964% Growth! That's What Podcast Ready Does.

There are a number of reasons why people produce podcasts: just for fun, to get the message out about a cause or a charity, to raise awareness of a business or premium service, or to advertise. One thing they all have in common is: to be heard. But for podcasts that are trying to earn revenue, or drive audiences to a service from which they earn revenue, how do they promote their show?

A lot of podcasters swap promos and collaborate to get the word out. Others use tools like Facebook, Twitter, or My Space. Still others buy ads through Google or on related sites such as the Pickle, and everyone hopes to get featured on the front page of iTunes' podcast section. (At the first Expo one promoting podcaster put stickers on the wall in front of the urinals in the men's rooms.)

The question is, how does a media company promote their podcast to the mainstream? And how do they hit the 150+ million people this year that will choose not to buy an iPod, opting instead for a less expensive, more feature-rich media player?

That's what Podcast Ready does.

We've licensed our podcast-receiving technology to device manufacturers who in turn are installing it directly onto their products at the factory. The end result is, the consumer is introduced to the wide world of podcast content the instant they connect their new players - no installation, and no configuration; just plug-and-receive.

As part of the first time experience, we pre-populate the receiver with sample podcast feeds. The user can of course opt not to remain subscribed, but for the content creator its a chance to get their feed - their freshest content - into the ears of millions of potential new audience members.

This works. It drives new subscribers to shows. Of course, its up to the content creator to keep them, but the exposure is on a scale like no other - 350 millions exposures in the next 12 months.

Even though we haven't begun shipping with our largest partners (shipping is slated to begin in November) several podcasters have already witnessed the benefits just from being part of our standard website download.


(that's a 790% increase in 14 days!)

Another podcaster (graph shown above) has seen their subscriber numbers grow steadily since their inclusion two weeks ago. And this graph is only going to jump once we start seeing the projected 10,000+ activations a day.

Using Podcast Ready's services to promote your show is the most effective tool out there. It ensures fresh, timely material and literally puts your content in the palm of your potential listener. We still have plenty of slots to fill, so drop me a line or give us a call (866-343-5166) if your interested in taking your show mainstream.

We're Number 4!

I spoke with a podcaster at the Podcast and New Media Expo over the weekend that had just made the switch from Libsyn's statistical system to Raw Voice Generator. The first thing he noticed was that while Libsyn didn't report any contact with myPodder, Raw Voice's system showed myPodder to the 4th most popular client downloading his show. I wonder if they take that into account when Neilson certifies Libsyn stats...

Podcast Ready at IFA

Hagen and Christian, co-founders of Podcast Ready and my business partners, are representing Podcast Ready with one of our licensees at the IFA in Berlin. The largest consumer electronics show in the world... lucky dogs.

Using Channels

Podcast Ready provides each user with their own channel. A channel is simply a personal feed to which you can add anything you wish. By default, this channel is private and is used to deliver specific episodes of podcasts directly to your player.

But by making your channel public, you can create a mash-up of any content to share with the world - and by adding friends you can allow them to contribute to your channel as well.


Here is a quick video tutorial showing how to set this up.

Media Ready is now "Podcast Ready"

In a press release dated yesterday, mediaREADY announced their new partnership with Podcast Ready. Quoting Jeffrey Harrell the CEO of mediaREADY:

Soon select MediaREADY portable media player products will become Podcast Ready-enabled. The MediaREADY Glider and MediaREADY Aero will be the first models to come pre-installed with Podcast Ready's myPodder™ podcast management software. Weighing just over an ounce and under 4" in length the ultra-portable Aero™ Audio Player/FM Tuner/Recorder is clearly the brightest new star in the MediaREADY™ line. "The partnership with Podcast Ready is yet another exciting development for MediaREADY and is a great revenue sharing opportunity for us

Dennis Miller is "podcast ready"

Podcast Ready is one of two directories listed on his web site. 3 guesses who the other one is...

Drive 100,000 new listeners to your podcast

"100K Play" Contest

What's it worth to get 100,000 first-time downloads of your podcast? Here's your chance to find out. Podcast Ready is giving away one placement on every copy of myPodder to one lucky podcaster. This means that your podcast feed will be pre-configured on MP3 devices from iRiver, Cowon, Skullcandy, and Wolverine (just to name a few) as well as in every copy of myPodder downloaded from our site, and other's. Your show will remain in the line up until you've received 100,000 downloads from new myPodder users.

This is a huge opportunity to expand your audience, and its free!

Here's how you enter:

1. Send an email to 100kplay@podcastready.com and include your contact information, your show's name, website address, feed address, and a desired promotional code.
2. Urge your listeners to visit Podcast Ready's site (http://www.podcastready.com) and register a new account (this will require a valid email address) or update their existing profile using your promotional code.

It's that simple. The show with the most registrations wins. And one lucky listener who registers using the winner's promotional code will win a free video iPod!

What's the catch? No catch. Before you can be entered, I will have to check out your show and make sure that it's not overly offensive or anything. After all, your podcast will end up on MP3 players sold through Amazon and Wal-Mart so I have to make sure that the content is "retail safe." (And before you ask what "retail safe" is, it's entirely up to me to decide... I'll know it when I see it).

Once you've received confirmation that your promotional code is registered, then you are set. The contest will end on August 31st, so what are you waiting for... more?

Okay, here's a little more: if you have a Podcast Ready chicklet on your site when you register your promo-code you will automatically start off on the scorecard with 1000 registrations to your credit! Now what are you waiting for?

iRiver is 'Podcast Ready'

I plugged in my new iRiver Clix Gen2 this evening and it immediatly started downloading podcasts - nothing installed, it just worked. iRiver is officially Podcast Ready!

iPod and U3 Users of myPodder get an upgrade

Recently we've upgraded our myPodder^TM to 1.6.5. A few minor bugs have been fixed and the iPod support has been greatly improved. For instance, when you now connect your iPod to any computer (Win, OSX, or Linux) it correctly places the content in the "podcast" section of your player and calculates that playing time for all those off-the-wall bit rates properly.

U3 devices also now have an upgrade. For those of you that are not aware of U3, its a technology that enables thumb drives to run U3-compliant applications right from the drive without installing anything on the host computer.

So you can take your Firefox, instant messenger, and Open Office applications with you where ever you go.

Interestingly enough, we've seen a huge amount of uptake from the U3 community since we won their application design contest back in June. It seems that even though a large portion of the podcast audience listens to podcasts at their desk, they really like the idea of having their content in one location (their U3 drive) and listening to (and managing) that content from whatever computer they happen to be at.