Audio as a Means to Connect and Learn

by Elizabeth S. Craig, @elizabethscraig

It’s taken me a while to come around to enjoying audio and podcasting. I prefer to read transcripts of podcasts.  I skim, pick out the wheat from the chaff.  And then I move on to the next thing I’ve got to do.

But when I had a back injury last year…from sitting…ha…I unfortunately ended up spending a lot more time at the gym as a result. Podcasts are lovely ways to distract ourselves from the unpleasant task at hand. That unpleasant task might be the frustration of a traffic jam for those of us in urban areas, the boredom of a transit commute, or the tedium of exercise. And podcasts are often jam-packed with information.

For those who are interested in completely forgetting about the fact that they’re exercising (as I am), here are some of the podcasts I’ve enjoyed (mixture of writing business and writing craft):

Jeff Rutherford’s Reading and Writing Podcast

The Author Biz from Stephen Campbell

Joanna Penn’s Podcasts at The Creative Penn

The Self-Publishing Podcast with David Wright, Sean Platt, and Johnny B. Truant

Author Marketing Institute (AMI) Podcasts

Rocking Self-Publishing with Simon Whistler

Dead Robot Society (various authors contributing)

Self-Publishing Roundtable  (various authors contributing)

And then I really started reading posts on the benefits of podcasting. Joanna Penn states during her podcast interview with Tim Grahl:

“…I still think as authors if you get into multimedia, you are so ahead of most authors, because most authors will not go through the pain barrier of learning some basic technical stuff and putting your face and your voice out there.”

And Joanna’s interview with author audio marketing expert Viv Oyolu was also fascinating and made excellent persuasive arguments for the power of audio.

And I thought: no, I really, really don’t have the time for this.  In fact, I have so little time for podcasts that if I elected to regularly tape one, I believe my family would brandish pitchforks.

But I do want to connect with readers. I agree that it’s a personal way to stand out. Do I hate my voice?  Of course I do.  Don’t most of us? But heck, if recording my voice will help me connect with my readers, I’m happy to do it…as long as I don’t encounter pitchfork-brandishing family members.

After all, it was my choice to connect with writers.  My sites and efforts have been overwhelmingly writer-focused for six years.  I’m ready to swing the pendulum back in the other direction.

I decided to figure out SoundCloud (which I heard about through the Joanna Penn interview with Viv Oyolu that I referenced above), interview myself,  and embed it on the reader-related pages on my site (books, buy my books, etc.)  I get pretty much the same reader questions over and over so I picked a few of the most common and answered them.  I decided I could do this as often as I had time, changing things up when I could.  SoundCloud is free for up to three hours of content.

Here’s how I did it:

I wrote a script, then recorded myself on the free voice recorder that came with my phone.  Then I emailed the file to myself on Gmail (surprisingly it wasn’t a big file).  I downloaded the file.  Then I signed into SoundCloud and uploaded the file.  I set it as private (which becomes public on the blog, but not on the SoundCloud site), uploaded an audio jpg cover as the cover for the file (I have audiobooks on ACX), added a link to my Amazon author page under metadata. So we can link to a buy-link. That’s very cool.

I downloaded a WordPress plugin called SC Ultimate (or SoundCloud ultimate). I activated it and connected it (via the plugin’s instructions)  to SoundCloud, allowing access to SoundCloud.

To embed the audio clip, I go to wherever on the page I want the audio clip, go to text editor, and put in a  code.  The track link is found in the sidebar under the orange SC Ultimate/Your SC tracks/ and Track URL.

Here’s a link for the process on WordPress from SoundCloud’s team.

Here’s a link for the process on Blogger from SoundCloud’s team.

And here’s a video for the process on Blogger from misterandrade1

Is this as effective as a podcast?  Well, no, probably not. Because listeners subscribe to podcasts that are regular programs. This is obviously more deliberate: interested readers visit our sites and click on the audio portion.  But an important benefit of podcasting is the same for this small bit of embedded audio…a more personal approach. And for those of us who are wanting to have a stronger, more personal connection with our readers,  I believe this is a good place to start.

A recommendation from Tom Corson who guest posted on Joel Friedlander’s blog (and appears to have an interesting podcast himself) was to be a guest on podcasts. He recognized that some authors might have schedules that prohibit regular podcasting.  He states:

“You can make a name for yourself by being interviewed on popular podcast shows in your market and area of expertise.”

This is something I’ve done.  I’ve been featured several times on different podcasts, as well as traditional radio.  You don’t really need any special equipment for it…I’m usually interviewed through Skype (occasionally on the phone) and I do have a USB-style microphone, but half the time I end up using my laptop’s internal mic. I do have a cautionary tale for parents of young children, but other than that, these types of interviews are easy.

I won’t always be this busy (knock on wood).  I won’t say I’ll never podcast.  In the meantime, guesting on others’ programs and embedding interviews fills the gap.

Have you podcasted?  Been interviewed on a podcast?  Tried audio on your blog?

Using audio to connect with readers and learn:
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