The Problem
Many businesses struggle with maintaining consistent content production for newsletters and podcasts. Manual creation is time-consuming, often taking 8+ hours per newsletter issue. Some companies skip months entirely due to resource constraints, damaging customer engagement.
A real estate company faced this exact challenge. They needed to keep leads engaged with monthly updates but lacked the bandwidth for manual content creation. Their podcast aspirations were similarly stalled by production demands.
The Tools
Make.com provides the automation backbone, connecting specialized AI tools into complete workflows. The solution combines:
- Feedly for content aggregation
- OpenAI for analysis and writing
- Google Sheets for content storage
- Mailchimp for newsletter distribution
- ElevenLabs for voice generation
- Spreaker for podcast publishing
Each component handles a specific task while Make orchestrates the entire process automatically.
The Setup
The automation follows a structured approach to transform raw content into polished newsletters and podcasts. The system evaluates, filters, and enhances content at each stage.
Key steps include content classification, relevance scoring, summary generation, and formatting for different media. The entire process runs on autopilot once configured, with optional human review points.
Newsletter Automation
The newsletter workflow begins with content ingestion from selected RSS feeds. Each article undergoes AI evaluation to determine its suitability for inclusion.
First, the system classifies articles as local or national. Local content then gets checked for specific geographic relevance. Articles passing these filters receive an impact score from 1-5.
Only high-scoring content (3+) proceeds to the next stage. The AI generates concise summaries in a specified writing style, then compiles them with an introductory paragraph.
Finally, the formatted content pushes to Mailchimp using predefined templates. The system can schedule sends or flag content for human approval before distribution.
Pro tip: Use structured prompts with clear evaluation criteria (like the 1-5 impact scale) to get consistent, predictable results from AI analysis.
Podcast Automation
The podcast workflow shares initial steps with the newsletter process but diverges at content formatting. After selecting top articles, the AI creates audio-optimized summaries.
These summaries convert to natural-sounding voiceovers using ElevenLabs' text-to-speech. The system assembles complete episodes by combining multiple segments with appropriate pacing.
Finished episodes upload automatically to Spreaker via API. Like the newsletter, this process can incorporate human review or run completely autonomously.
The result is a professional-quality podcast produced without recording equipment or studio time. Content updates whenever new relevant articles appear, keeping episodes fresh.
Pro tip: When generating audio content, specify "podcast-style" delivery in your prompts. This produces more natural pacing and emphasis for spoken word.