In the latest podcast episode of the Happier at Work podcast, host Aoife O'Brien dives into how AI is enhancing our podcast experience. Aoife delves into the behind-the-scenes processes and the impact of AI on the creation and production of our thought-provoking episodes.
In this episode, Aoife shares how AI has revolutionised her role in podcast production, from generating engaging episode titles and show notes to creating captivating social media posts and video snippets. Not only does AI streamline time-consuming tasks, but it also enables Aoife to focus more on the heart of the podcast - delivering deep and meaningful conversations that truly impact your work and life.
If you've ever wondered about the role of AI in podcast production or are simply curious about the inner workings of Happier at Work, this episode offers insightful perspectives and a glimpse into the future of podcasting.
Do you have any feedback or thoughts on this discussion? If so, please connect with Aoife via the links below and let her know. Aoife would love to hear from you!
So with all of the talk of AI recently, I've had a question from someone who listens to the podcast in relation to how I use AI in my role. I thought I can apply that very specifically to what I do with the podcast. And maybe if you're a podcast listener, you're interested in a little bit more around the behind the scenes and how I use that. So today's topic is all about how I use AI in my role. Now by way of intro, I'm gonna share something that I saw on Instagram quite recently where someone had posted, very obviously, an AI, caption. An AI caption that was on Instagram. And in it, it had so just kind of a, you know, normal caption at the start, but then right before it came to the hashtags, and we all know the importance of hashtags on link on, Instagram for getting reach and things like that. So right before the hashtags, it said, certainly, here are x number of hashtags related to, and then, you know, the the topic specifically.
Aoife O'Brien [:
So very obviously that person had used AI in and forgot to delete the the part of the prompt that said, certainly, I will, of course, be able help with this. So I just thought maybe a funny anecdote to to start today's episode. Now if I can cast your mind back to episode one of the Happier at Work podcast and maybe how things have developed over time. One interesting thing I've seen recently in the stats is that some people have gone back to the very, very start of the Happier at Work podcast. Even I am a little bit afraid to go back there because it's a long time since I recorded, you know, four and a half years since I've recorded those episodes at the very, very start. I don't know what my interview style was like. I'm sure I've improved over time. But thinking about all that was involved in in producing this podcast and all of the different bits and pieces.
Aoife O'Brien [:
So I think often maybe people think, well, if it's a if it's a 10 minute podcast or if it's a 45 minute interview based podcast, like, how long does it actually take to produce it? So for a long time, I was probably spending 5 or 6 hours of my own time between coordinating when we were going to be meeting up, coordinating when the recording was going to be taking place, following up on emails and and things like that. Then the recording itself, which is usually around an hour, then the follow-up and pulling together all of the social media. So the image for the podcast, writing up show notes, making sure it had keywords, although I haven't been really great at doing that, to be perfectly honest. So maybe at the very start, I wasn't doing all of that stuff. I was certainly editing everything myself. And I have subsequently got some support from people who would help me to edit the podcast. So that's brilliant. And that's not going to change, so I will always have a person who's actually editing the podcast or for the time being anyway.
Aoife O'Brien [:
Maybe AI will change that in the future. But this idea that, you know, I I do want to have someone who's actually listening to the podcast of of what I'm saying. And, that person then is able to pull out, well, what are some of the the interesting points? And, again, that's something that was happening by a person for a long time. Now with the with the advent of AI. And certainly in podcasting, I get messaged quite a a few times per week actually from people who are trying to sell me their podcast AI post production solutions. And I have one already. I have a solution and I've been using it for probably, I wanna say, around 6 months at this stage. And it's just been a game changer for me because it reduces the amount of time that I have to spend doing a lot of the stuff that takes a lot of time when you're doing a podcast.
Aoife O'Brien [:
So ultimate goal goal for me is that I show up and I spend an hour and I have a conversation with someone, a really deep and meaningful conversation that impact people's lives. That is my aim with this. But with AI, what I've been able to do is use it for loads of different things that you might not even think about. So coming up with the title for the podcast episode, and it's really important from search perspective that that title needs to be able to be found not just by people who are regular listeners, but by someone who is looking for that specific topic that they want to learn more about that. That that helps me to reach the people that I need to reach with the message that I have. It helps me to grow my listenership for people to discover about me and what I do. And thanks to you as well for sharing the podcast episode when you're listening to it. That really helps as well.
Aoife O'Brien [:
But having that right keyword or having that right title, AI now can do that. And the AI tool that I use comes up with 10 titles, for example. But if you don't like any of those 10, well, what I do is that I mix and match. I can take a little bit from suggestion 1 and a little bit from suggestion 3, for example. But if you don't like any of the options, you can always ask the lie to make it more formal, to make it more informal, to change it, or just to rerun it, or just to come up with some new ideas. So that's for the title. Then it comes to the show notes. Now the show notes, again, have always been quite labor intensive.
Aoife O'Brien [:
I typically take notes as I'm having a conversation. Anyone who watches the video version of the podcast will know that. I take notes as I'm having a conversation with someone because it spark something in me. It's an insight or it's just something that I can really relate to. So typically, I have use a combination of the show notes, and then I've maybe hired someone else then to do that. So whoever is editing the the podcast, they're listening, and they're coming up with the show notes as well. Now I have AI that can do the show notes. So it can pick out some of the key points.
Aoife O'Brien [:
It can break them down into different topics, it can highlight, some bullet points as well for me. Here are the here are some of the the main points that we covered. So that's another really fantastic way. And it it saves a lot of time not having to manually create those show notes as well. Another thing that the AI does is it can come up with social media posts. So it can create a post for Twitter in a thread post, it can do a threads post as well for the Instagram threads. It can come up with a, an email that you would send out to your email list, it can come up with LinkedIn as well, and it has all of these suggested things. And what I do is I typically take those, tweak them, and base them on some of the insights that I've had and some of the things that have sparked me as well.
Aoife O'Brien [:
So it's just a huge time saver for me while for doing this podcast. So it's a huge time saver for me for for when I'm putting together this podcast. It makes such a difference. I'm definitely not using it to its full capabilities either. I know there are way more things that I could be doing so optimizing for SEO, for example, understanding a little bit more about those keywords that I mentioned a little bit earlier. And what this allows me to do is spend more time doing those things that are important so that the podcast gets found by the people who need to really listen to what it is that I have to say. Now something that's even newer for me, so something that I'm starting to play around with now. And again, you know, getting emails and LinkedIn messages from people saying that they have this particular type of service, is taking video.
Aoife O'Brien [:
So I record all of my podcasts using Zoom. And I use the video from Zoom and I create short snippets. So I've been doing that for a long time. Again, me being me, I overcomplicated it at the start, and I had 3 different sizes. So I had a square one. I had a portrait one. I had a landscape one. And and at one stage, I would have 3 different clips or 3 different quotes of in and around a minute each and 3 different sizes.
Aoife O'Brien [:
So there is definitely at least 1 guest in the past where I provided them with 9 videos, not thinking how overwhelming would that be to receive 9 videos deals and what will I do with all of these 9 videos. Now I'm getting a bit more savvy about it. And I reduced it down to just 1 clip, and then, you know, who who's gonna watch a square video. I don't know. So we're not doing square videos anymore. We have the, landscape videos that are a kind of a longer clip that goes on to YouTube. And then we have portrait clips that go across Instagram, Gram Reels, Instagram stories, TikTok, and YouTube shorts as well. So they kinda show up in all of these different places.
Aoife O'Brien [:
And I know that video is so important, and video is something that I'm really gonna focus on this year as well in order to grow the podcast, in order to to grow my business as well. But why I'm talking about video now is AI has got so sophisticated that it can take now it takes a while. It takes maybe 20 minutes to produce this, but it can take a 45 minute hour long video, and it can come up with the clips for you. So I'm inputting something that is direct from Zoom, a video that is in landscape like mode, and it will produce something that is good for TikTok, let's say. So it'll be in portrait mode. It picks out the heads from the people who are talking. It it has captions, live captions as you're talking, highlighted captions as well. And the videos are around 45 seconds to a minute.
Aoife O'Brien [:
So that kind of perfect length. AI can come up with 25 of those in that time frame I'm talking about. So it probably takes around 25 minutes for it to produce it, but AI can do that kind of stuff. And I suppose the entire point of today's podcast episode is the fact that AI is not taking my job. AI is enhancing my ability to do my job. AI allows me to spend less time doing those previously labor intensive type of roles and more time spent on the more important aspects of my business, the more important aspects of the biz of the podcast as well. So I just thought maybe you might be interested in a little behind the scenes of how I'm using AI to produce the podcast. Would love to know what you think.
Aoife O'Brien [:
I'm always open to connecting. So do reach out to me on happier at work
