You have to make a number of decisions revolving around the two main aspects of your podcast, your Web site and your media. The decisions you make now have a direct effect on your production chain and also affect your long-term planning. After you launch your podcast and crank up your Web site, it can be difficult to change your approach mid-stream.
Let's start with an overview of the different ways that you can bring your Web site and podcast to market, along with some of the basic benefits and drawbacks of each option.
What Are the Options?
Up to now, all we've really discussed is how to create your podcast media file, and we talked a little bit about authoring your RSS feed. There's another aspect that can be just as critical to your success: your Web site. Podcasting began as a way to add audio to blogs, and to have this audio automatically transferred to an iPod. However, the concept of podcasting has grown since then. Informal studies have shown that up to 50 percent of all podcasts are watched while sitting in front of a computer. Many of these may be played on iTunes running in the background, but a significant number are also watched on Web sites as embedded presentations.
Podcasting purists are quick to say that these aren't really podcasts. (Some, in fact, say that anything other than an MP3 file is not a podcast.) Call it what you want: A ton of programming is being produced and distributed on the Internet using RSS feeds. This programming can be experienced in many different ways. The question is what sort of experience do you want your audience to have?
In an effort to try to impose some sort of order on this chaos, we can divide the different options into three main categories of ways to host your podcast:
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On a Web site or blog that you manage and maintain yourself
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On a managed Web site or blogging service
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On a dedicated podcast hosting service
Each of these has advantages and disadvantages. In a nutshell, if you're willing to take on the burden of managing and maintaining your site, you'll have the most flexibility and freedom. This flexibility comes at a price, though. If you're managing your own site, you have to worry about lots of things, such as software updates, hackers, spammers, and hardware problems. If you use managed or dedicated systems, you have much less to worry about, but this ease of use comes at the price of flexibility. You may not be able to install some new gadget on your site that you found on an opensource forum, or you may not be able to embed the latest video technology due to support issues. Let's talk about the options in a little more detail.
Managing your own Web site
Managing your own Web site can be lots of fun, but it can also be lots of work. First, you have to either build a server or buy space on a shared server from a Web hosting provider. Some Web hosting providers allow full access to the operating system so that you can tinker to your heart's desire, while others place fairly serious restrictions on what you can and cannot do.
The nice thing about managing your own site is the complete freedom to do what you want, when you want. Assuming that you're running on your own server and have full access to the operating system, you can add forums, install a wiki (a shared space where people can add and edit content at will), change the look of your home page, or do anything else that strikes your fancy. You don't have to wait until a host adds new features; you just add them yourself.
Of course, this assumes that you're very comfortable running a server and installing software. Many blog and content management system (CMS) software packages install fairly painlessly these days. At the end of the day, however, if something breaks, you have no one to call. Everything is just fine until something breaks, at which point running your own server can become a nightmare, particularly if your podcast becomes popular and your audience is baying for more.
Scalability is another issue. If your podcast becomes wildly popular or if for some reason iTunes decides to put you on the podcast directory home page, the traffic to your Web site will spike. Web servers are not that complicated, but they can break down, and if they do, it's almost invariably due to a large increase in traffic — precisely the most inconvenient time for them to do so.
As the saying goes in the world of start-ups, having capacity issues is "a good problem to have." If your podcast is so popular that you're frying the small server at the end of your home DSL line, chances are good that you'll be able to afford a new server or afford to move to a managed hosting service. You should try to run your own server only if you're a seasoned Internet veteran with access to some reasonable server hardware and some free time. If you're just starting out, you should consider a managed hosting service or a dedicated podcasting hosting service.
Using a managed hosting service
The next step up in the hosting world is to use a managed hosting service. There are literally hundreds of different hosting options out there. When you register the URL for your podcast, chances are good that the company you use to register your URL will offer some sort of hosting package for your site. Hosting packages generally offer a certain amount of free storage and throughput each month, and you pay overage charges when you exceed either of these.
Some hosting packages come with pre-packaged software that allows you to create a Web site from pre-existing templates or a content management system that allows you to easily manage your Web site. If you're thinking about including e-commerce on your site, you'll need e-commerce capabilities. Many hosting service providers offer "shopping cart" functionality and may even be able to process credit card transactions for you.
One thing you'll want to make sure the service offers is statistics about your Web site traffic. If you're serious about turning your podcast into a business, you'll need accurate traffic statistics to gauge the success of your programming and to lure potential sponsors and advertisers. You should look for as much statistical information as you can find. A number of standardized Web stats packages are satisfactory, but the best hosting companies will offer incredibly detailed stats.
Perhaps the greatest thing about using a managed hosting service is that a significant amount of responsibility is taken off your plate. You no longer have to worry about hardware, and spammers and hackers are the hosting partner's problem. Also, if your statistics are showing a strong upward trend, you should be able to predict when you're going to run out of capacity and work with the hosting partner to add more capacity.
The only drawback to using a managed hosting service is that you may be limited in the software you can install. It depends on the type of service you purchase. You can purchase a shared server, in which case you're usually fairly limited, because the server must be a reliable hosting environment not just for you, but the other clients on the same server. There may be hundreds of other Web sites running off the same shared server.
Hosting services generally also offer dedicated servers, where you essentially lease hardware from them and they keep it up and running. Different hosting services allow different levels of access. Some let you do anything you want to do, while others limit what you can do so that the machine conforms to their standard, which makes it easier for them to maintain. The service you choose depends largely on how much freedom you want to install and modify software.
Using a dedicated podcast hosting service
Dedicated podcast hosting services are managed hosting services that are highly customized for a podcaster's needs. For example, these services usually offer tools to create and update your RSS feed. They may even be automated through some sort of wizard so that when you upload a new media file, your RSS feed is automatically updated. Many dedicated podcast hosting services also offer some sort of Web site for their clients, typically in the form of a blog. The blogs often come with their own URL, so that you can have a somewhat custom Web address. For example, let's pretend that you've decided to host your podcast about pike fishing with a company called Podcast Poodle. You'd probably be given the option to register your own URL like this:
mypikepodcast.podcastpoodle.com
As good as this may seem, it's not as good as having your own URL, such as:
www.mypikepodcast.com
In the first example, your Web site is what's known as a subdomain of the master domain, which in this case is http://podcastpoodle.com (please don't register this and sue us). Essentially, you're piggybacking on the master domain. This isn't much of an issue if you're a tiny podcaster, but if you make it big, you really want everyone coming to your Web site, not a page on someone else's site. When you use one of these services to host your site, you are giving up a degree of control, which you may not be happy about later.
That being said, it's hard to argue with the convenience these services offer. They make it extremely easy to get a simple Web site up and running, to keep your RSS feed updated, and to monitor how popular your site and podcast are, because they usually run top ten lists and feature different podcasts from time to time. Many also offer automated tools to list your podcast in a number of other directories, which is especially important when you're first starting out.
Some podcasting hosting services have become destinations themselves, either because they host other popular podcasts or have been around long enough that folks know it's a good place to find podcasts. This can be another compelling reason to go with a dedicated podcast hosting service. They already have an audience looking for podcasts, and there's a good chance that they'll check out your podcast if you're the new kid on the block.
You probably won't have lots of freedom to modify your Web site on these services, because they're so highly specialized to begin with. You also may not own all the real estate on your Web page. For example, the hosting service may reserve the right to advertise on your Web page in order to recoup some of their costs. They may also want to put an ad in your podcast. Seeing as how many of these podcast hosting services give away a serious amount of bandwidth and storage, it's not surprising that they want to try to earn a bit of money from your podcast. It comes with the territory.
What solution is best for you?
With all these options available, how do you choose what is going to work best for you? We can try to summarize your options here:
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Managing and hosting your own Web site is really only an option if you're very savvy or if you already have an existing site to which you're adding a podcast. You may run into scaling issues, but because you're savvy, you'll be able to solve them, right?
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Using a managed Web hosting solution is a great option for your Web site if you're experienced. The more Web savvy you are, the more you can get out of a managed solution. You'll have your own URL and the freedom to do what you like to your site.
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Using a dedicated podcast hosting service is a great idea if you're just starting out and don't know much about Web sites. You can't beat the convenience, and they allow you to focus on the programming, which is what you should be doing anyway. If you outgrow the service, you can cross that bridge when you come to it.
One thing to mention is that this doesn't have to be an either/or situation. For example, you could host your Web site with a managed hosting solution and then use the dedicated podcast hosting service just to host the podcast file! Just because a podcast hosting solution offers you a simple Web site doesn't mean that you have to use it. In fact, this is probably the best option for the savvier user. Use a podcasting hosting service to host your podcast media files, and you'll be able to take advantage of its RSS tools, its statistics, and any other special tools it may offer. Then, host your site, complete with your personalized URL, with a Web hosting service, so you can have more flexibility with your site.
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