How to start your first podcast - equipment, editing, publishing and more

Scott Hanselman frames podcasting as a practical workflow from recording to publication. He focuses on equipment and publishing, assuming the topic and promotion are already decided, and points to the setup he and Luvvie use for their shows.

Reading notes

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• BlogTalkRadio is the fastest way to start, but it is limited and becomes more expensive quickly.
• For Skype interviews, a decent USB microphone or headset sounds better than a laptop mic, and USB is preferred over analog headphone jacks.
• When recording interviews, it helps if the guest also uses a good USB microphone, and it is even better if the guest records a local file while the Skype call is recorded too.
• Portable recorders give more flexibility, and WAV files are better for editing than MP3 files because they preserve more quality.
• A small lavalier microphone can be plugged into a portable recorder to isolate sound better in interviews.
• A Samson C01UCW USB mic is presented as a strong option for one- or two-person talk shows, with recording in Audacity, Adobe Audition, iMovie, or GarageBand.
• Room acoustics matter, and a Portable Vocal Booth can help in echo-prone or noisy spaces.
• Hanselman says the Zoom H4N with Shure microphones is the setup he uses on all his podcasts, and that it works well for in-person recording.
• The Zoom recorder can also improve DSLR video sound when mounted on a camera.
• For editing remote conversations, he records three files: local WAV files for each speaker plus the phone or Skype track for alignment.
• The phone or Skype track is only used to line up the cleaner tracks, which are then adjusted for volume and muted as needed during editing.
• For more complex shows, he uses Adobe Audition with effects such as Speech Volume Leveler and Hard Limiter.
• For publishing, he recommends LibSyn, while noting that Amazon S3, Azure Blobs, or an existing host can also be used.
• LibSyn is described as providing hosting, feed creation, stats, and mobile app support.
• Podcast feeds work like RSS feeds with an enclosure tag, which services like FeedBurner or FeedBlitz can add.
• He recommends submitting the show to iTunes and Windows Phone/Zune, and also targeting BlackBerry, Stitcher, TuneIn Radio, and DoubleTwist.
• His conclusion is that a podcast needs an MP3 in a feed and a website, and everything else improves sound, consistency, and presentation.