is shaping the experience as well. It's strategic editing for sure. Yeah. Thinking about how you're going to structure it so you can figure out where am I going to add sponsors or can I have a sponsors, can I have an advertiser sponsor this segment?

20:46 Yeah, I think those are really important points for sure. And I want to go to BC next. Go ahead BC. Quick clarifying question, since the original question from this person was production versus content editing, are we breaking down content 1st and then going into production or are we kind of mixed matching both in our responses? Certainly worth if you want to share what your meaning of production editing is, because I think that's important to share as well since yeah, you're right, she asked the question. So yeah, what say you BC? I said it's only because I've heard kind of back and forth between the group of what I would call production versus content. And this kind of goes again to how we term things.

21:27 But for me, production editing, I would just call post production, taking the raw content and then molding it into a finely tuned final product. Versus for me content editing is really it's taken any of the show for anything outside of a podcast platform. Production editing for me is producing the final product. And then the content editing is how do I frame it for everything outside of the host or YouTube. So social media, website, blogs, things like that. Thank you. Yeah, to add on to what you're saying about production editing, to be a little more specific, I think it is things like cutting out background noise or bumping your microphone or adding music and intros and outros and transitions that even exporting and formatting the final file, I think that's all production editing.

22:18 Would you agree? Yes, absolutely. OK, we're on the same page. Alex, you wanted to chime in? I just have a question because Sid brought up an interesting point that I don't understand. He had said that you had said, Sid, that it should be the podcaster that does the content editing. But are we talking about clips or are we talking about moving stuff around? And the reason I say that is because a good editor, if they've been working on your podcast for a while, whether it's you or it's someone else knows the good bites to put on for social media. Is that what content editing is for? I'm asking because I'm trying to figure out why is it the host's responsibility?

23:01 It should be the host's responsibility as opposed to a good editor because I think Ashley could probably once you get the feel of a podcast, you kind of know what The thing is. That all being said, if there were certain points that you wanted to tell the editor, hey, listen, I want to make sure this section gets done. Do you understand what I mean, Sid? Yeah. So let's go to Sid and and actually Sid, before we do so, I guess the question, Sid, really is if you could, would you define a little more of why you feel that's the case that that you as the podcaster should be doing the content editing and leave that to you, Your editor should just be doing the production editing. But let me first just say, Alex, you know, I think content editing, by contrast, I think it's asking yourself questions like, should this section stay?

23:53 Should I move this section? Is this the strongest way to say it? I think that's what. OK, I misunderstood content editing and I think but OK. Yeah, but Sid, do you want to add on? I think you're just spot on. So Alex, I don't believe that creating social media clips is content, right? That's something to be done by multiple AI tools to pick out a clip for you and a lot of editors to it. But I don't think that that's content editing. Content editing to me is taking one question you asked somebody and moving it from the point of the conversation, which you asked up to another point. That's editing the content, which could potentially be changing the meaning of it.

24:35 One of the examples that I know that happened with me was I was listen to that, listen to every episode. I was listening to an episode 1 morning and I realized I said the name of a company wrong. And so I had her change the name of the company. That's content editing. I'm editing the actual content itself, and she was correcting a mistake that I made because I called the company by the wrong name and I needed to make sure that that got corrected. So again, it's your show, it's your content. You know what the intent of what you were trying to get across was. And I think anytime you move something around or change something and you allow an editor, which a lot of people do, allow the editor to do it. I mean, she does it for me. I just told her what to do.

25:17 If it's changing, potentially changing the outcome of the conversation, then that's why I think of that the the content creator has to be the one to to do that because the editors like Ashley Mark and Dr. and the rest of you that edit it, you know, all the editing stuff and what going to make it sound really good. You should not be expected to know the content in a way that I know my topic to change things around or move things around without direction from these. That's why I think I should be the owner of editing the content itself. I'm so glad you cleared that up because that makes so much more sense. I do think that social media can fall under that category. And before I say that, I think that so Sid's bringing up the the fact like he called out me and Dr. and Ashley and I know Matt Bliss does this and BC does this.

26:07 We edit and produce podcasts. But there is a distinction between, in my opinion, producer and editor. If you're hiring an editor specifically, they say I am a podcast editor and I will edit your, your content, your podcast. I think that the editors, you shouldn't leave it in their hands to do the content editing unless that's something that they say is a specialty that you trust and and know. But ultimately, I think an editor is doing more production editing. You hire a producer like myself that has an editing team, then you're you are hiring, at least in my case, you're hiring somebody that is going to help you with the content editing, with the creating that experience for your audience.

26:56 It's still, in my opinion, important for you as a podcaster to understand what you want and what you don't want in the show. But I think that you, when you're hiring a producer, you're trusting them more to do that content editing. And that's, you know, that's also in my experience as ATV producer, it's the same thing. I think about the show that I used to produce and that host is not sitting there with a fine tooth comb after he recorded an episode and saying, yeah, keep this, get rid of that, move this over here, move that over there. No, he's, he's got producers that are paid to do that. So there is a big difference there. I just wanted to put a bow on it. I think that comes down to a Stinger versus what somebody thinks a Stinger is versus whatever everything can be called. So many different things and maybe I just was in the wrong path, but I'm so glad that I'm with you 1000%. That's why that's what I was just trying to. Say, and let me just address one more thing. I know Nick and also Matt want to chime in. When we talked about a briefly a moment ago, I think it was said saying something about social media not considering those clips, content editing.

28:03 I think it depends on what you're doing. If you're just trimming from that clip some dead air, maybe making faster or sharper cuts, cleaning up the audio, exporting the 60 SEC second clip, that's production editing. But the moment that you choose which moment best represents the episode, or you move a sentence from or to the front of the clip for more impact, or remove the setup so that that the hook hits faster, You know, these are the different things as you're thinking about. That's content editing. You've crossed into content editing at that point.

28:44 I think this kind of goes back to the point that I think Ralph made earlier in the show here about understanding what you're getting with the person you're hiring. Because I agree, there are the editors that'll come in, they'll clean it up, they'll make it sound nice and like that's the extent of the editing process for them to just make it sound pretty. But then you do have editors that they have creative liberty over the show and their whole purpose is to make the story cohesive and essentially tell the story using the content you've created. I've kind of went into a deep dive in this when I was getting into the video editing side of things because I started following an editor by the name of Hillier Smith and he's done a lot of video editing for Mr. Beast, Logan Paul, like all those guys. Those guys have an idea of where they want the story to go, but they're leaving it up to the editor to get it there. They film all the content, they get all the stuff compiled, and then it's up to the editor to piece it all together and bring the story into something cohesive for the viewer. So I think there is a very big difference, and understanding what you're getting with the editor is definitely important. Absolutely.

29:54 Thank you, Nick. And I'm just going to skip the line real quick. Matt, please bear with me because I want to check in with Tim, who's been on stage all morning. Tim, good morning to you. What do you want to add? Thanks so much Mark. I have two clients, 1 is a suicidologist and the other client is coach for Little League hockey. Now, I don't know a whole lot about suicide, and I love hockey, but I've never coached it. One thing that I do is in terms of the content of it is as the editor, I'm approaching it as the listener. I always tell my guys that when we're doing these interviews, I'm going to be the listener, make sure my camera's on and I'm list. I will bring them in the process because they're going to use terms that I don't understand that because I don't have a master's degree in suicidology.

30:49 So far, you know, when I bring them into it, yes, they're paying me. So they have skin in the game, but they also, as my clients feel more part of the process and I'm able to say, OK, what does that term mean? Let's find out a different way to say this so that way average Joe can get it. But also, and I'm stealing this from Dave Jackson and he stole it from somebody else. I'm making the conversation less boring and more engaging to those that may not have all the background or the information that my clients have and their guests have, so that's just something I do with content. Great point.

31:32 Anytime Dave Jackson can be a part of the conversation, I welcome that. And I appreciate, by the way, he shouted us out recently on one of his episodes. So yeah, thank you to Dave Jackson and thank you, Tim. Great points. I want to keep things moving here and go to Matt as promised. Go ahead, Matt. Good morning. Good. Morning. The way that I think about this is that regardless of how many people you start with or end with when you're creating your podcast, there is a workflow that's involved and there are varying number of steps involved in that workflow. Completely abstract to the people involved, give or take a podcaster.

32:12 They're kind of necessary to be part of that workflow to a degree. And with every podcast, it's going to be different. Like a suicide ology podcast is going to have a heavy emphasis on the content editing because of the nature of the content. And when I say content editing there I mean supervising the topic, the structure, the pacing, the information, the research and the fact checking. But at the beginning of any workflow is the recording. So the pre production process, pre production being sorting out what your recording will entail before you get there, if that's a necessary thing. And then the recording and then bring it into perhaps pre post production, which is what Sid might be referring to when he says the podcaster should own the content that they put their two cents in on what should stay and what should go content wise before it goes to the editor to do the standard editing things in post production.

33:11 So when I think about the titles and the roles and positions, I think about who occupies which particular part of any specific flow, part of a process, what they contribute to it and the responsibilities attached to that. Because I think creating a position for oneself and then expecting whatever we create as part of that position to be what we give the podcaster. That's the editor working forwards towards the podcast and the podcast fitting the editor or producer as opposed to what I think it should be in my belief, the other way around where the podcast has demands, has a specific workflow and the editor and producer provides whatever is necessary for that. Now when it comes to content editing specifically, I think the things you guys have covered so far is the post production or the pre post production as I mentioned just then. But there's the part that sits in at the end, the marketing. I think that's where there can be content production at the marketing stage, and that's when you're creating your social media reels, picking highly contentious, salacious moments so that you can start engaging people to bring them into your podcast.

34:34 You can indicate responsibilities, not roles, but responsibilities that are attached to certain functions as part of that workflow. So I always start in the workflow first and think about what's required in that part of the workflow, and then what each person does regardless of what their title is and how they contribute to that workflow. Well and, and fair to hear. So thank you Matt for sharing your take on what that looks like. I think it's, yeah, I think it is important, like we've said all along, I think today is if you are hiring an editor or a producer, I think it's important to understand the terms, understand the expectations and the IT.

35:15 And that goes both ways. But you need to understand where they're coming from and they need to understand where you're coming from and what your expectations are for this show. And I think that as that as time goes on, as chemistry develops, as you and your producer and or editor are getting to know each other, you can start to feel more confident in their ability to go ahead and do the content editing so that you can be less hands off. Because I think that is an intention for a lot of people is that they do want to be a little more hands off because they've put so much time and effort into it. And now they feel like, OK, I need a break here. I need somebody that knows what they're doing to take over as long as they understand me and my mission. Yeah.

36:02 Matt, did you want to add on? Just very quickly, this is something that I find a bit of a pet peeve in finding a good podcast editor. And fortunately or unfortunately, however you look at it, Steve Stewart of podcasts Editors Academy and the Podcast Editors Mastermind podcast Now for he's a finance guy and he edits a lot of finance based podcasts. And I think speaking to content piece and knowing that you're getting an editor that has experience in topic area that you're doing, I'm so surprised we don't see as many editors out there displaying their topic specialty. Thank you, Matt. Appreciate that. And Ralph, did you want to add something? And and before I get to you, I just want to say I wanted for the last 10-15 minutes or so, I want to find out a little bit more about how you all content, edit the specifics. I'll explain in a moment.

36:57 Go ahead, Ralph. Yeah, that's exactly where I want to pivot this to, Mark, because I'm thinking through this conversation and if I'm a new content creator, I'm thinking I can't afford A-Team. I can't afford to go hire an editor. I can't afford a producer and I'm thinking about all of us when we first started and we were sitting in front of that recording and say, what do I do now? And Mark, I think that's where I mean perfect pivot where I would wanted us to go because I think we need to now get into the nitty gritty of OK, I can't afford to hire a producer like Mark and Mark does a great job through Ironic Media, but I can't afford that right now. So how do I do this with the limited resources I have to be effective in that mark? So perfect pivot, my friend.

37:37 I think we're on the same wavelength. OK, Yeah, tend to be BC does want to chime in. So go ahead BC. I wish I had more time to be like this as a producer these days, but I'm so just calendar heavy. But what I love to do typically, and I'm a big Premiere Pro fan, I love Premiere Pro. And So what I will typically do especially for my in person podcast where I've got audio from three sources, so I've usually got a road caster and then the two cameras I use for the different shots. Once I have those things aligned in an Adobe session, I'll save that as kind of the base file and then I'll create 2 copies of it. One for the long form full podcast, the second which I will reshape the preview for 9/16 aspect ratio and then I'll produce both. I'll do the full podcast of the one and the second one I will focus in on that social media, finding the stingers, finding the hot moments and producing it for TikTok reels and all the other things.

38:38 That's my preferred workflow. I'm a big transitions person, so whenever I find those great moments for good L cuts and J cuts, and I know I'm using a lot of jargon right now, so we got to got to address that, but that's not the first thing I find so much. I thrive so much off of that in honestly kind of the in the weeds moment of the production process is where I really thrive. And so that's my typical approach, just being really in it Premiere pro. I know people might prefer like Rush or Cap cut or whatever other tools are out there for video production, but that's what I love to do personally. Do I should I break down all those terms? I just. Used well, you know, I think this is to, to not get into the weeds, we will just say for today that LL cuts and J cuts, these are terms used for video editing. It's, it's the way you can make those cuts look a lot more smooth.

39:33 I will say that for now, go ahead and Google it or go to AI and ask your AI for specifics. But yeah, that's the gist of it. Yes, Thank you. BC no problem. So let's let me ask some of you then. Let's talk about long form content editing. And I want to just get an idea of some of your approaches. Do you, for example, listen slash watch straight through the first time after the recording's over and then kind of make notes as you go? Or do you just start cutting immediately? I'm curious how that works. OK. Let's go to Ashley and then we'll check back in with Matt. With the exception of pmci edit, all the other shows I work on in passes like the first pass will be mainly audio cleanup, just make it sound good and then the second time I go through this is where the script is really handy. You can go through much like you would a Word document and highlight those pieces that you think would be good for social media and even build a highlight reel out of those. Thank you, Ashley.

40:41 All right, cool. And Matt, how about you? I am a single pass edit the whole thing in one go guy. It's not easy, it takes a lot of practice to do that, but I've been working for a long time to try and make my editing muscle memory for the things like that, the cuts and the fixing of the little bits and pieces as I go through it really easy. Like I call IT system one, like it's muscle memory at this point. And that leaves a lot of my cognitive bandwidth to listen to the conversation, make markers for when topics changes, when there's certain questions, think about the progression of the conversation where something doesn't fit. And I've gotten really good at doing it in a single pass. But I'm someone who does that for a lot of people. And I realize that's not something everyone has the exposure to do.

41:29 But I will always do it in the editor. I won't do any transcript looks before I get to it. I prefer the natural feel of the conversation and getting that flow going in the audio or the video. Even when you're doing more content editing versus production editing because I. I ask because I know that I've been caught, as they say, with my pants down when I'm doing content editing and I'm just doing it in a single pass. There are times that, like, I'll edit an area towards, say, the beginning, and then toward the end I'll realize, oh, if I had just left that in, that this would all make more sense. Or if I had left that in and moved it around and brought it over to this area toward the end, it would have made more sense. So do you ever find that challenging? I don't, but if only because I'm so well practiced in it and I find it very easy to troubleshoot and fix things up because of the way I work.

42:23 Backups, compartmentalization, and single pass editing don't do it the way I do it spread over like four or five days. Do it in one shot if you can. And it takes a lot of practice to do it. But I've seen Dominic mentioned in the chat there, Yeah, I'm sure he'll have a very different opinion to mine where it's not just an interview. He's crafting an entire soundscape experience. Maybe he'd be a good person to talk to about this next. Yeah, and Full disclosure, I did tip Dominic off before the show started this morning, let him know what we were talking about because as a 40 plus time award-winning podcaster who does I know a lot of content editing, I thought he would be a great contributor to this conversation.

43:09 So yeah, Dominic, good morning. I know you're a little late to the party and I'll just tell you we're right now asking each other how we approach content editing. We've defined it. We've we've talked about the differences between it and production editing. And so my first question to everybody a moment ago was, do you listen straight through 1st or do you just start cutting immediately? Like how? What's your process? How do you approach content editing when you're telling a story on your show, whether it's Black as America or mental health rewritten? Good morning everybody, hope everybody is well. Forgive my timeliness to the party. Honestly it starts before I even record anything.

43:53 I already know the story that I want to tell. And then whether I'm getting interviews or writing the script, the editing kind of starts even before that. And and so I'm, I'm asking the particular type of questions, I'm getting the particular type of content that I want to have. And then from there I'm going back and listening to, OK, what were the best bits, right. And so sometimes what's recorded it minute 30 is going to be on the front end at minute 9 or something like that. Or with black as America, I know I'm trying to hook you in from the beginning.

44:33 So we're probably going to go in the middle of John Fox's battle and then, you know, kind of transition and go back to the beginning, even though we're going to and then lead you back up into the battle of, you know, when he was in Selma Colonia and stuff like that. So it really does begin before I shoot anything, before I write anything. I'm already, you know, determining what story I'm telling. And then it just kind of goes from there. Makes sense. And then Dominic, a follow up question for you. Prior to these two shows, which are much more narratives, they are narrative style shows. I know you have done podcasts where they were more interview style.

45:15 Did you do content editing for that or was it just more production editing? It was more production editing. And The funny thing is, is that I got made fun of for editing my shows. They was like, oh, it's just an interview show. You don't need to do all of that. But it's like, had I not done the production editing, it would not get me an, you know, an interested in content editing. And then, you know, and then you know, the proof is in the pudding where we are now with that part of my career. And so did do the production ending because, you know, I was trying to make it all polished and take out the umms and the odds and all the things. It really did make me realize for me, and this is no, not to anybody. The magic is in the editing.

46:02 It just is for me, you know, and that could be just because I do the narrative style. And as I start to study films and TV shows, I see more and more that the magic really is in the editing. And I think it's not just the content editing, just the story editing as well, not just from the shifting around audio, but also like I, I can't tell you now that that's why episodes of things that I create takes longer now because I'm like, I'm writing 456 different drafts of something that's like, wait a minute, no, that's not quite right, you know? So that's kind of part of the process. The magic really is in the editing, I think. Yeah, and I think the magic is, at least from what you've shared, the magics also in the preparation. Yeah, 100% because like, because a lot of times even before the the shooting and stuff like that, like the editing is already happening in my head.

47:00 Like I first I, I want to figure out what story am I trying to convey by the end of this episode. I want the audience member to feel this or the very least think about that, right. So it really does begin way before you shoot any content, before you reach out to any person interview and, and, and, and I get some Flack for that, believe it or not, because a lot of times people will say, oh, you do a black history show. I have this person to come, you know, talks about this, about this in black history. Like that is great, That is wonderful, Sir or ma'am. However, it's not the story I'm wanting to tell, nor is it the type of stories that we tell on black as America.

47:44 If a story comes up where it's alive, then great, let's do it. But it really even starts even with the people that you bring on to the show as far as like, you know, editing and and how you want that that episode or story to kind of go, I guess. Yeah, thank you, Dominic. And if you want to learn more about Dominic or any of the fine people today that have shared in this conversation, go to podcastingmorningchat.com/people and you'll see all these fine faces and be able to click on them and learn more about them, how to connect with them, etcetera. So check that out. I know that more people wanted to chime in and we are out of time. So a reminder to you that we're back tomorrow, 7:00 AM Eastern, where we will be covering all the podcasting news around the world.

48:33 We'll comment on those stories, stories that I believe are important to you, the podcaster. So come join us tomorrow. Be a part of that conversation and and remember, we do this every Monday through Friday, 7:00 AM Eastern Time. You can learn more about how to connect with us, how to join us live at Podcasting Morning chat.com/join us. So until tomorrow, make it a great day. Everybody take care.