There are several key points to podcasting that will help small businesses have a successful podcast. There are multiple “key” points to podcasting that take time to master. Yet there are 8 base key points that will help with your podcast. These 8 key points will not guarantee success but they will ensure that you will grow an audience and develop a lasting relationship of dedicated fans.
Have a plan
This may be overly simplistic but there have been many times that people start their podcast and asked what their show is going to be about, the response is we are just going to talk about whatever comes to mind. We want our show to be spontaneous and “Authentic”. Everything has a plan. Whether you are making coffee or making the next great mouse trap that will put the Pied Piper out of business. You have a plan. Even when driving to work you make a plan in your head. If not, you might go the wrong way while only having a pair of cut off shorts and one shoe on. In other word you would not reach your destination in the fashion you should or even want. Make a plan of what your show is going to cover. What is the main topic going to be about? How often are you going to release a show? Is the show going to have segments, a guest, a co-host? Plan plan and plan some more. It actually does help to have a mission statement for your show. This way you are able to keep the show on point.
Have a Topic
Each show, depending on what format you are going to use, is going to need a topic to cover. Use the space between shows to plan, outline, and your get your show notes created. This will help when creating your show to stay on topic. There is nothing more annoying for a listener to receive your show think that you are going to talk about your topic and they get 25 minutes of you discussing how hairbrained your nephew is acting. It is good to get a glimpse into who you are but be relevant to you topic.
Set a schedule
Your audience wants to hear from you. Be there for them. The television show “The Game of Thrones” didn’t get to be popular because of a inconsistant schedule. The shows fans know that every sunday at 8:00 pm. Your audience likes consistency. They like to know that every tuesday morning there is going to be a new episode of your show ready to be listened to on the commute to the office. Your audience relies on you to be there to entertain and educated them on their boring ride to work. So, be there for your fans’s, those people who made the choice to listen to you. Be there for them if anything as a thank you for listening.
Bring yourself
Your listeners want you all of you. Now that may sound scary but it is actually a good thing. Podcast listeners are very fanatic and they will show up wherever you are. If they find out you are going to be at a conference or if they know where your place of business is located, your audience will want to show up some time if only to shake your hand and tell you how much you have influenced them. Since this is the case you do not want to have a big fake radio voice, or give the impression that you are this open, easily accessible guy and then have your audience find out that you are the opposite. Take Pat Flynn as an example, Pat Flynn’s brand is centered around how open and helpful he is. People always comment about how Pat Flynn is in person. This guy is just the same on his show as he is in person. Because of that the action of being open and accepting people take him at his word because he is truthful, honest, respectful. Even when he is confronted with a skeptic. Pat Flynn treats those people no different and often will convert that person to a fan just by being “Pat Flynn” So, Be the real you, even if you are a little bit of a curmudgeon, at least people will know what to expect.
Invest in your show but
In the research for your company in creating a podcast I am sure you have seen many times. You can start your podcast for free! These people are correct you can actually start a podcast show with no money down. Just use your laptop microphone or a Mic headset. Record your show on your laptop using some free software. Host your show on some free site and submit your feed to iTunes and you have a show. The question is, will it be a good quality show? Yeah it may have good content quality, and you might even have alright sound quality. Yet, there is the saying you get what you pay for. This applies fully to your podcast show also. Don’t go off and use a free hosting service many services will not allow you to move without paying an excessive amount in order to free up your RSS feed and keep your audience. Or you will have a free hosting site which might limit what you are able to do, with your site. Or might even just up and disappear. Invest in your show. Just because you can do free doesn’t mean that is a good idea. Spend $50 on a ATR-2100 and your show will improve with just that small change. So, yeah free is possible but if you want your business to grow through your podcast don’t go strictly free. But in the same breath you don’t have to spend $5000 on a big Mixing board and Compressor limiter gate, sound proofing or anything of that matter you can be set up for very little money but do spend some money your customers will thank you.
Be Unique
Though there might be only 300,000 podcasts to the millions of blogs and billions of websites, you still have to find a way to be unique. Right now in the entrepreneurial field you will find interview shows. Lots of interview shows and they all seem to have something to do with being engulfed in flames in their title. Why? because of the success of a man name John Lee Dumas. They hear that he is making huge amounts of money with his podcast, and so they decided to emulate him, not quite most people are copying him. These new shows are daily interview shows about entrepreneurs. There is no originality. try to find your own flair and stake that as your claim to fame. That is what John Lee Dumas did. He realized that he liked the entrepreneur interview format but he wanted more and so that is what he did he added the daily aspect. The daily part is what made his show unique.
Know your audience
If your business is fishing supplies, your audience is probably not in talking about Dune buggies. When making your plan you should get a visual of who your audience or customer looks like. Many people talk about visualize your business avatar. What do they look like, what do “they” do in their daily lives that your business can help fix. This will help for people to find you and will also develop the trust they are looking to put in to their leader
Have a descriptive show title
What do you think of when you hear Great Gear show? Well that could be an automotive show. It could also be a photography show? Could be about almost anything. Because you don’t know what gear is being discussed. If you were to hear the Virtual Assistant podcast or Logical Weight loss or even my podcast Podcast Dojo. You have an idea of what that show is going to be covering. I understand the want to have the be cute and exciting with the Bang Whiz show but you will not get as many of your target customers listening if they don’t know what your show is about. So use a descriptive title.
Bonus Have Passion
Now this could be argued to actually be the most important ingredient to starting a show. Do you have the passion about what you are going to be talking about? If the answer is no that lack of enthusiasm and passion will show through in what you do. If you are pumped up to be talking about your shows subject your passion will become contagious and your audience will become excited also. That enthusiasm level of enthusiasm is infectious and can not be faked. Lot of people can fake it for a short time but eventually that show will die off and its audience will go else where. So, make sure if you are going to podcast make sure you are podcasting about your passion.
Bryan Goodwin
Latest posts by Bryan Goodwin (see all)
- Website Advertising Is About To Change. Are You Ready? - August 28, 2017
- Who Controls Your Narrative? - October 20, 2015
- Ready, Set, Stream!!! - August 16, 2015