Sound Judgment

On May 6, 2024, The 13th Step team was honored with a Pulitzer Prize nomination for audio reporting "for their gripping and extensively reported investigation of corruption and sexual abuse within th…

In 2020, New Hampshire Public Radio Lauren Chooljian received an email about Eric Spofford, the founder of New Hampshire's largest addiction treatment network. In it was an allegation that Spofford w…

Sound Judgment is about the craft of audio storytelling. Not about the marketing of podcasts. But today, we're bringing you a gift from someone I trust completely when it comes to audience growth: Je…

At some point, every one of us will reach a point in our professional lives where it's time to change — but the status quo, even when it's not working, is comfortable. Are you ready to say goodbye to…

It's a brave thing to share the outtakes from a tracking session. All the blemishes are right there. But Martine Powers and Rennie Svirnovsky from the audio team at The Washington Post have graciousl…

The six storytelling strategies you're about to learn are drawn from the patterns I've seen across more than 150 behind-the-scenes lessons — lessons learned from some of the best hosts, producers, wr…

This is the sixth and final part of our new Sound Judgment quick-hit series on storytelling strategies for hooking your audience and keeping them with you. Today: specifics. The more specific our lan…

This is part 5 of our new Sound Judgment quick-hit series on six storytelling strategies for hooking your audience and keeping them with you. This one can mean the difference between ho-hum content a…

Our fourth S in the 6S framework for hooking your audience and keeping them with you is surprise. It's the left turn when we're expecting a righthand one that makes us listen. It's the twists and tur…

This is part 3 of our new Sound Judgment quick-hit series on six storytelling strategies for hooking your audience and keeping them with you. Today, we’re talking about scenes. They’re obviously a st…

In this series you'll learn how to use sound vision, structure, scenes, surprise, suspense, and specifics to make content that audiences love and share. Each of these bonus episodes is bite-sized and…

This is Part 1: Sound Vision. Be sure to follow the show so you don't miss the next bite-sized episodes on: 
Part 2: Structure
Part 3: Scenes
Part 4: Surprise
Part 5: Suspense
Part 6: Specifics

All of thes…

Improve your storytelling, interviewing, writing, producing, hosting and guesting skills! Sign up for new Sound Judgment workshops today at www.podcastallies.com/workshops. 


On this episode, Emily Sil…

Don’t miss today’s takeaways! Scroll down for lessons from this episode. 

The episodes we discussed on today’s episode are History Daily: Silent Spring Sparks the Modern Environmental Movement and Ame…

Sharing a personal experience, especially a traumatic one, is a particularly popular scripted podcast form. Memoir done well often shoots to the top of the podcast charts or the bestseller list. It m…

This episode was sponsored by Signal Hill Insights. 

Want to know how your podcast is affecting listeners? Need to plan to share outcomes with a branded client? 

Visit measureyourpodcast.com for a free…

If you liked this bonus episode introducing Podcast Perspectives with host Jeff Umbro and guest Jessica Cordova Kramer of Lemonada Media, you'll love: 

SJ S1/E1: Emotional Bravery on Last Day with Ste…

This episode was sponsored by Signal Hill Insights. 

Want to know how your podcast is affecting listeners? Need to plan to share outcomes with a branded client? 

Visit measureyourpodcast.com for a free…

The episode discussed on today's Sound Judgment is Believable: The Coco Berthmann Story. Karen worked with reporter/host Sara Ganim to create Believable. 

This episode was sponsored by Signal Hill Ins…

The episode discussed on today's Sound Judgment is Near Death: Death Party. Near Death is a Dying For Media production with sales and distribution by Lemonada Media.

Nikki Boyer's takeaways

These are …