How To Podcast Like A Pro

John Dumas was kind of enough to extend to me an interview to his fantastic show Entrepreneur On Fire and I happily accepted.  If you have not listened to his show, do yourself a favor and subscribe.  If you are ANYONE thinking about taking on a new endeavor his show will fire you up and get you in the mindset to make your your new quest a raging success. I listen every morning and I attribute most of my new found energy to this podcast.

John has world class guests on the show and it is tremendously interesting to hear their insights. I’m still trying to figure out how I made it onto the show!

Hope you enjoy:

http://www.entrepreneuronfire.com/podcast-interview-with-entrepreneur-steve-cherubino-of-podnutz/

I think as a podcaster it is important to know how to handle negative feedback, comments, etc… Because I hate to say it, but you probably will get some. I must say, I’m extremely pleased with how little I get, and I bet you’ll find that as well as you go along. But… there are just going to be some haters/trolls out there, so lets talk about how to handle them.

If I do get negative feedback, it is usually through email or on my forums. Here’s what I do:

1. If it is valid criticism, I acknowledge it, usually write back to the person and thank them for their input. And if it is good criticism I consider their input as I podcast into the future.

2. If it is just hate, I ignore it. I almost never dignify their communication with a response. As a rule you should stay on good terms with your public so don’t get into flame wars. It’s just not good for business.

If someone comes into my chatroom during a live show to troll, I ban them. I don’t just kick them out for that session. I just ban them from the chat room indefinitely and instruct my moderators to do the same. They blew their chance in my mind. And I don’t want them to infect the good atmosphere that has been created for my real listeners.

If someone comes to my forums to troll, I just delete their account.

If you get a hateful comment on your site, or an email that is just mean. Don’t read it on your show. Just throw it out. People get enough hate in their everyday lives. I try to provide an entertaining, informative, constructive and positive experience in my shows. I want people who listen or watch my shows to have a better day after listening to my shows than they were having before. So don’t let negativity into your shows. There is no rule that says you have to read every comment you get on your show, good or bad. Even though it may seem entertaining to read crazy and spiteful email, I believe it actually damages the flow and tone of the show. And especially don’t belittle yourself by reading a hateful email on your show so that you can bash the person publicly with a response. It’s not worth it and can hurt your reputation. This happened recently on a podcast that I regularly listen to and enjoy, and I felt it was the worst part of that show. I did not want to know the thoughts of some negative and idiotic hate-monger. Again, people get their fill of those people in their everyday lives. During my podcasting time I want to be enlightened and entertained.

I know it’s tough for me sometimes to hold off on firing an email back to a hater. But I suck it up, ignore it, and actually feel much better afterwards for doing this.

Do this and your shows will stay positive, fun, informative and you’ll get a great group of positive fans.

I love equipment and gadgets.  And the deeper you get in podcasting, the more equipment and gadgets you will probably amass. But don’t fret, it doesn’t take much to get started and that’s what we’re going to talk about now.

First off, don’t get hung up on your equipment.  You can make a perfectly good podcast without putting out big bucks for an entire fully loaded professional recording studio.  Good equipment is cheap these days but more importantly, content is king!  Meaning that no matter how expensive your equipment is, how good your podcast sounds, it’s the content and information in your show that is most important.  It’s what you talk about and how you present it.  I’ve heard some very popular podcasts that sound technically dreadful,  but the content is so good that people forgive it. (I’m not condoning this by the way)  If the content of your show is lacking, people won’t listen. So, at the very least you can start podcasting with some decent equipment, and as long as your content is good, you should be ok.

When I started out, I had a Mac Mini, Peavey PV8, and an average dynamic microphone and actually podcasted for quite some time with just this minimal equipment.  Though time I gathered more gear, but I definitely did not have much to start.

If you have absolutely no equipment I recommend putting out between $150-$300 for something. But even if you don’t have that, don’t worry we’ll still get you by.  I’ll try to help you out with what equipment to pick up.

The Goal Of Equipment

What is the goal of your equipment.   What is the equipment for and what does it need to do?

The purpose of your equipment in the simplest of terms is get your voice and/or video recorded into your computer, saved as a file, edited, and uploaded to the web, so people can download it and listen/watch it.  Simple, right?

Typically, the more expensive the equipment, the better the quality of your recording. Better equipment will also have more features allowing you to possibly do more in your shows.

Now, gone are the days, when you buy your audio equipment at BestBuy, CompUSA, or your local electronics store. No more Creative sound cards. No more crappy headset mics and headphones. It’s time to shop at music stores now. Most of the audio equipment we’ll discuss on this site is available at retailers that specialize in music production. We’re talking, Guitar Center, Sam Ash, Musician’s Friend, Sweetwater, Zzounds. This is where you go to buy quality audio recording equipment and that what we want to do.

Have you ever been in one of those stores I just mentioned?  I suggest you go and get familiar if you’re close to one. You’ll be in awe. There’s just so much cool gear there to check out and lust after.

More on equipment later!

So…Let’s take some time now, if you haven’t yet decided what you want to podcast about.  Take a few minutes, (hours or days if you need to) and get a good idea what you want your show to be about.

A tip: I believe it’s a good idea to have a “niche” show. A “niche” is a specific area of interest or activity.  In other words, pick something specific to podcast about.  Not general.

Some examples of a targeted niche could be topics such as digital photography instead of just plain “photography”, training cats instead of just “cats”, or discussing home theater instead of a show about “electronics”.

My philosophy is that if it’s too general of a show, like “technology”, or “cars”, there’s too much out there, everyone is doing it, and your show may get lost in the mix. With a targeted specific niche you will have a better chance of being found and having success.

For example, my first podcast, Podnutz, was a show about computer repair.  There wasn’t really any other podcast about this out there at the time, yet there was a lot of interest in the subject.  Now, if I would have made my show just about the general subject of “computers”, it would have most likely been lost in the mix.  By specifying the niche “computer repair”, I was easily found by people searching around the Internet for a show about such.

Ok, once you know what you want to podcast about,  let’s get you set up and doing it!  Next topic is equipment!

1. If you are in this just for the money, get out now.

Don’t get the wrong idea about this statement. I like money. Maybe you like money too.  And if you are good, money will come, but what I’m trying to say is that if you are doing this just for the money, you’re going to have a rough go of it.  Like I said, money will come, but it follows passion.  Think about what you are passionate about in life.  What do you just love to do or talk about?  Find the answer to that question and podcast about that! You will enjoy doing your shows and get great satisfaction from them. Otherwise you will have a really tough time forcing yourself to do a show that your mildly interested in daily, weekly, or whatever your schedule is.

You may have heard of the term “podfade”.  Podfade is defined at UrbanDictionary.com as “When a podcast begins putting out episodes more and more sporadically and at greater intervals. Typically it begins with only one episode missed, but if a podcast isn’t careful, it can compound, sometimes as severe as one podcast every other month. Podfade often leads to podcast death. Many podcasts deny their podfade until it is too late.”

Now you may even have listened to or watched podcasts that have podfaded.  The creator or host of the show just gives up, lets it go, loses interest, doesn’t have the drive to keep it going, or just stops it for whatever reason.  It may have been a legitimate reason, or maybe he just got bored. I can’t say why a podcast will stop every time, but I can tell you podfade will happen if you pick a topic to podcast about that you are not jumping up and down with joy about talking about.  So, for example, if you love gardening more than almost anything, than you’d be a great podcaster about gardening.  If you are a car enthusiast, I’d podcast about cars. Personally, I love tech and computers.  Hence, my tech podcast network, Podnutz.com, that is still running strong! Podcast about something in which you have strong interest.

To emphasize this point and give you more insight on passion, I recommend reading Gary Vanerchuck’s book “Crush It” if you haven‘t already.  I’d say it’s a great companion book to this product, at least with regard to thinking big, mustering up drive, and following passion.  Heck, Gary’s goal is to own the New York Jets!  If that isn’t thinking big, I don’t know what is! (And I think he may actually do it!) Personally I think Gary is a freak of nature, spaz ball of energy! But it’s actually a good thing, because his example shows you how far passion will take you and what we as people are capable of.  It’s a great read and you can pick it up at HowToPodcast.biz/CrushIt.

Another benefit of podcasting about something you love is the podcast will be interesting to people who enjoy the same thing you do.  They will feel your passion.  It will come through in your shows and draw people in.  Your listeners will share in your excitement and enjoy and look forward your upcoming shows.  And most of the time they will be a listener for life and may even turn into a life long friend!

*A side bonus to podcasting is the amazing people you’ll meet! I know I’ve met a ton of people through my podcasts who I’m happy to call my friends.

Ok, the point I started off this rant about was to not podcast just for the money.  The truth is, a large part of making money from podcasting first comes from people actually enjoying your show and respecting your opinion as a person, without you necessarily even advertising one thing! If they’re in agreement with you and like you, they will be more likely to follow recommendations about what you suggest that they buy.

But, if your show is a giant commercial or a spammy, scammy pitch, you’ll come off a bit slimy, and your listeners (if you ever get any) are not going to stick around.  Your podcast will fail.  You’ll hate doing it, and the whole thing would be one big waste of time.

Now, before we continue, did you ever ask yourself  “Why do I even want to podcast?”.  You need to ask yourself this before you start.  You need to determine what are your motives, what are your intentions, and what do you want to attain from podcasting. It’s kind of a mental preparation that I feel is crucial and will increase your chances of success.  I mean, after all, this is going to take  work, and more importantly, endurance!  So here’s some help to get you mentally prepared before you start.  Consider the two following points:

1. To reach a goal you have to visualize that goal, so you can work towards it.

If you can’t see in your mind where you want your podcast to go, it probably won’t get there. So let’s do a quick drill right now and get this step done: Take a minute right now and picture in your mind what you want your podcast to be like.  Picture yourself one year from now.  How many listeners do you want to have?  How many shows do you want to get done. What do you envision your studio looking like? Get that picture in your mind. Got it? Good.

Now Think Big!

Try this, (and this is actually some of my best advice here right off the bat):  Take that goal you though of earlier, those numbers you were thinking of, and multiply it by 100! So if you were thinking you’d like 100 listeners in a year, make it 10000! If you were thinking you would be happy making $50 from your shows per month in profit, readjust your thinking so you’d be comfortable making $5000! And really picture yourself having all these things.

It actually may be uncomfortable to even think about having all those things and all that money.  But keep picturing it and keep visualizing it.  Think of how you’d feel with those things, or what you’d do with that money.  Whatever…  Just keep doing this drill until you feel like you can be comfortable with having those things. If those numbers are just too much for you too bear, then lower the amounts a bit, but keep trying to think big, much bigger than what you would normally think.  Ok, are you able now to think comfortably with big numbers, big stats, big results and big success.? Good! Then this step is done!

As a note, all successful people think big. And I guarantee you, if you continue to think big, you may not actually get 1,000,000 listeners in a year, but you’ll get a whole lot more than if you thought about being happy with 10. And don’t ever doubt your abilities for a second.  If you want it, go for it, don’t let anyone stop you, and yes you can get it!

That’s it for today. And don’t worry, the technical stuff is coming real soon.

So you want to podcast.  Well I’m glad you do because it is rewarding on so many levels. Not to mention, it’s a ton of fun!

I’m Steve Cherubino,  founder of Podnutz.com which is a podcast network I started from scratch in 2008. I went from having zero, to over 50,000 shows downloaded a month currently.  I also have an awesome flourishing community at Podnutz complete with bustling forums, lounges, chatrooms, etc..  I’ll go over the steps that built it up to that point so you can do the same with your show.

Podcasting is super HOT right now.  So you picked a great time to get interested in it. People are turning to the Internet for entertainment in a big way. And some podcasters are delivering, responding to this demand by making great niche content and putting it out there. Advertisers are noticing that podcasts are getting more and more eyeballs, so they are putting their money into advertising on podcasts.  And podcasters are reaping the benefits, some making good money and leading successful lives with their shows! Sometimes becoming even more famous than if they tried their hand in Hollywood!

Which leads us to the big question I‘m sure you’ve asked: “Can I make money in podcasting?” I say the answer is certainly yes.  I’m living proof. But you need to be smart about it.  I’ll show you how.  A bulk of my income comes as a direct result of my podcasting.  I promote my own products on my shows that I know there is a demand for.  We’re going to go over that too! So yes, you CAN make money in podcasting and YES I’ll show you how.  And the kicker is it doesn’t even feel like work if you love what you’re doing.

So… like I said earlier, it’s a great time to podcast, and I can’t wait to take you through the steps of starting and running your own successful podcast.

Ok, are you ready?  Let’s start building your show!