The show was not the problem — the absence of infrastructure was
Fifty-five episodes and a guest list most shows would envy, distributed across six platforms, none of them owned. No website, no email capture, no indexable surface, and no single URL that was the canonical answer to the brand’s own name.
A rented audience is a real audience right up until the platform changes its mind. Everything in this build exists to convert that into something the show holds itself.
Front-loaded before a single layout
Business-goal research and a brand audit came first, then a competitor analysis across six established shows, then ICP and persona development for the two audiences that actually pay — sponsors and guests.
The information architecture was built around a three-layer offering hierarchy: the core podcast, bridge content, and the commercial surface. Eight user flows were mapped before layout, so the structure answered real journeys rather than a navigation convention.
- Three-layer hierarchyCore podcast, bridge content and commercial surface — so sponsorship and speaking do not have to interrupt the show to be findable.
- Eight user flows, mapped firstListener, sponsor, guest, event organiser and press each have a path that was designed rather than inherited.
- A one-founder content modelDynamic CMS templates for episodes, guests and show notes, so publishing does not require a developer.
A canonical home, and the surfaces that make it earn
Thirty-one pages at launch: structured show notes and guest metadata so every episode and guest is indexable, a media kit and press kit for sponsors, a newsletter lead magnet for owned-audience capture, and an enquiry funnel that gives sponsorship somewhere to land.
One hundred and twenty-one items were checked against a pre-launch QA list before it went live.
Email capture went from none to one. That sounds trivial written down, and it is the difference between an audience you reach and an audience you own.