Setup Wizard Walkthrough

The Setup Wizard runs automatically after you install Benecaster. It walks you through configuring your show and connecting your membership plugin before you publish your first subscriber feed. The whole process takes about ten minutes.

If you close the wizard early, it saves your progress. A “Benecaster setup is paused. Resume setup” notice appears at the top of every Benecaster admin page until you complete or skip the remaining steps. The Resume link is bold and underlined so it reads clearly as a link in any admin theme.

If a step will not continue. A step moves on only once its answers are saved. If the save fails, the step stays on screen with the reason in red underneath it:

• the site’s own reason, such as “Show limit reached. Please upgrade your plan to add more shows.” at the show-name step;
• “Your session has expired. Reload this page to carry on from this step.” when your login has timed out;
• “Could not reach your site. Please try again.” when the connection dropped.

Fix what it names and press Continue again. While a step is saving, Continue, ← Back and Skip are greyed out, so pressing twice never creates two shows.

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Step 1 — Show Name

Name your podcast. This is the public-facing display name that appears in podcast apps and on your site.

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Step 2 — Artwork

Upload your show’s cover art. Podcast apps require a square image — 3000 × 3000 px at 72 dpi is the standard. The wizard accepts JPEG or PNG and crops to square if needed.

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Step 3 — Description

Describe your show. The Description step collects two fields:

Short description — a one-line tagline, recommended under 500 characters. This is what appears in podcast app search results and directory listings.

Full description — up to 4000 characters. This is the full description shown on your show’s directory listing page and in your RSS feed’s <itunes:summary> tag.

Both are saved to your show record when you click Continue.

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Step 4 — Category

Choose the primary category and subcategory for your show. These map to the Apple Podcasts and Spotify category taxonomy and appear in your RSS feed’s <itunes:category> tag.

The dropdowns use standard OS-native select elements with explicit text styling — the selected option always reads correctly regardless of browser or OS.

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Step 5 — Show Details

A few more fields that appear in podcast app listings and your RSS feed:

Clicking Continue saves all four fields to your show and also writes a derived copyright string — © {year} {author name} — so your feed doesn’t ship with the placeholder “© 2026 Your Name” text.

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Step 6 — Subscribers

This step determines whether your show will have paying subscribers.

“Yes — I want paying subscribers”

This option shows the Connect to Benecaster button. Clicking it starts the OAuth connection flow:

1. The wizard calls the plugin’s license start endpoint and receives a redirect URL.
2. Your browser is taken to benecaster.com/connect, where you log in to (or create) your Benecaster account and authorize the connection.
3. Benecaster.com redirects back to your WordPress admin, stores the per-show token automatically, and completes the wizard end-to-end — the remaining steps (subscription plugin, tier mapping, limits, SSP import, language, permalink settings) are marked complete and you land on the wizard’s Done screen.

After Connect: The wizard is fully complete. No “Resume setup” notice appears. You can configure the optional areas (subscription plugin, tier mapping, and so on) at any time from their respective settings pages — Benecaster → Shows → [your show] → Settings → Subscription for the bridge and tier mapping, Benecaster → Settings for everything else.

The Subscribers step is marked complete automatically when the OAuth callback succeeds — you don’t need to click Continue.

If you don’t have a Benecaster account yet, the benecaster.com authorize screen includes a sign-up link. The Launch plan is free and allows up to 10 paying subscribers.

If the Connect button is disabled with a “Finish creating your show first” message, you’ll need to complete Step 1 (Show name) before continuing.

See Connecting Your Site for troubleshooting the OAuth flow, including what to do if you see a “site URL mismatch” or “access denied” error.

“Not right now — public podcast only”

Choose this if you publish a free, public show with no subscriber gating. Benecaster saves your preference and skips the subscription plugin, tier mapping, and limit enforcement steps for the rest of the wizard. Your show has its public RSS feed and no private subscriber feeds.

You can always add paying subscribers later from Settings → Account — this choice is not permanent.

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Step 7 — Migration

If you are moving from Patreon, Supercast, or another platform, this step is where you connect your existing subscriber list so Benecaster can import it. If you are starting fresh, click Skip.

See Migration Overview for full instructions on migrating existing subscribers.

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Step 8 — Subscription Plugin

Shown only when a license is active (you chose “Yes — I want paying subscribers” in Step 6).

The step asks How will subscribers pay you? and always offers Built-in membership first: take payments with Stripe, with no other plugin needed. It is marked Recommended when no other membership plugin is installed. Below it you’ll see any membership plugin Benecaster can connect to on your site: MemberPress, WooCommerce Subscriptions, Restrict Content Pro, or Paid Memberships Pro. If none is installed, the step says so and lists the ones Benecaster works with.

• Built-in membership. Saved as your show’s membership option as soon as you continue, even though Stripe and a tier aren’t set up yet. The next two steps collect them.
• An existing membership plugin. Benecaster’s bridge connects once you select it, and the wizard goes on to tier mapping (Step 9).
• “I’ll connect one later.” Saves nothing. Your show keeps its free public feed for now, and you can choose later from Benecaster → Shows → [your show] → Settings → Subscription.

Step 8a — Connect Stripe (Built-in membership only)

Shown only when you chose Built-in membership. You can skip it.

Paste your Stripe test publishable key (starts with pk_test_) and test secret key (starts with sk_test_), then set up a webhook in Stripe. The step shows the webhook URL, with a Copy button, and lists the eight events to select (see Connecting Stripe for Subscriptions for what each one does; customer.updated is optional). Paste the webhook signing secret (starts with whsec_) into the last field. The webhook keeps renewals and cancellations in sync.

Live keys are not entered here. Add them later in Settings → Payments. If you haven’t saved live keys yet, saving your test keys switches payments to test mode so you can try the whole flow before charging anyone.

Choose I’ll add Stripe keys later. to skip. Built-in membership stays selected.

Step 8b — Create Your First Tier (Built-in membership only)

Shown only when you chose Built-in membership. You can skip it.

Name your first membership tier (the suggestion is “Supporter”), set a monthly price, and confirm the three-letter currency code, such as USD, EUR or GBP. Type the price in that currency’s own units: a whole number for currencies without cents, such as 500 for JPY, and up to three decimals for KWD and the other three-decimal currencies. If your show already has a tier, the step tells you and keeps it rather than creating another.

If Stripe Tax is already turned on in the show’s Stripe account, the step also shows a Tax category box with two questions, What kind of content is it? and How do subscribers get it? Nothing is chosen for you, and Continue → waits until you choose. See Setting Up Sales Tax and VAT for help choosing.

Choose I’ll create a tier in Memberships. to skip and add tiers later from Memberships.

Built-in membership starts working by itself once Stripe keys and an active tier both exist. Until then, no one can subscribe.

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Step 9 — Tier Mapping

Shown only when a license is active and you chose an existing membership plugin in Step 8. Built-in membership has no separate levels to map, so it skips this step.

Map the membership levels from your subscription plugin to Benecaster’s internal tiers. This is how Benecaster knows which feed each subscriber should receive.

Your choices for each level, and any tier you added with + Add tier, are kept if you go ← Back and return. Choosing a different membership plugin on How will subscribers pay you? clears them, because the new plugin’s levels are different ones.

See Mapping Your Membership Tiers for a full explanation of how tier mapping works.

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Step 10 — Limits

Shown only when a license is active.

Configure what happens when your show reaches its plan limits.

You answer two questions, one for each limit, and you get the same two on every plan.

• Subscriber limit — “Upgrade my plan automatically (recommended)” or “I’ll upgrade when I’m ready.” Automatic is preselected. Under either answer, over-limit paying subscribers receive your public episodes rather than losing access.
• Token limit — “I’ll upgrade when I’m ready (recommended)” or “Upgrade my plan automatically.” Capping is preselected here, so nothing is charged without you choosing it. Capping does lock over-cap free listeners out of their feed until you upgrade.

The recommendations differ between the two on purpose: the subscriber limit costs you a subscriber’s private access, and the token limit costs you money.

On Launch, answering the subscriber question is a decision about your card. Choosing Upgrade my plan automatically means that going over the paying-subscriber limit converts your license to Starter monthly and charges the card on file, rather than repricing a subscription you already have. That is why the question is asked at signup rather than assumed — see How Subscriber Limits Work for the window and the amount.

This step does not appear on Pro, Multi-Show or Studio: those plans have no subscriber limit and no token cap, so there is nothing to enforce.

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Step 11 — SSP Import

If you have existing episodes in Seriously Simple Podcasting or PowerPress, this step lets you import them into Benecaster. It appears only while that plugin is active. If you have already deactivated it, activate it again and run the import from Benecaster → Settings → Tools → Import Episodes. After the import, the same review table and bulk toolbar described in Step 12 below appear here too, along with a separate list of episodes whose descriptions contain old player shortcodes, each with a Replace shortcodes button. Strip this prefix from episode titles starts with the show’s last prefix when it has imported before. When an import ends, a Redirect your old feed card shows your old and new feed addresses. See Importing Episodes and Switching from SSP or PowerPress for details.

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Step 12 — Import Episodes

Import episode data from your podcast host. The wizard fetches your public RSS feed and maps each episode to a Benecaster episode record.

• Select Yes, enter your existing feed URL, and click Import episodes →
• A progress bar shows the import running; episodes are created as WordPress drafts. Large shows can take a while, and you can leave the page
• After five minutes with no activity the step says the import has stalled and offers Resume. See If an Import Stalls
• Reloading the page rejoins a running import, with Yes chosen for you and the Feed URL field hidden. Continue starts no second import
• Press Continue at any point — if the import is still running, it continues in the background and finishes on its own
• Once complete, a review table lists the imported episodes (title, audio, artwork, description excerpt). The title links to the episode editor — clicking it navigates away from setup, which is expected, not the wizard breaking; use your browser’s back button to return and finish setup afterward. Tick the rows you want to change — or use the header tick box for all of them — then use the toolbar above the table: Set tier access, Set availability (Immediately or On a date), and Apply to selected. In the wizard, Set tier access offers All Tiers only — the wizard has no tier list of its own yet, and a show being set up may have no tiers at all; named tiers are offered once you’re on the two admin surfaces (Benecaster → Episodes and Settings → Tools → Import Episodes). The date picker is available in full. Times are your site’s local time, not UTC. If Apply fails, a message appears on the table instead of failing silently, and points you at Episodes after setup finishes.
• You can also set tier availability on episodes individually afterward, from Benecaster → Episodes
• If you type a feed URL and press Continue without importing, the import starts then. If your site refuses it, the step stays open with the reason
• If the import fails, you see “Import failed. You can try again or import manually in Episodes after setup.” Correct the Feed URL if needed and press Import episodes → again
• Re-importing the same feed is safe: episodes are deduplicated by RSS GUID, so a retry never duplicates episodes already imported

Select “I’ll add episodes manually” to skip this step.

Supported fields on import: title, description, audio URL, file size, MIME type, duration, episode number, season, episode type, explicit flag, author, and artwork. See Importing Episodes from Your Host for the full field mapping.

On a completed import, if your show doesn’t already have a Source feed URL saved, the feed URL you entered here is saved as one automatically (Benecaster → Settings → Show → Feed Sync) — so the show is ready for Feed Sync without retyping the URL. The Sync trigger stays Manual either way; nothing syncs in the background until you choose a different trigger there. A failed import saves nothing. The step’s finished message says so: “Feed Sync is set to Manual only, so new episodes on your feed won’t be imported automatically. To change that, choose a Sync trigger in Show Settings → Feed Sync.”

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Step 13 — Language

Set the primary language of your show. This appears in your RSS feed’s <language> tag and is used by podcast apps to categorize your show by region.

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Step 14 — Permalink Settings

Choose how your episode URLs are structured. This step is optional — clicking Skip saves the defaults.

URL mode — Single show (default) or Multiple shows. See Permalink Settings for how each mode affects your URLs.

Episode prefix — the word before your episode slug in the URL. Default: episode. Leave blank to place episodes directly at the root: yoursite.com/episode-title.

Show prefix — visible in multiple-shows mode only. Default: show.

A live URL preview updates as you type. Both Continue and Skip call the same validation and save logic, so the defaults are always written — your feed is never left with an uninitialized permalink state.

If either prefix field contains a reserved word, matches an existing WordPress page slug, or (for the show prefix) matches a show’s feed slug, the step shows an inline error and stays open until you change the value.

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Step 15 — All Set

The wizard completes automatically when this step renders — you don’t need to click any specific button. The paused-wizard notice clears on your next page load.

On every path, the page is headed You’re ready to go. and shows:

• Your public feed, under Here’s your public RSS feed URL:, with a Copy button
• Take a quick tour, which launches the Benecaster Overview tour immediately after redirecting into the admin
• WHAT’S NEXT: Add your first episode, then links to any steps you skipped so you can complete them now. Skipping the SSP import lists Import episodes from Seriously Simple Podcasting or PowerPress, linking to Settings → Tools
• Go to dashboard →
• Redirect your old feed, when Seriously Simple Podcasting or PowerPress is detected: a card with your old and new feed addresses, and reminders to publish your episodes before adding the redirect and to keep your old plugin active until it is in place. See Switching from SSP or PowerPress

Licensed (paying subscribers enabled) also shows:

• A note under the feed: “Anyone can follow this feed, and it carries only your public episodes. Paying subscribers get their own private feed URL when they sign up, so don’t give them this one.”
• Share this page with new subscribers →
• If you chose Built-in membership and it isn’t ready yet, a block reading “Built-in membership is chosen, but nobody can subscribe until you finish:” with Add your Stripe keys and Create a membership tier links for whichever is still missing

Public podcast only also shows:

• A link to submit your show to Apple Podcasts and Spotify
• A note: “You can add paying subscribers any time from Settings → Account. No rush.”

The “Take a quick tour” link on the Done step actually launches the tour — clicking it redirects into the Benecaster admin and immediately starts the Benecaster Overview tour.

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Exiting and Resuming

Clicking the × (Exit) in the top-right corner of the wizard saves your progress and returns you to the WordPress dashboard. This is a pause, not a cancellation — your answers on completed steps are kept.

A notice appears on every Benecaster admin page while setup is paused:

Benecaster setup is paused. [Resume setup]

Clicking Resume takes you back to the wizard at the first incomplete step.

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Setup Steps From Add-ons You Install Later

Some add-ons need a setup step of their own. If you install one after you have finished the wizard, it can ask Benecaster to offer you that step. You are never sent into setup without asking: a notice appears at the top of Benecaster’s admin pages instead, one for each show the step is for.

An add-on has a new setup step for {your show}.

When more than one step is waiting, it reads “Add-ons have new setup steps for {your show}.” and lists the steps by name when the add-ons give them one. The notice has two buttons:

• Set it up opens the full-screen setup page, headed New setup for {your show}, with only those add-on steps. Each step has Continue → (or Finish → on the last one) and a skip button. There is no Back button. When you finish, you return to the page the notice was on.
• No thanks declines every step in the notice for that show.

A step can go away with nobody answering it. If you do what it asks somewhere else first, such as saving a key an add-on’s provider accepts, the add-on can take the step back, and it leaves the notice.

Every answer is final for that show. Finishing a step, skipping it, choosing No thanks, and leaving the setup page part-way all settle it, and a step that has been settled is not offered for that show again. Each show is asked separately, so declining on one show does not decline on another.

Leaving part-way declines what is left. This is different from the first-run wizard, where × only pauses. Clicking × asks first:

Leave setup for {your show}? You have 2 setup steps left, including this one. If you leave now, they won’t be offered again for this show.

Keep going (or Escape) returns you to the step with nothing recorded. Leave anyway declines the step on screen and every step after it. The question appears on the last step too, because leaving there still declines it.

If you decline a step and later want it after all, look in the add-on’s own settings; Benecaster does not offer the step again.

Example: Transcription Service. With Transcription on for a show, the first-run wizard gains a Set up transcription step before the last one. If you finished setup first, it invites you once per site, on your lowest-numbered show with Transcription on. See Setting Up Transcription.