Podcasts – what are the top ten worst things about podcasts? As i start to consider doing my own, I wanted to make a list of all the things I need to avoid!
(Feel free to argue with me, this is only my opinion)
Personally I love podcasts, I like the fact that lots of people are willing to share their knowledge with me, for free. So I listen to hours of them every week, its a great way to keep my knowledge up to speed.
But there are things I really hate about them, things that make my blood boil, and here are the top ten. So in descending order of tossyness;
- “Marketing Yoda” – calling yourself something like the marketing yoda, or the marketing Buddha or worse of all a NINJA, you may think its funny, but it comes across as self-publicising, frankly as just tossy.
- Advertising – podcasters are not radio, they are not TV, I know that they want to generate income, but having advertising is just a step too far for me
- “Transition” – anyone who says “lets transition over to the next subject” should be taken out behind the building and shot
- Zoo format – a bunch of mates sitting around chewing the fat, it works if you are Steve Wright or Chris Evans (now i am showing my age), not if you are a podcaster
- Poor Audio – if you can’t afford to buy a proper recording system, don’t do a podcast.
- “Awesome!” – perhaps its because a lot of them are American, but everything is not Awesome, honestly its not and describing a link as Awesome is just plain annoying
- “We’re doing really cool stuff” – then stop talking about it, bugger off and do it and leave us alone – it seems to me that everyone on a blog is doing loads of really cool projects that they are excited about and that they can’t tell us about. The recession – it never hit them – clients they are never difficult – developers always fantastic – The worst one of the week, is the Boagworld web design show – the episode released on the 14th – 7 minutes of stuff before they seemed to remember what they were there for.
- Wasted time – ten to fifteen minutes of pure unadulterated rubbish – listening to the podcasters chat about their life.
- Circles of friends – if you listen to enough podcasts you can hear the same people talking to the same people, who all go to the same events, there is a group of people who basically interview each other for their podcasts, and they are all Awesome.
- Lack of content – I wonder why people listen to podcasts – I listen to gain knowledge, to learn from other people – so I don’t want 10 minutes of you telling me how great you are, and what you like, and then two minutes of information, the balance on many of them is just wrong.
So, what’s the best marketing podcast I heard recently – well I like “the engaging brand” the presenter does the minimum of self-publicity and seems to genuinely try to interview people with information to share. Not every interview is brilliant, but it’s far better than most. You usually get one or two things from every episode – I think it is well worth a listen. The best of all, is Mitch Joel – he is inteligent, well read, and always tells me something that I don’t know, that can make me sound more inteligent in meetings
The worst one of the week has to be the boagwold web design show – it has 5 star reviews on itunes! So perhaps its me – but I am listening to it as I type and I am hitting the keys harder and harder with every meaningless minute.
Podcasts can be a valuable part of any content marketing strategy, if you want to do them properly, then give us a call on 07765 406530.
What is marketing toss? Well it’s marketing that is either so awful that it makes you mad, so self congratulatory that it makes you ill, or like a lot of marketing – really done for its own sake. The sort of marketing that makes you feel good, but in the end does very little for your customers.