Basic Components of a Podcast – Content

The content of a podcast is as varied as the individuals who make them.  While I believed I had a clear idea for the topic to be covered by my podcast, I realize now that I should keep an open mind to other possibilities.

I’ve gathered from what I have read so far that it’s important to create a podcast about something you are passionate about.

I decided on the topic I originally chose by first giving some thought to things I know something about.  I considered hobbies.  I considered life events that I felt had given me sufficient experience to have as the topic of a regularly-posted podcast.  I also considered things I had studied, either in school or because of my work. 

My original topic is not really something that I’m passionate about.  It’s a topic that I believe would be helpful to others, so I’m not sure it’s really necessary that I’m passionate about the topic for it to be a good topic for the podcast.

Nevertheless, I will keep an open mind about changing the topic as we continue with this “adventure,” and this is why: 

A podcast can be quite a lot of work with little reward, aside from the joy derived from creating the podcast.  It’s not a way to make money and it requires some expense (like any other hobby).  The theory is that if you’re not passionate about the content of your podcast, you will soon lose interest and your expense will become wasted money.

So the takeaway message I’ve gotten is that podcasting is a hobby, not a potential means of making a living.  As with any hobby, it’s up to the individual to decide how much money is reasonable to spend on it. 

As for the topic, I will keep an open mind about changing it but I’ll keep the original topic for now while I continue preparation.  I didn’t decide to take this “adventure” as a means to make money so I will continue to keep the expenses of this hobby at a minimum.

What I will focus on in this blog, in terms of content, is how to organize the content in the podcast and how to present it.  I’ll try to answer questions like these:

• What do I like about my favorite podcasts?  
• What features do podcasts generally have in common?
• Which of those features would be good to adopt? 
• Which of these would be helpful to the listener?