Podcasters' Roundtable

Ever receive a negative comment regarding your podcast? How did it feel? How did you respond? Certainly, if you've been podcasting for any significant amount of time there's no doubt that indeed you've received a negative iTunes review, a "bad" comment on your website or a disparaging remark on your podcast's Facebook page. Perhaps it happened after your first episode! As podcasters we put our content and ourselves out into the world for anyone to see, hear and comment on. This inevitability means someone isn't going to like what you say, how you say it or misinterpret your meaning and share their dislike with the world. And in some cases they might be right. But how do you deal with it? On this Round, myself (Ray Ortega), +Daniel J. Lewis +David Jackson +Max Flight, +Robert Chazz Chute, +Erik Fisher, and +Gary Fawcett discuss the negative feedback we've received over our years of podcasting and what we did about it. And trust me, we didn't always make the right decision. How do you deal with negative comments about your podcast? Share your experiences below in the comments as you watch along. Links mentioned on this Round: CommentCast - "International iTunes review collector. Shrinking the world of iTunes store reviews"

  The term podcast has a specific meaning and if you have a show (audio or video) that you post to an RSS feed, congrats you have a podcast. But what do you call it? If not a podcast then what? A show, internet broadcast, netcast, or something else. And more importantly, why? Does the term "podcast" affect the medium's growth either good or bad? Does it even matter what we call it? Let me know in the comments what you think of the word "podcast." Guests for this Round included +David Jackson, +Daniel J. Lewis, +Richard Cleveland, +Steve Lee, myself (Ray Ortega), +Dustin Hartzler, and +Rob Greenlee.

  What gear, software and services would you purchase if you were starting your first podcast? Find out what experienced podcasters +David Jackson  +Daniel J. Lewis  +Jeffrey Bradbury  and myself (Ray Ortega) would purchase if we were starting our first show and had the knowledge we now possess after years of producing podcasts. Based on experience in podcast production, we'll take a mock budget and spend it on what we think are the most valuable items for starting a podcast. If you're starting your first podcast, thinking about starting a podcast or have been podcasting for years, join us in the chat to discuss where you'd put your money. Would you spend most of your budget on a microphone or buy something cheaper and invest in software? Should you skip paid hosting and buy a mixer? View the complete list of all the gear mentioned on this episode including links*. *all links should be considered affiliates. You can read my ethics statement regarding affilate links. 

What defines success in podcasting? Is it subscribers, downloads, website traffic, money or something else? Watch/listen to +Pat Flynn from the Smart Passive Income blog and podcast along with +Daniel J. Lewis  +David Jackson  and myself (Ray Ortega) discuss the concept of success as it applies to podcasting. Pat was a very successful blogger (numbers, money, recognition, etc.) before he ever started a podcast. We'll find out how starting a podcast has increased his own measure of success and learn how each podcaster on the Roundtable defines success in podcasting differently.  

How do you know when it's time to add another podcast to your lineup? We discuss some of the things to consider when thinking about starting another show as well as our opinions about when is the right time for adding a new podcast. You'll hear from experienced podcaster +Daniel J. Lewis about having multiple podcasts, podcaster +Mike Howard who has one show but has considered starting another, and +Chris Christensen, +Jim Collison and myself who all run successful multi-podcast brands. We'll also find out when starting a new podcast was a bad idea (the failures), the concerns a podcaster might have about starting another show, and feedback from the live audience about the good and bad of adding more than one show to your podcast workflow.

As a podcaster, what do you owe your audience? Whether someone subscribes to your show or listens only once, what obligation do you feel to that person? Do you feel like you should always bring your best content, be well organized, entertaining or never miss an episode? Perhaps you don't owe them anything at all? Join +David Jackson, +Daniel J. Lewis, +Allan Newsome, +Jeffrey Powers and Ray Ortega as we discuss a podcaster's obligation to their audience.

How do find balance when it comes to producing content and then having to promote it via any number of ways (social networks, blogs, forums, etc.)? Have you ever been overwhelmed trying to keep up? Has the need to always be promoting your show in order to grow left you feeling burnt out on podcasting? We'll be discussing podcast promotion and how much is too much? How do you know if what you're doing is actually working and is it really worth your time? The discussion will be focused less on which new social platform is best for podcast promotion and instead will take a deeper look at why or why not to promote, how much and is it necessary to always jump on the next big thing (ex: Pinterest)? Roundtablers for this session will include +Daniel J. Lewis  +Rob Walch  +Daniel Hayes  +Mike Russell, and myself (Ray Ortega). Join us in the chat along with your fellow podcasters to share your experiences with balancing content creation with the challenges of promotion. Links mentioned: Dircetory of podcast directories

We discuss the concept of "competition" as is applies to podcasters podcasting in the same niche. How much do you share with podcasts in your niche? Do you cross promote their shows? Do you have them as guests on your show or even co-host shows together? Is it possible to share audiences? Do you fear losing your audience to another show in your niche? What steps do you take to prevent this from happening? Do you think it's even necessary to compete or can working together actually benefit you? Are there any situations where it might actually be better to be a little competitive or even actively working against another show? Daniel J. Lewis, David Jackson, Corey Fineran and Nick Seuberling join me to discuss these issues and share our experiences with being part of a strong collective of podcasters in the same niche as well as our experience with competition or the competitive feeling.

On this Round, I talk to six podcasters (the largest Roundtable to date) about their podcasting pet peeves. Those things they see other podcasters doing that frustrate them. We also talk about things we've done wrong with our own podcasts and how we fixed those errors. Learn about the most common mistakes we see podcasters making on a daily basis and how to avoid those in your own show. Joining me for this Round was Daniel J. Lewis, Nick Seuberling, Daniel M. Clark, Martine Ellis, Jason Nagy and Cory Tibbits.

Over the last year several changes have been made to Feedburner including twitter feed shut downs, deprecation of API's, the loss of the .jp domain and a failure of the statistics system. All of this led to a perfect storm of fear that the core service was also shutting down. On this Round we discuss the facts and fiction of what's going on with Feedburner and ways to move forward using the service or how to get rid of it all together. Panelist on this Round: Ray Ortega from The Podcasters Studio Daniel J. Lewis from The Audacity to Podcast Dave Jackson from School of Podcasting Cliff Ravenscraft from Podcast Answer Man