Podcasts can be used, very effectively, as a marketing channel for webmasters and web site owners. They are not just for bloggers. Infact, most webmasters probably don’t realise just how much they could benefit.
Podcasts are unique and often entertaining. They allow you to share your knowledge and places you as the subject matter expert. There are plenty of directories where you can list your podcasts for free, including itunes. It might surprise you to know they have 100,000 podcasts as well as music.
Wikipedia explains what a podcast is, and once you understand the terminology, you’ll find the technology is easy to understand. Better still, making podcasts is easy to do and inexpensive once you know how.
But why would you want to go to the time and trouble of recording podcasts and promoting them on your website and podcast directories? There are many good reasons and here are just a few,
- It’s a rapidly growing media format, which is still relatively new
- You will reach a new segment of potential customers and prospects
- Current listener market is 6 million rising to 12 million by 2010
- There are 40 million subscribers to itunes
- Podcasts can be video as well as audio
- They are already popular with media sites like CNN, Fox & BBC
- They will improve your search engine rankings
- There is currently very little competition
If you want to learn more or just get started, I can recommend a practical guide written by Alan Petersen called niche podcasting. It’s non-technical and tells you everything you need to know to record and publish your podcasts.
PS: It’s not been launched yet! But I got a copy from Lynn Terry. She has negotiated a special pre-launch deal with Alan and the link is available from her excellent Internet marketing ideas blog called clicknewz.
