An RSS feed is what makes your podcast, your podcast. It is like the engine in your car. Without it, a podcast isn’t complete - it is what powers your podcast. It essentially contains all of the information that makes up your podcast, and allows you to share it with the world.
What is it?
RSS stands for “Really Simple Syndication.” Think of it as a newsfeed, or your Instagram feed - as posts are published, they become available for you to see. When a podcast episode is published, that information is added to the RSS feed, and the RSS feed is responsible for sharing and distributing that content to certain platforms.
Your RSS feed contains your show title, information you’ve added about your show, episodes details. It has everything that is necessary to add your podcast to directories. It all gets passed to directories, like Apple and Spotify. When you add and publish a new episode, your RSS feed updates to reflect that information, and pushes it to directories you’ve synidcated your podcast to.
RSS feeds are either created by podcast hosts, or you can create one on your own. With Wistia, if you enable podcasting for your Channel, we automatically create your RSS feed. You can find it in your Podcast Settings, under the Distribute tab.
Why is it useful?
An RSS feed takes the manual work out of adding your content to multiple platforms. Instead, it creates a more automated process - directories where you’ve syndicated your podcast to can read and monitor that feed. When new information is added, it will update accordingly.
Podcast Hosts
While you can create an RSS Feed on your own, podcast hosts will generate one for you. The RSS Feed URL is what connects directories to all of your content, so that listeners can access your podcast in listening apps.
Your RSS Feed is basically the liaison between your podcast host and directories. Once you submit it to directories, the RSS Feed says “Hey, here’s a podcast. This the title, these are the episodes, and it’s in English. Oh! It’s also not explicit.” Directories then evaluate your feed before approving it and displaying it on their platform.
Note
The approval timeline can vary greatly depending on the directory. You can get approval from Apple Podcasts within 48 hours, while approval from Google may take several days.
If you’re using Wistia as your podcast host and you’re just getting started, head on over here to learn about the Podcast Checklist!
All set and ready to distribute your podcast? This page lists out the steps to take for a number of popular directories.
Looking to switch podcasts hosts? Hop on over here to learn how to import an existing podcast and set up a 301 redirect on your old RSS Feed.
Question? Let us know!