Steady gives every paying member a private RSS feed for your members-only episodes. Turn the feed on once, and each member gets a personal link they can add to any podcast app — only active members can listen. Activating the feed is the step that lets you distribute paywalled episodes to podcast apps and Spotify.
New to Steady as a podcaster? Start with our introduction to using Steady as a podcaster.
The RSS feed works no matter how you publish your episodes:
Publishing and hosting a podcast episode on Steady
How to activate the audio RSS feed
You can activate the RSS feed once you have a podcast set up on Steady. If you don’t have one yet, start with one of the options above, depending on where you want to publish and host.
Open the Podcast page and select the podcast you want to activate the feed for.
On the Podcast edit page, switch the RSS feed toggle to on.
That’s it — your feed is live, and members can now subscribe (see below).
Activating the RSS feed is also a prerequisite for submitting your podcast to Spotify via Spotify Open Access. Once your podcast is submitted to Spotify, you can no longer de-activate the feed.
Steady’s feed, Spotify or Podigee: which to pick
With so many hosting options, it can be hard to know which is right. Two pointers:
Already publish a free podcast on Podigee or Spotify? It usually makes most sense to deliver your members-only episodes there too, so listeners don’t have to switch apps. Go with the platform most of your audience already uses.
Brand-new podcast, supported by paying members from the start? Steady’s own audio RSS feed is probably the best fit. You can also send each episode straight to supporters by newsletter, so members never miss one.
How members subscribe to your feed
Your paying members subscribe to your exclusive podcast straight from the RSS feed. We partnered with Podlove so they can add the feed to the podcast app of their choice in a couple of taps.
After buying a plan, members see a Subscribe button in three places:
on the Thank You page,
in the confirmation email they receive after purchase,
on the membership card in their Steady account.
Tapping it opens the Podlove widget, showing your podcast cover art and title:
Next, the member picks where to subscribe. Choosing an option opens that app and subscribes them there, so they never miss a new episode:
If they choose Other app, they see the premium RSS feed link to copy and paste into any app manually:
This is all walked through in our member-facing help article — feel free to share it with your members.
Frequently asked questions
What happens if a member cancels?
They lose access to the exclusive audio feed when their membership expires, and their individual RSS feed stops working.
What happens if I set an episode to “Visible to: everyone”?
The episode becomes accessible to everyone through your posts, including non-members.
Still need help?
Email us at support@steadyhq.com and we’ll be glad to help.
Related articles: