promoting your podcast?

[vikingyouth]

anybody got any hints or tips on promoting a podcast (other than the obvious of listing it on all the directories)? we're making some good stuff and i'd love other folks to hear it, but i don't get the impression it's make much of a noise outside of our 10+ friends, half of which are usually around when we make the show.

scratching head...

[camilian]

Find other people with your interests on mailing lists, chat rooms, blogs, and tell them about your show. The podcast community is still really small. Let's face it, it is still mostly us geeks listening in. Take it to a larger group. Once poopreport.com did a review of my site, I jumped from 300 hits a day to 3,500 - 7,000. When Ilovebacon.com linked my site I received 54,000 hits in one day. Find your "group" and market to them.

[notyourusualbollocks]

I couldn't agree more. It's just a matter of finding the right online communities to promote your show. Poop-meister, how did your hosting company enjoy the surge in traffic? 50,000 hits is pretty insane.

[bramley]

Ditto on the last two. Also, interview people who you think might have good connections. They will then tell all their friends to listen to them on the show. Both becoming a link on a related website and getting good people on the show led to promises of interviews for me in the past few days, which just in turn generates more trafffic, even it is comes through a print medium.

As another thought, also think about your marketing strategy -- to borrow a term that's needlessly more serious than this medium. I love your logo, and I happen to have my own "everything Viking" webpage out there. I went to your website when you were on the newbie list because I was really interested. But "Viking Youth Power Hour" as you may or may not have noticed sounds like a white supremacist group. I haven't heard your cast, so I don't know if that's what you're going for, but if it's not, I'd reconsider. White supremacists will be disappointed that you aren't and others, with images of "Hitler Youth" and "Viking Power," will just not tune in. And if you are, well, that's a niche market you'll have to reach through the usual infamous resources.

[vikingyouth]

But "Viking Youth Power Hour" as you may or may not have noticed sounds like a white supremacist group. I haven't heard your cast, so I don't know if that's what you're going for, but if it's not, I'd reconsider.

yeah, the day after i got our web page up i googled viking youth to see if the bots had gotten it yet and i found there is another, less, ummm, huggable, viking youth group that has a big old mug of hitler slapped up with some swastikas on their page. a bit frustrating to say the least. however, we probably won't change our name for one cuz i don't feel i need to be reactionary to a bunch of narrow minded creeps -there's a far richer norse tradition than what went down 70 years ago. and, really, it's the first of several podcasts we have planned and if nobody tunes in it won't break our hearts (but...). i'd rather move forward than scuttle backwards on what is really playful ground. and lastly, did i say f*** those guys?

anyhoo.. thanks for the great ideas. i'm actually starting to contact other PodCasters in Chicago as i want to start seeing if people want to come in for a bit, sit down, have a drink and chase the tail of christ for a bit.

godspeed...

[FLEB]

What's the generally agreed-upon etiquette for distributing audio promos, and what are some etiquettically-correct (and incorrect) promo-pimping methods?

[camilian]

I don't think there is any agreed-upon etiquette. I would say find other podcasters that might like what you are doing and send them a promo. You might want to email them first so they expect to see it.

[vikingyouth]

so does anybody want to swap up audio promos? VY will be recording our next show on friday and are open to dropping in some relevant audio plugs in exchange for you doing the same.

[PBCliberal]

I've always been fascinated with the history of radio. Voices coming through the air right into your parlor was such a mind**** to early 20th century man.

It almost like being there again, watching this new medium grow, being built largely by people who are re-inventing these concepts in real time and then applying them in new ways to new objects.

The best way, in my view, to promote a podcast is on other podcasts. If you can get onto somebody else's podcast, by definition you're talking to somebody who has the ability to listen to YOU too!

There's openpodcast.org, of course, which is a great place for short canned promos, but how about adopting some of the concepts of 30s and 40s transcription syndication. The deal with transcription syndication was that you provided all the difficult elements of the program on big 16" disks (like records but different under color of law), and the "local announcer" worked from a script introducing "The Carter Family" or "Patsy Montana" or "Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys" as if they were live right there in the studio. Other transcription services had jingles sung in a generic way that only lacked narration added that it was "Adam Curry's Mile High Ice Cream Parlor" that the singers were praising for the rich cool creamy taste.

I'm starting to hear people produce interactive elements designed for give-and-take with a show host either by pausing the insert or by talking in the holes left for that purpose. How about a whole spate of these, each one customized for somebody you're cross-promoing?

I've also wondered why I have not yet heard somebody take Skype and do an interview, but have both ends record only their local feed. The interviewee sends his side of the interview uncompressed or in a lossless compression format to the interviewer, who post-produces it by multiracking it in sync with his questions (also recorded from his perspective).

A little noise gateing on both ends, and voila! Person-to-person did this in the Ed Murrow days at CBS, so its hardly a new concept.

What a great time to be alive!