Friday, February 22, 2008
Virtual guest lecture: Donna Papacosta
Tuesday's virtual guest lecture in my Word-of-Mouth Communication class was Donna Papacosta of Trafalgar Communications in Toronto and the Trafcom News podcast. Both Donna and my students are well aware that I know next to nothing about podcasting, except that I like to listen to them. For anyone else in the same boat, here's some of what Donna had to say.
Benefits:
- To the listener: Portability, allow for multitasking, inexpensive player and free content
- To the producer: Relative low cost, appeals to auditory learners, adds value to existing communication, boosts search engine rankings
Uses:
Internal communication, recruiting, training, tours, investor relations, fundraising (including using the voices of recipients), PR-marketing-sales, and conferences/symposia
Directories:
- iTunes
- Podcast Alley
- Blubrry
Podcasts can include:
- Niche radio show
- Interviews
- Conference call recordings
- Listener comments
- Music
- Shownotes
Basic steps in creating a podcast:
1. Record the audio -- in studio, over Skype, telephone remote; microphones range from $20-$3,000 and can include USB such as Snowball, a condenser mic with pre-amp or mixer, or a portable digital recorder like the Samsung Zoom H4 or Edirol R1; Hot Recorder allows you to record a Skype call
2. Edit audio -- some people record on the fly but you can also edit stumbles, redundancies with Audacity (free); use Levelator (free software) to even out the sound; can add podsafe music
3. Need a place to host your MP3 files -- such as Libsyn, GoDaddy, Dreamhost
Measurement:
Downloads and subscribers
Comments, trackbacks, and e-mails
Depends on your objectives
These notes don't do her discussion justice, but I'm so far behind that it's this or nothing! You can also check out all the links from her presentation.
Labels: podcasting, social media, WOM
// posted by Karen Miller Russell @ Friday, February 22, 2008 
"More important than the curriculum is the question of the methods of teaching and the spirit in which the teaching is given" --Bertrand Russell
