Two years ago I met Mark Levine at the Erma Bombeck Writers Workshop. He is a book publisher, and I am a podcaster. We did some brainstorming, and Mark was smart enough to run with the ball. The result is published.com You think of it like a dating site, except instead of pairing up potential couples, it is pairing up podcasters/bloggers with authors. The part is it’s free.

Instead of trying to figure out who the publisher is, trying to get some contact information, published.com gets you the correct contact information. When you sign up (now as a blogger, but in the future there will be a “podcaster” option) you create a profile page, you put in what types of books you’re interested in and start searching their directory. I was amazed at the number of books available. When you find a book you think fits your podcast, you can request more information and you’re off in the right direction to get an evaluation copy of the book, interviews, etc.

There are tons of genres to pick from (you can have more than one genre that you’re interested in). When an author signs up, you will be notified via email that there is someone who matches your criteria.
Check it out at www.published.com

Thanks to Jessie, Emily, and Mark for their time. Even though we were all very tired, it was one of the funnest interviews I’ve ever done. Thanks for all the laughs

Radio Industry blog Radio Survivor has named podcasting one of the most important radio trends of the last ten years. They state that RSS podcasts feeds made it much easier to index podcasts and create easily searchable online directories organized by genre and keyword.

 I also found another blog post from Shel Hulz who does the podcast For Immediate Release. He (along with Nevile Hobson) has been doing it since 2005 and he recently put together a “looking back” post as they recorded their 514 show on their fourth anniversary. Here are some of the ways that Podcasting is helping Shel.

 Loyal Listeners – His show is published twice a week on a very regular basis. His fans are so loyal that when he was hours (not days) late he got email They have come to depend on his show.

 Mutual Respect – By having a co-host Shel and Nevile know the other person is working hard on gathering material, and they don’t want to let the other person down. It keeps them on pace, and it allows each other to share the load.

 Staying Current – They have started a fountain of knowledge. Shel checks over 100 blogs for information for the show, and he gets input from his audience as well. Consequently, he and Nevile are completely up to date with the latest happenings (and I would guess they have a good idea on what trends are coming).

 Client Work – By being so up to date, they are experts and this leads them to get more consulting clients.

 Because of these benefits Shel is committed to podcasting. How committed? He spends 14 hours per week preparing, recording, and editing his show. The best part if Shel says that all the work is worth every minute.

 You can read the full blog here

Amazon S3 is hosting from amazon.com It offers really inexpensive hosting. You pay for what you use. It’s .15 per gigabyte of storage. It’s .10 per gigabyte of transfer. What does that mean? Well I’ve got about 200 episodes of my logical weight loss podcast, plus some “Students Only” podcast, some videos, and more. In the end about 400 media files.  Here is my break down as of 12/14/09 (click on image to zoom in).

Amazon S3 Bill

So what do I get? I don’t get stats, but I get cheaper hosting ($9.59 but the month is not over). At the current rate (9.59/14) X 31 days means my bill maybe 21.24 by the end of the month (hence twice as much as Libsyn.com ). Last month my bill was $6.42, but this month has seen a large increase in downloads (and I’ve uploaded more stuff).

But what if you want to use Amazon S3 and you want Stats? The first thing is you have to use Firefox (with the Amazon S3 organizer plugin) or something like the Cloudberry Explorer (free). You need to configure these programs to see your account. Once those are configured there is a free service at www.podtrac.comThey offer many features for podcasters, and the one I use the most is their stats (they also have surveys, and pop up audio players). You have to put a “redirect” in front of EVERY media file (mp3 in my case). Well this is kind of a pain, but there is another fee tool. The blubrry Powerpress plugin (my favorite for putting audio players on websites). Under the Services and Statistics settings you can enter this redirect ONCE, and it will make sure to put it in front of all your media.

Blubrry Plugin Redirect Settings

I started this podcast back in October of 2005. Since then many other podcasts about podcasting have come and gone including:

Podcasting for Dummies (last show 11/19/2008)
Today in Podcasting (last show 10/21/2008)
Podcaster Confessions (all episodes have vanished)
Behind the Scenes (last show 1/6/2007)
Podcasting ABP (only did two episodes)
Learn to podcast (apple – ended 2006)
Podcasting 101 – (last episode 7/13/2008)
Podcasting Step By Step (Gone)
The Podcasting Blog ( 8/2008)
Podcasting Demystified (ended in 2006)

Also the yahoo podcast directory came and went (and people said “Podcasting is dead”). Software titles like “podcast station” and “mix craft live” have both gone away. In the mean time podcasting continues to grow, ways to create and receive them (phones, etc).

I am still here and ready to help you start a podcast no matter if you want it to do it yourself, or if you are looking for a podcast consultant to coach you through or do it for you.

One podcast about podcasting is the Podcasters’ Emporium. Anybody know of any others?

Last 5 in 5 From Fred Castenada

www.noagendashow.com
www.tech5.mevio.com
www.schoolofpodcasting.com
www.betterdave.com
www.businessweek.com

Fred has launched a new podcast at www.finance4startups.com in addition to his www.strugglingentrepreneur.com and www.gaincontrolofpyourday.com

Podcasting Reaches a Global Audience

We have a lovely note from my friend Lynn Pearson who sent in a message from Scottland.

Thanks to all the people I’ve helped get podcasts off the ground, and to everyone who listens.  You guys/gals are awesome. Special thank to the 2godcicks.com and Chris from the www.fillupyouripodshow.com

My consulting service is not under Podcast Mechanic at www.podcastmechanic.com Which makes more sense to people. Everyone understands what a mechanic can do for cars, etc. and that’s what I do for podcasts.

I also revisit the “podcasting is dead” discussion. I do not have a feud with Leo Lapote. I just hate it when anyone says podcasting is dead as potential podcasters may change their mind about starting a podcast.

Here are some new Podcasting Statistics

On 9/24/04 a search for the word “podcasts” resulted in 24 hits. Now it returns 60,700,000 results. To bad Leo Laporte thinks podcasting is dead. I’m sure he’ll say it again at the blog world expo in a few weeks.

Well a new report from Wizzard Media shows that podcast listeners are up from 15 million to 18 million. Here are some samples of that report:

Wizzard Media (NYSE Amex: WZE), the world’s largest podcasting network, today announced that for the third quarter of 2009 the Wizzard Media Network saw total podcast download requests of 332 million vs. 287 million in the third quarter of 2008, an increase of 45 million.

The number of podcast shows on the Wizzard Media Network grew from 11,600 at the end of the second quarter of 2009 to 12,281 shows at the end of the third quarter of 2009. Podcasters pay Wizzard Media to use its publishing platform and work with Wizzard to monetize their show through brand advertising and more recently, content sales (Apps).

Adam Corolla got fired from radio (After replacing Howard Stern) started a podcast and never skipped a beat. To bad podcasting is dead. Oh wait, the same company that fired him is now co-producing his podcast and will help sell sponsorships. Carolla is avergaing 130,000 listeners.

In the third quarter of 2009 Wizzard delivered over 12.7 million podcast advertisements, its second highest quarterly total on record and an increase of 130% from 5.5 million ads in the third quarter of 2008.

Defining Podcast Success

My last episode had 515 downloads in two weeks. If I compare myself to Leo Laporte who has THOUSANDS of listeners I will feel awful. However, if I got in a room of 515 people that would be a lot of people. There are podcast pioneers (starting in 2004) that have huge audiences. They were kind of luck in that they got the “Milton Berle” effect (having no competition). However, people like Michael Butler, Keith and the Girl, and Dawn and Drew have talent.

Promotion is Queen

I have a podcast that is in iTunes that I have not promoted AT ALL. I have about 10 downloads per episode. So listing your podcast in iTunes will not get you tons of listeners. You will need to promote your show to grow your audience. Someone asked “How many episodes do I need to get an audience?” it takes more than putting out a podcast.

You need to let people know about your podcast. I use business cards from places like Vista Print, and PSP Print and Over Night Prints

NO EXPO FOR ME

Unfortunately due to personal issues, I will not be attending the Blog World New Media Expo. You can still go (great pricing on hotels is still available) at www.schoolofpodcasting.com/expo

So as a test, I’m asking you to make a donation. Whatever you see fit (if you want) to see if I will average .01 a download. Click the button below and enter how much you think this podcast is worth.

What did you get for your donation?

Increase your listener participation.

Different podcasters are coming up with creative ways to get their audience involved. One way is to hold a contests. This can be monthly, quarterly, etc. Then you can award points for comments, emails, possibly more points for voicemail. The down side? Well you have to keep track. However, some people are really spurred on and motivated by competition. What do people win?

When it comes to prizes? Some people give away products they may be promoting. Andrew lock from the Podcast “Help My Business Sucks” gives away a free subscription to a magazine filled with marketing ideas.

Other podcasters give away prizes such as a prepaid iTunes card. This is a great prize considering iTunes is obviously a place where people who like to listen to things (music, audio books) are purchasing these items.

Some podcasters want to make it more personal. They will create a “Wish List” at Amazon.com and allow their listeners to support the show by purchasing items on the Wish List.

64 kbps = AM Radio

Not bad for shows that are primarily talking.

96 Kbps = FM Radio
Not bad for shows who want decent sound quality, but don’t need CD quality (this show is done at 96 kbps).

128 Kbps = CD Quality

When I changed the bitrate to 96, it cut the file size in half, and (in their case being mainly talk) it made almost no noticeable change the audio quality. Keep in mind the higher the number the longer it takes to download (and the 190 kbps took forever).

For those podcasters who do a show that primarily features music. Anything about this (in my opinion) is overkill.

One Way to Make Money With Podcasting

My Friend Mark from the A1Blues.com podcast (great podcast if you love “rockin’ blues) features music from great musicians. He often pointed people to Amazon.com and I noticed he was not using affiliate links. I pointed out that you can become an “associate” (amazon’s term for affilaite) and make some cash (a little cash) sending people to buy these artist’s albums.

The easiest way is when you sign up to become an amazon affiliate, install the “associate bar” (I believe was the name of it). Then when you login to your affilaite area you can then browse to ANY page on amazon and make a link to the page (I typically use the “text link” settings).

If you are wanting to promote items on iTunes, their affiliate program is through linkshare.com

This show originates from www.schoolofpodcasting.com

To get a decent sounding recording the first step is get a decent microphone. I recommend the Sure SM58 if your room is somewhat noisy, and the Audio technica 2020 if you room is very quiet. Then I typically recommend using a mixer just so you can (if nothing else) add treble and bass to your voice. There are lights that show your level at the mixer and you want these to be green and yellow, if it occasionally blinks red that should be ok. Be sure to be listening through headphones so you can hear yourself.

I typically send the tape out of the mixer into the line in of my computer. Now whatever computer software you are using SHOULD have some sort of meter. Again you should have green lights, yellow lights, and red lights. To get technical, at the top of the meter is a zero. When you go over zero the lights turn red. You do NOT want to go over 0. You do NOT want it to go in the red. If you go into the red the sound is distorted. I found a podcast called church leader insights and this was my first impression.

There is a master volume which adjust the levels of all the microphones you have plugged into the mixer. Then each microphone has a volume knob. This is called the channel volume. If the master volume is set to 10 o click, you would not want the channel volume to be 1 o clock (or higher than the master volume). This can cause distortion.

WordPress.com as A Podcast Solution

I am working with a consulting client, and they had just started a podcast so they decided to use WordPress.com. This version of wordpress is already installed and you can purchase additional space for your media files. However, all of the cool plugins that you hear about are limited to the plugins that wordpress.com allows people to use. The alternative is to host your Website on a website like coolerwebsites or host gator and install WordPress on your own (it takes about 3 minutes and 7 mouse clicks – easy). I prefer and recommend people to use this method in the past so you have complete flexibility. However, after working with this client I can say I’m not impressed with WordPress.com as a media host as well. Their reliability seemed suspect as files would sometime stream, and some time not. My client uploaded a file only to have it appear blank when I downloaded that site (I checked the original file, it’s not). The bottom line was there were strange things happening at wordpress.com

Some people ask, “should I start here?” After all its very inexpensive, and its easier (as there are less options). The idea being that you can move once you decide to “stick” with podcasting. Well much like real life, moving is never fun. NEVER. It’s not hard, but it’s a pain in the butt. So let’s look at the “Hassle” of going with yoru own hosted version of WordPress. If you don’t want to purchase a longer contract, Host Gator is 10 bucks a month. Let’s say you use Libsyn for your media, that’s 12 a month. So as you start you spend 22 bucks. IF you go with the WordPress.com version you put out 20 a year. Well in theory you’re going to know if you want to stick with podcasting within the first month. If you are you’re going to want to have your own hosted version anyway, so why not start there if spend the extra two bucks. If you stick with it, sure it will be another 22 bucks next month, but the good news is IT WORKS. Then you can call Host Gator, and change your account and only pay 5 bucks a month.

2 Buck Themes – Great Segway Royalty Free Music

In this episode I show how you can use music to transition between topics. By having the music come in towards the end of a segment a person listening knows that when the music comes up that segments is also over (and they can stop fast forwarding if they were not interested in that segment). I’ve been using Mike Stewart’s Two Buck Themes which gives you 5 different themes each month for $10 (hence 2 bucks each).

If you need one on one Podcast Consulting, or if you’re ready to learn to podcast using our Step By Step Podcasting Tutorials, then Dave Jackson can be your personal podcast coach. Start podcasting today, cause if you don’t your competition will.

I started a new podcast at www.datesfromhellshow.com and subscribed to other podcasts on online dating. I was surprised as time went on that most of my “competition” wasn’t putting out new episodes. So if I had seen a large number of similar podcasts and decided “there is no room for me” I would’ve been wrong. While there may be numerous podcasts similar to yours, they may not be putting out any new content.