The three things about podcasting I wish I knew 5 years ago.
3. USB is your friend
I really wish that USB microphones were more commonplace back when I started podcasting. Back when I first started podcasting I’d spend a lot of time dealing with line noise and interference that made my recording really bad. USB removes all that worry since the analog audio circuitry is in the microphone. In the past my mic would connect to the mixer and the mixer into my computer’s microphone port and various cheap wires I used would interfere with the other electrical equipment I had on my desk.
2. Use a podcast hosting provider
5+ years ago I use to host my mp3 files on my on web server and my downloaded were VERY slow from my shared web host. Statistics would be minimal and it was very hard to track the number of downloads we had. Now with WPwatercooler I host our mp3 files on Blubrry.com. My downloads are very fast and they provide awesome statistics for my downloads. The cost is minimal for thee service and is quite worth the speed and stats.
1. Build a community
Building a community is important. 5 years ago we tried to build some sort of community, but it was hard when our podcast GeekFit was mainly one way street instead of interacting with our audience. In a previous post I talked about the voicemail service we used to accept voicemail feedback from our listeners and we played them on the show, but aside from that we were unable to come back around full circle with our listeners and the exchange was delayed until the next episode. WPwatercooler’s my goal is to get our listeners to be on our show at some point, submit topics to the show and interact with us on our forums. Recently we had a request to include a chatroom for our viewers to talk with other viewers of the show in realtime. I’m not sure how well that would work out since the show is only 30 minutes it would be hard for our panelists to interact in the chat, but at least the viewers are able to do some interaction with one another.
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