…And I Was Just About to Jump on the Podcasting Bandwagon
If all goes well, I'm going to launch a weekly podcast with National Post colleague Kevin Restivo tomorrow. It's something that I've wanted to do for awhile but…well, you know….life gets busy and the next thing you know, another week has passed. If anyone has any suggestions on what makes for a good podcast in terms of format, content, etc., please send them along. Given my plans, it is somewhat disconcerting to read Forrester analyst Charlene Li's post that only 1% of North American households regularly download and listen to podcasts. If the audience is that small, why bother? Okay, that's totally dismissive - and tongue in cheek - but she does raise some valid points. Among them are that consumers aren't aware of original, new content. That said, Forrester expects the number of households downloading podcasts will climb to 12.3 million by 2010 from 700,000 in 2006 as podcasting “gets easier and the content gets better”. Andy Beal's take - Podcasting. R.I.P.? - on podcasts is the content isn't high enough quality, which has prompted him to give them up completely.
Update: Not surprisingly, Li's 1% “solution” is being savaged within the blogosphere. For some lively conversation, check out PodTech, which wonders what planet Li's living on; Scott Karp, who cautious people to be more patient, and Mathew Ingram, who suggests people look down the road rather than the here and now.
April 6th, 2006 at 5:13 pm
If you can add the podcast as a channel for the National Post, I think you'll do ok. Maybe re-cap and expand on stories that appeared in the paper - a summary for those that didn't get to read the paper.
Best of luck!
April 6th, 2006 at 6:38 pm
You had a couple of trains of thought in your post.
1. Size of market, this is still emerging and I know it was tongue-and-cheek, but certain podcasts are getting very good attention. PodcasterNewsNetwork is a good and growing location.
2. Format of your show is largely about your style, personality and day. You could do a daily recap of your observations throughout the day for 5 minutes that would rock, and then do a weekly longer format show. I see a lot of people doing that. Check out mip's scan and his show on PCN - leading edge technology. I do a weekly podcast which is an conversation with a variety of people in our industry, because I am often in that format throughout the week.
3. The last discussion on content and the RIP of podcasting is like anything. The content is King, if it is good people will find and listen to it.
I think you have very interesting viewpoints and should consider this media as your blogging, and other media channels change. For example, you do some interviews for National Post, use the information in an article in the paper, then 30 days later you can publish snippets from your interview as a podcast/blog post.
Just some thoughts.
April 6th, 2006 at 8:21 pm
Make sure the Post has a way of telling you how many hits you're getting. I've been doing it for two months or so with the Star and there's been no feedback mechanism — my friends excluded — because the service the Star uses doesn't track hits. They're hoping to change to something better soon, but until then it's like talking to myself while lost in the Rockies. I will say that, in my experience, simply reading your story or an abridged version of it is boring… it's got to be completely different, and somewhat interactive in the sense that you have Q&A or something like that. I'm sure you and Kev will work it out.
April 6th, 2006 at 10:22 pm
Check out Phil's comments at Skype Journal on 1% market share for podcasting….
April 7th, 2006 at 11:44 am
Ok, so only 1% of North American households listen to podcasts. Well when you consider that the podcast is only just 2 years old or so it can be expected. Another thing is that you're appealing to a very small group of people. People have an interest in the internet (i.e. Web developers) which is a small group as it is.
I find the best Podcasts are ones that have structure, but are not scripted. So come up with a list of things to talk about with maybe a note for how much time you want to spend on the topic. Then just go through the list if you reach the time frame you want to stick with then just cut a topic out and talk about it next week.
April 7th, 2006 at 1:07 pm
In terms of what makes a good Podcast, subjectively speaking of course, content is King. Obviously. Enough structure so it doesn't come off as stream-of-consciousness is also important and has been mentioned elsewhere.
I would add that the technical quality of the work is almost as important as the content, catchy intro and extro themes are a real asset, a well thought out and short name is quite helpful, and providing some sort of on-line “show-notes” allows a listener to relax knowing that they can check out the things you talk about later.
Who would you host with? I hear good things about Libsyn.
- Micah
April 8th, 2006 at 1:37 am
I believe it will take a new generation of ipods with wireless internet connectivity with the ability to stream podcasts. At that point it should become very mainstream. If you could steam video like that easily it would be like you tube but way bigger.
- Jonathan Armstrong