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Podcasting Design

Podcasting has become an over-used term for “Video and Audio Production for Online Sources” (VAPOS) but…until the masses adopt VAPOS as a replacement (something I very much doubt), we’ll be calling this new fangled market Podcasting. Whatever it’s called, I will venture to say…this is the future of television, radio and much of what we think of as “entertainment.” Maybe not today, or in it’s current form, but video and audio online is where cars were in 1904, radio was in 1922, television was in 1952, print publishing was in 1988 and the world wide web was in 1994. If you are in the business of video production, you simply have to pay attention to this market or you will not survive long term and you will give up valuable opportunities.

In this article, I’m going to talk about designing and structuring a podcast along with some of the technical issues that should be considered when producing a podcast. The Pixel Corps produces about 80 episodes of web content a month in 6-8 different structural formats. Much of what I will share is a culmination of many painful lessons we’ve learned over the last 8 years of producing online video.

Why Do a Podcast?

This of course, is really the first and most important question you need to ask yourself. “Why am I thinking about Podcasts, web video, or production at all?” If you are having a hard time coming up with an answer, let me give you a little help. Here’s where most podcasts come from…

1) Experimentation - This is actually a large focus of the Pixel Corps podcasts. We’re playing with ideas, playing with styles and formats, playing with the production pipe. The best way to figure something out… is to noodle with it. This can be a great reason to do a podcast in itself.

2) Self-Expression - I think about 80,000 of the 90,000 podcasts out there are for this purpose…for better or for worse. This is also 99% of YouTube. The masses have been unleashed and they are wrecking havoc on everything we hold dear in video production. Before you bemoan this, remember, people were going crazy with Photoshop in 1992…many (me) ended up taking it somewhere useful. Even if you are a little stodgier than the average Flip user, Self-Expression is important because if you don’t love what you do, it will be hard to get through the lean times…and if you start doing video on the web now…there will be lean years. Of course, if you wait until the market is moving, the train will have already left the station. We only do podcasts (for ourselves) about subject matter that we enjoy. We don’t wait for advertisers or funding. We create content because we want that kind of content to exist.

Self-Promotion - There are soo many avenues for self-promotion with online video. If you want to get known for something…do a great podcast about it. There is a lot of competition in many areas but the cream still rises to the top. And, if you are patient and diligent, you may end up with hundreds, thousands or even tens of thousands of followers. Just as importantly, you may find clients that are paying a great deal of attention to this. Self-Promotion comes in many forms (this may be the most important part of this article)...here are few ideas…

Getting the word out - This is the most crude and recognizable form of self promotion. You tell people about your product. While sometimes effective, you know how everyone feels about someone who just talks about themselves at parties? Yea, this type promotion often works just as badly. You can do it but the less people feel like you are selling something and the more they feel you are serving them, the more they will be interested in what you’re serving up.

Education - This is generally the most effective form of self-promotion using online video. Make sure people know how to use your product, make sure their questions are answered, make sure they understand the context for why your product exists. These kinds of videos deepen the company’s relationship with their consumers and makes sure those consumers have a good experience and spread the word. Here are a few good examples…

elfa

Elfa, like Ikea, Target, Staples, and a host of others, makes stuff that looks easy to build but turns out to be a weekend of swearing at the instructions and drinking hard liquor when you’re done to sooth the mental, and sometimes physical pain. Elfa recently posted videos on their site to show that it is, indeed, easy! ...Once you know what you’re doing. After 20 minutes of watching the videos, the customer can breeze through the operation rather than guess what the writers mean in the “intelligence test” written instructions that most of us fail. The customer gets their closet up fast, buys again, and tells their friends…success.

Whirlpool

Whirlpool takes frequently asked questions and hires people to make videos of the answers. This creates happy customers and reduces support call time (which saves lots of money). It’s also often more effective to watch the video than try to talk it through with a customer service rep in India.

Boxwrench.net

Holley ships a DVD of how to install and tune their carburetors with each unit. Why would they do this if it’s just mechanics looking at the videos? Because it reduces installation errors and thus reduces returns…saving, you guessed it, lots of money for Holley.

These are examples of the revolution coming…where it’s not “BMW films” but how-to’s and support videos that make sure that consumers know what their buying and know how to use it. Before you turn your nose up at this market, remember, it’s likely 20-30 times larger than film, TV and games combined.

And the last reason people make podcasts is for, you guessed it, Profit. Money makes the world go round and, while it’s not turning very fast yet, it can and does make money. Here’s the primary ways…

Services for people who want to promote themselves. See points above, consider doing them for someone else…enough said.

Advertising - While advertising is still getting started, there is plenty of money flowing into online video. Some of this is going to places like Hulu.com but it is also going to individual podcasters with niche markets that are coveted by advertisers. Much of this is non-fictional content about subjects people are passionate about. What are people passionate about? Go to the book store, walk through the magazine section. Welcome to 1000 passionate niches. You don’t have to do all footwork to get advertisers on your own, by the way. Websites like YouTube, Blip, Wizzard, Vimeo, and Howcast would be happy to sell advertising for you. We actually have an ad sales partner, Podtrac.com, who handles most of our advertising.

3) Clickthrough - While it’s a small market now, this is bound to grow - a lot. The idea is - that you are watching a cooking show and you want Alton Brown’s knife or pan or eggs. You click on them, order them and then go back to the show. Most people think that this won’t work because they are imagining this happening during a viewing of “Ocean’s 11.” Narrative is not the venue for this. How-to content is the perfect venue because starting and stopping is not that disruptive and because you have an audience interested in something specific. As devices like the iPhone mature, expect to see much more of this kind of content. Revenue can be either on the click-through or the purchase (Amazon Affiliate kind of stuff).

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