How and why small/medium businesses can get started for free using SoundCloud to market products/services using informative, conversational content.
Why Podcast?
Audio podcasts are an accessible, easy-to-consume format allowing you to educate your audience about who you are and what you do to solve whatever problem they have.
One of the keys nowadays in business is who you are.
A lot of the advertising and marketing in the world today is badly done, wastes money and annoys people. By creating good, helpful content aimed at all stages of the buying process (from initial discovery, to consideration, to sale), you should be recreating the experience of meeting and talking with you.
The embedded audio below is me talking on a local radio show about business. This was aired on the radio and then they uploaded the interview to their own (paid for) SoundCloud account.
Easy Listening
Listeners can download an mp3 or click the play button on Soundcloud and quickly learn about the products or services you offer.
Audio is very passive and doesn’t demand as much attention as reading or watching video.
Full Control
Podcasting is different to a conventional radio adverts because you control the production 100% and you don’t have to pay for voice artists or air time.
Audio podcasts can be as long or as short as you want. It’s a chance to be more authentic than conventional broadcast advertising.
SoundCloud Offers 3 Hours Free
You can upload music or spoken word to SoundCloud.
SoundCloud offers 3 hours of recording time under the FREE account. That’s 180 minutes.
This is pretty impressive because this free account means you could do 36 five minute podcasts and fit that into the the 3 hour limit.
More Features of Free SoundCloud Accounts
- SoundCloud lets you set your tracks as private or public
- You can either stream the sounds or download the sound file to a computer or device
- There are the social sharing options too like Facebook, Twitter etc
- There’s a cool commenting feature where people can leave a time stamped message on your SoundCloud recording
- You can embed your recording using the SoundCloud player in your website
- You can set up a playlists
- Your SoundCloud profiles are likely to get indexed by the search engine if you use good keywords, proper descriptions and build a community
Microphones
- You can use a USB headset mic and get very good quality sound
- If you want to use a higher end mic you could get something like a Blue Snowflake USB mic for around £60
- Smartphones have very good sound recorders
- Built in iPhone mic is good but you can buy good quality low priced plug in microphones which insert into the 3.5mm input
- There are lower budget options such as a hands-free earphone and mic kit which works well too
Best Practices for Podcasting
- Know your audience
- Avoid putting on airs and graces
- Do not pretend to be something you’re not
- Pick a specific topic to talk about
- Help people solve problems or understand things
- Mention your business website address
- Shorter episodes are a good way to start off
- Before uploading, do a light edit and clean up to keep it tight and punchy
- Spend time on the SoundCloud title, description, image etc
- Embed the audio recording on one of your webpages to complement a written version of the same topic
Social Media Warning…
SoundCloud is a social media site and social media sites get bought, change direction and sometimes shut down.
Keep copies of your podcast episodes backed up somewhere safe.
As great as SoundCloud is, you should never rely on social media websites. You have no real ownership when it comes to social media.
For serious podcasters, there are actually better options for media hosting such as LibSyn, Wistia, etc.
Sound and Music for Jingles
If you want to find out about using music, sounds, jingles etc you need to make sure you don’t infringe copyright.
