More tourism boards are asking the same question: should we have a podcast? It's a good question, and for most destinations the answer is yes. But it's the second question that decides whether the investment pays off: who should make it?
Search for a podcast production agency and you'll find hundreds. Most of them are very good at what they do, which is recording interviews, editing audio and publishing episodes for businesses of every kind. A destination needs something different. You aren't selling a product that can be explained; you're selling a place that has to be felt. That changes what good looks like, and it changes what you should ask before you sign anything.
Here's what we'd look for if we were on your side of the table.
1. Do they understand travel, or just podcasting?
A generalist podcast production company can make a clean, professional show. What it usually can't do is tell your story the way a traveler needs to hear it. Destination marketing has its own rhythm: the seasonality, the tension between visitor growth and community, the stakeholders who all need to see their corner of the region represented, the travel trade who will use the content long after launch.
Ask to hear travel work specifically. Not a sizzle reel, but full episodes made for other destinations. Then listen to one the whole way through, the way a traveler would. If you reach the end wanting to go there, that tells you more than any pitch deck.
2. Will they record on location?
This is the single clearest dividing line in travel audio. A lot of destination podcasts are recorded in a studio: a host, a guest on a video call, a conversation about a place. They can be informative. They are rarely transporting.
The episodes that move people are recorded where the story happens. The crunch of snow on a trail. The guide's voice catching as she describes the valley her family has farmed for generations. The market, the surf, the silence at the top of the climb. That sound is what puts a listener inside your destination, and it can't be added in post-production. Ask any agency you're considering how much of each episode is recorded in the field, and who actually goes.
3. Who is telling the story?
Audio producers make episodes sound good. Writers make them worth listening to. The best travel podcasts are built by people who have spent their careers turning places into stories, travel writers and broadcasters who know how to find the one human moment that makes a destination unforgettable.
Look at who will script and host your episodes, and what they have done before. Awards aren't everything, but recognition from the travel and broadcast industries is a useful signal that the storytelling holds up to people who judge it for a living.
4. What happens after launch?
This is where most destination podcasts quietly fail. The episodes are beautiful, the launch goes out on social, and then the show sits on Spotify and Apple Podcasts waiting to be discovered. It usually isn't.
A new podcast starts with no audience, and building one from zero takes years. So the most important question you can ask an agency is not how they make the show, but how they get it heard. Do they have an existing audience of travelers they can put your episodes in front of on day one? Do they have distribution partners beyond the standard podcast apps? Can they tell you, with numbers, how many people heard the last campaign they made?
If the answer is "we'll help you promote it," budget for the promotion yourself, because that's what it means.
5. How will you measure it?
Downloads matter, but they're only the start. For a destination, the real value of audio is time: a listener who spends twenty-five minutes inside your story is forming an attachment that a two-second scroll never will. Ask how the agency reports on listening time and completion, not just plays, and how those numbers compare with your other channels.
Then ask for case studies. Real campaigns, real downloads, real outcomes for destinations like yours. Any agency confident in its work will have them ready.
6. Who owns it when you're done?
A well-made destination podcast is evergreen. The story of your coastline or your music heritage will be as true in five years as it is today, which means the content should keep working for you on your website, in your newsletters, with your travel trade team and at trade shows. Make sure the contract gives you the rights to use it everywhere, indefinitely, without renegotiating each time.
A short checklist for your RFP
If you're writing a brief or comparing proposals, these are the questions worth putting to every agency:
- Travel experience: Can we hear full episodes you've made for other destinations?
- On location: How much of each episode is recorded in the field, and who records it?
- Storytelling: Who writes and hosts the episodes, and what is their background in travel?
- Distribution: What audience will hear this in the first month, and through which channels?
- Results: What were the downloads and listening time on your last three destination campaigns?
- Ownership: Do we own the finished content outright, for use on any channel?
How we answer those questions
We built Armchair Productions around exactly these answers. Every episode is written by award-winning travel writers and recorded on location. Every project features on our own show, Armchair Explorer, which sits in the top 1% of podcasts globally with more than 40,000 downloads a month, and we submit every episode to our airline network, where 75% of what we submit gets picked up. Our campaigns average 26 minutes of engagement per episode. Hidden Trails of Oregon passed 100,000 downloads and won the ESTO Mercury Award for Best Broadcast Marketing Campaign. And the content is yours to keep.
If you're wondering why audio matters more than ever for destinations, our piece on how AI search is changing travel marketing explains why the feeling, not the facts, is the part of your story worth owning.
Frequently asked questions
What does a podcast production agency do for a tourism board?
A specialist agency plans, writes, records, edits and distributes a podcast that tells your destination's story. For a tourism board or DMO, that should include recording on location, working with your partners and stakeholders to find the right stories, and getting the finished episodes in front of travelers, not just publishing them.
Should a DMO launch its own podcast or feature on an existing show?
Ideally both. Your own branded podcast is an asset you own forever, but it starts with no audience. Featuring the same episodes on an established travel show gives you listeners from day one while your own feed grows.
How do you measure the success of a destination podcast?
Track downloads, but pay closer attention to listening time and completion rates, which show how deeply travelers engaged with your story. Compare those against the time people spend with your other content, and look at how the episodes perform when reused across your website, social channels and travel trade.
Armchair Productions makes award-winning audio for the travel industry: stories that put travelers inside a destination long before they book. If you're weighing up a podcast for your destination, we'd love to talk.