Someone on your leadership team said the company should start a podcast. Before you go shopping for microphones, here is an honest breakdown of what a series actually costs and the situations where a company podcast will bring you nothing but an invoice. We are a production studio, so we have every reason to talk you into one. We are still going to tell you when not to do it.
Key takeaways
- An audio episode costs roughly 150 to 400 euros to produce, a two camera video episode 600 to 1 500 euros. A twelve episode series lands somewhere between 2 000 and 18 000 euros depending on format.
- The most expensive line item is not production, it is your team's time. One episode eats about half a day from two or three people, and nobody invoices that, so it never shows up in the budget.
- According to a Podnews report from May 2025, cited by Forbes, 90 percent of podcasts stop publishing after episode three. A podcast is not a campaign, it is a commitment.
- Only about 487 000 of the 4.52 million podcasts tracked worldwide had published anything in the previous 90 days (PodcastStatistics, September 2025). Roughly one in ten shows is actually alive.
- A simple decision rule: if you cannot commit to 12 episodes up front and you do not have a named person to host them, do not start.
What does a company podcast actually cost?
Between 150 and 1 500 euros per episode, and that spread is not random. One thing decides where you land: audio only, or video. Here is the breakdown so you can see where the money really goes.
Audio podcast, one episode:
- Story planning and question prep: 2 to 4 hours
- Recording in a studio or at your office: 2 hours including setup
- Editing, noise cleanup, mastering: 3 to 5 hours
- Hosting and distribution to Spotify and Apple Podcasts: 10 to 20 euros a month for the whole series
- Total: roughly 150 to 400 euros per episode
Video podcast, one episode:
- Everything from the audio version
- Two or three cameras, lighting, crew: half a shoot day
- Multicam edit, colour, graphics, subtitles: 6 to 10 hours of post production
- Three to five short clips for social: 3 to 6 extra hours
- Total: roughly 600 to 1 500 euros per episode
One trick we use, and so does most of the industry: record two or three episodes in a single day. Setting up lights and sound takes the same time whether you shoot one episode or three, so batching often cuts your per episode cost by a third. If you want to see how this fits your wider spend, read our piece on how much to invest in marketing.
Why do most company podcasts die after episode three?
Because nobody planned them as a year long commitment, only as a good idea for one quarter. According to the Podnews report from May 2025, quoted by Forbes in its January 2026 look at why podcasts fail, 90 percent of shows stop after their third episode. Another big wave drops off before episode twenty, and shows that reach thirty episodes sit in the top one percent for longevity.
Inside companies the pattern is always the same. The first three episodes get recorded in a burst of enthusiasm on one day. The fourth needs scheduling, the guest reschedules twice, the host has a deadline, and the series quietly dies. Not because it was bad, but because it was never in anyone's job description.
So the first question we ask a client is boring and always the same: who exactly is hosting this, and how many hours a week do they have blocked for it? When the answer is "we will figure that out later", we already know how the story ends.
When will a podcast do nothing for your company?
When you need leads within three months. A podcast is a slow channel that builds trust and authority, not a performance tool with measurable returns in the first quarter. If you need enquiries now, put the money into ads or sales videos instead of microphones.
Four specific situations where we talk clients out of a series:
- You have nothing to say. If your company sells a commodity and nobody inside has a strong opinion about the industry, you will produce an hour of polite waffle. Listeners spot that within two minutes.
- You want it instead of the basics. We have seen companies fund a podcast while running a website from 2016 without even a content plan. That order is backwards.
- Your audience is tiny. If you sell to forty customers across Central Europe, you will reach them faster in person than through interviews aimed at strangers.
- Nobody in leadership wants the microphone. A reluctant host is audible. Better no show than a forced one.
One more thing podcast agencies do not enjoy hearing. Numbers like "75 percent of B2B decision makers listen to podcasts" circulate widely online. Try tracing one back to its original survey and you usually land on another agency blog quoting a third agency blog. Do not build a business case on figures whose methodology you cannot find.
When is a company podcast worth it?
When you have a long sales cycle, an expensive product and a person people actually want to listen to. Then a podcast does something a banner never will: it gives a prospective client forty minutes with your thinking in their ear, repeatedly. Six months later, when they are choosing a supplier, you are already familiar.
Here is a test you can run today in fifteen minutes. Answer five questions, and if you score fewer than four yeses, shelve the series:
- Do we have a named host with hours actually blocked in their calendar?
- Can we write the titles of the first twelve episodes right now?
- Do we have commitments from at least five guests our customers recognise?
- Can we fund a full year, not three episodes?
- Do we know what we will measure, and can we live with it looking bad for six months?
On that last point, agree your metrics up front. Not download counts, but completion rate, saves, and how many people mention the show on a first sales call. We wrote a separate guide on choosing marketing KPIs.
Set the format up properly and the series feeds your other channels too. One hour long episode yields three to five short videos, an article and a handful of LinkedIn quotes. That is roughly how we handle content on projects like Mozgová Atletika. If you are weighing up a video version, have a look at what our video production involves.
Frequently asked questions
How long should a company podcast episode be?
Shorter than you think. Research by ResSOLUTION Group and Nielsen from January 2024 found that 62 percent of listeners in Slovakia prefer episodes under 30 minutes, and half of those prefer under 15. Unless your guest can genuinely hold attention for an hour, aim for 20 to 30 minutes.
Is a video version worth it, or is audio enough?
If you can only afford one, start with audio and find out whether you can sustain the series at all. Video doubles or triples your costs, but it gives you material for social and for YouTube, where people actively search for shows. A sensible compromise is one locked off camera for clips, with everything else handled in audio.
How many episodes before we see a result?
Budget for twelve episodes and six months before you have enough data to decide. The first three episodes tell you almost nothing about quality, because your listeners are mostly colleagues and friends.
Can we record the podcast in our own office?
Yes, and we often do. You need a room with carpet or curtains, no echo, and no air conditioning above your head. Bad sound cannot be rescued in the edit the way a dim image can be lit, so room acoustics matter more to the result than the price of the microphone.
If this breakdown left you unsure whether a podcast is the right format for your company, get in touch. We will go through your audience and your capacity together, and we will tell you honestly if the answer is no. Drop us a line through our contact page and we will set up a call.
