Virtual Event Success

One of the people I profiled in my book Podcasting for Profit is Terry Fallis. When I interviewed him a year ago, he was using a podcast to share the contents of his newest novel, The Best Laid Plans.

At the time, he couldn’t get a literary agent to represent his title. Many were saying that the topic – Canadian political satire – was just too narrow of a niche to be of any interest to a publisher.

Well, Terry continued to use a podcast to share the contents of his book. People started to take notice. He built an audience and finally self-published his book.

This week, Terry found out that he won a prestigious book award called the Stephen Leacock Medal for Humour. Part of winning this award was getting $10,000. This on the heels of finally getting a literary agent to represent him.

I’m so proud of Terry on many fronts. But most importantly, I’m tickled pink that he used a podcast to indirectly profit from his passion. I wouldn’t be surprised if Terry donates a portion of his winnings to charity because he’s just that type of guy.

My advice? If every door is slammed in your face, don’t give up. As Terry shows, you can use a podcast to share your passion with the world. It may take a while, but soon people will notice.

There’s a podcasting mailing list out there where I’ve become the topic of conversation. I’m posting my response on my blog since the moderator hasn’t approved 2 replies that I sent through.

I got wind of this when a colleague opened a ticket on my help desk to let me know what was going on. I checked the mailing list and on April 14th, someone started this discussion:

Subject: Leesa Barnes: The First Lady of Podcasting, the Queen of Podcasting?

Who is this person? I stumbled across her blog today where she’s got a bunch of testimonials from people I’ve heard of, like Paul Colligan and Jason Van Orden, and her blog says she is an expert in “podcasting for profit” and she’s written a book on the subject but there are no podcasts on her own blog. Does anyone know this person and can explain where her fame comes from?

There were a few responses. Some said they never heard of me. Others, like Dave Jackson, Larry Wagner and Will Brown all said that they know me and can vouch for my work.

[...]

I’m in Las Vegas this weekend speaking at the National Association of Broadcasters annual conference. This topic is of course, my favourite and it will have a slight bent towards broadcasters.

Podcasting for Profit

April 13, 2008 • 3:30 p.m. – 4:45 p.m.
Las Vegas Convention Center N253

Think advertising and sponsorship is the only way to podcast for profit? In this interactive session, join Leesa Barnes, author of Podcasting for Profit, as she shares with you the three ways to generate an income through podcasting that takes you beyond ads and sponsorship. This session is ideal for both newbie and experienced podcasters and will be filled with real world case studies of podcasters earning five, six and even seven figures through their podcast.

See you there!

This week’s issue of Make Selling Fun & Profitable will include some tips on how to write an earth shattering episode title.

Last week, I shared 2 tips in Part 1. Here are the tips I shared in last week’s ezine:

1. Put the episode number at the end.
2. Make sure your episode title contains keywords.

If you want to find out what 2 additional tips I’ll share in Part 2, join the ezine list by filling in the box below. It will be sent to you on Thursday April 10th.

Photo courtesy escortmad79

On March 28th, I was pleased to see that Google Adsense deposited $106.05 into my business chequing account. Very nice.

The rotten part of this all is that I opened my Adsense account in November 2005, the day I started generating page impressions on my podcasting blog called Podonomics Explored on Blogspot.

If you’re good at math, you’ll realize that it took me almost 2 and a half years to generate just over $100 from text ads.

Here are some interesting statistics from the report I generated in Google Adsense:

• I averaged 91 page impressions per day between November 2005 and April 2008.
• The day I had the highest number of page impressions was 458 generated on February 20, 2008.
• Total page impressions between November 2005 and April 2008 is 59,345.
• Total number of clicks between November 2005 and April 2008 is 271.
• The average click through rate is 0.46% (less than 1%).

At one point, I had Adsense text ads on 3 different websites – my podcasting blog on Blogspot, my podcasting blog at Podonomics.com and here at LeesaBarnes.com. Sadly, text ads did nothing to keep me gainfully employed as a podcasting consultant.

I’ve figured out other ways to make money podcasting. You can join my success club where I teach you how or join me in Las Vegas at the New Media Expo where I’ll teach you live.  Or, you can get my book.

Either way, unless you’re Darren Rowse or Andy Wibbels, relying on text ads or Google Adsense to make money podcasting is a sad, long road to profitability.

Photo courtesy swamysk on Flickr

After Michael Geoghegan stated that Podcasting Is Dead in his presentation at the 2007 New Media Expo, I said that I would no longer entertain this debate and stating anyone who does is trying to link bait.

So, here I am, four months later, posting about this debate as to whether or not podcasting is dead. There’s a reason why I’m addressing this now:

• Wizzard, the company that owns Libsyn, released some statistics that the number of podcast requests across their network is in the billions. Very encouraging.
• Mark Evans called me out wondering whether I would lay in on this debate.
• Paul Colligan stated that when he attended CES, podcasting wasn’t the star, going as far as to say that podcasting is no longer the story.
• And I’ve finally figured out the #1 reason why most people claim podcasting is dead and I must share this epiphany.

[...]

The day after Thanksgiving Day in the United States is called Black Friday. On this day, consumers enjoy steep discounts and huge bargains on many items.

I decided that I too would offer a steep discount on some products that I know will help you launch a podcast with confidence. I took the top 5 questions asked during the virtual book tour and matched them with products from my vault.

It’s all available in a neat little bundle that I’m called the Black Friday Podcasting Bundle. Here’s the five questions that I answer:

• If I’m Not an Expert, Should I Podcast?
• How Can I Develop a Podcast that People Want to Hear or See?
• What’s the Best Way to Record My Audio Podcast?
• What Do I Podcast About?
• How Do I Get Started With Podcasting?

To find out more about this bundle, click here. The excitement starts on November 23, 2007 at 12:01am EST.

In the time it would’ve taken me to agonize…oops, I mean write every word, I threw together this video program using the wonderful Camtasia.

Here’s the 7 steps to podcasting for profit in 7 minutes.

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7 Steps to Podcasting for Profit
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