Guidelines for entering into a podcasting partnership

The decision to create an ongoing podcasting partnership can seem like an easy one. However, there are some basic guidelines which should be followed in order to achieve lasting success.

After establishing a properly-aligned set of expectations for the project, the second most essential requirement is ensuring a high level of sound quality. The specifics will vary based on the recording setup. The most basic question to ask is, “Are we going to record in person, or remotely?” If your answer is the latter, you’ll almost certainly want to utilize Skype. The good folks over at The Conversations Network have put together an incredibly comprehensive video tutorial which, if followed closely, yields some very impressive results despite its age:

http://www.blogarithms.com/index.php/archives/2007/12/23/skype-for-inter...

One interesting event which occurred after the publication of this tutorial is that Skype produced its own USB headset for sale, the FREETALK Everyman:

http://shop.skype.com/headsets/iss-talk-5115-everyman-headset.html

Also, although the SILK audio codec has now superseded SVOPC, I’ve still had consistently better results with SVOPC. Your mileage may vary.

Are you more concerned with sticking to a set release schedule, or are you instead focused on sporadically releasing very in-depth material? Think of it as the difference between the nightly television news and a feature-length film documentary. Going back to expectation alignment, this particular issue has the potential to get quite thorny if not clearly established in advance. While it’s not impossible to maintain very high standards of quality with a frequent release schedule, it is certainly much more difficult, especially if podcasting is not your full-time job. Figure out where you are most comfortable along that spectrum.

This tenet will be a major driver of your content. Depending on your subject matter, your listeners will have expectations of their own. The governing question you should be asking is, “Are we creating a product that I would want to listen to, if I were in the audience?” More often than not, this question will yield some insightful hints at different ways you can tweak and improve your podcast. Just be sure to keep an open mind and a willingness to adapt; at the opposite end, getting too out of touch with your listeners and their expectations can result in growing disinterest and dwindling audience numbers.

The podcast should not be a strictly unidirectional flow. One of the most important things you can do is provide your listeners with a variety of feedback channels, and to regularly encourage (or even reward) their use. Most of the time, this is a relatively simple and painless exercise; web 2.0 provides us with a plethora of free tools which can fulfill this purpose. Besides the obvious use of email as a feedback mechanism, tools such as Twitter and Google Voice can be immensely useful. With Google Voice you can solicit telephone-based feedback from your listeners, which can then be easily incorporated into future recordings. The feedback effectively becomes the content, and may even inspire additional feedback of its own.


Don’t be afraid to periodically ask yourselves, “How are we doing?” If you think your podcast episodes are running a bit too short or too long, try adjusting the length. If you feel like you might need more or less participants in order to communicate effectively, shuffle things up a bit. As long as you update your alignment of expectations accordingly, taking a new direction here and there can be a positive and refreshing experience.

Each of these three adjectives is uniquely important to the enduring success of your podcast. You want a unique selling proposition for your content, and that comes with originality. If you’re simply rehashing information that others are already providing earlier and better, you might be wasting your time. While a bit of variety can be fun and entertaining, veering too far off the track can result in a loss of relevancy. If your podcast is about gardening, you can logically branch into tangents about cooking, but don’t let these tangents dominate the proceedings and dilute the brand you have built. And finally, don’t be boring! Keeping things interesting can be just as much a function of delivery as of the content itself. There’s a reason that radio broadcasts of baseball games feature one play-by-play announcer and one color commentator; one element without the other results in a worsened experience.

While this list of guidelines certainly isn’t exhaustive, it should be helpful in giving podcasters a workable foundation for success. Above all else: use these techniques to help you enjoy what you are doing. That enjoyment will come across to your audience, and serve as a palpable reason for them to continue tuning in.