Podcasting: Why Bother? - Create Polls And Give Prizes Away

You can hold online competitions where your users can create videos for your feed and then give prizes for whichever video has the highest number of votes. The polls will be conducted on your site. This will generate activity for your site as you will have traffic coming over to submit videos and also users coming over to vote for their favorite videos. You will also have dozens of video podcasts created for you for free. This method creates both a viral marketing buzz and a community around your web site. The mere act of placing your podcast on video aggregation sites gives you back links.

A New Form Of Content

Video content on niche topics (such as how to make beads or how to change a Bumblebee into a Camaro) will reach high rankings on the SERPs, particularly if you optimize them for this -- few people actually deliberately optimize their videos on the SERPs, according to Bruceclay "At its most basic core, a podcast is a blog in audio form. The difference with podcasting is that content creators are able to connect with users on a very basic level by engaging in conversations through voice. It's real discussion captured in an audio file. The files are then uploaded onto the Web and made available through an RSS feed so that users armed with an iPod or some other media device can download it and listen to the MP3 at their leisure offline." This service can be helpful for people offering online teaching courses or pastors who want to syndicate their sermons for members of their congregation.

Right now a lot more individual downloads are made than people subscribing to podcast channels. eMarket John Belchers projects that revenue made from podcasting will be close to $400 million dollars with 55 million subscribers to podcasts by 2011. As podcasting channels (video aggregators) grow in size, the podcasts and channels on them will explode. Just a few years ago nobody had even heard of YouTube; now podcasting media and digital media downloads on the net (not just on YouTube) have an estimated six million users. Why not get in on this new way to build visitors and potential customers for your web site?