Externally Hosted Shows

Not ready to move your audio hosting? Connect your existing feed and keep your current host. PodcasterPlus handles guest booking, automations, and episode collaboration, and a guided handoff makes publishing on your host painless. If you later decide to move your hosting, a migration wizard brings your back catalogue across.

Before you start

• Connecting an existing feed requires a paid plan. It's not available on the Free plan.
• Have your RSS feed URL handy; your current host's dashboard shows it.

Connect your existing feed

1. From your dashboard, click Create Podcast.
2. Choose Connect existing feed (the alternative, Host with us, sets up PodcasterPlus hosting).
3. In the Connect Your Feed card, paste your RSS Feed URL and click Import. PodcasterPlus imports your podcast details from the feed.
4. Review the imported information, adjust anything you like, and click Create Podcast.

What's different on an external show

Day to day, most of PodcasterPlus works exactly the same: booking links, the episode editor, show notes, guests and credits, and automations. The differences all relate to your audio living elsewhere:

• The Media tab has no audio uploader. Instead it shows the External Feed Link panel (below) and, once published, a Published on external host link to the episode's page on your host.
• Publishing goes through the Publish handoff rather than a one-click Publish Now.
• The Share & embed card doesn't appear; there's no PodcasterPlus-hosted media to embed.
• Your RSS feed continues to be generated and served by your current host.

Episode feed linking

PodcasterPlus keeps each of your episodes matched to its item in your external RSS feed. That link is what makes a future migration merge your existing audio instead of creating duplicates.

Each episode's editor header shows a link status pill:

Pill	Meaning
Linking to feed…	We're searching your feed for this episode. This usually completes within a few minutes once your host publishes the item.
Linked to feed	Matched to an item in your feed.
Pick a match	We found multiple possible matches and need you to choose one.
Not linked to feed	We couldn't find this episode in your feed after several attempts; link it manually.

Link an episode manually

1. Open the episode's Media tab and find the External Feed Link panel. (The Pick a match and Not linked to feed pills also take you straight there.)
2. Under Manually link to an RSS item, choose Pick from feed to select from your feed's unmatched items, or Paste GUID to paste the item's GUID from your host.
3. Click Link to selected item (or Link to GUID).

The panel also offers Re-attempt auto-link to retry automatic matching, and Unlink on linked episodes. Only Producers and Hosts can link or repair episodes.

Feed not updated yet?

Hosts can cache their feeds for up to 30 minutes after you publish. If your new episode isn't in the unmatched list yet, wait a little and click Refresh feed.

Publish with the handoff

When an external episode is ready, the Publish tab shows Prepare to Publish, which opens the Publish handoff page: a copy checklist of everything your external host needs.

1. Work down the cards, copying each field into your host's publish form:
   • Content: episode title, description (Copy text or Copy HTML), and shared show notes
   • Episode details: episode number, season, recording date, and the explicit-content flag
   • Artwork: the cover image, with Copy URL and Download buttons
   • Guest credits: Copy all, or copy each person (and each field) individually
2. The progress rail tracks how many fields you've copied.
3. Publish the episode on your external host.
4. Back in PodcasterPlus, use Confirm publication and pick what happened:
   • It's live now: fill in When did it go live? and optionally the episode's public URL, then click Confirm published.
   • I've scheduled it: fill in When is it set to go live?, then click Confirm scheduled. PodcasterPlus automatically updates the status when the scheduled time arrives.

Confirming keeps your PodcasterPlus episode status in step with reality, so automations and your episode list stay accurate.

Move your hosting to PodcasterPlus

When you're ready to host with us, the migration wizard imports your back catalogue and switches your feed. Start it from your Podcast Settings via Upgrade to PodcasterPlus hosting. The wizard has four steps:

1. Pre-flight: a summary of your feed with three counts: Already linked (episodes that will merge automatically), Needs pairing (episodes to pair in the next step), and Will be created if unpaired (feed items with no PodcasterPlus match). If your feed is out of sync with what we've linked (feed drift), migration is blocked until your host finishes updating; use Refresh feed and try again.
2. Reconcile: pair each unlinked episode with an item from your feed, or choose Skip (will create duplicate). Skipping leaves you with a duplicate episode to clean up after migration, so pair everything you can.
3. Fields: choose whether merged episodes adopt values from your feed: Use RSS titles for matched episodes and Use RSS descriptions for matched episodes. Both default to off, preserving what you wrote in PodcasterPlus.
4. Review: a final summary of merges, new episodes, skips, and overrides. Tick the acknowledgment and click Commit migration.

You'll see Migration started and can leave the page while your back catalogue imports. Subscriber continuity is preserved for matched episodes: their podcast apps keep the same episode identifiers, so nothing shows up as new.

One thing left to do after migrating

On your old host's dashboard, redirect your RSS URL to your new PodcasterPlus feed address (shown on the completion screen). Subscribers' apps follow that redirect and keep receiving new episodes. This switch can't be reversed automatically, which is why the wizard asks you to review everything first.

What's Next?

• Set up guest booking for your show
• Automate your workflow
• Migrated to PodcasterPlus hosting? Upload audio and publish directly.