by: AskPat 382 Episode Transcript
Pat Flynn: What's up everybody. Pat Flynn here, and welcome to Episode 382 of AskPat. Thank you so much for joining me today.
All right here is today's question from Greg.
Greg: Hi Pat, my name is Greg and I love your blog and your podcast. I am starting a podcast and a companion blog and I'm not sure what should come first. The blog or the podcast? The podcast or the blog? Does it matter? Maybe I'm just thinking too much. Thanks, I look forward to your response.
Pat: Hey Greg. What's up? Thank you so much for the question. This is sort of a chicken or egg deal we're talking about. And, really in order to start a podcast, however … I will say this: in order to start a podcast, you have to have a blog or have some sort of a website that can house the RSS feed. Now, you don't necessarily need a blog to start a podcast, but that's what most people do. You could just simply upload your files to a server like Libsyn or Soundcloud. Just take that RSS feed and then give it to iTunes or give it to directory Stitcher or what have you. But then you're missing out on what happens … You know, when people listen to that show, where are they going to go? They're just going to continue to subscribe, which is great. But then where are you where are you going to get them to take action.
I mean the whole purpose of a podcast, I feel, is to build a relationship with your audience and then also get them to take action. And the best way for them to take action is on a webpage somewhere because people are likely listening on the go. So you need a blog … And the blog to be able to post those episodes and have that be the RSS feed that then feeds these directories.
Again, if you're a little confused on how podcasting works, check out PodcastingTutorial.com. That's my free tutorial. No opt-ins required. Six videos seen over hundreds of thousands of times that you can use to begin and start your podcast. Tens of thousands of people have used it to help them and it'll help you too. It'll walk you through all the technical stuff and also give you a lot of inspiration and tips and things like that for you moving forward, for anybody who is starting a podcast.
But in terms of what you should start first, they kind of both go hand in hand. Now, there is a different way to phrase this question. Which one should I focus on most? Which one should be my primary mode of content generation? Now, I feel this does depend on your niche and your audience and how they're already being served. However, I would say if I had to pick one, it would actually be the podcast first. My podcast by far is outperforming my blog in several ways and the blogosphere is much more competitive, much more saturated than the “podcast-o-sphere”, if you want to call it that. There are, for example … And this isn't an exact number, but this is likely close to what it is based off of some recent research that I heard. There's over five hundred million active blogs, and growing. That's a lot. Five hundred million active blogs. Half a billion. And then five hundred thousand to a million podcasts that are out there and active. And so when you think about it that way, there's a lot more room for growth in the podcasting world.
Plus when you think about it, when you come out with a blog and you're publishing content to it, when you're just starting out, you're likely publishing that content to just those who are in your immediate network. Those who know you. Your mom, and your friends, and your roommates, and anybody who you've already made a connection with or had a relationship with.
With a podcast there's a cool thing that happens, especially when you put your feed and show into I tunes … Is you get exposure on the New and Noteworthy list. At least in this moment in time, you still get featured in the New and Noteworthy section for your particular category. And if your podcasting is doing extremely well, potentially in the New and Noteworthy section in the overall space of iTunes in all the categories. And that gives you a lot of free exposure for the first eight weeks of the life of your podcast to people who would have never found you otherwise. Because they are on iTunes, they are searching for new podcasts. Podcast is continuing to grow. It's becoming mainstream. People are starting to understand what that means. The podcasting app is native in your phone. There's car play in BMWs and other cars that are coming off the lots right now. And people are looking for content, and that's where they can find you.
They're not looking for blogs necessarily. Or when they are, they're not going to find you right away. But they will find you in the New and Noteworthy section in iTunes if you have a show with great audio quality, a decent description, and also good artwork. Apple loves to showcase nice looking things, obviously. And that includes your show if the artwork is decent. And you also want to make sure, obviously, that it stands out amongst a lot of the other people who are already providing podcast for your particular audience in your space. So do a little bit of research. Go into iTunes. Type in those keywords. Find those categories that you are potentially going to be in. See who's already there and serving that audience and how you can come in and be different. How can you come in and look different as well.
So, again, if I had to choose one over the other, I would start focusing on the content of the podcast first. But, have that blog that you can use to fill in with supplemental content. There's a lot of types of content that just can't be or is not perfect for audio, for example. If I'm going to walk you step by step how to change the engine of your car, which I don't know how to do but I'm just kind of making this up, doing it on an audio podcast isn't going to be ask valuable. It makes more sense to do either a video or something step by step with images on a blog. But that is something, obviously, you can mention on a podcast and say you have this step by step tutorial. If you want all the videos or all of the images and step by step requirements, go to this particular website. Similar to what I just did earlier with the podcasting tutorial. Podcasting is something that I could potentially teach you over the airwaves here on a podcast. But it's a lot easier if you have the diagrams and all the videos and what things look like and where things plug into if you have that in the images or videos like you would on podcasting tutorial dot com.
So start a podcast that's your primary mode of content generation. Again, do a little bit of research. Find out who's serving that audience and if that makes sense for them. But also, use your blog, the content you publish there to supplement the content that you have on your podcast. And also, it can house your show notes and the links. And again, it makes it easier for your audience to come and subscribe to that email list that hopefully you are building. So that when you come out with a new episode or new content, you can send out an email saying “Hey, I got this new stuff. Go ahead and listen to it. Go ahead and read it.”
You're going to get more traffic that way. More social sharing. More new people coming to your site and then discovering your podcast from there.
So Greg, that's how I would go about it. And I want to thank you for your question today. I really appreciate it and I wish you all the best of luck with your podcast. For those of you listening. For those of you who are starting a podcast, again, check out PodcastingTutorial.com. Completely free. No opt-ins required there for you to help you get your podcast started.
Greg, since your question was featured her on the show, we're going to send you an Ask Pat T-shirt free of charge. Thank you so much for calling in. For those of you who have a question that you would like potentially featured here on the show, just head on over to AskPat.com. You can ask right there on that page.
To finish up, here's a quote from H. Jackson Brown Junior. He said, “In business or life, don't follow the wagon tracks too closely.”
“In business of in life, don't follow the wagon tracks too closely.” That means don't do what everybody else is doing, necessarily. Its not going to help you. Yes, it'll give you a guideline. But to find all the cool stuff and to discover new things; to separate yourself from everybody else, you're going to have to kind of start to make tracks of your own. So thank you so much. I wish you the best of luck. Thousands of people have already responded to the survey over at SPISurvey.com. That's SPISurvey.com. I would love it if you took a moment of your time today just to fill out that survey to help me shape the future Smart Passive Income, of AskPat, and everything I do to serve you. Again, that's SPISurvey.com. Thanks so much. I really appreciate it and I'll see you in the next episode of AskPat. Cheers.