TPU #24 | How Often Should You Update Your Podcast?
Click here to download this episode.
In this episode of the Podcasting Underground, I discuss how often you should post new episodes of your podcast. Many podcasters quickly find out that posting to your podcast regularly takes a lot of time and energy. But you need to post often enough that your audience keeps coming back for more. So what is the right balance? This episode will help you think through the important criteria for deciding the right frequency for updating your podcast.
Links mentioned in this episode:
- Slides for my six presentations at the NAB Podcasting Summit
- Promoting Your Podcast
Send comments and questions to jason [AT] PodcastingUnderground [DOT] com or call the message line at 206-222-1585.
Peter Beck, MD said,
May 2, 2007 at 6:24 pm
Jason, howdy :)
You’ve probably got tons more experience than any of us in what works for podcasting frequency, especially for different reasons.
My own experience as a relative podcasting newbie (since Fall ‘06), is that when the material is relatively detailed and long (i.e. the show length pushes 20-30+ minutes), a month between shows isn’t unreasonable. As you pointed out, listeners only have a finite amount of available time to winnow thru your material, as well as that of other shows they’re downloading. I’m a busy medical professional, and while I’d originally planned 2-3 shows per month (after getting the “process” down), I promised myself 1/month. And that’s about where it’s stayed.
Updating the site in between podcasting shows with blog entries - especially if the material is best blogged anyway (e.g. fairly visual, complex, or requires a lot of flipping back and forth between topics) - is, as you’ve pointed out, a great way to keep folks updated and current with you. Or to keep *you* fresh in *their* minds.
Best, and enjoy the Bahamas,
Peter Beck, MD
http://www.PodcastingForMedicalProfessionals.com
Peter Beck, MD said,
May 3, 2007 at 5:37 am
Jason, another query –
If I’m mixing up your podcasts, my apologies, but did you end this last show with an appeal for future show topics/questions? If so, I have 2 requests, one specific, one more broad:
1) How do you format text in your feed, for reading in a typical web browser? Yours shownotes and blog entries break nicely into paragraphs and bullet points, but my feed reads with nothing besides punctuation - it’s all one paragraph, no matter what I enter when I WRITE the post/shownotes in WordPress.
2) Any thoughts on basic approaches for approaching advertisers or sponsors? I’ve been stymied a bit by a certain coyness in the podosphere about setting a price point for one’s services, what to have on hand, how to talk language that the sponsor needs to hear, etc. I realize that different podcasters offer different services, but having a successful podcaster tell me only after much verbal chasing, that he commands $XXXX for a month of placement in his show, much more than other pc-ers charge, because he can, since his show has such value, isn’t terribly helpful. The same host was somewhat against any kind of “unionizing,” or standardization among podcasters for insisting on certain minimums for certain kinds of ads, which as a physician struck me as very familiar (docs are an independently cussed lot, too), but also very worrisome (health insurers (read: corporate sponsors) nowadays eat individual medical offices for breakfast, *unless they band together in groups and use their collective bargaining power*).
Best,
Peter Beck, MD
http://www.PodcastingForMedicalProfessionals.com
Peter Beck, MD said,
May 3, 2007 at 5:44 am
And one last request (and I’m *really* sorry if this isn’t for the right show):
3) Can you address how to put useful sidebar content in WordPress, such as email signups, or subscribe via iTunes or whatever, or customizing the text in a sidebar entry (like your “Automatically get new episodes for free” section)?
Thanks!
Peter Beck, MD
http://www.PodcastingForMedicalProfessionals.com
Sara Farley said,
November 12, 2008 at 11:27 pm
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