School of Podcasting: Expert Tips for Launching and Growing Your Podcast

Today I'm back from Speaking at DC Podfest (what a great event) and I went to a session that had some interesting points that I wanted to share. The session was titled, "Size Doesn’t Matter: Build a Monetization Program with Any Size Audience with Doug Sandler and Strickland Bonner. Doung and Strickland host the Nice Guys on Business show. Their website states they have over 1 million downloads, and they showed proof in their session, and I can verify they are not lying. They explained a new strategy to grow your customers using your podcast. Because Of My Podcast: Stephanie Logan 8:35 Stephanie does the DC Diary show (sharing stories of DC Professionals) and she explains how Because of her podcast she was able to transition from a job that was more policy to now working in Media and communications Interviewing Your Potential Customers - The Power Of Podcasting 11:05 I have said one of the benefits of starting a podcast is people who would normally not give you the time of day, now will sit down to talk with you on a podcast. We've seen people use the power of being part of the media to partner with events and get access to vendors. Interviewing people that you want to start a partnership with is a solid way of breaking the ice. Doug repeated his main point, You have to reverse your thinking and focus on the guest, and identify people who would be a good client for your business. This was an interesting idea. One example in the session was someone who did a show about visiting the national parks. This is a hard show to monetize outside of a guidebook, or maybe mosquito spray. Doug said you should find the person who is in charge of the national parks budget, and have them on as a guest. They would know alot about the National Parks. When the interview is done you could mention that the show takes a lot of effort, and to keep going needs to find a sponsor and see if they would be interested in sponsoring the show (I would twist that and ask them if they knew anybody who would be interested in sponsoring the show). Again, interesting. I know consultants Natalie Echtal and Katie Krimitsos who have offered discounted coaching calls with the knowledge that the call may be used on the podcast. This provides content for the audience (as you help to solve the problems of your target audience) and shows off your expertise. So Doug pointed out that if you were a coach, you might interview people who need a coach. This does get a little confusing. If someone needs a coach, then one might think they aren't that successful (cause they need a coach), and with that in mind, if it's not a live coaching call, what kind of content does that create? This is where this idea goes a little south for me. It's the part where you have to put your brain on backward. What if you target customer is a prime prospect, but a horrible guest? If you've listened to my show (or Moondog Marketing) I am all about content, content, content. This is not focused on the audience, or the downloads, it is focused on getting in front of your target customer. They said their conversion rate was around 20%. For every 10 guests, they would get two new clients. This really goes against my main ideas, and I asked, "What if you guest/future client is boring?" They answered that they did their best to create good content. They then also stated there was a vetting process. They don't let "just anyone" get on the microphone. I left the session scratching my head a bit and realized I would need to listen to an episode to maybe complete my opinion. Their show is well produced and has a fair amount of comedy built in. Maybe a bit too much for my taste as I was five minutes in and they were still having a "how the sausage is made" discussion about the show's publishing schedule (which for me was boring as watching paint dry) and I never made it to their interview. Maybe I'll go back later. There is more to their strategy, and in my opinion, it's slightly sketchy. I've invited Doug Sandler to come on so we could have a dialogue about. We'll save that for a future episode. Questions of the Month 22:09 I need your answers to: What will you be doing differently in 2018? If you could only listen to one show, what would it be, where and what is it, and WHY is it your favorite (be sure to tell us about you too) Deadline is 11/20/17 How to NOT Make Money with Podcasting 24:34 Jessica Kupferman from JKM Agency (which recently merged with a new agency) comes with a story of how to NOT MAKE MONEY with a podcast. In this example, a podcaster knew they were going to start a campaign for a product. The campaign was going to start in the next episode. The podcaster covered ALL the competition of the sponsor in the current episode. The sponsor saw the post and asked, "Are they sponsoring the show?" As you might imagine they might wonder why they have to PAY for exposure while their competition did not. While you're always in control of your content, when sponsors get involved yo

Today we are talking with Mark Deal who has grown Podcast Atlanta to over 500 members (www.podatl.com). We get great tips on growing a local meetup, tips, and resources for better interviews, and how is creating podcasts for a living. How Long Does it Take Until Your Show Catches On? George Hrab answered this question on his Geologic podcast, and George told me a long time ago that if I ever want to use a clip I could. George's show spotlights his life as the drummer of the Philadelphia Funk Authority, but also features George's Skeptic point of view with highlights on Science as well as the "Religious Moron of the Week." George mentions that you shouldn't start a podcast to "be something" but instead make it because you can make something cool, interesting and fun. Make a podcast because you have a different point of view and it needs to be heard. It took him two years before an absolute stranger mentioned they listened to the show. As George says, "You're making something and that is more than most people." Growing Your Local Meetup Group Mark Deal runs podcast Atlanta and in 18 months his group has grown to 500+ members. In today's discussion you hear: Not all 500 show up at the same time The different formats of meeting he uses What he's doing to grow the group What didn't work in regards to growing the group How a meetup group is not exactly the same a growing a podcast How to pick a location How he offsets the price of running the meetup group How he got Gordon Firemark to come to a meetup The typical breakdown of a meeting How often they meet, and how they stay connected between meetings. The pros and cons of Meetup vs a Facebook Group The kind of "Special Events" they have Podcast Guest Experts and the Podcast Editors Facebook Groups What has happened because of hosting a podcaster's meetup (18:00) Podcast Studio Certifications, and what he feels every studio should have How he is making a living with podcasting Having Alcohol at events Other platforms he uses in addition to Faceboook, and Meetup. (Eventbrite.com ) He makes money from Podcasting not Podcasters Why he uses Steve Stewart to edit his show Check out Mark at www.podatl.com Podcasting in Six Weeks Starts January 2018 Six weeks of group coaching and personalized attention 1 Year Subscription to the School of Podcasting Private Facebook Group Be in the relevant Podcasting Directories by February Direct access to me / Priority Email Support Focus Group to Help Shape Your Idea Your Podcast will Sound Great Erase Your Fear of "Sounding Stupid" Go to www.podcastinginsixweeks.com for more information. Class Size is limited. Want a more leisurely pace, check out the School of Podcasting. Mentioned on This Show Gordon Firemark (Entertainment Lawyer) Author Inside You Podcast Eventbrite.com (ticketing for evens) Social Media Marketing World Podfest.us DC Podfest

Because of My Podcast, I Will Be Attending A Taping of the Black List Television Show - Troy Heinritz 1:58 Troy Heinritz has had story after story when it comes to his Black List Exposed show. He recently won a podcast award, and now was called by Sony to attend the taping of the 100th episode the Black List. Troy was on the Ask the Podcast Coach show and talked about he when he gets these opportunities, he prepares and delivers, and consequently keeps getting more opportunities. Check out his show at www.goldensprialmedia.com Questions of the Month 3:00 I need the answer to two questions by November 13th 2017. What will you be doing differently in 2018 with your podcast? What is your favorite podcast (if you could only pick 1)? What is it, what is it about? where is it? and most importantly WHY is your favorite? (be sure to mention your show as well). I need your answers by November 13th, 2017. For more information go to www.schoolofpodcasting.com/contact Embracing the Experience Gap 4:52 When podcasters first start, they put a lot of thought into their launch (sometimes too much), and they get their show out and into Apple Podcasts and the other directories. Then they do one thing that can really knock the passion out of them: they compare themselves to others. They want to know how many downloads other shows get, and start to focus on other podcasters instead of focusing on their audience. Back to the Woodshed I've played the guitar since I was 11. When I got done with school I would deliver my papers to my paper route, eat dinner, and my friend would come over and we would play guitar for hours. We weren't very good. We weren't taking lessons, and I was learning to play lead by trying to recreate the sounds I heard on albums. In other words, I would study music, and then practice, practice, practice, until I could play it. The music that was produced on the path to "getting it" was not pretty. I have hours of tapes of us playing Ted Nugent's Stranglehold for hours. Each of us would take turns soloing over the top of it. I recorded these so I could evaluate my process. I never intended to release them to the public. You can do the same with your podcast. Record a couple test shows for evaluation. How Can Podcasters Get Better? Podcasters get better by podcasting. I know that sounds stupid, but there is no way to know if you're content is good unless you get it in front of your target audience. You can also study other podcasts and entertainment. You see podcasting is part of the entertainment industry. Sure some of it is educational. Then again so is Sesame Street, and it's pretty entertaining. I recently watched a documentary on Steven Spielberg. Spielberg got turned down to be in the USC film school due to grades. He would take a tour of Universal Studios, and when the bus stopped for a bathroom break he would sneak away and watch people like Alfred Hitchcock direct. One of his first films (Amblin 1968 ) was geared toward studio executives to show he was not a normal independent filmmaker. - he knew his audience, and it worked it got him hired. As the youngest director under contract, he was a bit of a novelty item, so he had to prove himself over and over. One famous director pulled Steven aside and said, "There are days you will go on the set and have no idea what you're doing. Your job is to make sure the cast doesn't know that. The film interviewed Richard Dreyfuss who sais he was hired on the third day of the Movie Jaws. He said they didn't have a script, and they didn't have a shark. Steven decided to the movie on the ocean instead of a back lot of a movie studio. In fact, the first shark doesn’t appear until one hour and 21 minutes into the two-hour film. This was partly due to the mechanical sharks they built didn't work. The cost was 225,000. So you'll notice the use of barrels moving instead of the shark. You didn't need to see the shark. Just the music and the thought of the shark made it scary. The sharks were smaller than expected so they hired shorter actors to be next to the shark. The line, "“You’re going to need a bigger boat" was improvised. Jaws became the first motion picture to gross more than $100 million and won three Academy Awards (for Best Sound, Best Film Editing, and Best Original Dramatic Score). So how did Steven Spielberg get getter? Jaws had come in way over budget, and instead of taking 55 days, it took 159. His next two films also came in way over budget. This actually stopped from studios from working with him. Yes, he was making a lot of money at the box office, but his integrity was on the line and he improved. As podcasters we are storytellers. The only way we can get better is to keep podcasting. Final Lessons In the same way that Steven Spielberg didn't have all the equipment he wanted, you can make great content without having the top of the line equipment. Your next episode should be better than your previous one. You will get more confident, and your skills wi

The Essential Items For Your Podcast Website Let me state, that this has nothing to do with Wordpress vs Wix vs Squarespace. These are the items that I feel should be on your website (and why) A Play Button Think of this as a free sample. If someone is going to subscribe to your show, they need to hear it first. This is why there is a guy with the chicken on a toothpick at the mall. It is the teaser, the free sample of your podcast with no commitment to buy. A Contact Button/Page I'm not making this up. I just read an article in Pod to Pod, and I read a story about a podcaster that might have a good "Because of My Podcast" story. There wasn't any contact button at the top, bottom, left, or right side of the screen. It wasn't on the about page, it wasn't there. The only way to contact the person was via twitter. Being somewhat of a geek, I pulled up his RSS feed and dug through the code to find it. Realize, nobody is going to dig through your RSS feed to get your email address. Make your contact button easy to find, and don't get cute and name it something like "Let's get coffee." Be sure to test your button/page to make sure you get the messages from your website. Your About Page There are two answers here. If your website is primarily the home of your podcast then the first paragraph should be about the show. If your website is the home of your brand (products, press, etc) then the first paragraph should be about the host. Then a second paragraph about the show. In my travels, the about page is one of the pages that receive the most traffic. If you've been podcasting for a bit and have some reviews, take some of the phrases used by your audience and use it in your about page (use the native tongue of your audience). Subscribe Buttons We all love to talk about iTunes/Apple Podcasts, as we should. They have a huge amount of the market. There are android phones as well and it's a bit of a chicken or the egg. More podcasts are consumed on Apple products than Android. Well, most podcasters talk about subscribing on Apple products (and leave the android people out to dry). If Google would get off their butt and make a native app for podcast listeners that would be great (they did just purchase the 60 db app). So make sure people can subscribe to your show. You REALLY want to avoid telling people to "Find me in iTunes." Extra Credit Don't just make a subscribe page, but add directions with screenshots. You could even do a quick presentation on YouTube Live on how to subscribe to your show, and then send people to the video on YouTube. There is more power in subscriptions than reviews. Because Of My Podcast Scott Orr is Going to the Movies for Free Scott Orr does the Code 3 Podcast and was approached by the people behind the new movie Only the Brave. Check out Scott's podcast for Firemen at code3podcast.com Not sure what is up with Scott's voice? Check out the first 30 seconds of his show at code3podcast.com Always Be Open For New Input I've heard reports from one person or another. Anything on the internet that is repeated enough becomes an undeniable fact. With this in mind, I always stay open to new feedback. I always consider the source and always allow new ideas to challenge my beliefs. If I'm going to believe something, it is typically based on things I believe to be facts. Beliefs are based on input and your ideas and feelings (your feelings can skew the input). Actions are based on beliefs. Beliefs are based on perceived facts. Facts are based on input into your brain. For example, I don't like coconut. Any candy bar with coconut, I'm not a fan. The one day someone handed me a drink. I wasn't sure what it was, it was supposed to some drink better than soda. It was white. It turned out it was some sort of vanilla coconut mix. I have input. I now can say, I don't like something that is predominantly coconut, but I don't mind it mixed with vanilla. You have to be open to someone challenging a belief (I don't like coconut) and taking a look at the other side of the story (having a sip). Then allowing that information to influence your beliefs, which then influence your actions. I co-host a show called the "Podcast Review Show" where you can get your show reviewed, and in the past we've had people who were NOT open to ANY feedback New and Noteworthy Insights I've been begging people to share their before and after numbers if they got into New and Noteworthy and that is just what Matthew McClain did on this post about downloads from Apple He states before being on the Front Page of New and Noteworthy, "In this period we had an average of 71 downloads per day." This is with two episodes (36 downloads per episode - DPE) On their first day, the traffic went, "from 26 total downloads the day before (our lowest day ever) to 241." (122 DPE) He does say, "We released episode two on the 8th which pretty much doubled the recent total downloads to 1,447" (so he now had three episodes counting his trailer) (482DPE) One day

I was listening to the Book Feed the Muscle Burn the Fat and he relayed the story of a man at a Tony Robbins event (Tony is a major Business Guru). He told Tony that he had done EVERYTHING to grow his audience. Since he had tried everything Tony asked him, "Tell me the last 100 things you've tried." To this, the man answered, "Well I haven't tried 100 things." Tony then stated, "Then tell me the last 50 things." The man replied, "I haven't tried 50 things" Tony replied, "Then tell me the last 10 things you've tried." It turned out the man had tried about four things. We think we've tried everything, but there are more ways to connect with your audience, many of them that require just a little bit of time to setup up some technology. Today we need to look at ourselves in the mirror and ask, "Have I really done everything I can to promote my show, connect with my audience, and increase my reach? I think if we look deep into our hearts we know there is more. Here Is The Low Hanging Fruit Social media: You should be promoting your show on the social media channels. There are plugins such as social warfare. There are automation tools like Social Jukebox. Media hosts like Spreaker and Blubrry will publish your audio file as a video on YouTube. Spreaker will tweet out about your episode. Blubrry will create a sample of your show to tweet out and paste on Facebook. Libsyn will post to Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, iHeart Radio, LinkedIn, Blogger, Tumblr. Podcast Directories: There are four main directories you should be listed in. Apple Podcasts (formerly iTunes), Stitcher, TuneIn, and Google Play Music. Do You Have Subscribe Buttons On Your Site? One way to keep your numbers going up is to get people to subscribe. This includes buttons for ANDROID. Subscribeonandroid.com is a free site from blubrry where you can point people to that site (using your RSS feed) and if they don't have any apps to subscribe they will be prompted to download one. My friend Daniel J Lewis has a great plugin call Social Subscribe and Follow that creates amazing looking subscribe buttons Do You Have Share Buttons on Your Website? There are plugins (again I love social Warfare) that make it easy for your audience to tweet out your show. There are players like the coolcast player, the Smart Podcast Player, the Simple Podcast Press player. Don't get hung up too much on players as 80% of people are listening on on portable devices. With that said, can people share your episodes from their phone? Local Meetups I've had three people sign up for the School of Podcasting and I got to be on TV all from meeting local podcasters in Ohio. If you don't have a local meetup, do what I did. I created one. In the words of my friend Glenn "the Geek" Hebert, it's not who you know, it's who knows you. Check it out at www.meetup.com I run a local podcasters group for Northeast Ohio www.neohiopodcasters.com Reach Out to Other Similar Podcasts Some of my best friends are my "Competition." Daniel J. Lewis from the Audacity to Podcast, Ray Ortega who does the Podcasters Studio, Mike Dell works for Blubrry and does the Podcast Help Desk, there are others as well. Reach out to them and see if they'd like to co-host an episode or a segment, or be interviewed, or... or ... or.. Remember there really isn't any competition in podcasting. They can listen to you on Monday and your competition on another day of the week. It's not like radio where you are both on at the exact same time. Reach out to Businesses? If I did a show about weddings, I would reach out to every dress shop in the area and see if I could put some CDs at the check out for exchange for a link to their site, or a mention in the show. Go Record People at Events You can get a portable recorder for as little as $99 for the Zoom H1 or just use your phone. Then give these people your business card, and tell them they will be on a future episode. You do have business cards right? There are TONS of ideas Speaking of Daniel and Ray, we do a show together called the Podcasters Roundtable and we did an episode pointing out ways to promote your show (how to grow your audience from 100s to 1000s). The point here is you can't think about these ideas, you have to do them. In a recent (not safe for work) video Gary Vaynerchuck explained that he would Google his topic and connect every blog/podcast about his topic. He said 1 in every 347 will write your back, and that is better than zero. You Need to Quit Reading, Quit Watching, Quit Listening, and Start Doing If you're thinking of getting into podcasting, you can read articles, get confused cause some say to launch with 15 episodes, and some say (like me) it doesn't matter. Some say New and Noteworthy is the goal, and others (like me) say it's not that great. You can't improve what you don't start. How NOT to Make Money In Podcasting She's back! Jessica Kupferman runs the JKM Agency has a fun story today. In the same way that you learn new skills when you start podcasti

Simply Sound Company SS1 PreAmp Review While I've never used any preamps like the Triton Audio Fethead Microphone Preamp or the Cloudlifter CL-1, I was really impressed with the amazing amount of boost to the sound. The large dose of extra gain can make help a budget microphone/preamp combination sound clean and more professional. Some microphones such as the Heil Pr-40 and the Sure SM7B are known for really low outputs. This creates a situation where you have to turn the gain up on your mixer or recording device. This can leave the door open for added hiss depending on your mixer or recording device. The Simply Sound SS1 is designed for dynamic microphones only. More Clean Gain Triton Audio Fethead provides 27 db of clean gain with a price for $89 Cloudlifter CL-1 provides 25 db of clean gain for $149 The Simply Sound SS1 - provide 27 db of gain for $99 The Simply Sound website shows the Fethead at a $149 price tag, but at BNH, I show a price of $89 My Opinion As I had said, never using any preamp (besides the one in my mixer, and I've also used the DBX 286, and the Aphex 230) even without a preamp, I never thought I sounded bad. With that said, the concept makes sense. I know that when I turn the gain up on any mixer there comes a point where noise is introduced. Using the SS1, I basically turned my gain all the way down. The construction is super rugged and resembles the Cloudlifeter all-metal casing (but cooler looking in black) you're not going to break this. You do need some phantom power (so a typical route might be to plug your microphone into the SS1. Then plug the ss1 into your mixer. The mixer would need to have the Phantom Power Turned on. For my recording today I had my EV Re320 going into the SS1 and that went directly into the Zoom H5. It was an amazing amount of boost. How I did the test. I set my levels using the H5 recorded some audio, removed the SS1 from the chain, and plugged it back into my Zoom H5 without touching any knobs. Do you NEED this? As with all things podcasting, it depends. If you're happy with your audio, no. If you struggle to get enough signal into your recorder, or the sound has a fair amount of noise, then this is well worth the money. Check it out at simplysound.co Second Line Podcasting WordPress Theme I no longer recommend Appendipity themes. This is a theme I loved and have on most of my websites. The face of the company Joey Kissimmee was last seen online in late 2016, and they are no longer replying to any support emails that I send. Unfortunately, this is not the first time I've done this. Semiologic was a cool theme until Thesis came out. Then they went from needing no knowledge of code to having to know a ton of code. I really like Appendipity themes as there was a lot of flexibility (and no need for knowledge of code). I love the Divi theme, but they come close to having too much flexibility and people can get overwhelmed because it does everything (and the learning curve can be a bit large). Divi is a well-managed theme, with a huge community and awesome support. You can join Elegant Themes (the creators of Divi) for $89 a year. I did the one time fee of $249 for lifetime access. In addition to their themes, they have some cool plugins. One thing I just discovered is when you purchase a Second Line Theme, you can only use it on one website. This puts it int the "Depends" situation. The good news there is a one time fee. On the Evanto market, it shows six months of support with extended support for $17.63 a year. If you have multiple sites (for me I have at least four) that can add up ($59 X 4 = $236). Second Line Theme Support So far Second Line support has been great answering all my questions. The theme I'm using (Dixie) is skewing my featured image. When I informed this of the problem, they told me exactly what to do if I wanted to edit some files. The means you're going to need to understand FTP, and not be afraid to edit some code (always make a backup of any files you are editing when it comes to theme code). I was surprised that the theme allowed a featured image to be skewed disproportional as I don't know ANY designer that would allow an image to be reshaped (and if you have any text on your image it makes it blurry). The Power Of Elementor While the Second Line theme makes it easy to set colors, headers, and the theme seems to make it possible to adjust everything (except a skewing featured image...) what I also found amazing was a free plugin that they recommend you use (and they have some built-in features for it ) called Elementor. This is an open source page builder (That looks a lot like, Divi). This will work with most themes, and its a super easy drag and drop page builder. The cool thing is you can use that plugin on any theme. Always Consider Your Source I hear people that advise new podcasters and they try to sell people packages and strategies that work for them. The problem is they are not you. For example, as I have multiple websites,

In honor of International Podcast Day, I went to the local mall (that's still open) and asked people, "Have you have of podcasting?" If they said yes I would ask, "Have you actually heard a podcast?" Many people said NO. The people who had been listening to podcasts were really into podcasting. This show originated from www.schoolofpodcasting.com/586 School of Podcasting Wins The People's Choice Podcast Award in the Technology I've been nominated NUMEROUS times for the different shows I create such a the Logical Weight Loss Podcast, Feeding My Faith, and others, but I've never won an award. The School of Podcasting won this year in the technology category. Thanks so all of my listeners. It is DEEPLY Appreciated. Because of My Podcast - Douglas 3:45 Douglas from Zerobooks.com got a job, and is now podcasting as part of this job! Check him out at www.zerobooks.com His podcast is called Zero Squared. Looking For Podcast Listeners at the Mall 5:28 I went to the mall to ask random people if they knew about podcasts? Most people had not heard of podcasting, those who had listened to a podcast, really loved them. There are some people who need some help in understanding what a podcast is. You can always send your audience to www.learntosubscribe.com Get Out Of Your Comfort Zone If took me 40 minutes to get up the nerve to talk to complete strangers. I may appear outgoing, but underneath I can be pretty shy. As I moved along, it got easier. It was funny watching people put up their guard when I would ask, "Can I talk to you for a few minutes?" You can see their defenses go up. If I do this next year I need to find people who are bored (laundromats, or maybe set up a table at an Apple store). I'm not sure if Apple would allow this, but all they can say is no. Podcasting Does Not Waste Your Time 10:45 I had a talk this week with a potential podcaster who wants to build an audience and monetize his podcast. He wanted a step by step approach that would ensure that he was making a full-time living in the future. While there are people out there who are happy to charge you $4000 to tell you to believe in yourself, get into New and Noteworthy, and your dreams can come true, I prefer a more realistic approach. That is to say Gimlet Media producers super popular shows, and yet not every show they launch makes the cut a few months later. There are great shows like Action that was on a major network with A-list celebrities making appearances and yet the show was canceled. You can follow their footsteps and do a pilot episode, get feedback and shape your content accordingly. In the same way, you can't practice comedy in a basement (you have to tell your jokes in public to know if they are funny) you need to publish your episodes to the audience to get feedback. Even if your show doesn't end up doing as well as you had hoped, you will gain new friends, you will learn new skills, and you will benefit from the experience (I've had people say they are better speakers due to creating a podcast). You can get started with a small investment of $100 - $300 for equipment. See http://www.bestpodcastinggear.com/kits/ Common Audio Issues 15:02 The podcast sounds weird on a phone or single speaker (mono) - your recording may be stereo and out of phase. The solution is to copy one of the channels and copy and paste it into a new file and save it as mono. Check out this video to better understand My podcast is not displaying properly - This is almost always a case where you are exporting your podcast using a Variable Bit Rate (VBR). This will cause the episode to not display properly, and in some cases, if you press pause, and the podcast goes back to the beginning when you press play again. My podcast doesn't display the artwork in iTunes/Apple Podcasts - iTunes/Apple Podcasts does NOT display episodic artwork. It only displays the artwork for your show Growing An Entertainment Based Podcast 23:30 One strategy is to go to imdb.com and use their 30-day free trial to get the information on actors, directors, producers, for your show. Free Media Host Opinion Podcasting Goes Out of Business 26:30 I wrote an article about free media hosting on my blog and in it I look at six different podcast media hosting that have gone out of business. It turns out that the average lifespan of a podcast media hosting company that does not charge is 31 months. I do not recommend free media hosting for your podcast. It is building your podcast on very thin ice. Free Podcast Tutorials How Much Storage Space Do I Need For My Podcast? Busting Podcasting Myths The Truth about New and Noteworthy Join the School of Podcasting Check out the 19 courses, live group coaching, private facebook group at www.schoolofpodcasting.com/live

Hello, everyone, I realized in my last episode I didn't talk about International Podcast Day. If you haven't checked out their site it is www.internationalpodcastday.com They have cool tools to help you promote the power of podcasting check them out at https://internationalpodcastday.com/promotion/ Check out the Podcast Success Summit as well

The fastest way to connect with your audience is face to face. You may be thinking of creating a meetup, or a workshop, or yearly event around your topic/show. How do you go about doing it? Today we have Chris Krimitsos who is the organizer of Podest.us, Nick Seuberling of Cincinnati Soccer Talk, and Darryl E. McCullough who just organized his first event National Podcast Power. Darryl also hosts the Full Circle Podcast. In today's episode you will hear: About Nick taking his audience on a four-hour bus trip to Pittsburgh Darry'ls reflections the day after National Podcast Power conference Chris shares his insights as someone who has organized thousands of events. The risks and deposits that may be involved with an event. How to negotiate with hotels. How to choose speakers for your event. The dangers of food around your event. How to shop for a bus. Free places for a casual meetup. What was Chris's biggest trainwreck and how he handled it What to do with negative feedback Building Routines When you create an event for your audience, you are making memories with your audience. With the right event, people can start building their schedule around your events, and you become part of their routine. Mentioned In This Episode Acuity Scheduling National Podcast Power Cincinnati Soccer Talk Full Circle Podcast Ivy Envy Podcast Podfest.us Join the School of Podcasting Sign up for a Coaching Call

The podcaster attitude can be a tricky one to juggle. You care about your content, you care about your audience, but at times you might want to try something new, and that means your audience may not like it. If you like it, should you do it? Amy Pohler says yes. Success is achieved through Ambivalence This episode originate at www.schoolofpodcasting.com/584 Because of My Podcast - Dave Jackson My podcast has opened many doors over the 12 years I've been podcast. When I got home from Podcast Movement, I got an email from Michael Stelzner from Social Media Examiner stating he wanted to talk to me about the Social Media Marketing World 2018. In talking with Michael (and I so wish I had a copy of this ) he stated that he had people involved with his conference like John Lee Dumas, Daniel J. Lewis, and he's good friends with Cliff Ravenscraft. Michael said he turned to his crew and asked "Who is missing on the podcasting end, and they all said, "Dave Jackson." So here again, it's not who you know, but who knows you. So because of my podcast, I will be speaking at Social Media Marketing World 2018. The event is February 28th - March 2nd in San Diego. Shortly after talking with Michael, I received a call from Chris Krimitsos, and I will be involved again with Podfest.us in Flordia February 8-10 in Orlando Bay. This weekend, September 23rd I will be the closing keynote of the first-ever National Podcast Power in Perrysburg Ohio. While I'm talking about speaking today (9/18) I will be running the gathering of Northeast Ohio Podcasters where we meet, talk podcasting, gear, and whatever you would like to talk about. Check it out at www.neohiopodcasters.com Podcast Gear Yellowtec iXm Microphone Recorder At Podcast Movement Shawn Park from The Be Your Own Nerd show let me play with his Yellowtex iXm microphone/recorder. Here is a little about the microphone/recorder: "iXM was designed to become the finest reporter microphone ever. One of the most challenging requirements was a perfect auto leveling. Our engineers managed to develop an excitingly innovative procedure: the LEA engine. Whether whisper or cry, you will always enjoy a perfect level. LEA lets you do amazing recordings even under stressful conditions. No AGC and no artifacts. Try it out, you will be amazed." The price is $761. (so this may not be for the hobbyist, but it's always interesting to see pro gear like this as a more affordable version is probably in the works that will hit the shelves in a few years. Check out Shawn at beyourownnerd.com Ambivalence Is the Key To Success -Amy Pohler In the past I've mentioned there are three things a podcaster needs that have nothing to do with the tech. Support of your family - without it, there is stress and pressure Your health - without it you don't function well, if at all Your attitude - You actions follow your attitude. As the old Henry Ford saying goes, whether you think you can or you think you can't, you're right. If you look at the above three, that if one is removed, the other two suffer. Today I Want to Focus On The Attitude I've mentioned in previous episodes how Jerry Seinfeld had to wait four years to get on the Tonight Show. He then kept killing it on every appearance for the next nine years before he got his own show. The television show Seinfeld did awful for the first four years of its existence. I've been reading alot of autobiographies lately (or to be honest listening to them). My most Recent were Martin Short and Amy Pohler. In both cases, they kind of knew what they wanted to do (entertain people and be in "Show Business"). They started with small theater groups and immersed themselves in their local scene. They worked with people who were better then they were, and learned. They performed in theaters that were housed under a supermarket. They were in buildings where you put things over the bathroom drains to keep the rats out. They suffered through these horrible situations because they loved their craft, and they knew that these experiences would only help them get better. In Martin Shorts book he explained how he was doing a live TV show in Canada. Tony Bennet (one of his heroes was on the show, but due to a snowstorm was very late - again live TV). Martin was supposed to sing near the front of the show with Tony closing the show. With the staff scrambling to fit pieces into the live TV show puzzle, they finally heard that Tony was going to make it. As soon as he arrived, they put him on and in true Tony Bennet fashion, he was awesome. There was only one problem, this meant Martin had to follow Tony Bennet. Here is an excerpt from his book, "So I started singing: “Here we are, on earth together… . It’s you and me!” Already, I was wrong. The lyrics are “It’s you and I.” That’s because the song I was singing, by Stevie Wonder, is called … “You and I.” This little slip was enough to knock me completely out of orbit. I suddenly forgot the rest of the lyrics—and worse, for reasons I still cann

Glenn the Geek Hebert (from horseradionetwork.com )shares what he learns from talking to "Radio People" from Podcast Movement. We discuss being more focused with our podcast, so I bring on Addy Saucedo who is the author of The Podcast Planner ($37.99 on Amazon) and we talk about how you have less stress and more downloads by having a better plan for your podcast. This is episode 583 of the School of Podcasting and originates from www.schoolofpodcasting.com/583 Dr. Ryan Gray Stops Practicing Medicine to Do Podcasting Full Time Dr. Ryan Gray shares how he has left his medical career after his website and podcasting that has grown over and over the years, and he is now doing consulting full time on helping people survive medical school, and he published his first book, "The Premed Playbook: Guide to the Medical School Interview: Be Prepared, Perform Well, Get Accepted." His goal is to change the culture around medical school so it's not so competitive. Check out his podcast at www.mededmedia.com and medicalschoolhw.com Glenn Hebert on What He Learned from Radio Veterans at Podcast Movement 5:44 In today's discussion with Glenn we hear how: Radio veterans are jumping into the podcast pool The current issues with automated advertising How podcasters who want to podcast for profit need to learn from radio people and be ready, be prepared before pressing record. How Glenn keeps his integrity with sponsors How Glenn uses his audience to make decisions on what happens and is featured on his show. Podcasting With Laser Sharp Focus with The Podcast Planner - Addu Saucedo Interview 22:25 Here is the description of the Podcast Planner from Amazon: The Podcast Planner: Podcasting Guide With Templates To Help Podcasters Consistently Plan, Record and Publish Finally, a planner for Podcasters! It provides everything a Podcaster needs to be organized, motivated and happily podcasting. Successful Podcasters know how to consistently plan, record, and publish their podcast, and with The Podcast Planner, you can too! Buy it at Amazon Check out Addy's website at www.thepodcastplanner.com In today's chat we learn: Addy was helping people start and edit podcasts, but they keep podfading (quitting) How podcast planning can help you ensure your content resonates with your audience. How podcasting is hard, but it can be less stressful with a plan. A podcast compass guides you to your goals and purpose What to do if you're not sure who your audience is How the podcast planner can help with an Interview show How using a podcast to promote her book has brought more sales, and more email subscribers, and more speaking gigs. The importance of reviewing past episodes Why paper may boost brainstorming activities Find her show in iTunes or on Stitcher Start Your Podcast Today The School of Podcasting Offers: Step by step tutorials that will help plan, launch, and grow your podcast. Live group coaching Private Facebook Group Priority Email Support Join Today

Every month I ask my audience a question. This month is have you ever been approached by someone who OBVIOUSLY has NO CLUE about your show? Special Thanks To: Bernie from Bernie the Cat Show Lee Silverstein from the Colon Cancer Podcast has people wanting to talk about Cancer conspiracies. Glenn Hebert from the Horse Radio Network had someone ask for a donation if he didn't want to be on the show. Matthew McClain does an audio drama (obviously no guests) but still gets solicited to have guests be on his show. His show is "A Scottish Podcast" I had someone contact me about the Healing Our Marriage show (which is defunct) and I "Played" with them, and asked why they loved my show Jason Bryant from Matt Talk Online Podcast Booking Resources Interview Valet - Find and/or be a guest Interview Connections - Rock both sides of the microphone (one of the oldest podcast booking agents) PodcastGuests.com - A free resource for finding guests Help a Reporter - Reports looking for Experts How to Get Radio Interviews (Course) More Resources at PodcastingResources.com I'll Be Speaking at: Podcast Midatlantic September 8-9 in the greater Philadelphia Area National Podcast Power September 23rd in Perrysburg, Ohio Start Podcasting Today! Get immediate access to our online courses covering Podcasting from A to Z, start to finish. Priority Email Support Live groups coaching twice a month) Private Facebook Group Join today at www.schoolofpodcasting.com/start

I'm back from podcast movement, and I had a blast. I also have insights from one of the hardest assignments I've done in a long time. My Impression of Podcast Movement 2017 Nothing cooler than being picked up at that airport by fellow podcasters Marcus Couch from WordPress Plugins A to Z. We haven't seen each other face to face in about 10 years. We cranked some cool metal on the way to the Marriot and it was like old times. Then I get the then Marriot and I get to meet my co-host Jim Collison from the Average Guy network, and I go over to his table and there sits the one and only Steve Stewart and Mike Dell. So for me, the Summar Camp aspect of Podcast Movement is in full effect. The coolest line I heard all week was relayed by Paul Colligan (another person' I've known for 10+ years) and it came from a Dan Klass session. Dan (who is a former comedian) shared how often at comedy clubs you will have multiple comedians perform in an evening - and yet they all use the same microphone. The point? It's not about the tech. I roomed with Erik K Johnson from podcasttalentcoach.com, and he had stated that it would be awesome if he could meet a web developer who needed help with his podcast, as he was a podcast consultant who needed help with his website. I get into the elevator, introduce myself to everyone in the elevator and it turns out that one of the people is a web designer thinking of starting a podcast. When we get out of the elevator, on of the first people who see is Erik. I felt like I was in a Christmas movie and it was going to start to snow. I saw Harry Durran from Podcast Junkies and Dr. Ryan Gray who has given up his practice to do podcasting full time and Harry introduces me to Natalie Jennings who happens to be taking head shots at a reasonable price. She shows me a few samples of people, and I'm hooked. I can't wait to see how they turn out. The few peaks I saw of what she did was amazing. See her at http://www.nataliechampajennings.com/ I found out in Paul Colligan's session that if you are in Google Play Music, you are also on the Google Home portable audio speaker. I also know of a cool double secret project that is going to make recording double-enders via a browser very cool. I was on a panel with Ray Ortega, Daniel J. Lewis, and Addy Saucedo on what is inside an RSS. This was an insanely nerdy topic, but due to the recent Apple announcements we had some interested parties and I thought we pulled it off well. The bonus is I got to hang out with some cool friends. The Coolest Thing I Saw At Podcast Movement 2017 While there were tons of great sessions at PM17, as a vendor (I work for Libsyn.com - use the coupon code sopfree to get a free month) I don't get to attend any sessions. I did see something that was way cool. I met Alissa Daire of the Maximize Your Strengths show. I see her the first night, and she is in a group of people and we get talking about Strengths Finder, and she becomes a ping pong ball bouncing off the ceiling with energy. She's super nice, and it was great to catch up with her as I had met her last year. The next night, I'm standing at the Luau event, and here she comes. She explains how "I'm done." She's tired (as many people are), and she is considerably less energetic. Pat Flynn walks over, he's very witty and a super nice guy. Then the subject changes to strengths finder results, and it was like watching a time release video of a flower blooming. Her energy came back, her smile came back, her body language completely changed. It was amazing to watch. I saw this a few more times. It's late, and people have had a few adult beverages, then I ask them about their show, and BOOM, the body language picks up, the eyes are open a bit wider, the voice is a little louder. Later, Paris from Gamertag Radio got star struck when Cara Santa Maria from the Skeptics Guide to the Universe walks by. I offered to go bring her over. He got shy, so I did my best Steve Austin (the six million dollar man, not the wrestler) imitation across the showroom floor. I had no idea she was an Emmy Award winning journalist. I bring her over and embarrass Paris. Danny Peña is there, Jim Collison is there, and the minute Paris explained that he really did listen to her show the body language changed. For me, I think of it as being in your "first impression" mode and then finding out that you're among family. For the Best Content - Put a Time Frame On it I spoke about how I got lucky to be able to induct Dan Klass from the Bitterest Pill into the Academy of Podcasters Hall of Fame. The presentation should last three minutes. I had hoped that three minutes would be longer than I thought. I wrote out my first draft. It had some bits about history and podcasting in 2005. It had examples of how the show made me feel. I made a joke about how the more I talk about his show, the more I sound like a stalker. I listed his accomplishments. I started the stopwatch and went into the presentation, about half what thro

Full show notes can be seen at www.schoolofpodcasting.com/580 Why Keeping It Simple is a Good idea I do a show every Saturday call Ask the Podcast Coach with Jim Collison from theaverageguy.tv and at one point I decided to connect with Jim over Google hangouts, as well as have a Call In Number for the phone. I had to send a mix to Jim that had myself and the caller (but not Jim) while sending a mix to the caller than had myself and Jim (but not the caller). For those up on the lingo, I had to configure two mix minuses. I needed a mixer with two auxiliary outs. I found the Behringer X1832. It did the job well. I had a ton of extra channels, and effects that I never used. Then we switched and instead of using a phone (using CallinStudio.com) we went to a chat window to take questions. This was simple and free (using chatwing.com) . So now I have a giant mixer taking up half my desk, and I was looking for an alternative. I have a Yamaha MG102c Mixer (which has been replaced by the MG10XU) that would do the job. For whatever reason, I just didn't like it. It seemed like I had to crank everything up to the max. It still had a clean sound, but it seemed like I really had to push everything. I realize this is stupid (cause you should vote with your ears, not your eyes) but I've been hesitant to go back to it. The Other Problem with Recording Levels I use a Zoom H5. A great device with a giant screen. However, due to the way the studio is setup with the majority of the light coming in from Behind the Zoom H5 I cant' really get a clear reading. While there are lights to let me know when things are peaking, I tend to feel those are too sensitive. Then I heard about the Sound Devices MixPre-3. This might solve all my problems. Bad Time for a Product Review I received the Sound Devices MixPre-3 this week. It's horrible timing as I'm getting ready to run off to Podcast Movement, and I'm busy packing, buying Dramamine, recording podcasts and won't have time to do a super deep dive. So here is what I want it to do: Power my Electrovocie RE320 without a ton of his I want to do a mix minus for when I do shows with a co-host via skype or Google hangouts I want to plugin my ipad to play sound effects. First Impressions Of the Mix Pre-3 WOW IS THIS THING SMALL. I have an iPhone 6s, and it might be an inch wider, but it is the size of an iPhone on steroids. VERY COOL. At first, I was worried about the touchscreen display. But the display is super clear, and you can adjust the brightness. I had no problems reading it. I was worried about the touchscreen is small. That didn't seem to be an issue (I'm a guitar player with long fingers and not very fat). I almost didn't need the manual. I plugged in a microphone, hit record and was up and running. Using it as an Interface - WHY AM I DRUNK? I went into Hindenburg Journalist and did a recording. it was nice and clear, but I sounded slightly drunk as my voice was lower (as if the sound had been slowed down). I launched Adobe Audition and got the same issue. Hmmm. As I'm on a PC, I right-clicked on the Speaker in the bottom right-hand corner of my screen and went to the Properties of the Mix Pre-3. I had to set the recording and playback to 2 channel 24 bit, 48K. This solved the issue, and everything sounded fine. How Do I Setup a Mix Minus? I was able to set the input of Channel 2 to USB-1, and I could now hear my Skype caller. I was on Channel 3, and life was good. How do I go about making sure that the sound of the caller does not go back to the caller? I look at the output, and all the output routing is for the stereo out mix. Where do I adjust what goes back to the caller? I looked, and looked, and headed to YouTube. They have a video on the Sound Devices website, but they just said, "Set the input and out to the MixPre-3. My thought was, Yeah, but then what. Finally, I saw a video that explained you can't route what is going back to the USB output, and that you don't need to setup a mix minus, as IT JUST DOES IT. Well, that's cool. I'm definitely stopping by their booth at Podcast Movement and asking some questions about this as (and this is important) I'm not sure I'm 100% right on that. If I wanted to use the Stereo Output jack into another USB device (in my case I use a Griffin imic) than I could get into more advanced setups. What Would I Fix About it? The On/Off switch is placed in a not so great spot, but then again because this thing is so tiny, any place you put the switch it's going to be right on top of something. It seems like having the SD card behind the battery pack is a bad idea. However, when I push a button and turn on file transfer, it was super fast to copy the files from the device to my computer. I originally was somewhat bummed that it doesn't have a "Marker" feature, but using the wingman app (free) I can lookup and see what time the boo-boo happened and make a mental note. Not as cool as a marker (especially if you wanted to pass your audio to someone else

Darren Dake of the Coroner Talk podcast started a podcast in 2013, and started a podcast, but it didn't last. He really loves being a death scene investigator so he started the Coroner Talk podcast 2014. This lead to numerous opportunities: He started to make connections with people He now gets around 15,000 download a month He was asked the be the trainer supervisor for his state. He wrote a few books that has lead him to speak at conferences multiple times He includes going to different states to talk He created online courses for his "Coroner School" and is now taking off and now he is on track to make a six figure income from his speaking and his online courses. Please Notice: This wasn't overnight This wasn't easy. Your audience must always come first. Some Thoughts On Opportunities “A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.” ― Winston S. Churchill “We often miss opportunity because it's dressed in overalls and looks like work” ― Thomas A. Edison “Failure is only the opportunity more intelligently to begin again.” ― Henry Ford “I believe that every single event in life happens in an opportunity to choose love over fear.” ― Oprah Winfrey Unfortunately, there seems to be far more opportunity out there than ability.... We should remember that good fortune often happens when opportunity meets with preparation. Thomas A. Edison There comes a moment in every life when the Universe presents you with an opportunity to rise to your potential. An open door that only requires the heart to walk through, seize it and hang on. The choice is never simple. It's never easy. It's not supposed to be. But those who travel this path have always looked back and realized that the test was always about the heart. ...The rest is just practice. Jaime Buckley Spend eighty percent of your time focusing on the opportunities of tomorrow rather than the problems of yesterday. Brian Tracy Missed Opportunities I do a show called the Alexacast that is all about getting the most out of your Amazon Echo, Dot, etc. So I have an audience that is tied to Amazon. One might say they are Amazon "Super Users." Yet then Amazon Prime day came, and I have an audience that is tied to Amazon, and I barely promoted it. I should've made a big deal about this, and made it an event. Know What Opportunities Are Coming Up I found two sites that show special days. These are: https://www.daysoftheyear.com https://nationaldaycalendar.com By knowing when all these special days that come up, you might be able to make a special event to encourage your audience to interact with the show. Sometimes You Need To Ask I heard Dan Klass from the Bitterest Pill is being inducted into the Academy of Podcasters Hall of Fame. I'm a HUGE Dan Klass fan. So I asked if I could do the induction speech to introduce Dan to an audience that may not know Dan like I feel I do. Sometimes Opportunity Are Based on Previous Actions Because Jared and Dan from Podcast Movement had called on me in the past and I delivered "the Goods," and I had acted professionally in the past when I worked with them, I was given the opportunity to induct Dan. This puts me on a big stage. If I show people that I can handle the big stage (I've been a keynote speaker at some conferences) I can show the world that I can bring value to your event. Mentioned in This Podcast Podcasters Roundtable Grammar Girl Podcast Philip Keller from Blind Faith Live (here Phillip on last week's show) Podcast Awards Order the Messengers Documentary on iTunes go to www.schoolofpodcasting.com/themessengers then send me an email with the subject link "I have a message - your name " (dave "at" schoolofpodcasting.com) I will give you a coupon for 40% off your first six months (this offer expired 8/24/17)

Because of My Podcast Randy Goers of the Drone Radio Show When you start a podcast you are seen as a digital influencer and today's example of something that wouldn't have happened if it wasn't because of their podcast is from Randy Goers who produces the Drone Radio Show. He explains how he is able to make great connections, and be able to attend Drone events with a press pass. He recently was able to interview one of the senior vice presidents of Intel who is in charge of directing their drone policy and program. That all happens Because of my Podcast. How to NOT Make Money with a Podcast Today I start a new segment that will appear from time to time with Jessica Kupferman who runs the www.JKMAgency.com and helps podcasters find sponsors. This segment is to help podcasters looking to monetize their podcast by helping them avoid the mistakes other are making. Keep in mind, you do not have to monetize your show. In this first initial segment, Jessica explains that when quoting numbers to a potential sponsor the number people are interested is your episode downloads after 30 days of being available. Monthly stats don't count because in that monthly downloads are episodes in your back catalog (and the sponsor is not going to be in those episodes). While most podcasters are not crazy about the CPM Model (where you are paid a certain amount of money for a thousand downloads, such as 30 CPM would mean when your episode goes over 1000 downloads you would be paid $30). If you're creating a media kit, you need to have a dollar value in mind so that when people ask for it, you're ready. Being secretive about your pricing is not going to help you. Yes, everything is up for negotiation but you have to have a starting price. Phillip Keller (Formerly Trapper Jack on Cleveland Radio) Spotlighting a Living Saint Phillip Keller spent 25 years in Cleveland Radio. He took not one, but TWO stations to number one. His show might be seen as controversial as he interviews people who have been healed by a local Dr. Issam Nemeh. This has lead to national attention. The miracle stories became so commonplace that programs as varying as Dr. Oz and 700 club feature Dr. Nemeh. Phillip does all of his own production and editing even though he is legally blind. In today's interview he talks about: The difference between radio and podcasting and the different broadcast muscles you need to flex What kind of prep he was doing when he was on a #1 Radio Station (and going to work at 3 AM) How he was treated when he got to #1 is amazing. Why he doesn't miss radio. Besides radio, what other things have gone away in his life? How long should your podcast be? How being featured got his numbers to jump How his first podcast was awful. Where did the name Trapper Jack come from? How he turning his podcast into a book using rev.com What is his favorite miracle story (Episode 210) Check out Phillips show at www.blindfatihlive.com and subscribe to them in Apple iTunes Support his show on Patreon Mentioned In This Show Ham Radio 360 The Messengers: A Podcast Documentary Preorder in iTunes after pre-ordering the documentary (see the trailer) and you can get 40% off the School of Podcasting for the first 6 months (send an email with the subject line "I have a message - your name) I will show you how you can also get entered into drawing to get free items like a Heil Pro 40 Microphone, digital recorder and more I will be speaking at the National Podcasting Power Event in Perrysburg Ohio on September 23, 2017. See http://www.nationalpodcastpower.com/ I will also be speaking at Podcast Movement (use the coupon code sop10) in August. I will also be at Podcast MidAtlantic in September Join the School of Podcasting Join worry free with a 30-day Money-back-guarantee Private Facebook Group For Networking Live Group Coaching ($400 value) 16 Online Podcast Courses Covering All Aspects of Podcasting Join Today

Each month I ask my audience a question and they answer and we all learn together. This month I asked, "What have you changed about your show and why?" Some people added/removed co-hosts. Some people updated artwork and intro music. Others start/stopped writing out their podcasts. Some adjusted their attitude, or cut back on some of the podcast promotion. The following people contributed Win from buterfliesofwisdom.weebly.comBrad from wearethecinemaguys.com Anna From Authentic Moments authenticparenting.com Cheri from www.christianscienceforkids.com Dads Spotlight Lawschool Insider Emily from thestorybehindpodcast.com Craig from Inglespodcast Gabe Guys and food podcast Gary and Margaret from Kiwi Mana - Bee Keeping PodcastJenny K From Studio ChaoticJohn The Wired home SchoolKim from toastmaters101.net and onthetablepodcasts.comMark King (Venture Captial) http://markwking.com/Paul from http://www.trinitydigitalmedia.com/Scott from the Computer Tutor Podcast Sean from Slept in Government ClassBryan From Engaging MissionsRandy Cantrel From Pear Advisory GroupZack from Raising Rents (as in Parents) In the end, this shows you can change your podcast. Your podcast is not a statue, it's a recipe. If you want to change it you can. If you're happy with it, keep doing it, but there is nothing stopping you from throwing something out there, seeing the feedback, and go from there. Buy the Messengers and Save 40% on the School of Podcasting You can get 40% the first six months at the School of Podcasting. Just preorder the Messengers on iTunes, take a screenshot, or a selfie with the screen in the background (you know, prove to me you bought it, I trust you) and I will send you a coupon for 40% off your monthly subscription. Just email me and in the subject line put "I have a message - your name" and I will send you the coupon. To preorder go to http://www.schoolofpodcasting.com/themessengers The Power Of Distraction I had an awkward moment this weekend. My ex-father-in-law passed away. I wanted to be there for my ex-wife and my ex-step-children. I remember when my Mom died how weird it is to be in a room with your loved one in a box. My goal was to distract them from their Grandfather in the casket. I wanted to make them laugh (if possible) and get them talking about anything. While people alway say, "Thank you so much for coming.." when my oldest step daughter came up and gave me a hug and said, "I'm so glad you came" it seemed a little more heartfelt. It made me feel so good to be there for people in need. WHAT DOES THIS HAVE TO DO WITH PODCASTING? There are times when people have bad days, weeks, maybe bad months, and YOUR SHOW can be the distraction that helps them get through the day. Your show's ability to make them laugh, cry, think, grown, educated, or entertain, can take them away from whatever is bugging them. I saw that today face to face, and it can be huge. So if you're not getting feedback, or you're not selling a course, realize you can be doing a ton of service to people and never know it.

Because of My Podcast Danny Peña’ is Now on Twitch.tv Danny is a Hall of Fame podcaster who shared his story about how he started off with a cassette deck (see episode 506), and ended up playing video games with Bill Gates, and getting a spot on CBS Radio. Well, he has some more good news. He is not partnered with Twitch.tv Twitch.tv has evolved its reputation as the world’s leading social video platform and community for video game culture to now encompass an array of emerging content surfaced by its users. As a result, 10 million visitors gather each day to watch and talk about video games, music, the creative arts, themselves, and other beyond gaming topics with more than 2 million streamers. So in other words, Danny is going to get to record his podcast live in front of millions of people who happen to be his target audience. You will see when you go to http://twitch.tv/gamertagradio that there is a way for people to tip Danny as his crew, and Danny also gets a piece of the $5.99 subscription fee (which gives you more access, and the ability to watch the video on demand). Check out Danny's Show at www.gamertagradio.com The Messengers: A Podcast Documentary Now Available for Pre Order - Very Special Deal I was asked to work with the crew that created the movie, The Messengers: A Podcast Documentary. I created a podcast to give you the behind the scenes view of making the documentary. Well, the movie is now available for Pre-Order. We want it to be #1 when it is released. If you've ever wanted to support the show now is the time. This is a time when independent podcasters can ban together to show the true power of podcasting. It will be released August 23rd. From now until then I'm doing a special deal. I will give you a coupon for 40% off your first 6 months at the School of Podcasting. Just send forward the email of your purchase, take a self with your confirmation, in general, prove to me you purchased the film, and I'll send you a coupon. Make the subject line, "I have a message - Your Name" so in my case it would be "I have a message - Dave Jackson". The price is only $5.99, and you'll save $20 a month or $120 over the six months (before it goes back to your regular price of $49/month) Purchase the movie and get inspired when it comes out and start your podcast today. Here is the link Congrats to Niel, Willie, Ralph, Chris, and John for a job well done. Order the Movie Here Nominate the School of Podcasting for the People's Choice Podcast Awards I've been so busy working on finding good content for you each week, I have failed to announce that you can now nominate the School of Podcasting for a Podcast Award. I would deeply appreciate it www.podcastawards.com as the voting is different this year (no more having the vote every day). So if you ever got any value out of the School of Podcasting or this podcast, please go to and nominate the School of Podcasting in the Technology category Alexandra Harbushka May Be the Most Courageous Woman in Podcasting While all podcasters have to deal with hating their voice the first time they hear it, as well as worry about if anyone would listen or like the show. Alexandra had all those and one more BIG distinction. Her show is about Herpes, and yes Alexandra has Herpes. Her show is called Life With Herpes, and her first episode was one of the most insanely personal podcasts I've ever heard. She reveals how she found out, how she felt, and how scared she was. I couldn't believe what I was hearing. I wanted to have her on the show for a few reasons: If someone can do a podcast and stand up and say, "Hi I'm Alexandra and I have herpes" surely you can find the courage to start your podcast about your hobby or business She is building a community that is super connected because only people with this disease can truly understand what it is like to deal with this disease. As much as there is a stigma around this disease, she hasn't received any negative comments or name calling. Instead, she receives emails from people thanking her for her courage, and support as they struggle with understanding what is the "new normal." In today's interview we hear: a) What inspired her to start a podcast? b) What it's like to talk about a controversial subject. c) How having a super niche show is enabling her to be found, and her downloads are growing (not a ton of competition) d) How a change in philosophy helps her embrace the day, and inspire her to podcast. e) We hear some of the biggest misconceptions about Herpes (Grandma you gave me herpes!) Check out Alexandra and the Living With Herpes show at www.lifewithherpes.com Dave's Jackson Podcast Experience Ready to start a podcast? I have as of 7/23/17 Dave Jackson has produced over 2988 episodes of 31 podcasts with a total number of 3,182,220 downloads. Some were super niche (Alexacast) other were experiments (Worst Podcast Ever) but through my experience, I have seen what works and what does not. I can help you avoid the common pit

King of the Niche Podcasts Bill Strand of Chameleonbreeder.com In this 20 minute interview we hear how: Bill has been involved with Chameleon's For Over 40 Years His Podcast Has Lead His Audience to Trust Him and Engage with him on Social Media This trust has to lead to more sales than when he produced an Ezine (back in the day) His supplier can't keep up with the orders and Bill no longer mentions his Chameleon Cages on his show How Bill keeps his family supporting his show His audience loyalty results in them freely paying more for his products so they can support him. Bill is nice enough to share his numbers, and he is getting WAY MORE than the median 200 downloads (he had more than that in one day) Bill's commitment is to delivering value. 2017 Is More Than Half Way Done, How Are Your Goals? It's July, last month the year was 50% 0ver. My plans for this year had two big projects. Revamp the School of Podcasting Update my book, "More Podcast Money." I have not made any serious strides in either of these. Let's not panic. What did I do instead? I launched a few shows testing different hosting platforms (including a show for my cat). I started a Patreon group my weight loss show. I added a "Baby Steps" free video course to drive leads to the School of Podcasting. While learning about more platforms keep me well rounded in what is available for podcasters, it's kind of like knowing about Coke, Pepsi, and DR. Pepper. Do you really need more cola choices? OK, fine, we'll add RC cola. The Patreon experiment is for the book as was having a sponsor earlier in the year. Free Resources You Might Want to Check Out If you're looking for a way to get the word out (and you somewhat have an audience of friends, etc) there is a free tool called thunderclap.it where you pick a day when you send out a tweet (that you create) and it goes out everyone's twitter at the same time (and Facebook, and Tumblr) . You need a minimum of 100 people (according to their video) or it won't go out (the free version let's you choose how many people you need to share. The smallest paid plan is $55 per campaign. I've added this to the Podcasting Resources area. Sometimes reading books will give you an idea for a new episode. While there are resources like Audibible.com (where you can get a free book for joining), you may have heard of this thing called the Library (which I recently got to visit when we had a thunderstorm, and I had no power or the Internet and they did). On a recent taping of the Ask the Podcast Coach show, Daniel J Lewis from the Audacity to Podcast informed me of Overdrive.com which works with your library card to enable you to download audiobooks and ebooks for free. Kim Krachi from Toastmasters 101 also mentioned Hoopla Digital which is a similar service. Becuase of My Podcast I'm Going All over the World Talking About a Subject I Love Hilda from the Wise Traditions Podcast and her own site holistichilda.com started this podcast by contacting a company where she enjoyed their newsletter but thought it needed a kick in the pants (and she loves the topic). She get involved and now hosts their podcasts. She is doing such a great job they are now sending her all over the globe to talk about the show and be an ambassador. Check out at holistichilda.com and the podcast is at http://westonaprice.org/ Libsyn and Blubrry ready for New iTunes Tags As Soundcloud continues to plummet (and they hope Chance the wrapper saves them the way Justin Timberlake save Myspace?), Libsyn.com and Blubrry.com have already stated (and demonstrated in some cases) how the new iTunes Tags are in place. You can see Libsyn's new layout and demonstration here Mentioned in this Show Happy 100th Episode to The Feed (the official podcast from Libsyn.com Hero of the week Jessica Kupferman from the jkmagency.com for telling advertisers to stick their $6 per episode offers where the sun doesn't shine. Jimmy Iovine says it takes 6 years for great musicians to break into the music business (from the Howard Stern show on Siriusxm.com ) School of Podcasting Provides Direct Access to my twelve years of experience Private Facebook Group Access to all 16 courses Priority Email Support Live Group Coaching 30-Day Moneyback -Guarantee JOIN TODAY

I went to two concerts this weekend and underneath all the education and information, podcasters are entertainers. If you're not entertaining your audience, you're losing them. Dictionary.com defines entertain as, "to hold the attention of pleasantly or agreeably; divert; amuse." We need to hold people's attention. The concerts I saw this weekend were Jonny Lang and King's X. Two Concerts by musicians with track records going all the way back to 1980 (King's X) and 1995 (Lang). Jonny Lang released his major label debut when he was 15 years old. Both bands had music in the rotation on MTV (for those that remember MTV) So what does this have to do with Podcasting? Well as both of these bands are now "Indie" we can learn from them. Have a Crappy Opening Act In both instances, the promoters of these shows picked HORRENDOUS opening acts. While the bands have little if nothing at all to do with this, it does make them sound better. Know what you're going to say Both of these bands have what are called set lists. This lists the songs in the order. It's only game plan and can be changed, but when they hit the stage they have a pretty idea of what is going to happen in the next 60-90 minutes. As a podcaster you should have a pretty good idea of where you are going when you press record. I know this seems common sense, but I often here shows start with what should be pregame chatter, "Did you want to talk about _____?" This should've been decided before the microphone was turned on. It's not like the guys in King's X have a big "LADIES AND GENTLEMEN KING'S X" and then Doug and Ty look at each other and ask, "Should we do Groove Machine?" I recently read a book about Van Halen, and bands of this caliber practice the same set for months to make sure everything is smooth. For the Love of God put the good stuff first There is a reason the news often starts with the phrase "Our top story tonight." Both bands came out with great up-tempo songs to get the crowd engaged. 3. Be Original Jonny Lang sounded like he was 15 going on 48 when he came out of the gate. He has a voice that is very distinct, and you know its him. Kings X has a very distinct sound. Did they do something way outside the box? Yes and No. They tune their guitars lower than what is considered standard, and they use a slightly different tuning (for the musicians they tune to C instead of E, and they use Drop D (not C) tuning). So while a little outside the box, all they did was twist a few knobs. These small twists (combined with awesome musicianship) makes them very identifiable. 4. Listen to Your Audience During one song Jonny was playing and singing with his guitar. This is called "Scat singing" and it was pretty cool (and I hate scat singing). The crowd really came alive. Sure enough later in the evening he brought it back. All night King's X fans were shouting requests (they have quite a few albums). One song is called, "King" and one person kept screaming, "Are you going to play King?" Well, they weren't because I was in the front row leaning on the stage and could read their set list (and I took after the convert). Before their first encore, they swapped added it. 5. You Can't Make Everyone Happy One dufas at the Kings X show wrote a note with a song request and was very persistent. Eventually, the lead singer stated they had a set list, and they are prepared to play and some they are not. 6. Have a Cool Logo if You Want to Sell Merchandise Jonny Lang's t-shirt was boring. They pictured his latest album cover which has his picture on it. With the music business in a mess, musicians make a fair amount of money from merchandise sales. For those who want to keepsake from the concert, the traditional "Album cover" t-shirt will do. King's X has a cool logo, with the phrase "First Church of Rock and Roll" with the saying "May the Groove be With you" You want to wear this shirt BECAUSE IT'S A COOL SHIRT. The other thing about having a cool logo shirt, is you can sell it no matter what tour you're on. This also means knowing your audience, so if your audience is a bunch if middle aged dudes, you better keep the extra large in stock. 7. Do No Underestimate the Power Of You, and the Value of Direct Access With Jonny Lang you can purchase a VIP package with gives you access to the soundcheck, selfie, posters, guitar picks, commemorative laminate, etc for $100. Most of this has very little to do with Jonny. 8. Don't Lose Your Cool, or Panic During the first few songs, the lead singer was having an issue with a microphone stand. Eventually, he threw it to the ground. Was he upset? I don't think so. I think he was trying to get the attention of the sound crew. Some "Rock stars" might've walked off the stage. Doug kept his cool. King's X Did Something Brilliant At Disney at end of the every ride you exit through the gift shop. At the end of their show, the lead singer from King's X explained how they were going to towel off, and head over to the merchandise table wh

Today I talk with Drew Ackerman of the Sleep with Me Podcast. I met him at Podfest.us and I was amazed at the amount of detail he puts into a show that has a singular goal of putting you to sleep. In the interview you will hear: How Drew started his show with not the best of equipment His "Let's See What Happens" attitude How he picks the not too boring, not too entertaining topics. How he pushed through when he thought about quitting What inspired him to start the podcast How he takes it seriously, but not too seriously. What countries just don't get his show. The listener email that left him humbled. His massive amount of downloads reported in the Washington Post Check out Drew's Sleep With Me Podcast at www.sleepwithmepodcast.com Anchor.fm Trying Hard to Be Everything and Succeeding at.... I took another look at Anchor.fm now that you can create a podcast for free. This is another great example of a company knowing NOTHING about podcasting and jumping into the space. Leading people who are uninformed into situations that they are going to hate in a few months. They are going to control your feed if you let them submit your podcast feed "for you" which means later you won't be able to see your Apple stats. As a feedback mechanism, it's easy to receive feedback, but impossible to get it off your phone (and if they knew anything about podcasting they would know this). For now, I'm going to play with it for a week, but getting these files into a podcast (not using their horrible system) is not easy. Ready To Start a Podcast? Go to www.schoolofpodcasting.com/start You get step by step tutorials on 16 courses Private Facebook group to pick the brains of other podcasters Priority email support and Live Group Coaching 30 Day Money Back Guarantee Go to www.schoolofpodcasting.com/start

Even though I asked, "How many strikes do you give a podcast before turning out?" nobody answered with a number. Instead, the answers were "it depends." It sounds that you are going to get more strikes if you are delivering Contributors to the show Cliff from www.podcastanswerman.com Tim From the Sled Dog Podcast Jenny from Studiochaotic.com (personal journal podcast) Kyle from Reckoneer.com Reckoneer is your #1 resource for the race promoter who didn't major in business. Darren from coronertalk.com (thanks for the shirt!) Haley from Adopteeson.com a podcast where Adoptees talk about the adoption experience Larry from goinglinux.com Sean from Slept in Government Class Dennis from Evil Podcast The CUB Approach to Podcast Reviews CUB stands for is it Confusing, Unbelievable, or Boring. If you have any of these, it's time to edit the show. Because of My Podcast: Ray Edwards I attend Ray's copywriting Academy and Ray mentioned how he had a client hire him for a $10,000 job from a podcast Ray puts out for free. This was part two of episode 572, and originated at www.schoolofpodcasting.com/572 July's Question What has changed about your show since you started, and why did you make the change? Contact me, and be sure to mention 577 Ready to start Podcasting? Join the School of Podcasting.com using the coupon listener

We seem to think we don't know what to do, when in truth we don't do what we know. This week I attended Ray Edwards copyrighting academy, and it was pretty cool. I went there as I will be updating the School of Podcasting's website later this year. Also, people that are learning to write copy, probably have a product. People who have a product need customers, a great way to attract customers is via a podcast. So when you hear me say go to where your target audience is, make friends with them, then tell them about your show, I did that repeatedly this weekend. Success is sequential, not simultaneous. Your calendar shows your priorities or your distractions? Everyone has a excuse as to way they didn't succeed. If everything you do is an experiment, then nothing is a failure If it does everything, it does nothing well. Part 2 coming later this week after I take care of my car.

Because of my Podcast: Clay From Fish Nerds Clay has had some very cool things happen on his Fish Nerds Show including having a touring opera singer invite clay to do a show at a theater. Check out Clay at www.fishnerds.com The Sometimes Condescending Nature of Radio People Towards Podcasting There are some really cool people from the radio industry that get podcasting. People like Eric K Johnson from Podcast Talent Coach and the Podcast Review Show, Michael Sharkey from the Talent Show, Jeff Brown From Read to Lead, Tim Sinclair from Ringr and My Worst Interview Ever, and Phillip Keller from Blind Faith live GET PODCASTING. I don't want to lump all radio people together. There are times when someone comes across with a condescending tone of voice. It comes across like "Podcasting is a fad, or not "Real Broadcasting." They seem to think that now that the "Real" broadcasters are here and it's time to step aside and let the "real" broadcasters take over. I recently listened to The Sound Off Show with Matt Cundill. In the episode, he was talking about how a recent professional survey company had polled listeners in Canda.Matt asks, "Is the hype on podcasting just a lot of noise and it takes a study like this one to figure out where it really ranks?" What a douchebag. AS if study after study showing podcasting's slow but steady growth, and radio's slow and steady decline aren't enough. This is what I say "Radio People" with a negative slant. This is what I'm basing my opinion on, and when I say "Some radio people have a bias," this is why. How Improv Skills Can Help Your Podcast Today I have Chad Elliot from the Off the Cuff Comedy Improv Podcast, and http://seattleimprovclasses.com/ I appeared on episode 7 and was SUPER nervous as I didn't get this I would be doing improv on his show. I have never done improv. Luckily Chad sent me his book Improv Manifesto: 7 Easy Steps to Confidence, Creativity, and Charisma - Even If You're Shy! (Think On Your Feet Under Pressure with Tools of Improvisational Theater & Improv Comedy.) which helped me get ready. Here are some things I learned. Talk with confidence, even when you're not confident about your answer. You will be amazed at how your brain "Fills in the blank" when you start talking. The key to improv is listening to every word of the person you are working with. If things horrible, it is a learning experience and you will handle it better next time, and will build skills to help get through it better. You can see results when you start doing one improve exercise What Does This Do With Podcasting? When you are 100% focused on what your guest/co-host is saying you are better prepared to ask a better follow up question (than if you had a premade lit of questions). If you have a bad interview, living through this experience shows you that you will survive and equips you to handle it better in the future You can contemplate different stories to pull from an idea (see The Story Factor: Inspiration, Influence, and Persuasion through the Art of Storytelling by Annette Simmons) It builds confidence and can get you our of your comfort zone. This way when podcasting opens the doors to new relationships, you will have the confidence to walk through Face Your Podcasting Fears Chad had a client who said, "You know what I want to do this because I'm scared of it, but I don't want to do it because I'm scared of it." The pros of podcasting outweigh any negatives and if you can make it through the learning curve, you will be so happy you made it through (see www.schoolofpodcasting.com/start to start your podcast today) This Month's Podcast Question How many "strikes" do you give a podcast before you unsubscribe (if you have subscribed) or if you don't subscribe how many strikes do they get before you quit streaming their show. Got to www.schoolofpodcasting.com/contact and use the information there. You can send an email with an audio attachment and put 572 in the subject line. Be sure to mention your show and website so I can put a link in the show notes Start Your Podcast Today - Risk-Free The School of Podcasting has a 30-day Money-back Guarantee, so if you sign up and decide podcasting is not for you. Contact me anytime within the first 30 days and get a full refund. Sign up today at www.schoolofpodcasting.com/start

New Apple Specs Coming In the future, Apple Podcasts app will support some new features including: One the podcast level you will have Seasons Serial and Episodic podcast types On the Episode level Title, episode number, and season number Summary and episode notes Trailers and bonus content GUID (don’t change it!) I am worried when I read the text, "New subscribers will receive the first episode in their Library, or the current season if using seasons. " As we don't know what "will receive" means. Does this mean it will automatically download an entire season? We don't know. If it does, I can see people abusing this to get more downloads. There are already people sending old content back to their audience just to juice their download numbers. They also mention not to change the GUID. The GUID is a unique number that identifies your episode. Changing this number will have the app seeing the episode as new. You should never change this number. Apple is saying "Don't change this." This is kind of like saying "Don't stick that knife in the outlet" to a two-year-old. In my opinion, this is a bad idea to even give people access to this. New Listener Stats Apple will provide statistics on how many listeners you have, minutes per listener, Abandonment Point, and Average Completion. The statistics are "Launching this year." The other thing I'm worried about is currently people OBSESS over their podcast numbers. They release an episode, FREAK OUT that it's not in their iTunes listing, and want to know why they don't have download number immediately. This will give podcasters more stats to obsess over. Also, you may not be ready for the shock when you find out that only 48% of your audience is listening to the entire of your episode. None of This Matters Yet If I told you there was a new audio format and it was going to sound great and do all sorts of new fun stuff, but there aren't any players that can play it yet the news wouldn't mean anything. You can't experience any of the new stuff until players are available. These new features won't come into play until iOS11 is available (that will have the new Podcasts App). So it's exciting, but the time to celebrate and figure out how to get these new tags into our RSS feeds should be something we worry about later. I'm sure Libsyn, Blubrry, and Speaker (and any other Podcast Media hosts worth anything) will have systems in place shortly. I know patience is not a characteristic of some podcasters, but for now, know things are going to get better later this year. Here are the details from Apple. Becuase of My Podcast: I Got a Gig as an Audio Editor Jeff Perry has had multiple version of shows about podcasting. He has really enjoyed editing them into different forms. He recently landed a job working for Emerald City Productions as an audio editor. Check out Jeff's show at https://podcastingspark.com/ Great Follow Up Questions Make Great Podcasts Your homework for today is to reach out to a podcast you listen to, and let them know you enjoy their show (I call this "putting gas in their tank). For me I did this after listening to Lee Silverstein on Podcast Junkies What Podcasters Can Learn From Kevin Hart I remember watching the comedy special I'm a Grown Little Man and he was hilarious as he shared stories about his family. At the end, he said, "I want to show you why I do this," and brought out his two little children. It was touching, and transparent. I've seen copier salesmen drag their kids around as a gimmick. This just seemed genuine. I've seen every one of his specials since then, and when his book came out, I instantly got the audio version (read by Kevin) on Audible. (you can get it for free if you're new to audible). I always if you can make me laugh, cry, think, groan, educate, or entertain me I'm in. This book did all of that, but the things that podcasters can take away from this story is Kevin's relentless pursuit of getting better at his craft. You also see how those "hard times" that we have often come back to life in a way that you are thankful that you had them. Here are some of the things that jumped out of the book: Kevin's Father is crazy. He did things to his children that were cruel. One time he stole a bike and tried to give it to Kevin as a present. His Mom knew it was stolen, and instantly made Kevin give it back. He "borrowed" a neighborhood dog and gave it to his children, only to have the neighbor come back and get the dog. Kevin soon realized, his father wasn't going to win any medals for "Father of the year."He accepted it, but instead of hating his father, he forgave him. Kevin got a mentor after making it "big" in Philidelphia and wanted to takes grow his career. He drove from Philidelphia to New York City (according to Google Maps that is one hour and forty-five minutes one way). He would then sit and watch his mentor perform a numerous clubs. He wouldn't get to sit at the table with all the comedians. He was building a relationship with his

Understand Before Being Understood About a month ago I left a comment on the Spreaker Live show, and this comment resulted in a response from the host that in a conversation he had with me was "Disproportional." So after we both hissed at each I set up a time when we could talk about this and see how we pushed each other's buttons. We did and it was a great interview. The bad news is my SD Card ran out of room, and my backup (mp3 skype recorder) didn't get it either. I could call Alex back on, but at this point, so much water is under the bridge, I thought I would just paraphrase what really happened. In my comment, there were times when I used ALL CAPS to make a point. Alex is used to dealing with comments from YouTube which are much crueler, and personal that the average podcast comment This was the first time he had been challenged on the podcast side of this content (vs the YouTube side) and it caught him off guard. He apologized for calling me a schmuck, and I explained that when he made a joke about me not having any listeners (because I don't use Spreaker), and that I wasn't up front with people about the fact that I work for Libsyn, and we chatted about that. I explained how I wasn't trying to push his buttons, and then we did something that most people miss out on. We had some cool conversation about topics we have in common. For example, Chris Cornell had just died. Neither one of use quite gets while World Trade Center Tower Number 7 went down. In the end, I look forward to meeting Alex at Podcast Movement. If I had not taken a second to step back, and wonder if there was something I DID to create such a reaction (instead of just condemning the other person) then I would've lost out on an opportunity to learn something (be careful using caps in comments), and Alex wouldn't have been able to see his reaction. Lastly, I think we both gained a new friend. So instead of being so set on proving somebody wrong, instead maybe ask, "Why did you say that?" or "What were you feeling when you said that?" and try to understand before being understood (Which is a lesson I learned from the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People) Seriously, How Do I Grow My Audience? Devlin Wilder posted in a Facebook Group, "Please, for the love of all that's good and pure, someone please help me WITH REAL INFO on how I get the numbers. I don't want to hear I need to have my show out for years or I need to get to 200 episodes or what not. And I've had no luck with Fiverr. I need to know the real deal" This is like saying, "I want to know about making a baby, but I don't want to hear about ovaries, sperm, or having to wait 9 months." THERE ARE NO SHORTCUTS In her book Beyond Powerful Radio Radio Consultant Vallerie Geller states, "in my experience, with few exceptions it takes about three years to build a talk station." She points out that the original Star Trek Series was canceled after three seasons and it was re-runs where the audience found the show. Jerry Seinfeld has framed a memo stating that his show has a poor supporting cast, and most people who saw the test pilot would not watch it again. Gary Vaynrchuck says nobody watched his show for the first 19 months Rand Fishkin tells about his wife, Geraldine, and her travel blog, Everywhereist. For two years she never broke 100 visitors a day (she does a blog). Five years later she gets 1000,000 visitors a month. Source Success comes from feedback, and the ability to look at yourself and ask "Can I Improve This?" Growing up I had a basketball hoop in my backyard. Every time I shot a basket and it bounced off the rim and back at me.... that was feedback. I watched Kareem Abdul Jabar and his sky hooks shot. It was unblockable. I practiced my skyhook over and over and over. Eventually, I could shoot it with my eyes shut. That took time. If you want to quit your job in six weeks, I would recommend that you not even start podcasting. This is like someone wanting to lose 40 pounds in six weeks. You soon learn that six weeks is not that long, and 40 pound is not that small. The Answer is There is No Answer There are so many factors that play into this Are you working full time? What market are you in and how crowded is it? How unique are you? Your Web Design It's Not Who You Know, It's Who Knows You Podcast Movement is coming up in August, and DC Podfest is coming up in November. I will be at Podcast Movement, and I plan on being in DC Podfest. Do these cost lots of money? Just the travel alone can be expensive based on your budget. That is the key, what is your budget? If you don't have the budget, don't be stupid, don't go. I'm saving money as we speak for Social Media marketing world. I have to plan. I have to put money in my budget. If you have a family with a spouse and kids, don't be stupid. Is It Worth Going to An Event? I have a podcast group for people in Northeast Ohio. I rarely get more than five people in attendance. One of those people (Matt from theauthorinsideyou.com) h

I asked the question: Are you podcasting? If so where and why? If you quit podcasting, why? If you haven't started yet, why? Matt from the Author Inside You Sleep Whispers Podcast Simple Money Solutions Steve Stewart Podcast Editor Jeff had a blog that didn't get traction (for every 2000 blogs there is ONE podcast), he wants his show to be perfect (if you miss perfect you land on really good), is it viable to spend more money (we spend money on bowling, golfing), and what about Web Hosting? I like Site Ground and Cooler Websites. For media hosting use Libsyn and use the coupon sopfree to get a free month Jenny from Studio Chaotic Derek From Life after Sight Loss Darwyn from Dealing with My Grief David from the Magic and Steele (he's the guy taking all the missing E's) Chris from Dad Spotlight Gabe from Guys and Food Brad from Cinema Guys Sean Slept in Government Class Hilda From Wise Traditions Cheri From Creation Science for Kids Jonathan from Trivial Warfare Bill from the Chameleon Breeder Ready to Start a Podcast? What do you get at the School of Podcasting? Step by step tutorials to guide yo through ever aspect of planning, launching and growing your podcast Priority email support Access to the School of Podcasting Private Facebook Group a 30-Day Money-Back Guarantee Just go to Schoolofpodcasting.com/start and sign up today

Comments? 888-56-33228 Podcasting Microphone Shootout Microphone 1 - Audio Technica ATR2100 $59 (Here is Bundle with Boom arm) Microphone 2 - Audio Technica ATR2005 $79 Microphone 3 - Samson Q2U $54 (with headphones) Microphone 4 - Knox Dynamic USB Microphone $39 (here is a bundle with boom arm) Microphone 5 - Audi Technica 3035 $179 Microphone 6 - Heil Pr40 $327 Engage, Listen, and Grow Your Audience with Jonathan Oakes Jonathan Oakes has been producing the Trivial Warfare for two years he has had some great adventures with his audience including participating in some really big trivia contests. Jonathan has always had a love for trivia. He participated in those TV shows where high school teams go against each other. He has taken on entries bars of people (AND WON). Jonathan's audience loves to learn, and love the ability to show their memory skills. You can find his show at www.trivialwarfare.com Today in episode 567 we hear: How Jonathan worked with his co-hosts to set expectations when it comes to dividing any money. He brought on co-hosts that brought in different viewpoints He listened to what his audience wanted (to be on the show) and found a way so that both the show and the listener benefit. He has incorporated giveaways into his Patreon to increase patron in the higher support tiers He uses a Facebook Group to gather feedback on ideas to Check out Jonathan's Show at www.trivialwarfare.com and check out his Patreon Account at https://www.patreon.com/TWA Ready To Start Podcasting? Join the School of Podcasting at www.schoolofpodcasting.com/start 30-Day Money-back Guarantee Access to all of our courses Live group coaching sessions Priority Email Support Find out more at www.schoolofpodcasting.com/start Next Week is the Audience Poll Episode Are you podcasting? If so why? Did you post and quit? If so why? Have you never launched a podcast but want to? What's stopping you? Call 888-563-3228 or use any of the contact options at www.schoolofpodcasting.com/contact answer the question by 5/26/17 (be sure to mention your show if you have one) Mentioned in This Show Jonathan's Appearance on "Harry's Show" Podcast Junkies Jessica Kupferman's JKM Agency helps podcasters get sponsors Podcasting 101

Because of My Podcast: Lee Silverstein Lee Silverstein is the man behind the Colon Cancer Podcast and the Color Cancer Network was able to get press passes to a very cool event in his area. Cool Image Tools For Your Podcast I've been working on rebuilding PodcastingResources.com and in the process finding that some resources are gone, and other have been updated. Also in the process of moving items, I've had podcaster inform me of new sources. Today I want to talk about some resources you might know and a few might not when it comes to creating graphics and images. Canva.com Canva.com was my favorite tool for a simple but powerful tool. It included photographs you could include for free, or in some cases $1. It has a set of tutorials to get you up to speed and you can create some great looking images for free (or next to fo free) Pixlr.com Pixlr.com is another graphic program in the cloud. It doesn't have access to photos and such, but it can edit the photos you have, and it's a great tool if you need to resize an image, especially if your artwork for Apple Podcasts is the right dimensions, but the file size is too big as you can have pixlr.com compress it. Vectr.com Vectr.com is a new program to me, and from I've seen is the most powerful graphics program that is 100% free. It works on any platform, and it also has a cloud version. As it is super powerful there is a bit of a learning curve, but if you took the time to go through the tutorials (and they have quite a few) you could make some great looking graphics. Adobe Spark Adobe Spark is my new favorite tool. It has one drawback that I will hit on in a minute. You simply click on what you are trying to make (twitter, facebook, Instagram, etc) and pick a design, choose some colors, spin a wheel to scroll through some fonts, and share your image. So what is the one drawback? Most of these other tools allow you specify custom sizes, but from what I've seen there is no way to specify a file size. So what I do is if I need a square image, I go into adobe spark, create an Instagram image, and then resize it using Pixlr.com New Twists on Old Tools Ecamm Call Recorder is a great tool for Recording Skype, they recently launched Ecamm Live which is meant to record Facebook Live broadcasts that costs $29.95 and has some of the same features as wirecast (but that costs $500). This cost $29.95. Here is a tutorial. A New Podcasting Microphone For Half the Price I've been a huge fan of the Audio Technica ATR2100 microphone. It sounds great. It has both USB and XLR inputs (so it can plug directly into the computer or into a mixer) and it has a lifetime warranty. As I write this, that microphone is $67 the ATR2005 is a slightly more stylish version for $79 Well SP on the Better Podcasting Show found the Knox Cardoid USB Microphone for $40. This microphone looks and sounds very much like the 2100/2005 (it looks like a 2005 with the 2100 switch). There is even a bundle where you get the microphone and a boom arm for $69. When You Step on A Listener's Toes In my twelve years of podcasting, I may have had someone send a nastygram once or twice. This is why I was so surprised to get a nasty email calling me a piece of garbage, and another podcaster resorting to name calling and saying how I had no listeners and other false statements. So what do you do? Well, you could load up your anger and hurt and go out attitude a blazin'. From my experience, this typically does not end well. or Reach out to them and attempt to get an understanding of how your words offended them. Realize this is NOT saying they were wrong for feeling hurt or offended. Everyone is allowed to feel what they feel. Many times when two people are involved in a conversation and someone gets offended chances are the person who did the offended didn't know what they said was so lethal. My Offensive Words On my Logical Weight Loss podcast, I was reading a story about how Americans are giving up on trying to lose weight and accepting being fat. In the article, it mentioned how American Doctors feel they can tell their patients about the dangers of being overweight as they might be accused of "Fat Shaming." This to me makes no sense and stated that if your doctor can't talk about your weight than who can say anything negative. I asked, "What is there no Slut Shaming, no Thief Shaming? What if you have relations with a goat? Is that OK? To this, I got an email. The subject of the email was F*CK YOU. Here was the message: In your latest podcast, your comment about "slut shaming" and comparing it to "thief shaming" was absolutely disgusting. FUCK YOU, go to hell you piece of garbage. To this I replied: Thank you so much for your feedback. My point was if we don't allow anyone to say a negative thing about anything, isn't that the doorway to anarchy? I would love to have a dialogue about this with you. Can we get on skype? The response I received was simply: GO TO HELL To that, I replied, "Too bad. As a former teacher,

I Just Launched My Podcast, How Many Downloads Should I Have? This question has no "Set" answer. It depends on a couple of things: How much value do your episodes bring to your audience? (is it any good) How much promotion do you do? What is your niche (a podcast like this - about podcasting - will never have 5000 downloads) Right no 50% of podcasts get less than 200 downloads per episode after 30 days (and 50% get more) with the average being around 2000 (listen to The Feed Podcast for updated stats) Think of Your Podcast Like A Train A steam locomotive has an engine. The engine has to go to where the other boxcars are an connect. So do you. You need to go to where your audience is, and connect. A train announces where it is via the whistle, you need to promote your show to let people know you exist. A train starts off slow, very slow, and build momentum over TIME. So they are slow to start, but once started, hard to stop. My Dad drove a truck, and once had a wreck where the momentum of a couple of tons on his trailer went off the road (he blew a tire) and he was knocking over giant tree's like they were toothpicks, so momentum can do great things. However, it takes time. Today we have Katie Krimitsos on the show, and he is doing great with her show that she has been producing three years. So when you start your podcast, the more you focus on your audience (not the tech, not the stats on an hourly basis) you will build up momentum in your show. Katie Krimistsos on Building a Community With a Facebook Group Katie has been running the Tampa Bay Business Owners group for five years. Together with her husband Chris Krimitsos, they help business owners grow their businesses and connect with the right people. Katie has been podcasting for three years at http://bizwomenrock.com In today's interview, we learn the following with Katie: How to avoid the common mistakes of creating a Facebook Group The Different types of groups and what each type offers. How she makes her Facebook group feel special How she maintains control of her group and keeps them engaged. Why she had a successful relationship with a sponsor, and quit using them. How she grew her coaching business with a strategy that anyone can use. How her podcast fuels her Facebook Group, the Facebook group fuels the podcast, and they both fuel her coaching. Why she almost quit, and what stopped her from walking away from podcasting. Check out Katie's tools for growing your community with a Facebook group, taking that group on a retreat, as well as her private coaching to help you grow your business by going to www.bizwomenrock.com and check out her podcast on iTunes (as well as on her site) Mentioned in this Show Banner Poll - Are you Interested in a Banner Exchange for Podcasters? Ready to Start Podcasting? Join the School of Podcasting Podcast Movement - Use the Coupon Code sop10 to save 10%

Because of My Podcast: Katie Krimitsos Katie is the host of the Biz Women Rock show, and when I asked her how she would finish the "Becuase of my podcast ____" she answered, "Everything" She feels her business, her consulting, courses, and coaching are all based on the relationships she has fostered through her podcast. Bridge Ratings Podcast Report is a Bit Hit or Miss Bridge Ratings continues its coverage of the podcasting space with this latest update which provides never before insight and best practices learned from a three-month study conducted between January 23, 2017 and April 10, 2017. A panel of 2000 persons ages 13 and older were contacted by random digit dialing phone method to both landlines (45%) and mobile phones (55%) in the continental U.S. Phone interviews, on-line questionnaires, and daily diaries were utilized to gauge the consumption behavior of current podcast listeners and potential listeners. The margin of Error for this study is +/- 2.2%. Here are some items I wanted to address Trends in time-spent-listening shown in the following chart reflect a significant reduction in the average time spent per listening session falling by a third between August 2015 and April 2017. "Listening Session" is defined as the portion of each podcast listened to during individual sessions. 56% of our panelists listened to podcasts in multiple sessions. When they mentioned how people find podcasts, their answer was What are the most popular methods of discovering podcasts of interest? 1. Social Media 2. Search 3. Word of Mouth 4. Other Podcasts 5. Streaming Channels 6. Radio Hosts In their conclusion they stated, "“For broadcasters seeking to increase listenership to podcasts by their talent, a significant increase in promotion - both on-air and through social media - would be the primary strategy.”" In their Best Practices Section, they listed the following 1. Producers of podcasts should have a clear idea of the prospect or audience - the target market. Knowing who is the target will help producers stay focused on the topics covered. Audience knowledge lays the foundation for all of the other items on this list. To this I say AMEN. I'm doing a show right now as a test called "Podcast Rodeo Show" where I pick random podcasts and give my first impressions. 2. Be organized and know where the podcast is going. Be considerate of your audience's time and don't ramble. Get to the point. The average time spent with podcasts is 22 minutes with listeners who commit beyond the first five minutes. Podcast abandonment continues to plague non-focused hosts with no clear understanding of how to capture their listeners' attention. The “session” average of 22 minutes also reflects partial podcast consumption, i.e. podcasts of longer length are often listened to in 2 or more “sessions”. This is the point that I want to make sure people don't get wrong. THIS DOES NOT MEAN YOUR PODCAST NEEDS TO BE 22 MINUTES. Libsyn.com (a podcast media hosting company) reports that 84% of the podcasts with more than 100,000 downloads per episode are longer than 51 minutes. Listening to a podcast “in its entirety” often means listening to it in multiple sessions. No Kidding. Really? In a world where both parents are working, taking kids to school, soccer practice before going to their second job, you mean they don't have multiple unlimited hours to sit and listen to a show uninterrupted? I've quoted her before Valerie Geller in her book Beyond Powerful Radio has said, "There is no such thing as too long, only too boring." I recently listened to episode 301 from Daniel J Lewis. It was 3.5 hours long. In spans of 10-20 minutes, I listened to that show over two days. Why? Because I find it interesting. 3. Edit. Edit. Edit. It is easy to start a podcast recording only to find the host and/or guests have rambled for 45 minutes or an hour. Before posting podcasts on-line, producers would be best served to listen to the entire recording with a critical ear and edit out content that doesn't serve the "vision" of informative, engaging and entertaining content that listeners can't get from other media. Again, I totally agree here. Mount Rushmore was just a mountain, and then Doane Robinson decided to have some editing done to it. 4. Establish a publishing schedule. Bridge Ratings' analysis found that weekly podcasts are most popular followed by twice per week and daily. Tuesday was the best day to post podcasts followed by Friday. based on our panel's responses. I don't think it matters what day as long as your consistent. A podcast about entertaining might make more sense to put out on Thursday or Friday as people prepare for the weekend. When it comes to picking a schedule, keep the following in mind: Podcasts app for iOS pauses downloads of episodes from podcasts which the user hasn't listened to. Episode auto-downloading stops 15 days after a user last views that podcast or plays an episode on any device the user is signed into and after 5 new

Welcome to episode 563 of the School of Podcasting Have you ever had a problem with something, and then when you stated your problem out loud the answer came to you as you were saying it? You can use that exercise to help your podcast. I recently read about 80% of the book Out on the Wire: The Storytelling Secrets of the New Masters of Radio by Jessica Abel. Jessica went DEEP INSIDE NPR and the creators of This American Life and took lots of notes and shared them. One strategy they use to shape a story is to say out loud, "I'm doing a story about X, and what is interesting about it is Y. They say it's important to do this out loud to a real person. Then to shape your story you use this tool, Somebody does something because of ____(their motivation) but _____(a challenge). If you can't answer the but, then ask yourself, "What do I have?" They have another exercise where their focus setting may be something like. "This happened _______, then this ____, then this ____, and you would #$%&! believe it but ____. And the reason that is interesting to every single person walking on the face of the earth is ______. This is where I draw the line. Sure we want everyone to like our episode, but that is NOT going to happen. If you try to make a podcast that is interesting to every single person, you will go crazy. Keep in mind these people are telling stories, and stories are powerful, but in certain circumstances, they don't really fit. For example, Many podcasters want to make money with their podcast (motivation) but only 10% of podcasters get enough downloads to get big named sponsors. Then this guy start a podcast about horses, and you won't believe it but he got a sponsor when he had less than 100 downloads per episode. He added more and more shows and called it a network, and ignored the CPM model brought over by radio, and now he is making a full-time living with his podcast. The reason this is important is dynamic ad insertion is paying very low rates and uninformed podcasters may take those fees because they feel they can't get a sponsor without huge downloads. If I'm interviewing technology, it may be a piece of technology that eliminates the challenge. Some podcasters have a hard time sharing promotional material with their guests, but podhero.io makes it easy. Your intro Can Make or Break Your Podcast This is from the Book Ted Talk by Chris Anderson Zak Ebrahim did a TED Talk, and he originally was going to start his talk with this paragraph: I was born in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania in 1983 to a loving American Mother and an Egyptian Father who tried their best to create a happy childhood for me. It wasn't until I was seven years old that our family dynamic started to change. My father exposed me to a side if Islam that few people (including the majority of Muslims) get to see but in fact when people take the time to interact with one another it doesn't take long to realize that for the most part, we all want the same things out of life The folks at TED brainstormed and help him come up with this opening Paragraph: On November 5th 1990 a man named El Sayyid Nosair walked into a hotel in Manhattan and assassinated Rabbi Meir Kahanethe leader of the Jewish Defense league. Nosair was found not guilty of the murder, but while serving time on lesser charges he and other men started planning attacks on a dozen New York City landmarks including tunnels, synagogues, and the united Nations Headquarters. Thankfully those plans were foiled by an FBI informant. Sadly the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center was not. Nosair would eventually be convicted for his involvement in the plot. El Sayyid Nosair is my father. The audience was riveted See video https://youtu.be/lyR-K2CZIHQ Leave Out Stuff That You Don't Need Here is an example from the TED Talks book byChris Anderson(also available on Audible) Once, when I was eight years old, my father took me fishing. We were in a tiny boat, five miles from shore, when a massive storm blew in. Dad put a life jacket on me and whispered in my ear, "Do you trust me, son?" I nodded. He threw me overboard. [pause] I kid you not. Just tossed me over! I hit the water and bobbed up to the surface, gasping for breath. It was shockingly cold. The waves were terrifying. Monstrous. Then . . . Dad dived in after me. We watched in horror as our little boat flipped and sank. But he was holding me the whole time, telling me it was going to be OK. Fifteen minutes later, the Coast Guard helicopter arrived. It turned out that Dad knew the boat was damaged and was going to sink, and he had called them with our exact location. He guessed it was better to chuck me in the open sea than risk getting trapped when the boat flipped. And that is how I learned the true meaning of the word trust. EXAMPLE 2: SAME STORY WITH TOO MUCH DETAIL AND NO EMOTION I learned trust from my father when I was eight years old and we got caught in a storm while out fishing for mackerel. We failed to catch a single one before

Today on episode 562 Joe Saul Sehy of the Stacking Benjamins podcast explains how he changed his podcast format, and lost 30% of his audience but now is working on his fifth sponsor. Joe Saul-Sehy is the creator and co-host of the Stacking Benjamins podcast. Kiplinger magazine listed it as Best Podcast 2016 and The Art of Manliness listed it in their list of their top podcasts for 2016 (although the show isn't specifically aimed at men). Stacking Benjamins is a light, magazine-style podcast about money, where the goal isn't to teach as much as it's about entertaining people enough that they learn. Over the last four years Joe had to rebrand the podcast twice and after Podcast Movement 2015 completely blew up his format and changed everything. He has five different sponsors and the show comes out three times a week. Today on episode 562 we have a long talk with Joe with some great nuggets. Lessons From Steve Martin (so Far) You're probably going to hear more about this in the future, but I purchased the Steve Martin master class and it is CHOCK FULL of great content (and we haven't' even got to the comedy part yet). Here are some takeaways: Steve went from being on the end of an old movement to the front of a new movement. instead of talking about the same old stuff, he asked, "What hasn't been talked about?" All movies are cult movies. Steve wanted to be funny without telling jokes. When you decide on a bit, you are defining your taste, and your audience is waiting for your taste as you are the authority. They want to know what YOU think. Apple Updates Their Brand - What it Means To You Apple has updated their branding and to change the name of the podcast directory from Podcasts to Apple Podcasts (which ties in with the Apple Watch, Apple iPad, etc) What I'm seeing as a support person from Libsyn is a more than average amount of people where there show does not update (it takes 24 hours to update anyway, and your subscribers get the episode almost instantly). So if it's been longer than 24 hours and your show is still not showing in your Apple Podcasts listing then you might want to check your artwork (I know it seems unrelated, but out of spec artwork causes all sorts of issues). Here are the specifications: 1400x1400px (minimum) 3000x3000px (maximum) Under 500kb Use rGB color space Be a JPG, JPEG, or a PNG file If you need an online tool to help resize or compress your file check out pixlr.com Get 10% off Podcast Movement with the Discount Code SOP10 Podcast Movement is in August and it's going to be a great time. Use the coupon code sop10 to get 10% off your ticket. Staying True to Your Format Joe knows he doesn't want to be another "talking head" about finance talking 401ks. He wanted to be entertaining and also talk about finance. When Joe gets a review that says he's not funny, instead of changing his format, Joe takes that as a cue to work on being funny. Here are some other topics we talk about: Instead of choosing a solo show or an interview show, Joe does both. Joe knew the first version of the show was going to be a test, and purposely made 13 episodes The second version of his show made it 69 episodes before Joe changed his format again. Joe makes sure his intro lets his audience know that this is NOT The typical finance show. He starts working on a show five weeks in advance using the Promo Republic service You have the ranking that you deserve. How he decided to bleep out or leave in swearing How he handles negative reviews How he drew a "line in the sand" with his intro to let people know if this is for them or not. How he used affiliate links as a "sponsor" How he gave his first sponsor a sweet deal to have a big company sponsor his show (which made him look bigger than he was at the time) How he chooses sponsors and the criteria he uses. How he keeps people tuned in during midroll advertisements. Book Mentioned: Steel Like an Artist and the Steel Like an Artist Journal How he gets big guests using tools like netgalley.com Why he takes one week off every 8 weeks and what he does to fill in the gap. How one woman sent hate mail, only the be one of the first people to sign up for his Facebook What drives him nuts as a podcast listener. Next Week's Poll: What is the Least Amount You Would Take from a Sponsor? Every month I do a show based on listener feedback, and the deadline is 4/21/ it is a super easy survey at https://schoolofpodcasting.com/poll564 Mentioned In This Episode Stacking Benjamins Podcast Book: Steel Like an Artist and the Steel Like an Artist Journal netgalley.com Promo Republic Be a Podcaster Join the School of Podcasting today

Podcasting in the Media: Teen Titans I want to thank Caine Door of the Adventure Frequency for letting me know that: "In the newly released animated film: Teen Titans the Judas contract (Warner Brothers) Kevin Smith is in the movie as himself interviewing a member of the team on his podcast and it's good. He's a known fanboy so he has great questions and brings some levity to the end of the movie after the big final battle scene. I think it says something that they make time for podcasting in the movie." This is just another example of podcasting being more and more mainstream. Thanks to Caine for the heads up. Thress Years Into Podcasting, She's Not Where She Thought's She's Be, She's in an Event Better Place Natalie Echdahl Almost Quit Podcasting - She's Glad She Didn't Natalie Eckdahl, MBA, is a business coach, professional facilitator, keynote speaker and the host of the Biz Chix Podcast which iTunes featured as a top New Business Podcast in March 2014. Three years ago she went to social media marketing world, she joined John Lee Dumas' Podcaster's Paradise and started following "the formula" that everyone at the time did. However, it didn't reap the results that she expected. At one point Natalie launched a mastermind group, and not a single listener signed up. As she unfolds her story today, you will hear how Natalie handles disappointments and turns them into learning experiences. You will learn: I love Natalie's opening. In less than a minute you understand what the show is about, where it's going, and who it's for. My guess is she used Music Radio Creative I also love her closing call to action which uses her two young sons. It makes it memorable and makes her even more human. When to do an interview show, and when to do a solo show How breaking away from "podcasting best practices" had her numbers go through the roof How to get your audience involved with your show. The importance of timing with your podcast Is your podcast in a Blue Ocean, or Red Ocean (see the book Blue Ocean Strategy, Expanded Edition: How to Create Uncontested Market Space and Make the Competition Irrelevant) Personal connections lead to her sponsorship with Aweber How she went from being an attendee to a speaker at Social Media Marketing World How she is promoting her show on social media Starting a business? Work with Natalie by going to www.bizchix.com/workwithme Mentioned In This Episode Bizchix.com She Podcasts Biz Women Rock Stop Chasing Influencers book by Jared Easley Music Radio Creative Aweber Need Some One on One Podcast Consulting? Book a coaching call with Dave (as short as 15 minutes) go to www.schoolofpodcasting.com/schedule Start Podcasting Today Tap into Dave's 12 Years of Podcast experience and enjoy: Step by Step Tutorials Private Facebook Group Live Group Coaching Priority Email Support 30 Money Back Guarantee Start podcasting today by going to www.schoolofpodcasting.com/start

Chuck Berry died last month at the age of 90. I saw him four years ago at a special event that honored him with tons of musicians (Merle Haggard, Ronnie Hawkins, Darryl "DMC" McDaniels, Joe Bonamassa and Lemmy Kilmister) coming to play his music and honor him. At the end of the night, Berry accepted the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's American Masters of Music Award, wrapping the Hall of Fame's weeklong celebration of Berry's life. In the end, they brought Chuck out with a band consisting of a lot of his children who knew how to follow their father's (at times) unpredictable behavior (Chuck got confused in the middle of song two, and restarted it). Chuck got us smiling from the very first moment. He said, "It's great to be here. Then again, I'm 86; I'm glad to be anywhere." So here are some things, on Episode 560, that podcasters can learn from Chuck Berry. Now as a guitar player myself, you start playing the guitar hoping to play Stairway to Heaven, Iron Man, Smoke on the Water, you want to be Van Halen, but you don't start there. You start with Chuck Berry, and you start with Johnny B Goode. In the same way that every band has to learn Mustang Sally and Brown Eyed Girl, every guitar player has to learn how to play Johnny B Good. I am no exception. It's not about the tech. Keep it Simple Other musicians had pedalboard were made of technology on top of technology. They could do the river dance as they changed the tone of their guitar with each tap of their foot. Chuck came out with his trusty guitar and plugged into a single amplifier. He hit the opening riff of Roll Over Beethoven, and you could not help but smile. Chuck had one tone, it was Chuck Berry. This was not a drill, this was not a test, right there in front of my was Chuck Berry. He had a smile on his face, and by the third beat, the whole place was clapping along to the music, dancing, or both. 2. Give the People What They Want. Chuck Berry had many styles. Some of his songs had remnants of country music. He played slow blues., You probably don't know most of those songs. If you wanted airplay, you had to play something kids (teenagers) wanted, and could dance to. One other thing, the teenagers were the ones buying the music. Rock and Roll music was new. It was a great way for being rebellious, and the fact that this was Rock and Roll from a BLACK MAN, made it even more revolutionary (this was the 1950s). You will notice that Roll Over Beethoven, Johnny B Goode, Rock and Roll Music and many other Berry titles are pretty much the same song. When he appeared on the Johnny Carson show, he said to the band leader, "It's the same as the last song" as they prepared to play another song. However, those songs like Sweet Little Sixteen, School Days, and others were instantly relatable to his audience. He also had suggestive lyrics which probably made parents offended. Here is a verse from Roll Over Beethoven: Well, if you feel and like it Go get your lover, then reel and rock it Roll it over and move on up just A trifle further and reel and rock with one another, Roll over Beethoven dig these rhythm and blues. 3. Chuck Was Engaging Chuck made sure you were looking at him. in the early days of his career he usually wore black or white suits, but his eyes, mouth, and hands, and especially his legs demanded attention. He would strum his guitar in a way that has hand moved from the back to guitar toward to top. As a guitar player, I can tell you it makes almost no difference where you strum an electric guitar, but it looks cool (and yes, I've borrowed that move). His "Duck Walk" he said in a CBS interview was a mistake. He had slipped and fallen and the "Duck Walk" happened as he was trying to get back up. He noticed the ovation and worked it into his act. Chuck paid attention to what made the audience go wild. 4. Charge What Your Worth There is only one Chuck Berry. Sure everyone from the Beatles, Stones, Elvis, Duan Alman, The Kinks, John Lennon, Simon and Garfunkle, Bruce Springsteen, and David Bowie, they all have covered his music. There is only ONE Chuck Berry. Consequently, Chuck knew this and after being ripped off in the early part of his career, he started demanding that he get paid up front, in cash. 5. Chuck Got the Audience Involved Most of his big hits made it super easy to make them "sing-alongs." All Chuck had to say was "Go!" and put his hand up to his ear and the audience would sing "Go Johny Go, Go.." 6. A Little Planning Up Front Saves Some Editing Time Later Post-1970 Chuck didn't tour with a band. He brought his guitar and whoever was promoting his concert was in charge of putting together a band. On a tonight show appearance, he said, "well everybody knows my music." This was true, but they all sounded the same. While they are not obvious, when you see Chuck perform with these acts, the intros are a little sloppy, and the endings were often train wrecks as the band didn't know that when Chuck kicks his leg up that meant stop. 7. Don't Bre

When you create a recipe for food, you serve it to someone and ask them "What do you think?' They might say, "it needs more salt" or some other suggestion. It is then up to you like the chef to decide if you want to implement that recommendation or not. It's not any different in podcasting, but I feel we don't take the time to ask out audience, "What do you think?" So I decided to do this, and bring you along. I asked two simple questions (thanks to Lee Silverstein of the Colon Cancer Podcast who did this first) and saw what kind of feedback I got. You Think You're Going to Get Butchered, But You're Not If you are asking your audience, if they are your audience - they like you. If they have any negative comments, they will probably attempt to deliver them with kid gloves. By Know What Works, You Can Do More I feel like a bit of an egomaniac today, as much of the show it telling me how much people like my show, but I was more interested in WHY they like my show, and I learned: I make things easy to understand (which is my #1 priority) I am a likable guy I make people laugh I get to the point I'm willing to speak my mind People understand my intentions to help people I'm not judgemental I'm encouraging I share insights into my life and do a great job of relating those stories to podcasting Here are some great ideas on how I can improve my show (from listener feedback): Put episode numbers in your posts for easier searching Try not to repeat the same content on the School of Podcasting as I do on my Ask the Podcast Coach show. (some people listen to both) Mention that I have a newsletter more often Be more confident in my sales pitch. Maybe not so many appearances of my cat. Here are some suggestions from my audience that I'm not going to implement One person said that the phrase "Tackle the technology" was not entirely correct. I like the "Theater of the mind of that phrase, so it's staying. One person doesn't like the "Ladies" that sing my jingle. For now, I love my jingle in the same way I loved the theme music for Johnny Carson. I know much more people who LOVE the ladies. You're Not Going to Please Everyone Some people like my cat and other could live without the "Bernie blooper real." Some people like my intro and other do not. With this in mind, you're not going to please everyone. Follow your heart, and remember a few things: It's your show There is a fast forward button Making An Audience Survey There are all sorts of tools for feedback. You can use speakpipe, voicemail, email, and forms. Here is a quick tutorial to show you how you can use a free tool that allows unlimited forms, unlimited questions, and unlimited responses. https://youtu.be/BvYihe3tah4 Don't Be Afraid To Look in the Mirror Somewhere in your life, you had someone give you feedback, or maybe you made a mistake, but it leads to you becoming better at that task. Constant improvement has been a mantra of mine for many years. You just spent all that time in the kitchen slaving over your podcast. Shouldn't you take the time to ask people what they think? Are You Ready To Launch a Podcast? Join the School of Podcasting and: Get step by step tutorials A private Facebook group for networking Live group coaching (a $400 value) Priority Email support A 30-day money back guarantee Go to www.schoolofpodcasting.com/start Episode 559 first appeared at www.schoolofpodcasting.com/559 Contributors to this Episode J Cleveland Payne - Theinternettoolbox.net Darwin -dealingwithmygrief.com Amanda greatbeetadventure.com Anna - authenticparenting.com Cale- hamradio360.com Randy growgreat.com Carolyn carbonbasedpodcast.com Chris podcastengineeringschool.com themysticshow.net Connie positivelylifeafterfifty.com Craig from ingleaspodcast.com Daniel- theaudacitytopodcast.com Jessica -interviewconnections.com Jeff -http://genealogypodcast.com/ Geoff - dealtalkpodcast.com Jessica -shepodcasts.com - jkmagency.com Juan thegentlemensbrotherhood.com Kim toastmasters101.net Less thecancerradionetwork.com Matt- theauthorinsideyou.com Scott -computertutorflorida.com Nick Cincinnatisoccertalk.com Terry - itprovidernetwork.com Tina - thestartsomethingshow.com Tyler - CashFlowGuys.com

Because of My Podcast I'm on the Cover of a Comic Book Jeremy Dennis explains how he was able to commission a custom comic book cover thanks to his supporters. New Edison Research on Podcasting Edison Research did a telephone survey of 2000 people ages 12 and older. Here are some of the results related to podcasting: 81% of the respondents own a smartphone (up from 76%). It's actually gone up 22% in two years. 50% of people have a Netflix account (more on that later) 60% of people (168 million) are familiar with podcasting (up from 55% last year) 40% have ever listened to a podcast (up from 35% last year). 10 Years ago is was 13% 24% listen to a podcast in the last month (up from 21%) 15% listen weekly (up from 13%) The people who listened weekly average five episodes per week. Their data shows 65% is mobile (Libsyn says this is closer to 80%) 40% listen to the whole thing. 45% listen to most of it. 10% listen to less than half. 5% listen to just the beginning. 77% Click on and listen immediately (stream). 41% download and listen later. 2&% subscribe and listen later People that subscribe, are subscribed to an average of six podcasts. Each year since 2004 these numbers have gone up every single year. Get the slides and see the presentation at http://www.edisonresearch.com/infinite-dial-2017/ One More Thing.. 50% of people have a Netflix account, and 43% of them use it on a weekly basis 60% of people are familiar with a podcast. 40% have listened to one, but 24% listen monthly, and 15% listen weekly. Why? In my opinion, you have a better chance at finding quality programming in Netflix than you do in iTunes. I'm going to do some random experiments on this going forward. Pinecast is a new "Free" media hosting service. It is founded by Matt Basta who is an engineer for Uber. It was founded in August of 2015 (per his LinkedIn profile). Their free hosting has the following features: Demo accounts are limited to three podcasts per account. The podcast import tool is not available for demo accounts. An unlimited number of episodes may be added, but only the most recent ten episodes will be available to view in the podcast dashboard and the podcast RSS feed.* Episode audio is limited to 48MB (per episode). You are free, however, to split episodes into smaller episodes. Only a small subset of the basic analytics will be available. This includes subscriber and listener counts. Episode descriptions will contain a link to Pinecast. Episodes older than the most recent ten are not deleted, but they are not available to view or edit. Upgrading your plan will make them available again. Upgrading to a plan will remove the link to Pinecast from the show's episode descriptions. All analytics data that is collected for higher-tier plans will always be collected for all podcasts (even ones owned by demo accounts), meaning analytics data will retroactively be provided if the account is upgraded. Unavailable Features The following features are not available to demo accounts: Feedback Geo analytics Import tool Ability to create networks Embeddable (HTML5) player Bittorrent downloads Podcast website or blog They have a demo (free) account, Starter ($5/month) and Pro ($50) a month. The pro plans allow you to create a network, and allow you to receive comments on your page, as well as have multiple users on your account. Their free (known as "Community" plans meet the following requirements: These plans may not be used exclusively for marketing, evangelical, or other promotional purposes of any sort. The user's content must provide unique creative or informational value. Things that seem cool but aren't Subscriber counts are pointless. If I subscribe on my phone, my tablet and iTunes it's going to potentially show me as three separate subscribers. I do give them credit for being blatantly honest. On their website it states, "Pinecast will only mark a subscriber a single time in any 24-hour window. Note that this is not a great metric for measuring podcast success; there is no foolproof means of tracking the number of subscribers." There is a tip jar where you put in your bank account information, and when someone leaves you a tip, it goes to your bank. This is done securely through Stripe, but Pinecast is also going to take another 5%. As this is not available on the free plan, I'm not sure why they feel the need to take a cut. Keep in mind that you can make your PayPal donation button in about 2 minutes. Their podcast site needs work, and you have one shot to get it right. I uploaded artwork that was made to the spec they suggested. It looked horrible when I went to go back and upload a new version that was not an option. So here is my checklist 1. Don't mess with my file. What I upload is what I want people to download. - Pass 2. Give me the ability to have an unlimited back catalog (unlimited storage) - Pass 3. Don't limit my audience size (unlimited bandwidth) - Pass 4. Don't control my feed, and make it easy to leave if I choose

You can be the media. In a world where what is and is not true, you have the power and distribution to be your own media outlet. I have known Emily Prokop (of the Story Behind Podcast) as we run in the same circles, but I was unaware of her background in Journalism. So when I heard she had a degree in Journalism, I asked to come on and share some Journalism 101 insights. These include: The importance of headlines Getting to the point. How to structure your podcast using the Inverted Pyramid Give people an idea of where they are going Show notes broken into small sections using Subheadings are more informative than giant blocks of text. How she got over "going solo." How to write out your show script that won't results in tons of editing What websites are good resources. Extra steps you can take to make sure your source is trustworthy. Her thoughts on using a Libsyn Podcast Page #podernfamily hashtag The importance of not inflating your numbers Interview tips, and making sure you get the most out of your guest. Talking about sensitive subjects. How long does it take to produce a well researched 10 minute podcast? Her early days of podcasting with a microphone from the Rock band video game. Behind the Scenes of Podfading Emily's first show didn't end well, so she shares some insights into how they didn't set expectations, and in the end it didn't end well. So if you are starting a podcast with a co-host, be sure to make sure everyone knows what is and is not expected. This way you can get back to making content, and not worry about what happens if..... with your podcast as you've already set your expectations. About the Story Behind The extraordinary history of the ordinary. Do you like trivia and fun facts? Have you lost hours to Wikipedia rabbit holes? Do you ever wonder about the history of everyday things in your world? The Story Behind ... is the show for you!. Check it out on iTunes, TuneIn, Stitcher, Google Play Music or on her website at www.thestorybehindpodcast.com Final Thoughts Unlike newspapers and radio, we don't have those MUST HIT deadlines. While you want to publish on a regular basis, we can make sure that the episode is right before we publish it. You can get the best resources (see podcastingresources.com), whip up a great headline, and come out of the gate with great content. Mentioned In This Podcast The Story Behind Podcast How to Male Great Headlines Podcasting Resources Join the School of Podcasting

Today I'm back from Podfest in Orlando Florida. What a great show, there were tons of brand new podcasters looking to jump into the space. This week we share if you had one podcast episode that sticks in your brain, if so why. Joining the Podcast Family 4:28 I share how the Podcast Family came to my rescue when I had a device fail when I got to Florida. Special thanks to Marc Johanssen of the Podcast Gear Facebook Group, and Michael O'Neal of the Solopreneur Hour who let me borrow gear to make my session happen when things broke during travel. My Favorite Episode Is 09:35 Gabe from Guys and Food said his favorite episode(s) were from The Sporkful http://www.sporkful.com/calls-a-root-beer-float-to-cure-the-cancer-blues/ and http://www.sporkful.com/margaret-chos-eating-disorder-advice-to-a-teenage-girl/ Both were poignant and heartfelt depictions of people who are going through pain and the ways that they try to handle it. Their stories are told in an authentic and human way. These episodes stand on their own because of that. However, they especially stand out when juxtaposed to the other, more lighthearted episodes. It reminds me of the TV show MASH in this way. 11:42 Lee From This is Rammy loved and episode of the Social Media Examiner and one of the things he does't is recommend it to his friends. 14:12 Zack Demopoulos of the Rasing Rants Podcast loved the Story of Monty Roberts on the Relaunch Show with Joel Boggess 18:12 Kuldryn from Kuldrin's Krypt loved the emotion behind episode three of the Messengers Podcast 21:30 Emily from the Story Behind Podcast loved the story of Charles Manson's Hollywood. The Dave Jackson Two Question Challenge 25:36 The first question is what do you like about my show, the second question is what you wish I would change. Write and email with the title of "559" and send in a voicemail, or audio by 3/24 Behind the Scenes of My Podfest Presentation My presentation got off to a rocky start, this lead to many voice in my head filled with panic. Things weren't turning out the way I wanted. When I was done, as things had not gone the way I wanted, I assumed it was awful. Yet I was approached by people who told me it was a great presentation. I've said this before, if you aim at perfect and miss, you'll land on really, really good. Quit Obsessing Over Things That Don't Matter People are failing to launch their podcast because they are obsessed over things that don't really matter (color of website, the player your are using). I don't recommend a podcast based on the player or color of the website. Mentioned in the Show Grow Great Podcast Lee Silverstein's Colon Cancer Podcast Horse Radio Network Ham Radio 360 Podcast Kenn Blanchard - Black Man with a Gun Kenn Blanchard Show Join the School of Podcasting

Today I share some insights after talking with Jason Norris of Podcast Logical Chris Holifield of I Am Salt Lake Lee of This is Rammy Ken Blannchard from Upper Marlboro (and black man with a gun) We hear what it is like to start a local podcast including: The struggles to interview local "Mom an Pop" businesses Is it easier/harder to get a local sponsor? How they developed their format How they are promoting the show. Ready To Start Podcasting? The School of Podcasting features: Step by Step tutorials Live group coaching Private Facebook Group Join the School of Podcasting

Comments? Call them in 888-563-3228 Today we talk with Glenn Rubenstein who is the author of the book Podcast Advertising Works. Glenn worked at the TWIT podcast network in both ad sales and as the company’s Director of Marketing. He is also the founder of Adopter Media (https://adopter.media/) World Radio Day Get Hindenburgh Journalist For $1.90 You can purchase Hindenburg Journalist for $1.90 (Not a typo, typically $95) and help fight hunger. You can upgrade to their pro version for $215 (usually over $300). Need help learning the software? Check out the School of Podcasting's Hindenburgh Journalist for Podcasting Course Because of My Podcast - I'm Going to Spring Training for Free Corey Fineran hosts the Ivy Envy Podcast, and shares how his audience is paying for him, his co-host (and their families) to go to the Chicago Cubs spring training in Arizona (in addition to making some great keepsakes for their studio). Podcast Advertising Works - Glenn Rubenstein Interview Glenn has been working in Ad Sales in podcasting for many years and today he shares some insights into: What mistakes podcasters are making What a future of dynamic advertising could look like How to overcome common objections when trying to sell advertising The book Podcast Advertising Works is great for someone who is trying to sell advertisements on their show. If you want more about advertising and monetizing your show. Check out the Episodes with Jessica Kupferman, and Glenn The Geek Hebert What Do You Mean When You Say Edit Your Podcast? Today I'm going to play some clips of a podcast (friend of mine, who has come and said he should've edited) to help demonstrate things you should consider editing out of your show. Michael Butler knows his episode was going down a dark path (he has spoken about this on his show). Luckily for those who know Michael and the Rock and Roll Geek show, we found it funny. Mentioned In This Episode Podcast Advertising Works Rock and Roll Geek show The Bitterest Pill Check out Dan Klass' book Podcasting Solutions Adopter Media Hindenburg Journalist Radio Day Promotion Join the School of Podcasting Risk Free www.schoolofpodcasitng.com/start

Today we have a serious subject that isn't so much about getting more downloads, and new cool gear, but the fact that your podcast can make a difference. I've helped people save money on fear, and help them launch podcasts. I've helped them find ways to grow their audience, and give them insights into creating better content on the Podcast Review Show. I've helped a listener of my Logical Weight Loss podcast lose 100 lbs. None of those compare to the email I received from the producer of Kuldryn's Krypt podcast. Honestly, in September of last year, 2016, I had resolved get my affairs in order and to end my life on Halloween night, the greatest day of the year. I was introduced by complete chance to you. I was on Spreaker, did a search for podcasting and you came up. I chose to listen to you because my birth name is Ryan Jackson and I have a brother name David. Keep in mind I had never heard a podcast prior to this and I have no idea how I or why I was even on Spreaker's website...but I was and there was you were. I am a Patron because you gave me the tools to start my own podcast but more importantly you, YES! YOU! "The Dave Jackson, provided me with something to live for. My podcast isn't great, it isn't even good, BUT IT IS MINE and it provides me with the outlet I need to help other's and once again have a purpose in this world. It is just a very simple fact-if I had not found YOUR podcast when I did, on October 31st, 2017 11:55p.m. a bullet from a Taurus .38 Special would be ending my life. Thank you for never giving up and fighting through...I'm sure through your divorce and the issues with your family it hasn't been easy but Dave, I am will continue to be literal living proof that it's been worth it. Thank you! So today we are going to talk about setting expectations, and crushing it, etc. Suicide Among Entrepreneurs is a Problem We Should Talk About 30% of all entrepreneurs experience depression, according to a study by Dr. Michael Freeman, a clinical professor at the University of California, San Francisco. Depression among entrepreneurs is way higher than depression among Americans in general, which is estimated at about 7% — although that number could be even higher because of the stigma associated with talking about it. Of the 242 entrepreneurs surveyed, 49% reported having a mental-health condition. Depression was the No. 1 reported condition among them and was present in 30% of all entrepreneurs, followed by ADHD (29%) and anxiety problems (27%). That's a much higher percentage than the US population at large, where only about 7% identify as depressed. Here are just some examples In May 2015, 31 year old Austen Heinz, CEO of Cambrian Genomics took his own life. In July, 29 year old Faigy Mayer, CEO of Appton jumped off a New York rooftop. 26 year old Aaron Schwartz, a partner at Reddit, hung himself in 2013. 47 year old Jody Sherman, founder of Ecomom shot himself that year. One of his colleagues, 24 year old Ovik Banerjee, followed a year later. 22 year old Ilya Zhitomirskiy, CEO of Diaspora, took his life in 2011. In Las Vegas one project had three suicides. In an article The Downtown Project Suicides: Can the Pursuit of Happiness Kill You? they mention Jody Sherman (4/13), Ovik Banerjee (1/14), and Matt Berman (4/14) – all people involved in the Vegas Tech phenomenon. Some people are smart enough to see the writing on the wall. Rand Fishkin stepped down as CEO of Moz in part because of his depression.Rand Fishkin In 2010, suicide was the highest cause of death for people aged 15-49, in the developed world. That’s way above death from lung cancer and murder. In 2013 Newsweek pointed out that the suicide rate in America had been increasing since 1999. Why Is This Happening? We get caught up in the should philosophy. I should have more downloads, more sponsors, more whatever. The bad news is your comparing yourself to someone's numbers who are potentially altered. We look at all the people "Crushing It" on Facebook, Twitter, and nobody sees the struggle. Should is fraught with guilt and remorse. It implies that you can’t change things. So when we feel we are "falling Behind" we start to put poison in our bodies in the form of fast food, and other items that have no nutrition. We then cut back on our sleep to prove we are committed. In this instance when you need to be at the top of your game, you are filling it with junk, and robbing it of sleep. This is like buying cheap gas and punching a hole in your gas tank. Eventually the car is going to come to a quick stop. We are told to DREAM BIG, and if we just focus on our dreams they will become a reality. This puts us into an anxious state, and that is NOT the time to be making decisions. Then we all get INSANELY Focused on our launch, and how we are going to come out of the gate at this breakneck speed, but then we are supposed to KEEP this pace. Anything less than a sprint is a lack of dedication. Think of joining a marathon an hour after it sta

Once a month this year, I'm going ask you a question and use those answers for an episode. I want to get to under you more, and in general get a better understand of what you like and dislike. This month I asked, "What are those things that make your go "Uggh" when listening to a podcast. They might make your even unsubscribe. SPONSOR: Emerald City Productions Get your first four episodes edited for $15 each (and only $40 after that – for shows up to 30 minutes). Just go to www.emeraldcitypro.com/sop(other companies are charging $99 an episode) What Makes You Unsubscribe From a Podcast? Failure to Get to the Point 4:10 Haley Redke (Adopteeson.com) is not a fan of not getting to the point, and people that interrupt their guests. 5:33 Tracie Bonnick also hates when the podcast hosts hates it when the host of the podcast doesn't let the guest talk 6:05 Glenn the Geek Hebert of Horse Radio Network was on Podcast Junkies and said he hates it when the podcast hosts just runs down a list of questions 6:39 Brian Weber (bartenderjourney.net) hates it when people don't get to the point 7:15 Ishamael Colderon - Hates long intro 7:43 John Wilkerson (www.strugglingforpurpose.com ) hates a super long intro 10:00 Daryl hates a ton of ads at the beginning (Joe Rogan?) as in three minutes of nothing but ads. 11:00 James Aaron of https://2middleageddudes.wordpress.com/ hates people talking to hear themselves talk. 11:53 From new Father Daniel J Lewis (YEAH NOODLE BABY) from the Audacity to Podcast said, "I go "ugh" when a conversation with a guest starts with "getting to know you" stuff. I don't care about the guest's background until after I care about their message." 12:40 Riding the Volume Knob 13:10 Kathe Kline from Rock Your Retirement goes nuts when she has to keep adjusting the volume 14:30 John Hilman hates it when the hosts and guest have WAY different volume levels. 15:50 Emily from The Story Behind Podcast - Four People Around One Microphone makes her turn off the show immediately. 17:20 Kuldrin Fire (kuldrinskrypt.com ) hates the word, "Right" and having to ride the volume knob, and he hates when hosts put down other hosts. 19:50 Inside Jokes 20:15 Emily from The Story Behind Podcast when they forget they have new listeners and talk about things from past episodes 20:53 Mark Des Cotes from the Resourceful Designer (and http://solotalkmedia.com/)hates it when TV Show podcasts refer to the actress name only (and not the character) 22:23 Emily from The Story Behind Podcast hates people who are note authentic and giant commercials. Experts Who Don't Know What They're Talking About 24:00 Connie From the Small Business 101 Podcast couldn't believe the advice she heard about starting a business 27:00 Hall of Fame Podcaster Danny Peña from Gamer Tag Radio hates it when Podcasts about Podcasting promote the importance of New and Noteworthy (see newandnoteworthy.info ) 27:30 Cedric Green hates it when people Curse.(cookingwithceddy.ws - coming soon). It unprofessional and you can't listen to it with kids in the car. 28:35 Emily from The Story Behind Podcast judges harshly when easy to remove ums are not removed. 30.17 Michael Blakston (Road Noises Podcast) hates mouth noises 32:00 Boomy Room Noise 33:14 Cheri Fields (Christian Science 4 Kids) had some show that were so boomy she couldn't understand the podcasters due to the room noise 35:07 Nivek Thompson of Real Democracy Now Podcast - hates when the host sounds like they are in a barn. 35:50 Chris Hache (chrishache.com) - If your podcast is not pleasing to my ears you are gone! 36:25 Things You Say That Drive Me Crazy Try Price (Completely Comics) hates when a podcaster will "be right back." 37:12 Rob Kerns from Living the Vet Life - When a podcast is filled with complaints, but there are no solutions proposed. 38:55 Steve Stewart - hates it when people don't edit, and when people kinda, sort of, maybe, think about, taking action. 41:27 Cheri Fields (Christian Science 4 Kids) the ultimate pet peeve is when people can't listen to your show cause it doesn't work. Start Your Podcast Today Go to www.schoolofpodcasting.com/start Step by step tutorials Private Facebook Group Live Group Coaching

Today we go deep into running the business that is The Horse Radio Network. We talk with America's Horse Husband Glenn "the Geek" Hebert SPONSOR: Emerald City Productions Get your first four episodes edited for $15 each (and only $40 after that - for shows up to 30 minutes). Just go to www.emeraldcitypro.com/sop (other companies are charging $99 an episode) Because of my Podcast: Ravi Jayagopal Ravi is the man behind Digital Access Pass which is a great membership script if you're looking to turn your Wordpress Website into a Membership site. Ravi shares how starting his Subscribe Me and Cut to the Chase Podcasts has boosted sales, introduced him to new friends and resources, got consulting clients, and created doors where none existed. Check out Ravi's "Subscribe Me" Book, His Subscribe Me podcast, and his Wordpress Player "Cool Cast" Player Glenn The Geek Takes Us Behind The Operations of The Horse Radio Podcast Network. What a typical day looks like The rules of setting up additional shows What media group is RIPE to start their own podcast What Glenn does with his advertisers to keep them engaged Check out Glenn at www.horseradionetwork.com Glenn was on the SOP talking about Sponsorships Mentioned In This Show Dealing With My Grief Podcast Podfest.us February in Florida Podcast Engineering School (Chris was on a previous show) Digital Access Pass My Podcast Reviews Confessions of a Wannabe PodcaSTAR: The Biggest Podcasting Myths Busted Honestly: My Life and Stryper Revealed Divi Wordpress Theme Not Sure Where To Start With Podcasting? Free video course "Podcast baby steps" will show you in bite size chunks what to do.

Because of My Podcast Dana Gould I was reading an article where West Word was interviewing Dana Gould (Who I find hilarious) and they asked him he still does his podcast (the Dana Gould Hour) while now running/writing the show Stan Against Evil. Here is what Dana said, “I cite the podcast as the things that literally made everything else possible. It keeps my name out there and connects my audience. I think the reason that I’m still allowed to work in clubs is because my podcast has nurtured and cultivated my fan base to the point that people show up. Because if people don’t show up, you don’t get hired. And I think the podcast is very much responsible for that. – Full article Dana Gould Hour on iTunes Dana Gould Hour on Stitcher Spreaker Unveils Beta Ad Revenue Share Program Spreaker.com is a podcast media hosting company that has the added bonus of being ale to stream your podcast live. The recently rolled out an ad revenue program. The program right now is beta, and only for US users. It allows you to have a 30 second preroll ad (meaning it is the first thing that starts your show, it goes before the show - pre-roll). There is some new terminology Requests - The number of times your episode is called (most of us would refer to this as a download, but in this case Spreaker is streaming the file) Impressions - This is how many times an ad was in your request Currently impressions will only appear if you're using the spreaker player on your website (again, this is beta, more features coming) You won't have ads through your RSS feed Some advertisers have a geographic specification so that they only run ads in certain area. I had an ad for a college in Cleveland Ohio (I live on Akron) Podcast Glossary "L" Levelator Levelator is a free program (mac and PC) and allows you to drag a file into the software and it will adjust the volume level to be consistent. For example if you have an interview and you are louder than the guest, the Levelator software will adjust the audio of your guest to match your volume. You can find it at http://www.conversationsnetwork.org/levelator Libsyn Liberated Syndication (libsyn) pioneered the system to host and publish podcasts in 2004. And since then has grown to the largest leading podcast network with over 2.6 billion downloads in 2014. Libsyn hosts over 25,000 shows with 44 million monthly audience member. Find it at www.libsyn.com (use the coupon code sopfree to get a free month) My Podcast Launch Kit I had someone said to me, I don't want to think about it, I trust you. Tell me what to do. Well, there is no one size fits all, but here are some things that I recommend: I say use a self hosted Wordpress Website. I do not like Blue host, or dreamhost, I am moving my things to Coolerwebsites.com which is my reseller account for Godaddy. I've also used Hostgator. I use Libsyn for my media hosting and distribution. I used them 10 years before I started working for them in 2016. For my Wordpress theme I use Appendipty themes which run on the Genesis platform, or if your situation is a website that has a podcast, I like the Elegant themes Divi (which I will be using on this website later this year) The Actual "Launch" I would record a few episodes. This lets me see how much it takes to get create an episode, and then it lets me decide what my publishing scheduling. I would ask some people who are my target audience to listen, and get feedback. The goal is to ensure you are delivering value that makes people do one (or more ) of the following: Laugh Cry Think Groan Educate Entertain I would have a few "in the can" (which means recorded but not released) if possible so that if life happens you can still publish without missing your schedule. Publish an episode or two (I don't believe you need 3, 5, 8 episodes - unless you have content coming out of your ears) and then list them in the following directories iTunes Stitcher Google Play Music TuneIn Most apps like pocketcasts and overcast pull from iTunes. Then you tell everyone you know, use email, social media, etc. You might try creating a Thunderclap campaign, and then use social jukebox or Buffer.com to promote your episodes as they go out Sponsored By Emerald City Productions Get your first four episodes (up to 30 minutes per episode) edited for $15 each. From head to toe you will sound great. Go to www.emeraldcitpro.com/sop Mentioned In This Show Mark Neslon Show Thunderclap campaign Coolerwebsites.com Dana Gould Hour on iTunes Start Podcasting Today School of Podcasting - Podcasting Courses

Because of My Podcast: My Family Was Fed A Giant Meal Cale Nelson of Ham Radio 360 sent in a great story where a listener told him NOTt to make dinner the Thursday before Christmas. Then sent Cale a giant box of Barbecue. When you've got a houseful of kids, and your wife is happy because the food is excellent, and she didn't have to cook it - it's a big win. Check out Cale's show at HamRadio360.com Starting a Podcast Your Customer Wants To Hear Should your business have a podcast? Probably. It's a great way to get in front of your target audience no matter where they are. I was asked to be on a new podcast coming out today (my episode is in the future) and its from Tim Sinclair. You may or may not know that name, but I'll reveal who his is in a second. I just checked out his site and then it hit me. This is a great example of using a podcast for your business. Tim Sinclair is the CEO of Ringr . This is an app and service that allows you to record both sides of an interview. If you're worried about doing a "mix minus" then you may want to check out this service. Plans start at $7.99 a month for the basic, and $18.99 for the premium. For more information go to http://ringr.com/podcastcoach The people that use Tim's technology interview people and want a good recording. There are two ways to learn things. You can be shown how to do it right, or your can bring in those two famous trainers that seem to help everyone. You may know them as Trial and Error. They are not very efficient, but their lessons cut deep. You want your podcast to do one of these things Laugh Cry Think Groan Educate Entertain If you have your show do more than one of the above, you're headed in the right direction. So what Tim did is launch a podcast filled with fun, entertaining stories that can be educational as well. The podcast is called My Worst Interview Ever. He has interviewed people like Cliff Ravenscraft, The Mobile Pro Shawn Smith, The App Guy Paul Kemp, XM Radio’s Doug Hannah, Blubrry’s Todd Cochrane, Libsyn’s Rob Walch, syndicated radio host Brant Hansen, Dave Jackson, Dan Franks, Jeff Brown, Daniel J. Lewis. The stories I understand are hilarious. The first episode is John Lee Dumas talking about his worst interview ( a rock icon famous for selling coffins). So when creating a podcast, one strategy is to create a podcast that your target audience wants to hear. Tim identified his audience and has come up with a fun and entertaining way to produce good content without making his show a giant infomercial. Remember, nobody tunes into an infomercial on purpose. The next thing I like is Tim is already in iTunes and Stitcher. He doesn't seem too worried about the magical happy place of New and Noteworthy and his first eight weeks. With content like this, I bet he'll get listed because he didn't name his show wtf this week in cold cases on fire. He also made sure NOT to make it giant Ringr commercial. He does a quick mention in the middle. He understands the idea is to build an audience first. Check out his show at worstinterviews.com and check out his service at ringr.com A Not Great Example The Penzu podcast is meant to help promote their company (penzu.com which I love and use) Nobody is looking for "Penzu" that doesn't know then) so how is this supposed to bring in new people? They are using Soundcloud as their platform (who are leaking money). Switch to Libsyn.com and your back catalog comes for free during the first quarter of 2017, and get a free month using the coupon code sopfree Their titles look awful. There is no description. They only have seven episodes (which is fine), but they have the podcast in their software (so their customers have had "episode 7 in their platform all year) Back to the Basics Of Your Website I recently did the "Favorite Podcast Ever" show where you sent in your favorite podcasts and explained why they were your favorite. I always then go to the website of those show and share that someone thinks you're the best. I am amazed at some of the things I find. Before we get into those, you do need to decide what your website is for. By this mean I mean if your podcast is to drive leads to your business, then you might have a giant sign up form. If you're trying to grow your community, you might really be sending people to your Facebook group. So in the end, there is no one size fits all. However, there are two things I hear over and over and over. I hear, "I want more downloads, and I want more interaction." When I go to the websites of these people, there are no links to subscribe to their show. There is no easy way to contact you. One person I had to tweet at (and their twitter account was waaaay at the bottom of their screen). I had someone who was going to hire me to help him get more subscribers. I went to their website, and said you don't need to pay me for this, but there isn't a single subscriber button on your website. Ready To Start Podcasting? Join the School of Podcasting or Schedule some One

Here it is 2017. Congratulations you made it through another year. Some of you were going to start podcasting last year, some of you go back to 2015. Some of you, are going back even further. Today I want to give you some ideas and strategies to launching your first podcast. What Do You Need To Start Your Podcast An idea A microphone A media host A website (optional, but STRONGLY encouraged) Some artwork for iTunes A description To get into itunes you need one live episode. Take A Mulligan So here is a strategy that some people on accident, and you can do on purpose. I call it "The Mulligan." This comes from golf. When you hit a bad shot, you call that shot your mulligan, and you throw down your new ball and swing again. It is basically a do over. Some very popular podcasters like Hall of Fame Podcaster Mignon Fogherty, Lauria Petruci, even Adam Curry (who helped invent podcasting) didn't hit pay dirt till he was on his THIRD podcast. So start a podcast about anything, it doesn't. You could do a podcast about the weather in your city, just to go through the motions and learn the tech. Once you've got it down, cancel everything, delete all the files, and go back and do one for real. Take a mulligan on purpose. When I played in bands, often the best recordings were the one where the engineer told us he wasn't recording. There was no pressure we were just doing a sound check. With no pressure we often would come up with a great "take" and end the song and say "I wish we would've recorded that" (and luckily in some cases they did). If you start out with a show you don't care about you can get a show up and see it really doesn't take that much to record and publish a show. (Getting people to listen is really the hard part). What About The Expense? I graduated from the University of Akron with a Bachelor's Degree in Education specializing in Technical Education. Just the books for a semester are an estimated $450. The actual classes are $5473 semester (typically three months) if you're going full time (Source). When you sink $100-$300 into a podcast (FOR A LIFETIME), that is a small investment. Moving forward your will be spending $30 a month (typically). Cut out a few sodas and snicker's bars and you've got your money. Keep in mind, The money you are spending is an investment in you. But What If You Want To Actually Take a Real Swing? You've probably heard about S.M.A.R.T. Goals. This stands for Specific Measurable Actionable Realistic Time Bound So instead of "I want to start a podcast." You need to get more specific. I want to start a podcast about Raising Llamas . This is more specific, but I'd like a little more specifics and some time. I will Google other Llama podcasts to see what names might be available by January 15th. Michael Hyatt (one of my favorite Authors - I read Platform every January) has a "Best Year Ever" course and he throws in two more items. Exciting - You wouldn't set a goal that bores you. Relevant - I'm going to do a daily show, even though I have two jobs, a wife, and a set of twins. By adding these two, you are creating smarter goals. Why Should I Podcast? You have something to say: You're yelling at the dashboard in the car, or swearing outloud in the super market as you think, "ugh I could do this better.." Here are some more. You want to be seen as an expert You want to reach a global audience You want to build a community You want to sharpen your presentation skills You want to build your brand You want to promote your products You want to boost your speaking career You want to have fun with like minded people You want to make some additional income. But, But, But, But...... I'm not sure exactly what format. - - Your Podcast is a recipe - not a statue I hate my voice - This is normal as your are hearing your voice for the first time through your ears (only) with no vibrations from your skull. I'm not a nerd - Yet you attach files to emails, turn down the volume in the car, press record on the DVR (so you know file management, audio mixing, and recording) I might look stupid - It's not radio. It's not live. The only way you will sound stupid is if you release something that sounds stupid. People might say negative things - Every day people say negative things about your driving, etc. Yet you still drive. Don't let your fear stop you from doing the thing you love. Did you give out presents this year at Christmas? We are not always 100% sure they were going to be loved? Yet, we give them anyway. Here is a little truth, when you first start, nobody is listening anyway. Don't think about the thousands of people listening (cause it's not ) think about talking to ONE person. While helping one person may not change the world, it could change the world for that one person. Some of My Favorite Quotes on Starting You don't have to be great to start, but you do have to start to be great. -Zig Ziglar When you want something you've never had, you have to do something you've never done. -Thomas J

This Year SOP Listeners said the following list was "Their Favorite Podcast" This means if they could only listen to ONE, this would be the show. Here they are in alphabetical order 4:00 Adam Carolla Show - http://adamcarolla.com/ 4:42 Bloodround - http://www.bloodround.com 6:58 Freakonomincs - http://www.freakonomics.com 9:18 Hollywood Bable On - http://www.smodcast.com/channel/hollywoodbabbleon 11:35 Kate’s Take - http://www.eofire.com/audio-blog/ 12:34 Medication Oasis - http://www.meditationoasis.com/podcast/ 13:25 Mighty Blue on the Appalachian Trail - http://mightyblueontheat.com/ 14:23 Mike Row’s The Way I Heard It - http://mikerowe.com/podcast/ 15:54 Mixergy - https://mixergy.com 17:00 Mysterious Universe - mysteriousuniverse.org 17:54 Mystery Show - https://gimletmedia.com/mystery-show/ 20:11 Old Pre-Meds - http://www.oldpremeds.org/ 22:10 Radio Labyrinth - https://audioboom.com/channel/radio-labyrinth 23:12 RED Podcast - http://www.redpodcast.com 24:25 Retired Exited - http://www.retiredexcited.com 25:30 Rock Your Retirement - http://www.rockyourretirement.com 27:25 She Podcasts - http://www.shepdocasts.com 29:20 Spawn On Me - http://spawnon.me/ 30:47 Stacking Benjamins - http://www.stackingbenjamins.com 35:42 Stuff You Missed in History - http://www.missedinhistory.com/ 39:05 Ted Radio Hour - http://www.npr.org/programs/ted-radio-hour/ 40:17 The Audacity to Podcast - http://www.theaudacitytopodcast.com 41:25 The School of Podcasting - http://www.schoolofpodcasting.com 42:50 Trecks in Sci -Fi - http://treksinscifi.com/podcast_notes/ 46:55 Tumble - http://www.sciencepodcastforkids.com/ Contribtuors Amanda from the Great Beer Adventure greatbeeradventure.com Brian Entzminger, host of the Engaging Missions Shows at http://www.engagingmissions.com Bryan Goodwin with http://www.goodwinsocialmedia.com Cale Nelson from www.hamradio360.com Chris Hache of the Noshing Nova Scotians podcast http://www.chrishache.com Glenn “The Geek” Hebert of the Horse Radio Network http:/www.horseradionetwork.com Hall of Fame Podcaster Danny Pena, founder and co-host of Gamertag Radio (http://www.gamertagradio.com Henry Shapiro of the Retired Excited podcast http://www.retiredexcited.com Jason Bryant from Mat Talk Online http://www.MatTalkOnline.com Jason Norris of Podcast Local from On the Go FM. http://www.podcastlocal.com Jayson Sacco of the Outdoor Adventures with Jason http://www.oawjs.com Jen is one of the founding co-hosts of the Anomaly Podcast, anomalypodcast.com Jonathan Christopher, host of the Career Eden Podcast http://careereden.libsyn.com/podcast Jonathan Messenger of The Alien Adventure of Finn Caspian show FinnCaspian.com Kathe Kline of the “Rock Your Retirement" podcast. rockyourretirement.com Katie Krimitsos of Biz Women Rock http://www.bizwomenrock.com Kim Krajci of Toast Masters 101, http://www.toastmasters101.net Lee Silverstein of the Colon Cancer Podcast http://thecoloncancerpodcast.com/) Randy Cantrell who is the host of the Grow Great podcast http://www.GrowGreat.com Rob Kerns of Living the Vet Life podcast http://www.livingthevetlife.com Stargate Pioneer of the Gonna Geek Network gonnageek.com Steve Stewart at You can find Steve at SteveStewart.me. Tyler Sheff of the Cash Flow Guys podcast http://www.cashflowguys.com Zen Runner of www.slowrunnersclub.com HOMEWORK What are you top podcasting pet peeves? Go to www.schoolofpodcasting.com/contact and let me know READY TO START PODCASTING Go to www.theschoolofpodcasting.com

Because of My Podcast I Got Media Passes - Cheri Field Cheri Fields has at least 7 children, and produces the Creation Science for Kids Podcast http://creationscience4kids.com/ What Podcaster's Can Learn From Amazon.com Amazon is an amazing company. Recently I purchased an Amazon Echo, and Later and Amazon Dot. These devices allow me to do things through voice activation system known as Alexa. You can control Alexa with an Amazon Echo, an Amazon Dot, and Amazon Tap, and now you can control your Amazon Fire TV. If you're interested, check out my Buyer's Guide. The item that made me purchase the Echo? The ability to say “Alexa, add eggs to the grocery list.” The more I examine the Amazon company, the more I believe there are tips we podcasters can learn from them. Amazon Makes It Easy To Find Stuff Their search is at the top of their page. You don’t have to search for the search. Amazon understands their customer may want a number of things, so they make it easy to find. Podcasters you need a search button that is easy to find, if you provide topics that are more of a reference. Podcasters you could use categories to create filter to only show those episodes that are categorized a certain way. Customer First Mentality Any research into amazon and you will read how they make all decisions based on serving the customer. They are spending money on items that will better serve the customer. So when you are thinking about purchasing some equipment for your podcast you need to ask yourself who the purchase is serving, you or your audience? Amazon project lead Ian McAllister has described a sort of reverse engineering that happens frequently at company HQ. “We try to work backwards from the customer, rather than starting with an idea for a product and trying to bolt customers onto it,” he wrote on Quora.com. When someone approaches you to to be a guest on your show, you need think, “Will my audience want to hear this content?” Personalized Recommendations There are plugins that can add related links to other episodes on your site. So when someone listens to an episode about Topic A there could be links to more Topic A shows at the bottom of the post. There are plugins such as Yet Another Related Wordpress Post Plugin (which has lots of features, but can be a bit of a resource hog), and Related Wordpress Posts is a lighter weight plugin with an easy setup. If you’re using Appendipity themes, this is a built in feature They Don’t Always Win, but They Try I completely forgot that Amazon launched a “Fire Phone.” That tells you how much of an impact it had on the phone space. They’ve done quite a few things that didn’t land well. It wants to infiltrate people’s lives to such an extent that they can’t imagine living without it — that they don’t even try to imagine living without it. We always joke that "No one will punch you in the face," here at the School of Podcasting. Your podcast is a recipe, not a statue. One of the cool things about being cloud based, is they are constantly adding new features to the Alexa system Keep Your Pages Loading Fast After analyzing the ratio of sales to website performance, Amazon discovered that for every 100ms of page load time there was a 1% decrease in sales. So how fast does your website need to be? Many usability experts propose that the ideal page load time is 2 seconds or less. You can easily test the page load time of your own website by using free tools such as WebPageTest.org So podcasters be careful loading tons of plugins if you're using WordPress. Some of those may slow down your site. Make it Fun Google the phrase "Alexa Easter Eggs" and you will find a giant list of goof things you can get Alexa to say. There are Make it Easy The one thing the Amazon Echo and Dot do is they make it super easy to ORDER STUFF. With a few phrases, "Alexa order Angel Soft Toilet paper" it is pretty much on the way. She will state what size the package is and the price and ask me if I want to order it. There are safeguard can put in so your kids do order every thing under the sun. Podcasters who are saying thins like, "Find me in iTunes" are missing a golden opportunity to lead their customers by the hand and show them exactly how to subscribe to their show. One of the things I did as a young grocery clerk was if someone asked where something was, I would take them to it, and make sure they could reach it. I wanted to see that product go into their cart. I would also ask if there was anything else they were looking for before I returned to whatever I was doing before. Make it easy. You can do this by finding your show in iTunes, and right clicking on your art work and copying the link then add a button to your site and attach that link to the button (there is a tutorial for this at the School of Podcasting Amazon's Ultimate Goal - Routine Amazon wants to be your right arm. They want to be integrated into your life. When I recently traveled without my Amazon Dot, it was weird not to wake up, chec

Call the Show 888-563-3228 Because of my Podcast Cale Nelson Last week, a listener contacted me via email. He is one of my Pateron Supporters. He said he noticed on my Pateron page the goal for buying a new Mixer. He went on to inquire about which mixer I was interested in. I sent him a note back telling him about the 12 ch Behringer mixer I had been saving for (which was the lowest cost mixer with Faders I could find on Amazon-I'm a FM Radio Throw-back and prefer faders). In his subsequent email, he stated he wanted to purchase a Mixer for me-and he'd buy the Behringer if that is what I had to have, otherwise he preferred to buy me a Yamaha MG12. After picking myself up from the floor, and maybe or maybe not drying one or both of my eyes; I said the Yamaha would be a fine choice. The board arrived today, I'm still flabbergasted, and completely humbled. I have the best listener(s) on the planet! Cale Nelson www.hamradio360.com Be the Best Podcast Guest Be the Best Podcast Host Maybe it's Friday and I am just tired after so many hours of programming this week but if you send me an interview request that includes the following I will not even respond to you. 1: you must have a hour for the interview 2: you must have headphones 3: you must have a quiet space 4: We request all guest to share our podcast on social media I must? I must? You are asking me for an interview and you say I must? Plus, if in your initial email request you say I should share it to my social media, I will never respond to you. I will share it to my social media if I think it is valuable to my friends, family and audience. Show some respect when you are asking for interviews. Wow. Whew, ok now I am going take a break this weekend! Have a good one everybody! Stop Chasing Influencers Jared Easley is one of my My Favorite People on the Planet. I do't interact with him much, but when I do, I'm always glad I did. His Book Stop Chasing Influencers: The True Path to Building Your Business and Living Your Dream had a TON of useful advice that came from the real world. Here is a quick excerpt. A majority of the influencers and A-listers on his guest wish-list did not have time or interest in being on his new show, which had zero listeners. The guests who were gracious enough to give him the time for an interview were not inclined to share it with their audiences. Finally, the guests who did give him their time, and who also shared the show with their networks on social media, did not translate into a large Starve the Doubts audience that listened to the guest interviews and subscribed or stuck around as well. So if you're looking for GIANT numbers by having GIANT names, that is not going to happen. Host Tips If you of alot of interviews, you're going to lose your mind without a scheduling tool I love Acuity Scheduling. If you're looking for a free (scaled down) tool I've heard good things about Calendly.com Let the guest know WHY they are there. WHO they are talking to, WHAT they will be talking about and HOW long the interview will be. Go to their website and get the bio, headshot, etc. Then ask for what is missing. Do some research (if you want, listen to other interviews, check out their Facebook page, twitter), and come up with some questions. This list of questions (for me) will be used as "game plan" but not as an interrogation Email the day off (if not before, or better BOTH) the interview to remind them of your appointment. Make sure they know to get the best microphone available, and to have headphones on. Find out what website your want to promote. Where are we sending people? If they don't sound good (meaning their sound is distracting from the content), stop and ask them to get a different microphone, different position, etc. TRUST ME, you will not want to release this to you audience. Who do you want to upset, your legions of followers or ONE guest. You will spend a lot of time trying to clean up bad audio, and some times you just can't. When the guest arrives let them know its not live (unless it is) and that if they mess up you can do it over. Let them know that if you pause, you may be looking for the next question (and you're not looking for a longer answer). Erik K Johnson has a great tip and says to come up with a great first question to get the interview pointed in the right direction. Make sure you know how to say their name (sometimes you find them on YouTube and learn how to pronounce their name) Michael O'Neal has a great tip in his Art of the Interview Course. If you know a guest loves to tell the same story over and over, use it in the intro, and now they can't repeat it. Don't make them sit through the whole show if it's done live. If it's a live call, then bring them on 5 minutes before they go on the air. Michael O'Neal said (when he was on this show) to promote the guests stuff first, then they are happier to be on the show, promote the episode, and they aren't looking for opportunities to promote because you already