January 14, 2015 @ 9:58 PM (Penalty Entry #3)

Recently someone on twitter reached out to this guy I know to ask about how to get started with a podcast. I’ve written this a few different ways in a few different places, and I know I should really put together an overall guide that people could use. Maybe this entry will be the first step in that process.

So, you want to start a podcast? Great! What do you do?

First and foremost you have to ask yourself what you want to talk about.

Many times I’ve referred to the process of finding what to talk about as “finding your voice.” I don’t mean this as figure out how you are going to talk into the microphone. I mean it as a statement to find out what the topics and discussion you envision for your podcast. How do you find this voice? I refer to the old adage they tell writers, “Write about what you know.” Guess what? Podcast topics are the exact same thing.

I like to tell people to figure out what it is that you are passionate about and talk about that. If you overheard this topic at a party or even in a crowd with strangers and you heard someone bring it up what is the topic that you just couldn’t help chiming in on? If you can figure that out than you know exactly what your podcast should be about. Your conversation will be truthful, it will be filled with passion, and it may appeal to the people that would eventually become your audience. Don’t worry if there are 1 or 100 podcasts that fall into this category, they aren’t you and they don’t bring your unique perspective to the topic.

Maybe there isn’t a topic that you are passionate about but there is someone that you just love talking to. It could be that you love talking to this person about something or you love the conversations you guys have overall. I’d stay try to talk this person into sitting down and recording your conversations. See how they go and figure out what the thread is that binds them together. That’s the topic of your podcast and congratulations, you just found a co-host.

The “recording conversations” approach also gives you insight into how you may want to structure your podcast, it may help you figure out what works and what doesn’t. Regardless, record some stuff, even by yourself, so that way you get comfortable just talking on mic.

By the way, I highly recommend that you find a co-host because talking to yourself could be tough both on you as a singular host as well as the listening audience (unless you are a great talker… in which case knock yourself out).

That’s podcasting advice tip #1: Find Your Voice.

Tune in on the next penalty entry where I’ll start talking about how to record your podcast.

-Will

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