81: What to Do If You've Been Rejected by Apple Podcasts
If you've been rejected by Apple Podcasts, chances are that you're feeling confused and frustrated.
I get it and I'm here to tell you that, most of the time, it's not really that big of a hassle to get it fixed.
Take a listen to this quick episode to find out the most common reasons for rejection to see if any of them apply to your show. If they do, you should be able to make a few small tweaks, resubmit your show, and then receive your approval.
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Transcript
Welcome to podcasting for coaches. I'm Britany Felix and I'm a podcast launch consultant who specializes in helping coaches and consultants utilize the power of podcasting as a way to build brand awareness and generate new leads for their business. I realize not every new coach or consultant can afford to hire someone to help launch their show. So I created this podcast as a way to guide you through the process of launching and utilizing your very own podcast to help you grow your business and reach a new audience of adoring followers and potential clients. If you're ready to get your voice and podcast out into the world, head over to podcasting for coaches.com to learn more. Welcome to Episode 81, of podcasting for coaches. So you've been rejected by Apple podcasts, I am sure that felt like a punch to the gut. But don't worry, chances are, it's probably a simple thing that you need to fix. And then you can resubmit and you'll be approved. So let's go ahead and just jump right in here and go over some of the main reasons why a show gets rejected by Apple podcasts because it is the most strict platform. So it is of course, the one that people get rejected by the most. The number one reason that a show gets rejected by Apple podcasts is because there is something in their artwork that's not meeting Apple's requirements. Now, by artwork, I mean, the main cover art. So the main image for your show, Apple has very strict Apple requirements. And you will see some people that are not following along with this. Maybe you said at a show a few months ago or a year or two ago, and you didn't have this problem. But at this moment that I am recording this episode, may 2020. Here are what the requirements are. And every single one of these has to be met in order to get approved, the image needs to be an absolute square, the size of the image has to be a minimum of 1400 by 1400 pixels, and a maximum of 3000 by 3000 pixels. Now, Pandora wants 3000 by 3000. So I recommend going with that. But the image also has to be an exact square. so it cannot be 2999 by 3000, it needs to be 3000 by 3000. And speaking of file size, the actual size of the file, so not how big it is when you look at it, but the file size itself has to be under 510 kilobytes. Now, I recommend going under 500. Just because different programs can read this file size a little bit differently. So your computer may say it's 508. But Apple system may read it as 512. And that could cause it to get rejected. If you need to make your file size a little bit smaller because it is too big, especially if you're going with a 3000 by 3000 pixel image, you can use an image compressor, which app will actually recommend using anyways. And that will basically shrink the data it literally like compresses that file size down and remove some of the data in it so that it doesn't take up as much space in like a storage system. Now when you do this, be careful because every single time that you do it, since a little bit of that data is removed, the picture becomes a little bit less clear each time. So if you compress this image over and over and over again, eventually it will become blurry and like pixelated looking, and you definitely don't want that. So go easy on the compression. And I do have a tool for you, tiny PNG or tiny jpg.com to help you with that compression. And of course the link will be in the show notes. The resolution needs to be 72 dpi. This is one that's hanging a lot of people up. And it's one that they haven't endorsed until all that recently, the first show that I saw that got rejected because of this was actually my own. It was my other podcast for some gossip that I submitted to Apple this past December. And it was the very first one I've ever had that got rejected because of the DPI. I created the image of myself and Canva and Canva automatically defaults to 96 DPI, which Apple does not want. So there are some converters that I will have in the show notes that you can try if this ends up being an issue for you. Of course, you can always just talk to a graphic designer and have them do it as well. The file type needs to be a JPEG or a PNG and the color space needs to be rbg. And if you use Canva, that's their default so you don't have to worry about it. However, there are a couple of things with the images that a lot of people don't realize. So they also don't want it to be blurry. They don't want it to be pixelated and they don't want it to have anything that has to do with Apple whatsoever. So it cannot have a logo for Apple podcasts or iTunes or Apple and it cannot have the terms Apple Inc Apple podcasts Apple Music, iTunes Store or it tunes, it cannot have a visual representation of any Apple hardware. And I have actually seen some other shows that have been rejected for other logos as well. There was one artwork that I saw on a Facebook group. And it was this really cute image of somebody like sitting on a couch. And they had like a little table next to him that had like a magazine rack. And there were magazines stacked on top of it. And some DVDs, I think, and one of the things that like a magazine title or said, like Netflix or something, it was just this little animated drawing. And that was super cute. But it had another brand's name in it and their logo. And that is a big No, no. So just make sure you don't have anything like that in your image, and especially not anything related to Apple. Now, they also don't want any references to illegal drugs or violence. And here's another one, they don't want any explicit language. And I'm going to follow that up by saying not just in the artwork, but in the title of the show itself. Now, I know, I know, I can hear you already saying, but so and so has this podcast, and they've got this language in it, and they've got this cuss word in it, and they've got this explicit word. I totally get that. I know that it's frustrating, but it's technically against Apple's policy. So maybe they have gone through when policies were a little more lacks, maybe the algorithm or the bot or whatever that approves, it just didn't catch that. But that doesn't mean they won't for you. So if you have an explicit word in your artwork, or in your title, that is another reason you could be rejected. And I'm going to follow that up even more by saying that even if you have a self censored word, in your artwork, or your official title, you could still be rejected. They technically don't want any explicit or self censored language in your artwork, your main show title, your episode title, or your episode descriptions even. So you can try it. And you honestly probably will get away with it. But Apple absolutely can remove your show from their platform at any time without any warning if you violate this policy. And it doesn't matter how long you have been podcasting, if you violate one of Apple's policies, even if your show is four years old, you could see it vanish in the blink of an eye, it's there one day and gone the next. And this absolutely happens. So just keep that in mind when you're assessing whether or not you want your artwork or show title, especially to have any explicit language. And if you've been rejected, and you do have explicit language, that's a very good possibility of why. And then the last reason that is common for why you can be rejected is because you have no rating selected for your show. So here's the thing, you can have explicit content or language in the artwork, the show title, the episode titles or the episode descriptions. But that doesn't mean you can't have it in the show itself. Apple doesn't care. If you want to go drop an F bombs left and right, you can you just have to mark the show explicit. So if you have submitted your podcast to Apple podcast, and it is rejected, go back and look at your feed and make sure that you selected either clean or explicit. Again, they don't care which one, they just need something selected, and it should be accurate for your show. Okay, so super quick episode. Those are the main reasons why someone gets rejected by Apple podcasts. If you have gone through your artwork, and it meets all the requirements, and you don't have any branding, or business names or logos that you don't own, and you don't have anything Apple related, and you don't have any explicit content anywhere, you don't have anything promoting drugs, or violence or anything. And you also have your ratings selected for your show, and it still was rejected. There's something else has gone wrong in the process. At this point, you can run the show through and you can actually do this at the very beginning, when you first find out you're rejected in case you don't know which one of these it might be. But especially if you've gone through all these things, and they all seem good. I want you to use something called a feed validator. What this says is you take the RSS Feed URL, so that same URL that you used when you applied to Apple podcasts and run it through a couple of feed validators, which are just websites and see what they say. So a couple of options here are feed validator.org pod base and cast feed validator. When you input your URL in here, it will run a diagnostic test basically, and tell you what parts of your feed look good and what parts might need them correcting. So this can also point you in the right direction. If after that if you don't understand what's happening with the feed validator you don't know what it's told you. You just cannot figure out what's gone wrong. Contact your hosting service. If you host with Lipson like I recommend that you do just reach out to Lipson customer support team and say, hey, I've been rejected by Apple podcasts. I already looked through all of these things. I ran it through a feed validator here's what I got. I have no idea what's gone wrong. Is there something wrong with my feed and they can look into it for you. Alright, so super quick episode today. But if you just don't want to be bothered with this, if you don't want to have to dig into this at all, you can absolutely feel free to reach out to me and I can perform an audit of your show. So in addition to checking all of these requirements that I mentioned in this episode running at the refeed, validator, all of those things, I can actually just take a look at everything for your show, I can look at the show notes, the presence on the website, how you have the feed set up, even go so far as to listen to your trailer episode and provide feedback. So again, I can perform a full audit and help you really get things nailed down so that there's no more delay in getting your podcast and your voice, and your message and your services out into the world to new audience. If you want more information on this audit, there will of course be a link in the show notes, as well as a link to everything else I mentioned in this episode. So just go to podcasting for coaches. com, click on the podcast tab in the main menu and then go to episode number 81. That's going to wrap things up. And I hope that you will join me next week for another episode. Have a fantastic week. And that wraps up another episode of podcasting for coaches. If you'd like to connect with me further, you can do so on Instagram at podcasting for coaches. If you know it's time to finally get serious about starting your podcast, go to podcasting for coaches comm and click on the work with me tab in the main menu to learn more about my one on one launch consultation packages or my self paced online course. And I look forward to seeing the podcast that you create and put out into the world.