You Don’t Need Video to Start a Business Podcast
If you’re thinking about starting a podcast for your business, don’t let the stress of video stop you from creating one. Yes, I know you see video everywhere and you see a lot of nonsense “all or nothing” advice saying video is a MUST in podcasting, but that’s simply not true. There is plenty of value in audio content, and it’s more important to get comfortable with that first.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
Why your audience might prefer audio anyway (even on "video" podcasts)
Why video creates a challenge with video and interview podcasts
How to use audio as a stepping stone to get comfortable first
Why podcasts with massive followings still see most engagement from audio
How to build your podcast skills before adding video complexity
VIDEO TRANSCRIPT
Hi, and thanks for joining me today.
I wanted to talk to you a little bit about whether or not the concept or idea of learning video or using video for your podcast is making or breaking whether you start a podcast, because I'm seeing that type of talk a lot these days, especially on LinkedIn, where businesses are thinking about launching podcasts, or personal brands are thinking about launching podcasts.
But this is about video, and if you're somebody who is not really that comfortable or used to doing either, you know, they're not used to doing audio podcasts or podcasts, and they're not used to being on camera, well, that's putting two things together that you've never done before, and then you're starting to figure out:
"How am I going to simultaneously do this well?"
I would say don't even bother with video for now. Because first off, a lot of people that are just going to dive into video podcasting, they're probably different from you.
They're already comfortable with video, and that's why they're excited to transition their podcast to video. Whereas what we're talking about here is you kind of need it to be one less thing you gotta deal with as you develop your very first one.
But here's the other important thing that's kind of a extra layer to this, and that's your audience. You know, as creators, we have a tendency to get a little excited about all the things we can do and how cool it's gonna be when we put it out there, but we haven't spent enough time thinking about what the audience is gonna think.
You know, even marketers do that a lot. They'll create a lot of content at work, because that's kind of what they're doing in their marketing mindset, and then they'll go home, and they'll look at content just like that and just completely ignore it.
So this is a similar thing. And I'm not saying people out there don't like video.
But what I will say is people are still very, very comfortable and interested in audio-only podcasts. And I would even take this a step further and say that I think people, even if they seek out video podcasts, I don't know how much time they're actually sitting in front of their screen, whether it's mobile, whether it's on their desktop, and watching that.
Most of the time, that's an interview podcast, isn't it? And depending on the setup, you're probably gonna have, you know, that split screen that spends a lot of time on one shot, where half the screen is talking, the other half is-
And I don't think anybody's gonna watch that for a long period of time. And it's even true if it's able to do one shot, one shot, two shot, all that kind of stuff. If it's going for 45 minutes plus, they're probably gonna minimize it and listen to it.
It's also possible to still stream that on your phone, which I've done at the gym, is I've listened to a podcast that's video, but I'm listening to it, and it's streaming from my phone.
So if people are gonna do that anyway, why not just focus on audio if that's better for you? I mean, you can have your service, your, um, hosting service for your podcast send the audio file to YouTube. I mean, it's really that simple, and people could listen to it there. It doesn't have the visual, but the most important thing, which is your content, is still there.
And here's the other thing that I think is really important if the context that I'm talking about here fits you, which is I need to get comfortable with this, and the less I have to deal with, you know, in developing this show, the better - which is really good thinking.
You could actually say that by starting with audio, you are giving yourself a chance to do kind of the easier thing first because you're giving yourself a chance to get used to this, used to being comfortable in front of the microphone, developing your style, developing how you communicate with your audience.
And here's the other thing I will tell you, just as a side note if I could throw this in as well, because I think this is important…
One of the reasons why these platforms and these approaches to content are becoming so popular is they're very humanizing. You know, you're having that conversation either through video or audio, and really you notice how a lot of times when people are on video, they're talking to everybody, when really, just like what I'm doing, they should just be talking to you.
The same thing happens on a podcast. You don't wanna ever host your podcast like you're talking to all the listeners. You're talking to that one listener that's listening to you right now. So you get in that mindset of being in a conversation with them, and then you suddenly start to get really comfortable with your style and how you wanna record it, how you wanna edit it, and how you wanna produce a really good, solid program.
And it doesn't have to take 15 hours to produce an audio show. Spend some quality time on it. Doesn't have to be that long. Make a connection, provide value, and call it good, and get really, really comfortable with this part of it. And then you think, "Okay, now I'm ready to try video." You can still try video, and it doesn't even have to be part of your podcast.
Because here's the other thing, you may not wanna conduct interviews in your podcast.
You could just simply stick with audio and create new video content. Or the other thing you could do is you could take, you know, maybe a really good topic maybe that you had on the audio content and repurpose it and try just doing what I'm doing right now and talk about it through video Just put it out there, try some things, see what people engage with, build content over time.
That's the other thing that you're going to be able to learn, is if you can get into a habit of getting that podcast out, usually what's best is every week or every other week, then you're already going to be used to the process you have to follow for yourself to get things out on time. You'll be able to apply that now to video because you're used to it.
You've done everything you needed to do to get yourself in a better position to get comfortable in front of the camera.
So, this is a really good time to do either one of these platforms. But if you're really interested in that podcast content and creating that, uh, for you or your business, um, don't let the concept of, "I have to figure out video at the same time" be one of your big barriers, because you don't have to do it. You really don't.
It is perfectly acceptable to just focus on audio. In fact, let me leave you with this.
I was on a podcast, um, several weeks ago that has a massive following. I mean, I've known about this podcast for years. I mean, when I first started in, in this industry, I knew about this podcast.
We're talking, like, 2012, and they're still going.
And the host of the show even told me, "Yeah, this is gonna be on video, and we'll get some good hits there. But, uh, most of our hits are still coming on the audio side."
And this is coming from somebody who is well aware of all the trends and how to make them work, because that's why he interviews people.
So even a show that's been around forever and has a massive following, those people still want to listen to audio podcasts. So I highly recommend if you don't wanna do video, go with audio.
Develop that skill, and even if you choose not to turn it into a video podcast, that's perfectly okay.
But right now we're just talking about getting you comfortable in front of the mic and connecting with somebody one on one through an audio podcast.
