Jul 13, 2015
In today's episode, (not safe for work) I share clips from a podcast I set out (as an experiment) to be the Worst Podcast Ever. It would:
1. Have F-bombs.
2. Insult the audience.
3. Deliver no value
4. Use Potty humor and be overtly immature
The reason? I had two:
1. I wanted to test podbean.com (who during the test had a technical issue, and my files quit downloading).
2. I wanted to see what kind of downloads a horrible podcast would get. I've heard from Libsyn that many podcasters get around 200 downloads per episode. (get a free month at Libsyn using the coupon code sopfree )
The worst podcast ever gets about 10.
Rules for Experiment:
1. I could not use my real voice. I didn't want anyone to know it was me.
2. I could not promote it at all. Not a single tweet.
Doing a Podcast as a Character:
This is not new. "Madge Weinstein" has been doing yeast Radio since 2004. There are people who do not use their names such as School of Podcasting student Stargate Pioneer who does the Legends of Shield podcast. Cali Lewis has always been Luria Petrucci behind the scenese of Geekslife.com
You may feel more confident behind the microphone as your character then in your own skin. I say "Fake it till you make it" (you will get comfortable as yourself) but being a character is an option. People like Seth McFarland get away with tons of things on their TV show The Family Guy as the characters are cartoons. The Simpsons is another example of characters getting away with things a real person would not.
But in the end Seth still takes flack for his characters.
The down side of being a character is connecting with your audience. I met Paul David Peterson of Entrepreneur Explosion. Paul's show is a parody of all the Entrepreneur shows. Paul is not his real name. If I want to meet Paul at Podcast Movement or New Media Expo, I can't if he is completely incognito. In my case my character on the Worst Podcast Ever was simply named "Grumpy Old Man." What if AARP wants Grumpy to come speak at a convention? These characters don't exist in reality.
The Stylizer 3000
Today I play a bit that I included in today's show to get you to think about all the different styles that you can use to create your podcast. There are SO MANY ingredients that you can use to create a completely unique podcast. I worry that people will not take me seriously as a podcast consultant if I'm too goofy on the microphone. I guess we will see.
Podcast Rewind: Formats on the Podcasters Roundtable
I participated on the Podcasters Roundtbale Episode 53 with +Ray Ortega,+Daniel J. Lewis +David Jackson +Colin Gray +Paul Peterson and+Doug Payton to discuss the various types of formats you can chose for your podcast. Check it out
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