Queen’s Young Leaders attend podcast workshop

Creator of the popular podcast CTRL, ALT, DELETE, Emma Gannon and BBC Podcast Producer, Shola Aleje, hosted a podcasting workshop at the Media Trust for their Transforming Hidden Talent programme recently.

The session saw the groups of young people go through the different stages of creating a podcast. First, groups had to agree on the idea for their podcast and why they felt there was a gap in the market for it to be successful. They were then shown by Emma and Shola how to record their podcast and then how to edit it.

The final stage focussed on how to market and promote your podcast using social media, cross-promotion, and collaboration.

Emma Gannon said:

“I think podcasting is so important because it gives anyone a voice. It’s really hard to get into mainstream media at the moment, especially radio. Whereas podcasting is very much low barrier to enter, it’s really leveled the playing field. Today I just wanted to show them how easy it is to have a voice and put it out there.”

Here are the key lessons from the day:

• Stick closely to your theme
• Be consistent when uploading (same time every week/month)
• Listen to other podcasts for inspiration
• Invest in a quality microphone
• Don’t record in an echoey room!
• Invite interesting guests on and ask them to promote it
• Plan ahead with your content – have an editorial calendar
• Promote your podcast, on blogs and in press
• Ask listeners to leave a rating or review
• Be yourself!