SES San Jose Podcast and Audio Search Optimization Tuesday August 21, 2007
Multimedia Track Detlev Johnson, Moderator, SearchReturn
Speakers: Daron Babin, Webmaster Radio Amanda Watlington, Searching for Profit Rick Klau, Google
The room isn't full this morning, which surprises me because this is a hot topic. I covered this session in Chicago (I believe it was) and the room then seemed packed. I didn't stay for the Q&A session but this is the type of session that generates a lot of questions on everything from how-to to what equipment to purchase or use.
Detlev: Welcomes everyone to SES. Was it worthwhile? Audio search is something difficult for SE's to produce an audio powered on the web. Trying to figure out what's in the file is difficult, with audio. Popularity of iTunes makes audio optimization vital.
DB: Begins with how many familiar with Webmaster Radio. How many are just learning. You learn a lot hands on, while doing it. Not a ton of forward progress seen what we do for audio. Wants to show pitfalls, deploying productions, how to save money, bandwidth issues. Are people listening? In droves, he says. If you create compelling content, people will listen. Is it worth it to get into audio arena? Production time is costly. Cost of production (human resources). Equipment and gear costs. Encoding is a pain. You need to think about types of prod you do, live? Live to hard drive then to RSS feed later. Analytics - who comes close? Bandwidth. Quantifying listener ship is important. Make content compelling. Make your speech on topic. Don't ramble into a mike. Real specifics. Reason is to transcribe audio file. It's easier with good content. Banter is fine to engage listeners. Listeners want to hear what you say you'll talk about. Their time is valuable. Entertain them a bit. They want to educated and entertained. They don't want to know if dog is being neutered.
Prepare for growth over time. Recommend securing a sound host or content delivery network and work a deal. Handle load is vital. Establish a good relationship with your host or CDN. Most are not upfront with you. Transcription is important, transcribe everything. Leave no word unspoken. It's the equity in your organic fortuitist display of originality. Originality with passion = downloads. Show ex of repeating names when transcribing. Adds to density. Ensure proper on the page criteria no engine can complain about finding new original and very relevant content. Categorize content to rank those words. Optimize ID tags. Get to your numbers when you can. Analyze your data. You can drive feed revenue. Optimize your feeds. He breaks up one show into 4 parts, removes the ads using robots.tx disallow. There's a lot of people exploring podcasting including the "big boys". Think ahead of the game.
(During his talk, someone in the audience had their laptop open and suddenly it began to broadcast a live radio show. It took several minutes for it to be shut off. Daron Babin thanked the guy for the example. Everyone laughed.
AW:
Asks for hands for newbies. Why should we podcast, as marketers? We have the task of selling the medium as well. It creates an emotional appeal, due to human voice. New outlet, new medium of getting the message out across. We listen differently. We're human. It adds a human atmosphere to whatever it is. From content side, pros and cons. Engage consumers by creating dialog. Requires a level of transparency. Indexed by SE's but this must be measured and tracked. Podcasting can be done inexpensively if you have compelling content. Shows a slide of universal search results - paid listings, maps and local, podcast listings appear for "Orlando paid vacation", 2nd organic listing is a podcast. "2 bites same apple" - text and the podcast. She doesn't cover how to record. Takes too long to discuss equip. Decide standalone or pod show w/episodes.
Name your show. Consider the name of the show and name of episodes. Different keywords. Make sure your showname is not in use, like domain names. Changing later is difficult when you have a listening audience. Each show needs own title and name. Write title and desc for both show and episodes. Transcribe or just abstract the show contents. Prepare keyword list for the show and determine how you will brand it, the show, etc. Write audio tag info in advance. Review iTunes cats to see where you fit. Edit audio tags yourself. Download and test tag editors.
Optimize your ID3 tags. ID3 = metadata for MP3, 4, WMA, AAC or Ogg Vorbis audio files. Max tag size is 256 megabytes and max frame so is 16 megabytes. Go to ID3.org for more info (her slide had tons of tech info on this alone.) Search engines read metadata. Title, date, name of show or episode name, name of host, track episode number, urls, are things to stuff into content. She shows a screenshot with app tool that optimizes tags. Use a unique name. Use a shortened name plus date or episode number. Important for users and directories. Separate feed for podcasts from your blog or web site. Separate page for every episode. Use separate landing pages to avoid broken links. Have a page with list of next episodes. Optimize landing page. Include a player for those who want to listen online. Describe file size. Consider adding a transcript link to your web page.
Create and validate feeds. Submit your feeds. Track and monitor submissions to all the feeds you submit to. Similar to old days of submitting to SE's. Use your PR, word of mouth, use marketing communication to drive listeners, feature links to podcast. blog about your content and link to it, don’t expect traffic to grow w/o help. Watch for changes, submit broadl7, landing pages for shows. Amanda participates in a weekly podcast every week and is always "Surprised" they have listeners.
RK:
Feedburner was acquired by Google and is being integrated by them. He is with Google. Podcast market is changing quickly. Web based capturing market share. Social networks gaining as place to consume and distribute podcasts. Meta data is essential for discovery. Syndicate. Ping. 800 thousand feeds managed by feedburner. 75% iTunes, Google, My Yahoo, Miro, (Democracy player) the remaining 25% referrals and repeated content.
Shows page of fragmented via services, apps, etc. Syndication is done by referrals. Directories drive attention to podcasts. Websites drive in people. Don't consider them separate from podcasts. Ex. put podcast on homepage. Market for podcast listeners is a fraction of how many iPod users there are. Expect this to grow. 70% of new American car will be setup for MP3 players. Social networks. Facebook launched ability to add third party apps. You can add podcast content to Facebook.NPR Podcasts is the name. This is another new way of being introduced to podcasting. Young people like to add podcasting to Facebook. Create a feed but avoid exposing code. Give them simple pages they can understand how to enable delivery of your content to them. Opt for iTunes. Read Apple's Tech Spec. ITunes does not index item metadata. Do not abuse keywords. Categorize your podcast. iTunes only looks at 12 keywords. Use iTunes summary tag. Categorizes for them is online on Apple's Tech Spec page. Add show notes rather than just listing just episode numbers and link to file. Content in show notes show up in Search engines. Ex of husband and wife podcast and their hilarious bad vacation experience. Their audience grew over time because of their content found in SE's. Be sure to PING. Enable "Pingshot" to ensure timely content updates. Use Ping O Matic if not using Feedburner. You can submit feeds to directories. Ensure auto-discovery is enabled.
Know which bots know you. He shows a page of names of them.
