Over the summer, I had the pleasure of attending PodCamp Boston. One of the first presenters that I listened to was Guido Stein, passing on some tips to getting started in podcasting. There are more of the technical than creative vein, but good stuff, nonetheless.
Recording Audio
- GarageBand is great. Sadly, only available for Macs. However, the default file format is MP4. Go to “Share” and change for iTunes/MP3 for best results and most versatility
- Use Levelator to unify audio levels in the recording *before* doing any other editing. This is especially important if you have more than one person on the recording, and are not in the same location.
- Audacity is a pretty good and easy to use editing tool for getting rid of mistakes & deadspots.
- Speaking of mistakes, if you do make a slip up while recording, leave about 5 seconds of silence after, so it will be easy to find while you’re editing
Recording Options
There are many ways to get audio into a file on your computer. The key, though, is getting it the best format possible. I’ve suffered through podcasts that were obviously recorded over the phone or similar, and one person is LOUD and you can hear paper shuffling, sniffling, everything, and the caller is so soft that you want to turn it up to hear him/her, but you’re eardrums get blown out when the first person comes back on.
- Headset – with so much VOIP techonology being used, there are many headsets on the market these days. Find one that comfortable, with good sound quality. I use one that was actually designed for Sony Playstation, but it’s lightweight, comfortable, and delivers pretty good audio quality.
- USB Microphone – the cheap $7 versions probably aren’t going to give you the best quality but if headsets aren’t your deal, try a standalone microphone.
- Digital Recorder – this could be a great option if you plan to be recording your podcast when you’re not at your computer. You can transfer the recorded file to your computer later for leveling & editing.
- VOIP – some VOIP tools like Skype allow you to record a call, which could be an ideal solution if you have multiple people on the recording from different locations. Please remember to run the file through and audio leveling program, through, to be nice to your listeners.
- Another option is a service like drop.io, where (I’m told) you can call in and set it up to automatically post the recording to your podcast. Neat.
To test out a microphone, record something and play it back. Make sure the output levels are satisfactory, and quality is good – no scratchy noises, pop, background noise isn’t too loud, etc.
Next time, I’ll share some of the tips I’ve picked up for how to publish your podcast, and where to get it listed to maximize your exposure.
Until then, I’d love to hear how you currently or plan to record your podcast…
It seems that one of the biggest things that trips up people new to the social networking adventure is the difference between an individual profile and a Fan Page on Facebook. Let’s take a few minutes to try to straighten that out.
When you sign up for Facebook, you create a profile. A profile should only be for an actual human person – not a mascot, dog, cat, iguana, or spiritual being. This is where you connect with people you know – your friends. You share stuff with them, they share stuff with you and everyone’s happy. Here’s my Facebook profile. Now, if you decide you want to be friends with me, please take time to introduce yourself and tell me you stopped by here first, so I know who you are.
If you have a business or volunteer or non-profit group or church (or WoW Guild), and you want it to have a presence on Facebook, then you need to create a Fan Page. For most, the hardest part of creating a Fan Page is figuring out how to get to them. If you look at the bottom of your browser window, just above your Start bar (for PCs) or Dock (for Macs), there’s a little Facebook toolbar. One of the last icons kind of looks like a blue speech bubble on top of a green speech bubble. If you mouse over it, it should say “Ads & Pages” – click it.
From this page, you have the option to create a new Fan Page for your business/organization/guild. Choose the name carefully, as you can’t change it once it’s been chosen. From there, just enter the basic information that’s requested and upload a picture. Then, tell all your friends (or, at least, those that might be interested) about this fabulous new page so that they can become Fans of it, as well.
Stay tuned for more info on how to use & love you Facebook Fan Page. Got a specific question about Facebook or other social networks? Leave me a comment and let me know…
Twitter Fox
TwitterFox is a Firefox plugin that helps you manage your Twitter account. Once installed, it sits in the bottom right corner of your browser window. The interface has tabbed displays to show your entire Twitter stream, your @ replies (Mentions) and your direct messages. It’s very easy to use, and makes retweeting only a right click away.
TwitterBerry
TwitterBerry is great for staying connected to you Twitter friends on your BlackBerry. You can swith between your stream, your public stream, replies and messages through the menu button. I love this app for keeping up while I’m in waiting rooms and traffic.
Ping.fm
Ping.fm is fabulous for managing several social media sites at once. It works with lots of social media sites, and can be managed by using the web interface, SMS text, or email. You can even set up triggers to post only to specified networks if you don’t want to post to all of them.
HootSuite
HootSuite is the perfect tool for managing several Twitter accounts at once. This is so useful if you manage accounts for your clients, or have personal and professional Twitter accounts. Using the web interface, you can make new posts to your account(s) immediately, or schedule them for future posting. HootSuite now integrates with Ping.fm, so you can use HootSuite to schedule posts to all of your social media sites
DestroyTwitter
DestroyTwitter – Gotta love the name, right? DestroyTwitter is a desktop app for managing your Twitter-verse. Similar to TweetDeck, it runs on the Adobe Air platform, so you’ll have to download and install that as well. Accodring to the website, though, it uses less system resources that TweetDeck, so might be easier for you to use if you’re a big multi-tasker. The interface is broken up into two pages of three columns – Home, Replies & Messages on the first page, Groups, Search and Saved Messages on the second. You can define as many groups as you want, but can only view one group’s stream at a time. My only want for this software is to be able to see two groups at the same time, and maybe some options for layout. However, I do like it the program, and get a kick out of the name every time I use it.
I love when I hear conversations about social media that contain complaints about a lack of response to marketing messages. Too often, it seems, people tend to focus on marketing and not the social part of it all.
Social media is about building communities and developing relationships. Yes, there is currently a large commercial component to social networking but, that doesn’t mean that the expected elements of social communication are irrelevant in these web based arenas.
Think about this scenario: you’re at a networking event and someone who you’ve never met and knows nothing about you comes up to you and shoves their business card in your hand, and then walks away. How likely are you to want to work with that person, even if you need or want what they are selling? Most people would be more likely to toss that card in the nearest trash can and move on.
Networking is not (or, at least, shouldn’t be) about closing the sale and moving on; it’s about creating and developing relationships with those that might be interested in your services or are connected to and influencers of others that would be interested. People want to do business with people they know, like and trust.
If you were to just jump on the nearest social network, bombard all of your contacts with spammy sales messages and have no interaction with them, you’re not really behaving any differently than the guy that shoves a business card at you. Let your contacts get to know you, share information with them, join into their conversations (when you have something relevant to say), develop a relationship so that they trust you, and let them know that you’re there to help them.
“Social” has become a bit of a buzz word over recent times. Social networking. Social media. Social bookmarking. Social marketing. Social responsibility. And the latest that I’ve heard – Social shipping.
Social shipping is a term I first came across on the Smashing Magazine website on the post about their upcoming book. Here’s how they put it:
We want to make the book affordable to everyone and therefore are subsidizing shipment of the book worldwide. However, shipping costs are extremely high to some parts of the world. Please help us minimize these shipping costs for folks who are worse off by voluntarily paying more for the shipping of your copy. This is what we call “social shipping.”
Cool idea, huh? What do you think?
One of the more interesting discussions at PodCamp Boston was not scheduled – which is the great thing about PodCamp. It was a mostly impromptu and ad-hoc discussion about women in social media. I joined the discussion about halfway through, as I had started out elsewhere, but was encouraged to join the discussion on the lawn by a VA associate on Twitter who wasn’t even at PodCamp. Word of the fabulous discussion had spread quickly and far.
My favorite quote from that discussion was by Christopher Penn, who said, “I don’t care what you have between your legs, be AWESOME between your ears!” Fellow PodCamper Georgy Cohen had this to say about that:
I guess I just don’t understand reactions like Sarah Wurrey’s, who was angered by Christopher Penn saying that all women had to do was “be awesome.”
I’m sorry, I was unaware that we weren’t already awesome. I can name at least 100 awesome women right now. Why is it the responsibility for changing the state of affairs all on us?
Um. I really don’t think he was saying you weren’t awesome now. But there’s a difference between being awesome in a closet and feeling comfortable and confident enough to wield that awesomeness. And really, in the realm of social media, I don’t think there’s a patriarchy waiting to beat you down. The “responsibility for changing the state of affairs” is on ALL of us, irregardless of gender. It’s called the democratization of media.
As an ironic follow up to this discussion, I atteneded the Southeastern Connecticut Women’s NETWORK luncheon yesterday, where our speaker was Teresa Younger, Executive Director for the Permanent Commission on the Status of Women (PCSW) in Connecticut. She gave an interesting speach about the inequalitiess of women in the work force. Some of the statistics Ms. Younger gave were astounding:
- Women earn $0.78 for every $1 a man earns
- Women stay in [job] positions longer, on average, than men
- Women CEOs are more likely to focus on long term sustainability than men
- 80% of women value customer relationship more highly than business growth and expansion
- There are 14 million people out of work & 10 million woman-owned businesses in this country – if every woman owned business hired just one person we would have the lowest unemployment rate ever!
So, the way I look at it, women are awesome. We take care of our families, our businesses, and ourselves (all too often, in that order) and we do it all for less pay. Changing the landscape of women in social media is a great idea, and maybe empowering women in just one area will push that same passion and enthusiasm into empowering women in other areas as well. Who’s with me?
(Another irony: as I write this, my Twitter stream is exploding to references with the same types of messages.)
One of the great sessions that I attended at PodCamp Boston 4 was about Podcasting, led by Guido Stein. Guido covered many great tech tips about podcasting, from Recording to Editing to Posting and Interacting with your listeners. All of Guido’s great tips are available online. One of the things that was discussed is the importance of editing your recording before posting so that you are presenting a quality podcast to your listeners. All of these tips immediately sprang to mind when I was listening to a back issue of an SEO podcast. Seriously, those people needed to be at Guido’s discussion.
The podcast in question started out okay enough – catchy into music, brief description about what the podcast was about, and what they would be discussing in the episode. Then it went downhill. In that episode, they were interviewing the creator/spokesperson for Knowem.com, a web service for checking the availability of your branded or favorite username at hundreds of different social media sites. Great concept, and I was really interested in learning more about it. However, the podcast was filled with lots of dead air as the hosts were busy checking out websites and having a private tour of some of the enterprise level and soon-to-come features of the service. Hearing the hosts say “Wow” over and over made me want to know what they were looking at but since it was a sneak-peek that couldn’t be shared with the audience yet, it left me frustrated not knowing what they were so excited about. I think a better way for this to have been handled would have been to share the sneak-peek with the hosts off the air and have them talk about it during the podcast, and not spend/waste so much time with checking email and viewing websites that you can’t even describe and discuss with the listeners.
So, this brings me to my podcast point of the day: if you’re going to be intereviewing someone during your podcast, be sure to have your questions/topics outlined before you start, and be sure to edit out dead air before posting.
