Creating an Award Winning Podcast

Today we have some great podcast success stories. If you are looking to start a podcast, click the join now button and join the School of Podcasting - you're audience awaits.

Because of My Podcast I Had No Problem Getting a Book Deal [3:30]

In our podcast success story we hear from heather of the Craft Lit podcast. She combines niches of knitting with literature. She later "spun off" a "just books" option for those who loved the literature but weren't too keen on the knitting part. As a teacher, Heather loved the ability to enhance people's understanding of literature and help create a community that was talking about great books. Later she took the relationship she created with her audience and offered premium content for those looking for more literature information. She also easily found a publisher for her book What Would Madame Defarge Knit?

This is a great story of embracing a niche, listening to your audience, and moving them with your content. In her case she is helping people understand the books, giving insights, facilitating discussions, and enhancing the overall consumption of literature. You can find her at:

CraftLit.com - Just the Books • Knitting Blog: MamaOKnits.com• What Would Madame Defarge Knit? Books 1&2 Available now: WWMDfK.com

Harnessing the Power of Influence with Award Winning Podcaster Daniel J. Lewis [20:15]

Daniel J Lewis of the Audacity to Podcast Today we hear part one of my interview with Daniel J. Lewis of the Audacity to podcast. In today's interview you will learn where Daniel grew up, and how his early hobbies turned into his day job. Daniel is a very talented designer and does web design, as well as presentation designs.

Daniel decided to start podcasting after he realized that he had something to say. The podcasters he was listening to were using skype and other tools that Daniel had worked with, and he thought, "I could do that."

He started out by writing out the entire podcast, but quit doing that after the first 9 episode as it just took forever to produce a show. He still does the Ramen Noodle Clean Comedy Podcast, the Audacity to Podcast and the Once Podcast. You can find them all at www.noodle.mx

He recently released his first wordpress plugin that makes it super easy to add icons for sharing and subscribing to your podcast. You can find it at subscribeandshare.com

Winning a Podcast Award
In the interview Daniel explains the steps he took to rally his audience into nominating (and eventually wining) a podcast award in the "Technology" category. By directing his audience through specific steps, Daniel was able to sharpen their effectiveness and maximize their potential.

Daniel did this via video that showed them exactly what to do, and reminded them regularly to help out and vote. He then promoted across all of the podcasts. His Ramen Noodle podcast was the ONLY clean podcast in the category. By doing this he avoided being disqualified by being nominated in too many categories.

Through his networking efforts he was able to have other podcasters tell their audience to vote for Daniel.

Connecting With Your Audience

Daniels says to be in those network where it makes sense. If you can be on a site like facebook or twitter and be able to engage your audience on that platform then be there. If you can't do it well, don't do it. Different audiences will engage in different ways.

Delivering Great Content

Daniel purposely makes an effort to NOT turn his podcast into a giant commercial for his services.

Subscribe and Follow Podcast [44:47]
Daniel explains what inspired him to build his first plugin as well as all the features of the subscribe and share wordpress plugin.