Brands’ Podcasts Dissected: All About the Duolingo Podcast
Reviewing podcasts of famous brands and trying to learn from them.
What can be better than learning from those who already made it? In our new blog section #BrandsPodcastsDissected, we’ll be reviewing podcasts of famous brands and try to learn from them so that you can later leverage their insights in your own podcasting journey.
The first brand whose podcast we wanted to dissect is Duolingo, an online app and tool for learning languages. Let’s see what the guys do in terms of podcasting.
Duolingo: General details
You’ve surely seen this green owl or at least stumbled upon those screenshots on X-formerly-Twitter with vicious threats the Duolingo owl makes when a student skips a day of language learning. But if you have no clue what Duolingo is, let us briefly provide you with a bit of general info about the company.
The short explanation is that Duolingo is a language-learning platform that helps people learn a language through a variety of gamified tasks—speaking, translating, listening, and multiple-choice tasks are a few to name. The platform provides grading and offers products like Duolingo tests, tiny cards, podcasts, stories, and a dictionary. Available as a mobile application on Android, iOS, and Windows platforms, as well as through the Duolingo.com web platform, Duolingo caters to over 500 million users worldwide.
But there are plenty of language-learning tools on the market, and Duolingo is among the most popular ones. In 2021, Duolingo was the dominant language learning platform for installs, accounting for 63% of total installs across the top 10 most popular apps. How come? Gamification is the answer. The gamified approach of the green owl makes the usually dull learning experience engaging and fun. Duolingo leverages an algorithm that adapts to a student's level and even learning style, so the whole process is pretty personalised—the platform shares feedback and recommendations tailored to each student.
Another gamified perk that incites users to keep on is the grading system. Users progress through skills placed along a "tree," with the goal of completing each skill to turn it "golden" or "legendary." There are also Leagues for users to compete against friends or globally based on XP earned in a week.
We’re not even mentioning the push notifications the Duolingo owl sends—these are a huge contributing factor to the platforms’ popularity as they’ve already become a meme and are highly viral on social media.
And here’s the meme that came out of it.
Duolingo Podcast: What’s it about?
This is basically a part of the learning process within the platform. The Duolingo Podcast is a free show available in English, Spanish, Portuguese, and French; the idea behind it is to improve listening comprehension of students with the help of stories.
The podcast covers various topics, from culture to personal stories, from history to human experiences, so learning is quite engaging and doesn’t let users get bored, thanks to the variety of angles the podcast touches on.
For instance, in the podcasts that focus on Spanish and Portuguese, the narration features real-life stories of everyday people from Central and South America. They show (or rather, tell) snippets of their lives rather than travel or culture. The stories are also guided by an English-speaking narrator and include parts told in the first-person.
Who are the listeners?
The audience of the show are obviously learners who want to improve their listening comprehension skills in various languages. So if you’re learning Spanish, French, or Portuguese, you might like what Duolingo has to say in their podcast. Some topics might be insightful for those who don’t seek to enhance their language skills as well.
The Duolingo podcast format & structure
Duolingo wouldn’t be Duolingo without something extra added to its show, right? The part we found the most interesting is that the podcast’s episodes are structured in some sort of bilingual format, alternating between the target language and English to aid comprehension. The duration of each episode is typically around 15 minutes, so students won’t get tired while listening to the show. We’ve listened to a few episodes and can say that Duolingo's show is well-produced and narrated.
The show is an entirely audio podcast and doesn’t have video episodes.
Is it a solo or co-hosted show?
It’s primarily a solo podcast and it features narrated stories with an English-speaking narrator guiding listeners through the stories. Some episodes are co-hosted, though.
How is the Duolingo Podcast distributed?
Like all other podcasts out there, Duolingo hosts its show on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Google Podcasts (the latter shuts down soon, so make sure you transfer all your subscriptions!).
Duolingo regularly releases new episodes of the podcast to keep the content fresh and engaging for its audience.
🔴"Duo’s Film Club — Fresa y chocolate" — This episode features a cult classic from Cuba, "Fresa y chocolate," which broke barriers in the world of cinema, telling the story of two unlikely friends and sending a powerful message of acceptance and diversity while showcasing Cuba's culture.
Record your own podcast with Waveroom
If you're inspired by the example of Duolingo, you can make your own show too! The absolute minimum you need to start a podcast includes a mic, recording software, your voice, and ideas! But if you want to dive deeper into the subject, check our ultimate guide on how to record a podcast from scratch.
So, here's how to do it with Waveroom, our free online podcast recording studio that locally captures your show:
- Log in to your Waveroom account or create it if you don't have one.
- Click Create Room.
3. Set your Video, Audio, and Record preferences under the video preview in the Devices tab.
4. Click the Go to Test Record button to see how you're going to look and sound, or head over straight to Start Meeting to start recording.
5. Once you've finished the recording, Click Stop Recording.
6. Wait a few seconds while the meeting recording is being saved and press the cross button in the left corner to leave the room.
You will get back to the room that stores all the recordings you've just made, whether audio-only or video. Here, you can play and download the locally recorded video and audio files of each person who participated in the meeting.
If you've recorded a podcast in a noisy environment and some ambient sound has seeped into the recording, follow the remaining steps to cancel it out.
7. Press the Remove Noise button at the bottom of your screen to get rid of noise from all the recordings in the room.
The noise removal feature can be applied to both audio and video tracks.
All the tracks that have been post-processed are labelled with a noise removal icon.
8. Export tracks by pressing the downward arrow icon.