Podcast: New Age Radio

Remember the good old days of TV and Radio? Everyone gathered around to be entertained and shows were broadcast at specific time and if you are not around at that time you missed it. But now times has changed now show times don’t matter. As Internet connectivity and mobile usage booming across India it brings lots of change in technology verticals and also how people are now creating and consuming data. We have seen a huge impact of social media in our society, today it affects everything from TV industry, education, politics, business, job market to revolutionary waves. In Indian politics we have seen our very own Prime Minister Mr. Narendra Modi hosted a radio podcast (Mann Ki Baat), which was first broadcast on 3rd October 2014 has recently completed its 50th episode and all the episode are now available at https://pmonradio.nic.in/. But do you know in 2005  the White House adds an RSS feed of the downloadable Weekly Address to whitehouse.gov, making George W. Bush the first presidential podcaster?

Let’s start with a brief history about Podcast:

Though Podcast is a relatively new content platform that got its start in the early 2000s when Adam Curry and Dave Winer began discussing new forms of automated media distribution. By 2004, Curry had developed a program for downloading Internet radio broadcasts to an iPod. Others later improved Curry’s program, giving rise to the podcast.

So we can say that Adam Curry was may be the first person who started podcasting, this MTV video jockey releases RRS2iPod, an Apple Script that automates the process of sending MP3 files downloaded using RSS to an iPod using iTunes. The script is among the first “pod catchers”, but lacks a user interface but it was a sophisticated method of broadcast that makes audio content available to listeners at their convenience in any state.

• The first application to make the podcast feasible was the iPodder X, iPodder X is really the first iPodder app with a full-fledged GUI. After this when people discovered that they could create and host their own radio show, a community of pionier podcaster was born.
• In 2005 Apple adds a podcast directory to the Apple iTunes Store, bringing an-easy-to-browse repository of shows to their millions of users. In just two days Apple reported 2 million podcast downloads.

What is the current state:

When podcast was invented,, it was invented to serve devices like iPods, which was not online and in which we can carry quality content wherever we go, there was a need of that sought of a thing, but now we carry a very different device in our pocket which kind of obviates the need of lots of protocol of podcast. One of the biggest thing is that the dominant paradigm for list to a podcast has shifted, its more like click and listen to immediately rather than download and listen to it later. So Podcasting is never been bigger that it is now and it will continually go bigger.

While podcasts are a fairly popular medium of content consumption in the west, the Indian market is still playing catch-up. Over the last 4 years, IVM has been creating audio content and building a consumer base for the medium by creating engaging content and has collaborated with over 50 podcasters to garner 10 million listens so far.

According to Amit Doshi, Founder of IVM Podcasts Growth has been dramatic over the last few years. Since Jan 2017 they have seen a 25x growth in audience, and over the last few months its growing rapidly.

On the monetization part he mentioned that “Understanding that monetization is a long term process. Be prepared to stick the course even in the face of challenging circumstances”.

“77 per cent of the listeners in India are consuming it on the go and mostly on their mobile phones.”

How to Create a Podcast:

A podcast can be easily created from a digital audio file which you can easily record using your mobile phone. For good audio quality you can even use your headphones too. If you are using a desktop or a laptop you can use Audacity which is also great for editing audio. After that, save the file as an MP3 and then upload it to the Website of a service provider. Once a podcast has been created, it can be registered with content aggregators, such as podcasting.net or ipodder.org, for inclusion in podcast directories. Some of the platforms you could look at also are Audioboom and  Audiomatic. Now people can browse through the categories or subscribe to specific podcast RSS feeds which will download to their audio players automatically when they next connect.

“Content producers are increasingly turning to podcasting as an inexpensive and user-friendly new distribution channel that has the potential to reach a large audience. “

“As communication becomes more content-centric, podcasts have a huge growth potential in India, supplemented by factors such as increasing digital penetration, the cost-effectiveness of smart mobile devices, content diversity and an overwhelming amount of commute time. The availability of insightful and informative content for diverse needs and desires helps to assure users of a rich experiential value derived from audio entertainment facilitated through podcasts.

Podcasts are increasingly gaining traction as a medium for everyone with diversified content for the dynamically evolving demographics as the content available through podcasts caters to every age group and every mood—from mythological series and bhajans that appeal to senior citizens, to insightful and inspirational series for millennials, and fun stories and poems for children.“ says Mr. Gautam Raj Anand, Founder & CEO, Hubhopper.

Hubhopper is an AI-enabled content aggregator and India’s largest Podcast and Audio on Demand

platform. It connects content creators of varying genres with different types of content consumers,

thus emerging as the largest podcast and publisher repository in India.

“Easy access to mobile internet and long travel times has boosted the podcast community in recent times.”

Reasons why should start your Podcast

• Because a Podcast is more popular than ever, according to a recent survey more than 110 million people listen to podcast, and over 60 million people listen to podcast every single month, and 40 million listen to podcast weekly in US. Its a huge market searching for content all kind of niches, so no matter whatever your niches or you brand is about, their probably people looking for podcast about that niches.
• Podcast are so much easy to consume now a days, everyone walks around with smart phones in their pocket with a headphone jack and can listen to podcast any point of time while travelling, driving, work out or may be while working. It’s also a good option to start your day with a podcast that can inspire you educate you, and you can listen to them while doing other things.
• With Podcast you can also connect with your audience with a deeper level, research shows that 85 % of people, who starts a podcast, finished that podcast. That’s a lots of content consumed, knowing that podcasts are typically 30, 40, 60 min or more way better that YouTube videos, blog articles or any social media post. So it provides good amount of time to help you connect with your audience because you have so much of time.
• Now Podcasts are so easier to get started, there are some amazing microphones that are available online starting with 1500 Rs. to 10,000 Rs. and a computer and some free software like Audacity to get started. Hosting your podcast with Libsyn or Buzzsprout which are relatively inexpensive or free to actually submit your podcast to directories like iTunes, Sticher, Google Play and Spotify. Anybody can do this kind of recording, editing, uploading and submitting your podcast to these directories to really able to reach the world.
• Another big reason is that you can make money with your Podcast via Advertisers or sponsorships, Affiliate marketing, selling your own products or services etc. The CPM (Cost Per Mile) or Cost Per one thousand listen of your podcast is higher than other forms of content, for most podcast it around 20 to 45$ per Ad which is much higher than video or blog content right now which is around 10$. So you can make more money from podcast content than the other forms of content. If you break it down and put 3 Ads in one podcast like one in the beginning, one in the middle and one at the end which comes around 60$ per episode minimum for only 1000 listen, but if you push it and make it around 10,000 listen that will go up to 600$ per episode which is like 40,000 Rs. Per episode. And if you host a weekly it comes around 1,60,000 Rs. per month. So now you can imagine how much you can earn per month if you host monthly, weekly or daily shows.

So if you are planning to start your podcast, this is perhaps the right time to start and definitely it has lot of room to start a podcast.

Key to Success:

Like YouTube, Podcasting is also a great source of leads for your business. You can generate traffic, interest, and new email subs with either medium.

The main difference comes with your role in the process and what skills you want to improve on. Which do you enjoy more? What do you want to get good at? Stay consistent with it, there are lots of people who start and give up after 3 to 4 months, but if you can stick with it like for a year or two or longer, you gonna have a lot of success.