Outline:
The captivating world of storytelling
Humans have been amused by stories for millennia but it wasn’t until we started recording them (in stone or paper) that we could reach millions through space and time. We’re constantly searching for new ways to engage people with insightful stories and podcasts are within everybody’s reach and quite trendy these days.
However, in this case, it’s not just any story. It’s about the life of successful entrepreneurs seen from a novice perspective. Pioneer Laurent Brouat has taken the idea of engaging narratives one step further by sharing the journey of entrepreneurs through a fiction podcast. His astounding success in just over a year since he started his podcast serves as an example that can help you start your own dive into this innovative format and get the audience hooked to your stories.
The power of sound-driven narrations
In the old days when people gathered around the radio to listen to the news and follow sports events, there was also a third option, radio plays. People enjoyed listening to these dramas up until many people mistook Orson Welles’ broadcast of “The War of the Worlds” dramatization as an actual invasion of aliens on Earth. Using only the sense of sound, people felt genuinely terrified and some fled their homes in a rush to save their lives. Even Hitler commented on the broadcast in one of his speeches in 1938!
Today, we have developed this art into what’s called a fiction podcast, with no one getting hurt in the process.
A fiction podcast is a show that tells immersive stories driven by only audio features like the soundtrack, voice-over dialogues, and sound design as part of the story’s narrative. By removing the visuals, people can create their own internal images of the characters, settings, and scenes, and leave them with a strong impression. Just remember how your mind fills in the blanks when watching mystery or thriller movies. It’s an emotional roller-coaster!
Although only 6% of high-income podcasters (above $50k per year) use this podcast form, the majority (63%) use stories as an integral part of their episodes. Also, in some parts of the world, fiction podcasting is growing at more than 300% per year, according to Karin Bäckmark, Spotify’s Nordic podcast manager.
Whatever the format being used, it’s clear that stories have a special place in people’s hearts.
Setting everything up
In just over a year since starting his journey, Laurent has reached thousands of listeners from his innovative fiction podcast called “The Apprentice”. By telling the stories of successful entrepreneurs, like Xavier Niel the “French Steve Jobs”, he inspires people to get things done.
Each episode is specially crafted to meet the highest quality and it involves a team of 4 to set it up. This is how an episode is usually created:
- Research: reading everything there is to know about the entrepreneur including books and podcasts to gather all the information. (1-2 days)
- Writing: creating the dialogues and scenes by writers specialized in this genre. (1-2 days)
- Audio creation: composing the music and sound ambiance (1 day).
- Audio-to-text (bonus): setting up an article entry as a story on his website.
Each episode takes approximately 4 days of full-time work and it costs around €2.000 to produce per episode (although this could decrease to €1.500 soon according to Laurent).
Lessons after making more than 50 episodes
After more than 50 episodes in over a year, Laurent realizes that there have been some important changes since he started this journey.
The writing has improved significantly with better dialogues and more powerful narratives, and all this takes less work than it used to. With time, his team cracked the code on fiction podcasting and it has paid off.
Another important difference with his early days refers to the sound. Dialogues are enriched with different voices making the podcast livelier and the sound design is more precise and enriching. The sound can capture the context and ambiance through different noises and tricks that add to the overall perception of the scenes.
Finally, Laurent and his team have mastered working asynchronously and remotely. Due to the physical distance between teammates and their different work schedules, they have managed to create a workflow that gets them the best result. In fact, after talking to Rumble Studio he acknowledged that this work format is normal for him and he enjoys it very much. No wonder he is having so much success!
Summary
Fiction podcasts have become an immersive way to engage people with storytelling. In his podcast “The Apprentice”, Laurent invites the audience into a captivating narration about the life of successful entrepreneurs, inspiring them to take matters into their own hands. With his recent success, he shares his workflow and lessons learned throughout this journey.
Feel free to visit our podcast episode on fiction podcasting with Laurent Brouat and learn more about the power of storytelling through podcasting. We go into more detail about turning life stories into engaging audio-driven stories that everyone will want to listen to. The future of podcasting is unfolding right in front of us!
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