Mike MurphyAI Handyman
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Episode 80

The Show Notes Show

March 17, 2017 ·

EP80: THE SHOW NOTES SHOW Behind the Scenes of Show Notes Episode Summary: How I write my show notes How I Format my Shownotes for the Web How I Prepare my episode artwork How I Schedule & Publish Each Weekly Episode on my Wordpress Site.

Episode Summary: A behind-the-scenes walkthrough of how show notes actually get made each week — writing, formatting, episode artwork, and the full publishing workflow on WordPress.

What You’ll Learn

  • What show notes are and why they matter beyond just being a text afterthought
  • Mike’s 8-step weekly workflow, from artwork to newsletter to social sharing
  • The core rule for not hating show notes: build a repeatable process
  • The full toolchain: InDesign, Scrivener, Byword, WordPress, Libsyn, PowerPress, Mailchimp, Buffer

What are show notes? The blog post that accompanies every episode — where links and resources mentioned in the episode live, along with an overview of what listeners can expect.

Tools Used

Adobe InDesign, Scrivener, Byword, the Divi theme by Elegant Themes, WordPress.org, Libsyn, the PowerPress plugin by Blubrry, MailChimp, and Buffer.

Show Notes: How to Not Hate Them

  1. Build a repeatable process.
  2. Write the script or outline with show notes already in mind — don’t treat them as an afterthought.
  3. Find balance, and don’t agonize over minutiae.

The Weekly Show Notes Workflow

Step 1 — episode artwork. Built in Adobe InDesign, roughly 5–10 minutes.

Step 2 — craft the show notes outline. Duplicate the script and copy the show notes content to the clipboard, using Scrivener. Roughly 10–20 minutes.

Step 3 — multi-markdown formatting. Paste the script into Byword and use multi-markdown (HTML shortcodes) to format it for the WordPress post.

Step 4 — create the blog post. New post in WordPress.org using the Divi theme. Tip: append /wp-admin to the domain to log in. Schedule the post for Friday publishing, update the permalink for easy sharing, and swap in the episode artwork and featured image.

Step 5 — grab the audio link. Log into Libsyn, copy the MP3 link and the podcast player embed code.

Step 5.5 — wire it into the post. Paste the MP3 URL into the PowerPress plugin by Blubrry.

Step 6 — prep the newsletter. Build it out in MailChimp.

Step 7 — make a promo video for the episode.

Step 8 — share it. Use Buffer to send the show notes page out to Facebook, Twitter, and Google+. Rinse and repeat.

Show Notes & Links