When you sign up to Captivate you have the option of either starting a brand new podcast, or importing as many podcasts as you like from your old podcast hosting provider at no extra cost!
Importing your podcast to Captivate is easy, secure and can be done in a matter of minutes without the loss of any of your listeners.
Are you new to Captivate? Every podcaster gets a 7 day free trial when they sign up with us, alternatively check out our features to see that we offer (hint: so much more than just hosting)
Before we get started...
If you have any kind of dynamic ads or content on your show (pre-roll, mid-roll, post-roll), you will need to make sure you have disabled these before following these import steps. If left in, this can break up the audio file and cause issues when trying to import.
Sometimes your old host will have it set that your show must only display, for example, 150 episodes in your feed. We have made sure that Captivate checks your episode numbers and that if we detect that your show has published more episodes than are in your feed, we let you know to change that setting in your old host before importing. It's the little things, right?
For added security, when you begin importing an RSS feed, Captivate will trigger a verification email to the address registered to the feed, letting you know that the import has started.
If you have transcripts on your podcast, these won’t be imported, since they use the transcript tag and don’t appear in your public RSS feed. We’re looking at how to bring over transcripts, but for now you’ll need to manually re-upload to your episodes.
Here's your complete, 4 step-by-step guide to importing your podcast:
Step 1: Current feed URL
In your Captivate dashboard, click the Import your podcast button, which will open up the Current Feed URL screen. This lets you paste your current RSS feed into the import box, as well as choose which host your podcast is currently hosted with.
If your current host isn't included in the dropdown, you can simply choose "Other" as your option. Once completed, click Next: Check show information.
Step 2: Check show information
To make sure you've copied the correct RSS feed from your existing host, we show you a small sample set of your most recent episodes, including artwork, episode title, publish date, and episode number. If this information looks good, click Next: Check feed settings.
Step 3: Check feed settings
This is where you can check the information that we're pulling from your previous host, to make sure that your show description looks good, and replicates what you currently have set for your show. This includes:
Artwork, authors, show intro, and copyright.
Show description.
Categories.
Is the show explicit.
Is the show episodic, in seasons, or serial.
Website link.
How many episodes we'll be importing.
If this information is correct, click on Next: Set up your feed URL.
Step 4: Set up new feed URL
To help the various podcast apps update your show now that you're hosted with Captivate, we need to create a new RSS feed for your show, to take over from your previous host's feed.
We'll create a default feed for you during the import process, but you can change this to one of your own preference. Simply change the suffix after https://feeds.captivate.fm/ to your own wording.
Once you've completed your RSS feed URL and checked the redirect box, click Import My Podcast.
And that's it - your podcast is now imported, and ready to start publishing new episodes with Captivate! 👍
Once you're happy with everything, you'll need to create a 301 redirect from your old host to Captivate, so the podcast apps can update their feeds to show your podcast is now hosted on Captivate - you can read more on that in our 301 redirect guide.
Once the redirect is in place, we recommend keeping your old hosting account open for 30 days, to ensure all podcast apps and platforms have updated to your new Captivate feed.
Note: After you import your podcast from another host, you do not need to submit your show to Apple, Spotify etc again - they will read the 301 redirect from your old host and automatically know that you've moved.
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