WEBVTT
1
00:00:02.560 --> 00:00:05.960
Welcome to my Digital Life show for May twenty six,
2
00:00:06.040 --> 00:00:09.240
twenty thirteen. I'm Rob Greenley, and thank you for downloading
3
00:00:09.359 --> 00:00:12.759
or just clicking play off of my website at Rob
4
00:00:12.800 --> 00:00:17.399
Greenley dot com. This is episode two of the radio show.
5
00:00:18.640 --> 00:00:21.519
In this episode, I'd like to talk about the blog
6
00:00:21.559 --> 00:00:24.480
posts that I made here over the last week titled
7
00:00:24.719 --> 00:00:28.239
is podcasting the same as Radio? And I made this
8
00:00:28.359 --> 00:00:31.800
post and it seemed to have picked up a lot
9
00:00:31.839 --> 00:00:37.200
of podcaster interests on Twitter and Google Plus, and just
10
00:00:37.240 --> 00:00:39.280
wanted to expand on it a little bit on my
11
00:00:40.520 --> 00:00:44.119
new show that I've launched here. It's kind of an experiment,
12
00:00:44.240 --> 00:00:47.399
more of a personal show. But I can be reached
13
00:00:47.479 --> 00:00:51.240
at Rob at Rob Greenley dot com and that's r
14
00:00:51.520 --> 00:00:54.399
O B G R e E N L e E.
15
00:00:55.079 --> 00:00:59.759
Or I can be found on Twitter at Rob Greenley,
16
00:01:00.399 --> 00:01:04.879
or in iTunes or on Windows Phone podcast Area, which
17
00:01:04.879 --> 00:01:09.560
I manage for a small company called Microsoft. On Saturday mornings,
18
00:01:09.599 --> 00:01:13.359
I also co host the New Media Show from nine
19
00:01:13.439 --> 00:01:18.400
am to about ten thirty am Pacific Standard time with
20
00:01:18.560 --> 00:01:22.120
Todd Cochran, who's the CEO of Raw Voice, Blueberry and
21
00:01:22.879 --> 00:01:26.400
is the creator of power Press plug in for WordPress.
22
00:01:26.760 --> 00:01:31.040
And you can certainly catch that show live every Saturday
23
00:01:31.480 --> 00:01:36.719
at live dot Geeknewscentral dot com. So let's go ahead
24
00:01:36.760 --> 00:01:39.359
and dive into what I was talking about in my
25
00:01:39.439 --> 00:01:43.680
blog posts. I've been hearing quite a few kind of
26
00:01:43.680 --> 00:01:46.760
broadcast radio folks have been recently kind of plugged into
27
00:01:47.480 --> 00:01:50.599
listening to what people are talking about in the broadcast
28
00:01:50.680 --> 00:01:56.239
radio business, and specifically, my ear has been tweaked to
29
00:01:56.319 --> 00:02:01.040
listening for commentary about podcasting, and I've been hearing a
30
00:02:01.079 --> 00:02:05.079
lot of those folks starting to, you know, kind of
31
00:02:05.680 --> 00:02:09.479
welcome podcasting into their kind of broadcast radio world, and
32
00:02:09.560 --> 00:02:12.319
I definitely see a lot of trends around that. I
33
00:02:12.360 --> 00:02:16.159
get a feeling like they're kind of maybe a little
34
00:02:16.159 --> 00:02:18.479
bit trying to co opt it and try and fit
35
00:02:18.560 --> 00:02:22.719
it into their world instead of really understanding what the
36
00:02:22.759 --> 00:02:28.400
differences are between podcasting and broadcast radio. And they were
37
00:02:28.400 --> 00:02:31.960
commenting about how best to produce a podcast, and they're
38
00:02:32.080 --> 00:02:34.639
like creating these lists of the things that you have
39
00:02:34.719 --> 00:02:37.400
to do and how to best produce a podcast, and
40
00:02:37.439 --> 00:02:40.560
it's like, you know, I've been around podcasting for a
41
00:02:40.560 --> 00:02:42.759
long time, and I know a lot of people in
42
00:02:42.800 --> 00:02:45.360
this space that have been doing it a lot longer
43
00:02:45.400 --> 00:02:48.879
than a lot of broadcast radio people and have learned
44
00:02:48.879 --> 00:02:52.879
a lot over the years, and this topic really hits
45
00:02:53.039 --> 00:02:57.719
at a very core level of why radio and podcasting
46
00:02:57.800 --> 00:03:01.240
have not really been kind of more to each other
47
00:03:01.599 --> 00:03:05.439
and been kind of supported that the podcast community kind
48
00:03:05.479 --> 00:03:07.919
of shies away from the broadcast radio side, and the
49
00:03:07.919 --> 00:03:10.599
broadcast radio side tends to kind of shy away from
50
00:03:10.639 --> 00:03:14.039
getting involved in podcasting, and I think it really does
51
00:03:14.120 --> 00:03:16.039
get back to the fact that it's it's kind of
52
00:03:16.039 --> 00:03:18.800
a different culture, it's a different format. I think that
53
00:03:18.879 --> 00:03:23.439
the broadcast radio side tends to think that podcasting is
54
00:03:23.879 --> 00:03:27.400
kind of like not as professional as they are, and
55
00:03:27.520 --> 00:03:29.960
so they tend to put it in it's in a
56
00:03:30.240 --> 00:03:33.240
kind of a user generated content area, which in a
57
00:03:33.240 --> 00:03:36.960
lot of ways is accurate. I got the impression they're
58
00:03:37.000 --> 00:03:41.520
not really understanding why podcasting is significantly different than radio
59
00:03:42.039 --> 00:03:45.319
and it really is not the same medium. Lots of
60
00:03:45.360 --> 00:03:48.639
people have debated this issue and they've talked about why
61
00:03:48.759 --> 00:03:55.479
podcasting is is really just like radio, but it's not
62
00:03:55.599 --> 00:03:58.080
the same medium, and I have a couple of key
63
00:03:58.120 --> 00:04:00.919
points to point out of why it's not the same.
64
00:04:01.360 --> 00:04:06.840
First of all, podcasting the content segment concept that is
65
00:04:06.879 --> 00:04:11.599
also part of broadcast radio is not normally related to
66
00:04:11.719 --> 00:04:17.480
a commercial break, so broadcast radio is broken up into pieces.
67
00:04:17.560 --> 00:04:19.920
I did a broadcast radio show for many years and
68
00:04:20.360 --> 00:04:23.600
had to produce it in like four to six different
69
00:04:24.839 --> 00:04:28.800
down to the second segments. Believe me, I know as
70
00:04:28.800 --> 00:04:31.879
well as anybody how to produce a radio show, and
71
00:04:32.040 --> 00:04:35.519
producing a podcast is not like producing a radio show.
72
00:04:35.959 --> 00:04:39.279
This show is a perfect example what I'm doing right now.
73
00:04:39.720 --> 00:04:43.240
I have a structured topics list of what I cover
74
00:04:43.439 --> 00:04:47.879
in the show, and it's very structured, but it's not
75
00:04:48.040 --> 00:04:51.959
structured down to the second. That's what is really different.
76
00:04:52.399 --> 00:04:55.519
I used to have to edit my pre produced segments
77
00:04:55.560 --> 00:04:59.560
for broadcast radio down to the exact second. And I
78
00:04:59.560 --> 00:05:04.439
don't know if anybody in podcasting that actually records segments
79
00:05:04.560 --> 00:05:09.279
down to the second and then ads like exit music
80
00:05:09.800 --> 00:05:14.600
and lead outs and then comes back with lead ins
81
00:05:14.720 --> 00:05:17.360
and intro music and stuff. And that's exactly what I
82
00:05:17.480 --> 00:05:20.279
used to do, and it just doesn't It's not necessary
83
00:05:20.279 --> 00:05:22.839
in podcasting, and it creates a lot of disruption to
84
00:05:22.879 --> 00:05:27.040
the flow of the content for the audience. And that's
85
00:05:27.079 --> 00:05:30.279
why podcasting is better. We don't need to go backwards
86
00:05:30.319 --> 00:05:33.560
and make podcasting like radio, it doesn't have to be
87
00:05:33.639 --> 00:05:36.399
that way. Most of the ads and sponsor messages, and
88
00:05:36.439 --> 00:05:39.920
this is my next point, are best delivered as part
89
00:05:39.959 --> 00:05:43.120
of the flow of the regular content. Right, So, as
90
00:05:43.160 --> 00:05:46.480
you're talking about a topic like I'm talking about here,
91
00:05:47.279 --> 00:05:50.120
it's very easy to kind of roll into talking about
92
00:05:50.120 --> 00:05:53.399
a sponsor. So let's say I'm sponsored by Audible or
93
00:05:53.439 --> 00:05:58.279
somebody or GoDaddy or some sponsor, and they just deliver
94
00:05:58.480 --> 00:06:01.759
like maybe a twenty second kind of message about that
95
00:06:01.839 --> 00:06:05.480
sponsor and then immediately just kind of go back into
96
00:06:05.639 --> 00:06:11.040
talking about the content. Right. Well, that is done somewhat
97
00:06:11.079 --> 00:06:16.040
in broadcast radio. It's basically called a host read, and
98
00:06:16.800 --> 00:06:20.959
they do do that on occasion, but that's not where
99
00:06:21.000 --> 00:06:25.279
the majority of the advertising is played in broadcast radio.
100
00:06:25.519 --> 00:06:28.720
So that's kind of like special deals that happened between
101
00:06:29.439 --> 00:06:34.240
the host of the show and an advertiser that they
102
00:06:34.279 --> 00:06:38.560
want to get deeper engagement, which really exposes one aspect
103
00:06:38.639 --> 00:06:43.040
of podcasting that's very powerful, and that's the host read aspect.
104
00:06:43.120 --> 00:06:45.600
And you see a lot of successful podcasters doing this,
105
00:06:46.120 --> 00:06:51.199
and it's cutting out this whole segmented advertising breaks in
106
00:06:51.279 --> 00:06:55.040
the content to just focus on the type of delivery
107
00:06:55.279 --> 00:06:57.600
that a sponsor really wants. You know, I did a
108
00:06:57.639 --> 00:07:00.000
broadcast radio show for a long time, and the advertise
109
00:07:00.160 --> 00:07:03.600
are always wanted a host red spot over any kind
110
00:07:03.639 --> 00:07:06.360
of thirty second spot. That's what their primary. So you're
111
00:07:06.360 --> 00:07:10.160
going after the sweet spot by actually taking that content
112
00:07:10.480 --> 00:07:14.199
and wrapping it very closely with the advertiser instead of
113
00:07:14.199 --> 00:07:17.600
creating a break right that you break the attention to
114
00:07:17.639 --> 00:07:21.360
the audience. The audience maybe goes off and pays attention
115
00:07:21.399 --> 00:07:24.079
to something else, doesn't even listen to the ad They
116
00:07:24.079 --> 00:07:27.720
either go to the kitchen, or they on broadcast radio,
117
00:07:27.800 --> 00:07:31.199
they'll just turn the channel, right. It's it's about being
118
00:07:31.199 --> 00:07:34.480
more personal with you with your audience. My personal experience
119
00:07:34.560 --> 00:07:38.360
is a well produced podcast do have structure, and that
120
00:07:38.560 --> 00:07:42.279
structure is led by the content like what I'm doing here,
121
00:07:42.439 --> 00:07:45.639
and very loosely timed in the program. Sure, you can
122
00:07:45.680 --> 00:07:47.920
have a target for how long you want your show
123
00:07:47.959 --> 00:07:51.079
to be, but even that doesn't have to be tightly
124
00:07:51.879 --> 00:07:55.639
defined right because the audience doesn't really necessarily care. Though
125
00:07:55.680 --> 00:07:57.720
I did get a lot of feedback over the years
126
00:07:57.759 --> 00:08:00.959
with my own shows that are at their audience member
127
00:08:01.000 --> 00:08:03.959
would like your show to be fairly consistent in its length,
128
00:08:04.759 --> 00:08:08.279
not down to the second, but down to like maybe
129
00:08:09.120 --> 00:08:12.079
you shoot for like a thirty minute show each each week,
130
00:08:12.199 --> 00:08:14.399
or you shoot for a forty five minute show. If
131
00:08:14.439 --> 00:08:18.399
it goes forty minutes or it goes thirty five minutes,
132
00:08:18.920 --> 00:08:21.439
the audience really doesn't care about that, right, That's not
133
00:08:21.519 --> 00:08:25.000
what's important to them. But what's also important is being
134
00:08:25.040 --> 00:08:28.519
able to cover whatever topic and content that you want
135
00:08:28.560 --> 00:08:31.759
to cover, but also what you feel like you've completely
136
00:08:31.879 --> 00:08:34.960
covered for your audience. And if you produce your content
137
00:08:35.080 --> 00:08:39.360
to go after a certain period of time, then it's
138
00:08:39.879 --> 00:08:43.480
easier to make it all work for what the content
139
00:08:43.559 --> 00:08:46.960
producer wants and what the audience wants. And that's the key.
140
00:08:47.480 --> 00:08:51.799
So there is no reason to hit a certain time clock, right.
141
00:08:52.240 --> 00:08:54.799
And the thing about program length is is that it
142
00:08:55.320 --> 00:08:58.759
doesn't have to fit a standard model like radio. Give
143
00:08:58.840 --> 00:09:02.039
the length what the audience wants. No one size fits all,
144
00:09:03.000 --> 00:09:05.399
and it can also be different based on genre. So
145
00:09:05.480 --> 00:09:09.320
if I'm doing a podcast or a show about you know,
146
00:09:09.399 --> 00:09:11.360
it's like the one minute Bible or something like that,
147
00:09:11.519 --> 00:09:14.159
well it better be probably close to a minute, right.
148
00:09:15.000 --> 00:09:17.159
But if I'm doing a show like this, what I'm
149
00:09:17.200 --> 00:09:20.360
doing here is giving my thoughts in my opinion, it
150
00:09:20.480 --> 00:09:22.360
can be a ten minute show or it can be
151
00:09:22.440 --> 00:09:24.840
a fifteen minute show. It really doesn't make any difference.
152
00:09:24.919 --> 00:09:26.879
The audience just feels like they need to get something
153
00:09:26.919 --> 00:09:29.399
out of it. This discussion that I saw happening in
154
00:09:29.440 --> 00:09:33.840
the radio broadcast side was that all podcasts have to
155
00:09:33.919 --> 00:09:37.879
be short. This one I really take offense too, because
156
00:09:37.960 --> 00:09:44.320
it is completely misunderstanding the medium. Broadcast radio does, in
157
00:09:44.720 --> 00:09:48.799
a lot of situations tend to be short. But you
158
00:09:48.919 --> 00:09:51.519
can't take that same model and just say that's what
159
00:09:51.799 --> 00:09:54.879
works in another medium, and that's exactly what this is.
160
00:09:55.399 --> 00:09:57.679
It's fine to do a podcast at short, but my
161
00:09:57.879 --> 00:10:01.440
own experience is that doing a podcast that short doesn't
162
00:10:01.559 --> 00:10:03.720
have a lot of value in it, and it certainly
163
00:10:03.799 --> 00:10:07.240
doesn't have a lot of long term value. The whole
164
00:10:07.320 --> 00:10:10.159
question was, well, you know, if you do a long podcast,
165
00:10:10.279 --> 00:10:13.000
will anybody stick around to listen to it? Well, the
166
00:10:13.519 --> 00:10:16.799
truth the matter is that podcasts are about engagement. It's
167
00:10:16.840 --> 00:10:20.759
on demand medium. Typically, it's a more personal thing. People
168
00:10:20.960 --> 00:10:24.559
can start and stop this show, they can come back
169
00:10:24.600 --> 00:10:28.159
to it later. On broadcast radio when it airs, it
170
00:10:28.360 --> 00:10:32.840
basically airs and there is no repeat. Typically in broadcast radio.
171
00:10:32.919 --> 00:10:36.240
Now there are broadcast radio shows that do make their
172
00:10:36.279 --> 00:10:40.519
shows available as a podcast, but that's kind of rare. Really,
173
00:10:40.720 --> 00:10:44.200
the whole issue of podcasts not being caught up in
174
00:10:44.320 --> 00:10:48.000
this whole thing of that radio has of flipping channels, right,
175
00:10:48.159 --> 00:10:51.919
So that's the big thing that drives short content in
176
00:10:52.440 --> 00:10:55.240
radio is the fact that it's so easy for a
177
00:10:55.360 --> 00:10:57.879
listener to just change the channel, right, So they have
178
00:10:57.960 --> 00:11:01.639
to always be doing the hot, most popular thing at
179
00:11:01.679 --> 00:11:03.960
the moment, and it's always about here in the now,
180
00:11:04.039 --> 00:11:05.679
because if you don't do it, then you're going to
181
00:11:05.759 --> 00:11:08.840
lose them, right, You're gonna lose your audience. Well, podcasts
182
00:11:08.879 --> 00:11:12.200
are not like that. It's much more difficult for a
183
00:11:13.080 --> 00:11:16.960
listener to change the channel in podcasting because then they
184
00:11:17.039 --> 00:11:18.799
have to stop the episode. Then they have to go
185
00:11:18.919 --> 00:11:21.480
find a new episode. Though I would say that the
186
00:11:21.759 --> 00:11:26.440
future technology and podcasting will make podcasting a little bit
187
00:11:26.559 --> 00:11:30.840
more like radio in like a sequential playlist type of scenario,
188
00:11:31.399 --> 00:11:34.120
but it will still be on demand medium. So I know,
189
00:11:34.240 --> 00:11:36.679
I've talked about this a lot. To kind of wrap
190
00:11:36.759 --> 00:11:40.600
it up here on this topic, podcasts and broadcast radio
191
00:11:40.759 --> 00:11:45.320
can coexist. There's strengths and weaknesses on both sides of
192
00:11:45.360 --> 00:11:49.799
the fence, and podcasts can live with broadcast radio, but
193
00:11:49.960 --> 00:11:53.759
they can't be thought of as the same production. Right
194
00:11:54.240 --> 00:11:58.000
in an ideal world, there are successful podcasts that are
195
00:11:58.000 --> 00:12:01.559
broadcast radio shows that does to be more on the
196
00:12:01.679 --> 00:12:05.879
public radio side, which coincidentally doesn't have as many ads
197
00:12:06.320 --> 00:12:09.559
or ad breaks. So I would say the public radio
198
00:12:09.639 --> 00:12:13.200
side follows a little bit more with the model of
199
00:12:13.399 --> 00:12:18.919
podcasting than commercial radio does, which has this really dense
200
00:12:19.120 --> 00:12:22.399
level of commercial breaks to kind of boil it down.
201
00:12:22.879 --> 00:12:26.720
Both can coexist, but they're not the same medium, and
202
00:12:26.879 --> 00:12:30.039
that the broadcast radio folks need to dive in and
203
00:12:30.279 --> 00:12:35.159
educate themselves about how podcasting is different, and the podcasters
204
00:12:35.240 --> 00:12:37.919
need to dive in and learn some of the things
205
00:12:38.000 --> 00:12:41.879
that the broadcast radio folks can teach them around personality,
206
00:12:42.120 --> 00:12:46.960
around content, around how to be engaging and fun, and
207
00:12:47.080 --> 00:12:49.720
things like that which are very important to the success
208
00:12:49.759 --> 00:12:52.039
of podcasts. Now, I haven't brought a lot of fun
209
00:12:52.120 --> 00:12:55.080
and excitement to this podcast, but this is this is
210
00:12:55.080 --> 00:12:58.159
a fairly serious topic, and there's definitely room for serious
211
00:12:58.200 --> 00:13:02.120
topics and there's room for comedy topics. So I had
212
00:13:02.200 --> 00:13:07.200
a few folks online that are podcaster podcast consultants that
213
00:13:07.320 --> 00:13:11.000
gave some feedback on my article and my commentary here,
214
00:13:11.600 --> 00:13:15.840
and one was from mister Adrian Bacon. He says, I'll
215
00:13:15.879 --> 00:13:18.159
say the same thing I said on Twitter about this,
216
00:13:18.399 --> 00:13:22.080
No podcasts are the same as radio. They are two
217
00:13:22.240 --> 00:13:25.879
different but somewhat connected worlds. I definitely agree, and that
218
00:13:26.039 --> 00:13:29.360
follows along with what I said in the article. Daniel J.
219
00:13:29.600 --> 00:13:34.320
Lewis who does the Audacity to Podcast podcast He always
220
00:13:34.360 --> 00:13:38.480
gets really annoyed when when even podcasters call their shows
221
00:13:38.559 --> 00:13:42.600
online radio or some variant of that radio is something
222
00:13:42.720 --> 00:13:47.159
totally different technically than podcasting. The only time I mentioned
223
00:13:47.279 --> 00:13:50.600
radio is when I'm explaining what a podcast is to
224
00:13:50.720 --> 00:13:53.399
someone and I say that it's it's kind of like
225
00:13:53.559 --> 00:13:56.759
a radio talk show. That's some of the feedback. And
226
00:13:56.799 --> 00:14:00.480
I certainly want to get your feedback on my thoughts here,
227
00:14:00.639 --> 00:14:04.960
and we'll mention it on the show like I just did.
228
00:14:05.519 --> 00:14:08.799
So that's it for this week, and I'm Rob Greenley
229
00:14:08.879 --> 00:14:12.200
and I'm the podcast guy for a Windows Phone at Microsoft,
230
00:14:12.519 --> 00:14:15.120
And again, thank you for listening to my thoughts here.
231
00:14:15.480 --> 00:14:18.960
Please reach out to me and offer your thoughts on
232
00:14:19.519 --> 00:14:22.360
this topic and other topics that you think are important
233
00:14:22.399 --> 00:14:26.440
for me to cover. And you can reach me by
234
00:14:26.879 --> 00:14:30.639
sending me a tweet at Rob Greenley and that's r
235
00:14:30.679 --> 00:14:32.759
O B G R e E N L e E,
236
00:14:33.360 --> 00:14:36.440
or in the comments area of my roggreenley dot com
237
00:14:36.559 --> 00:14:39.480
comment area. And if you're a podcaster and you want
238
00:14:39.519 --> 00:14:43.080
to get your podcasts into the Windows Phone Podcast catalog,
239
00:14:43.480 --> 00:14:48.399
then shoot your feed to me at Podcasts and that's
240
00:14:48.440 --> 00:14:51.840
with an s at Microsoft dot com. And I'm also
241
00:14:52.000 --> 00:14:54.720
on Google Plus, LinkedIn, and Facebook, so look me up,
242
00:14:55.000 --> 00:14:59.200
or you can just email me Rob at Roggreenley dot com.
243
00:14:59.440 --> 00:15:01.799
So thank you very much for listening, and I look