Podcasting » SEO Vision

As a lover of all things audio (and the podcasting format in particular), it was with great joy that I read a SiteProNews newsletter article on “Enhancing Web Effectiveness with Sound Design.”

Audio has a powerful effect on an audience. The internet has a powerful effect on an audience. And whoever said “ne’er the twain shall meet?”

We’ll be talking more and more about using web video to make a powerful impression, but let’s not forget that even though the moving pictures make a movie, an, uh, “move”-ie, the audio is just as important.

If not more.

The thing about audio is that it captures your mind and is cheap to produce. You can put it on your ipod and take it with you to the gym, take it on the bus and enjoy it while driving. Try the same with a movie and you run into problems.

Also, the file size of audio is much smaller than video, which in turn lowers the bandwidth expense of adding video to your site… and increases how many people can effectively enjoy it with a primitive connection.

Audio is not for everything, but for the right offer, it can be transformative. For example:

• Have your actual customers voice their testimonials
• Create a voice-version as an alternative to text on your website… great for people with limited patience or with a vision impairment
• Jazz up descriptions of your products with professional narration of key selling points and some tactfully used effects and music
• Create a weekly podcast covering hot topics about your industry (hey, it works for us)
• Use audio as training or learning materials to accompany webinars, webcasts, or PDFs

And that’s just brainstorming for a minute or two — the point is, there’s a way you can use it on your site, and the uses of audio are only limited to your imagination. Which, by the way, is the canvas of audio.

As a de facto podcast fanatic, I have to admit that the choice of podcast readers out there is a little underwhelming. Unlike blogging, where you’ve got everything from Google’s customizable homepage, plug-ins for Outlook, plug-ins for Firefox, and standalone RSS readers, finding the right combination of functionality and ease of use in a podcast reader can be frustrating. Whether you’re looking for a better way or subscribing to a podcast for the first time, this guide will help you spend less time searching and more time listening!

iTunes

Summary: The juggernaut of podcast applications, indeed, the genesis of the phrase “podcast” is Apple’s iTunes. iTunes boasts what’s likely the biggest podcast directory out there, and the most store-like browsing experience for podcasts. If you’re interested in hearing some podcasts, but aren’t sure what you really want or where to start, iTunes is the way to go.

Subscribing to a Podcast: About as simple as it could be… from within the iTunes store. Search or browse until you find a podcast you like, and click the conveniently labeled “subscribe” button. iTunes will add it to your library and will automatically start downloading recent episodes. Download more episodes by clicking a dropdown and hitting the “get” button.

From the web, it’s a little more difficult. Conscientious podcasters will have a iTunes-specific RSS link with the proper itpc: protocol. If all you’ve got is an RSS feed, you’ll need to copy that feed, boot up iTunes, hit “Advanced,” “Subscribe to Podcast,” and punch in the RSS feed you have.

Juice

Summary: Leaner and meaner than iTunes is Juice, a cross-platform podcast reader that makes life a little easier for the advanced user. You can easily add RSS feeds by address, pick episodes you want to download, and browse a boring-looking, but functional, directory of an umpteen-million podcasts. What I don’t like so much about Juice is that it tends to go wild with downloads — you can’t easily start/stop downloads, or control in what order things are downloaded.

Subscribing to a Podcast: Simple as pie… if you know where to track down the RSS feeds. Though you can configure the software to grab feed names from your web browser, it’s not easy to differentiate news feeds from podcast feeds. You’re better suited to copy the RSS address to the clipboard, open up Juice, and click the (+) icon in the subscription tab to add your feed.

Media Monkey

While it masquerades as a gun-toting, hip-banging, jack-of-all-trades MP3 library manager and media player, Media Monkey is ALSO a podcast reader. Seriously, I’ve loved this program for a while and its very flexible podcast features really sweeten the deal.

MediaMonkey is similar to iTunes in that it is a complete manager for all your media files — MP3 files, iPod syncing, etc. — but it also features some powerful features such as CD burning/encoding/recoding, and the ability to plug-in META information and tags for your files quickly, intuitively, and easily. Podcasts are available both as subscriptions in a separate podcast area of the program or in your standard MP3 library. You’re able to very specifically tell the program how you want to handle your files — e.g. don’t download things automatically, download every so often, pause downloads and more.

Subscribing to a Podcast: Comparable to Juice. You need to know the RSS feed you’re looking for and then you just choose a “Subscribe to new Podcast” option from within the program. Punch in the feed address and you’re done. It also is hooked up into some massive podcast directories so if you want to browse programming without exploring the world wide web, you’re able to do so.

While there are PLENTY more podcast readers out there, three’s a nice number and these programs are about the cream of the crop. Depending on your comfort level, you can go for full keel, lean and mean, or a combination thereof. Whatever the program you use, pick out the feeds you want and get listening!

Just in case you missed, you may also want to check out our “How to Subscribe to a Blog” post too!

Over on Search Engine Land today you’ll find their weekly “Search Illustrated” column, which this time around shows a 1-2-3 type illustration of podcast optimization. The title raised my eyebrows at first because, obviously, there’s only so much you can optimize about a piece of audio (and having a column about SEO contained entirely in graphics is a little ironic, but I digress…). But with a stretch of what the phrase “optimization” means, the tips end up being pretty solid.

Essentially, they say:

1. Use a keyword-dense naming scheme for your podcast Fair enough. I would add, being a frequent podcast listener, that you should pay as much attention to naming your podcast consistently and optimizing the file names to be read in proper order by a computer.

   Nothing’s more frustrating than downloading a bunch of podcasts (especially if they’re meant to listened to in order) and having them come up scrambled on your mp3 player. So just for the record, here’s the schema to use:

   my-awesome-podcast-title-01.mp3
   NOT my-awesome-podcast-title-1.mp3

   If not, all of your early episodes will be read after your later episodes, and who wants that? For similar reasons, I’d avoid doing anything too complicated — like having the day, month, year, etc., unless you test to make sure they’ll be listed in proper order by a computer.

2. Brand your podcast at the beginning. - This is another given that’s overlooked by many amateur podcasters. Apart from a select few who might listen to your podcast in their web browser, your audience is portable people who will be listening to you far away from their computers and might not even have a device that can read your id3 tags (which we’ll get to in a second). Brand your podcast and let the listener know why they’re listening in the first 10 seconds or you risk losing them forever.
3. Add to RSS Feeds - Another given. I assume they mean to make sure your podcast is part of an RSS feed, and if it isn’t, well… it’s not much of a podcast, is it? Do make sure to promote your feed as much as possible on the blog or website where you host your ‘cast.
4. Place on a site and optimize the page - Probably the most important tip in the entire walkthrough. Google obviously can’t index audio, so your blog or website is the only opportunity to write content relevant to your podcast to attract organic searchers. As part of your overall plan you should try to get as much traffic from other blogs, forums, and directories, but never forget the Google.
5. Make MP3 and iTunes versions - To be honest, I’m not entirely sure what they’re getting at here. MP3s work fine with iTunes, though you do want to make sure that you add descriptive id3 tags and your iTunes-specific XML data (a process made super-easy by Feedburner).
6. Submit to Odeo and podcast search engines - Another given, and another task made easy by Feedburner. Properly configured, you’ll never need to worry about doing anything except hitting the “post” button, though you should make sure to get your podcast listed in as many directories as possible (which, surprisingly enough, can generate quite substantial traffic).

   The directories to seek out?

   • iTunes (obviously)
   • Podcast Pickle
   • Podcast Alley
   • Yahoo (worth a shot, though they’re discontinuing their podcast directory)
   • Odeo
   • And many, many more

Now if your podcast doesn’t offer anything compelling to your audience, all of the optimization in the world won’t do much to help you gain a listenership. Remember that the audio crowd is smaller, and more impatient, than regular web visitors, but that a properly executed, compelling podcast can do a lot to sell your brand, services, or talent to that audience.

Want to hear a podcast in action? Then tune into SEO Audio every week for discussion about the latest SEO News and burning answers to your questions about web marketing.

We’re proud to finally be launching a new media foray with our first podcast, SEO Audio. SEO Audio continues our mission of demystifying SEO for the average business owner and does so in a snack-sized 3 mins or less format you can pop on your iPod or tune into on your computer for convenient listening wherever you prefer. We’ll start by answering the basic of the basic questions and then get into some of the more complicated curveballs we’ve had thrown our way.

Today’s episode answers the questions that’s at the root of this whole deal: What is SEO? And will Google get mad at me if I do it?

SEO Audio Episode 1