10 Steps To Planning Your Podcasts and Vodcasts

Posted by raj on 04/22/06 in How do I, Weblogs, Web feeds, Podcasting + vodcasting + vlogging

If you’re planning to produce your own podcast, you should keep a few things in mind. Steve Rubel mentions discusses some of his viewpoints in his Is Podcasting Evolutionary or Revolutionary? blog post. The reader comments are very informative as well.

I’m overstating the obvious, but podcasting/ vodcasting consists of audio or video content, and a regular website or weblog consists of text articles. Text is easily searched for keywords and topics, audio and video are not. While some services exist to search audio files (e.g., Podzinger), auto-transcripting is an emerging technology with bugs to be worked out.

With the rapidly growing number of podcasts available in the blogosphere, you’ll have a lot of competition, particularly against early adopters. If people don’t know about your podcast, they may never know. Someone calculated a rough average ratio of subscribers to podcasts on Feedburner and got something like 44. That is, each KNOWN podcast has an average of 44 subscribers. Not very good. Another calculation, probably just as useless, is to divide the proverbial million channels of TV (podcasts/ vodcasts?) into the current number of Internet users, which is about 900+ million. That gives you about 900 subscribers per channel.

Obviously, there’s a lot of competition. So what can you do to get ahead, to entice readers to become listeners, and to maintain them? The answer is to treat your audio podcast like a radio show. And like most popular radio shows, word of mouth is your best friend. Impress a few people, and they’ll tell two friends, and so on. That means providing relevant, informative, and/or entertaining content on a consistent basis. That means planning your podcasts. It means possibly writing rough (or finished) scripts, especially if you’re running interviews. It means making sure that if you have two or more voices on your podcasts, that they have different tonal ranges. For example, putting two bassy male voices together is a bad idea. You want audio texture. Use a male and female voice, or two male or two female voices that sound significantly different.

If you are the sole voice on the podcast and you want to produce a serious audio product, consider taking some speaking or broadcasting lessons. I studied radio broadcasting for a short time in my twenties, when I had dreams of becoming a TV news anchor. That never happened, but my trained speaking voice did get me work as a corporate trainer, and later on a friend of mine asked me to be her radio show producer and co-host.

But even with that background, I recorded my voice the other day, only to be aghast at how awfully boring I sounded, and how often I said ‘um’ or ‘uhhh’. I haven’t practiced my vocal exercises in many years, and the recording is proof. Unfortunately, I’m not the only person in this situation, as I’ve listened to numerous podcasts that sound like they were recorded by zombies lurching half-dead in the record studio. Just because you own a website doesn’t mean you should be the person talking on podcasts. Hire a friend with a good voice, if you don’t have a good voice. (Sure, we all think we’ve got great voices.)

So don’t be a zombie, and don’t um and ah/uh. You can avoid this mostly by scripting out each podcast. Not knowing what to say next is the primary reason for poor speech in podcasts. Very few humans have the improvisational skills of people like comedian Robin Williams.

Add tonal contrast, using both vocal and musical interludes, especially if you are podcasting interviews. If the bulk of your content, on the other hand, is music, considering adding voice interludes. To make it easier for people to find your podcasts via search engines, also post the text content of your scripts on your weblog.

If you’re producing vodcasts, the rules are a lot different. It’s easier to scan a vodcast and decide you might like to watch it than for a podcast. And because human beings are primarily visually stimulated, vodcasts are more likely to be popular than audcasts, regardless of quality of content. While I’m not dissing the ultra-popular tech vlog/ vodcast Rocketboom, per se, since it’s informative, what do you want a bet that the bulk of the eyeballs watching it belong to male subscribers eager to gaze upon the ample bosom of the attractive host, Amanda Congdon, who appears to wear the tightest t-shirts she can find?

Millenia of human males have been visually-oriented, at least when it comes to “interacting” with females, and that’s unlikely to change. History shows, however, that females are less visually-oriented, and men don’t care if a male host is good looking or not.

Personally, I prefer an intelligent, mature host, regardless of sex. I despise those hosts and video-journalists who constantly interrupt their interview guests. This behaviour so unfortunately common on TV these days, and makes for irritating, insulting viewing. I’m sure I’m not alone in feeling this way, so I recommend keeping this issues under consideration when you plan out your podcasts and vodcasts:

Have an idea of what your podcast content will be about and stick
to it. If you’re talking about, say, technology, I don’t want to hear
about your dog or cat unless its relevant. And make sure your podcast
topics relate directly to your weblog’s topics.
Plan not just the topic of your next podcast/ vodcast, but also a few episodes ahead. You don’t have to be extreme, but because of my editorial and publishing background, I tend to plan 10-20 issues/ episodes ahead, sometimes longer.
Script your podcast to your best ability. If you plan to improvise, at least make a list of the subtopics you want to touch upon, and the order of their introduction. If you don’t, and you haven’t developed your improvisational ability, you’ll probably find yourself stumbling verbally. You can’t afford to do this too often, as you’re likely to lose listeners to a more verbally eloquent podcaster.
If you’re planning a vodcast, storyboard your episodes. Unless you’re a pro director/ cinematographer. And even then, you should still do it.
Whenever possible, to both increase your search engine traffic and to offer text summaries, publish a transcript of the audio portion of your podcasts and vodcasts.
If you’re relying on your podcasts or vodcasts to sell your services or products, take public speaking or broadcasting lessons. No one wants to listen to boring host. Learn about vocal inflections and tonal variation. Learn how to be charismatic on camera by taking a short modelling course. If lessons are not an option, consider having someone else more skilled be the host.
Promote your podcasts and vodcasts in every way you can, including offline. Burn CDs or DVDs and give them away to friends, clients, customers. Use podcast directories as a promotional vehicle.
For variety, have regular new guests, if appropriate.
Research your topics in the same way you would for an article.
Review your older podcasts and vodcasts with a critical eye and ear, after some time has passed since recording, so that you can catch “persona” problems such as speech impediments or behaviours, physical twitches, and so on.