The power of podcasting
I’ve been active on the internet for just over 15 years, and have had some success stories along the way. An area I overlooked all of this time was podcasting, I’ve been an avid blogger and from time to time have created videos for my youtube channel until now.
I decided I would try out podcasting as my 2021 new years resolution, well my internet resolution at least. It has taken me by surprise ! There are a good selection of free to use platforms out there, or at least paid ones with a free / lite plan version. The two I am currently trying our are:-
Anchor FM — This seems great great its easy to record podcasts, and to create text, add lead in’s and lead outs and it has distribution options built in ready to go at the click of a button.
Click a button for each then check back in a few days time and your content is live for example on Google Podcasts.
I used a graphic designer to help create my custom logo and then selected a background to match it.
Buzzsprout is the other one I am trying. Its a paid site with a free version that auto deletes content after 90days which I guess if it works well is then hard to avoid.
There are some nice features here also including the option to embed your own links to episodes which seems important if you want to get backlinks to your website from places like itunes.
I also write about podcasting on my mini blog and on my Linkedin company page.
I struggled somewhat with Audio levels from my USB microphone so I purchased a podcasting microphone on ebay:-
That has made a huge difference to the audio quality.
Next I paid a professional voice over artist to record a nice intro for me, and now I am good to go.
We now have a Patreon account so if anyone wants to support a growing business please feel free. I post regularly on there also and give comments on items in the news such as the takeover of French Connection
The distribution options on Buzzsprout are also worthwhile and mostly different from Anchor’s
As you can see there are some impressive names in their, Apple itunes, Amazon plus loads of others.
What is good is that a lot of these then link back to your website, giving you backlinks plus direct visitors who enjoy your podcasts.
Overall I am really impressed, I am getting great exposure for my product, good backlinks from high quality places and having fun at the same time!
Here are a couple of examples of how their partner sites display my podcast.
Breaker — which looks great.
Google Podcasts — doesn’t need to explained — must be good!
Podchaser — another great site
I’ve held back from submitting to itunes as I want to spend a little time professionalising things further before I take the plunge.