Tag Archives: podcast your passion

Podcast Seminar: Show notes, keywords and SEO, why they are important?

This post continues the Podcast Seminar series. This week we answer the question, Show notes and SEO, why they are important?

SEOI’m not going to pretend to be an expert on SEO.  I do however understand keywords and their importance in your show notes and blog posts.

Create great show notes that give an overview about what you talked about and more people will find your site, and your podcast, than just posting an audio file alone. Use the keywords in your show notes that you expect someone to type in Google to find your podcast. If you type “podcast studio” into Google right now, The Podcast Studio is the #1 search result. That’s not by accident.  Most posts that I make I try to get the keywords “podcast studio” in there at least once.  The same goes for your domain name.  If you can include the keywords in your domain name, all the better.

For goodness sake, do not stop here in your search for SEO goodness.  Search Google for SEO techniques that will take your podcast and your blog to the top of the searches.

Next time, Podcast Metrics.

Podcast Seminar: Marketing your podcast.

This post continues the Podcast Seminar series. This week we discuss, Marketing your podcast.

Getting your podcast out into the ears of your listeners is the next necessary step. There are a couple of initial steps you must take. After you have produced your first show and posted it, submit your podcast to iTunes. If you aren’t in the iTunes Podcast Directory, you don’t have a podcast. Add your podcast to as many podcast directories as you like. You will get listeners from them, but the lion’s share of your listeners will come from iTunes. It’s sad but true.

iTunes Subscribers

After getting your podcast into iTunes, go ahead and submit your podcast to all the other directories. As you can see from the graph above, it won’t make too much of a difference, but it includes all listeners that might want to listen to your show.

How about promoting your podcast? One easy way to promote your podcast is to send an announcement to your contacts that would be interested in your podcast. Invite them to check out your latest show on your blog or website. Another way to promote your podcast is by publishing a related article and sending it off to article banks, e-zine publishers, etc. A popular way that a lot of people promote their podcasts is by commenting on another podcast or blog. If you use this method, please remember to add some value to the blog you’re commenting on and don’t just add a link to your podcast. That’s a good way to get your comment deleted. Lastly, there are many podcast related forums that allow you to promote your latest show. Podcast Pickle and Podcast Alley come to mind.

Remember, your podcast is a product. Any method that you might use in promoting a physical product or web site can be used to promote your podcast.

Next time, Show notes and SEO, why they are important?

Podcast Seminar: Choosing a topic for your podast.

This post marks the start of another new series of posts inspired by the recent seminar that was put on as part of the Long Beach Podcasters. The topics were a good outline of what a new podcaster might want to know. Rather than attending the seminar and paying the fee, I’m giving you what I might include in such a seminar. Here are the topics we’ll be covering.

  1. Choosing a topic for your podcast.
  2. What length should your podcast be?
  3. What type of podcast do you want to produce?
  4. What equipment/software do you need?
  5. Should your podcast be daily, weekly, monthly?
  6. Creating your podcast with a blog.
  7. Marketing your podcast.
  8. Show notes and SEO, why they are important?
  9. Podcast metrics
  10. Monetizing your podcast
  11. Spreading the word through Social Networks.

It’s not organized exactly as the seminar, but the topics are mostly the same. Let’s get started.

Choosing a topic for your podcast?

What are you interested in?

You should podcast on what gets you heart pumping. In other words, podcast about what you are passionate about. Back at the first Podcast Expo in 2005, Leo Laporte gave the first keynote of the event and this was his topic, podcast your passion. If you’re not passionate about what you’re going to talk about, then why are you talking about it? Why would anyone else want to hear you talk about it? If you want to do a music podcast, be passionate about music. If you want to do a knitting podcast, be passionate about knitting. Your audience will be able to tell if you’re only mildly interested in the topic.

The best example I can think of for podcasting your passion would have to be Wine Library TV. Gary Vaynerchuk is passionate about wine and his podcast shows it. If you’ve never seen WLTV, go see it now. Whether you’re podcasting for you business, for your school, or for you favorite football team, be sold out for that topic and your listeners will appreciate it.

I’m not going to tell you to podcast about the Mac, Windows, wine, knitting, music or any other topic. But I will tell you to pick your topic and be focused. The more focused you are on the topic of your podcast, the more success you will have in podcasting. Trying to have a podcast about “the Internet” is a little too broad. Pick one topic and stick to it. It may be a small market that will find your podcast.

Let’s look at the example of fly fishing. You may be passionate about fly fishing. Your target audience is probably men, already cutting the market in half, with an interest in fly fishing, smaller market yet, and who are looking for fly fishing content on the Internet, smaller yet. That may be a pretty niche market, but there are fly fishing podcasts. There is someone out there on the Internet waiting for your content.

Lastly, I heard recently about this idea that everyone wants to be significant. Everyone on this planet wants to be remembered. They want to put their mark on this world before the leave it. This would explain why podcasting has become so popular with thousands of podcasts being produced every day. But desire to podcast isn’t enough. You need to have something to say.

Next time we’ll talk about; How long should your podcast be?