What is a Podcast? How Podcasting Works? Podcasting Explained for Beginners

Man is a social animal and we need to communicate for existence. There is hardly any human being who can live without communication. And that’s true ever since human beings existed on this planet.

Back then people used to communicate using the sign language which was basically a visual means of communicating using gestures, hand movements, and body language.

But later on, this way of communication changed into other means, like art and scriptures, languages, letters, and many other forms. But you must be wondering why I’m telling you all this, right?

It’s because some of the latest means of communicating and sharing our message with others have been emails, websites, social media, videos, and audios as well.

And the podcast is just the audio version of communication. If you ever asked yourself what is a podcast and how podcasting works, then keep listening because this episode is for you.

Hey digital learner, welcome back to another episode of Digital Marketing Made Easy podcast and if this is your first time here, let me introduce myself.

My name is Rahul Dubey and I help people turn their digital presence into profit using various digital marketing strategies. If you are someone who loves tips and strategies to create a profitable online business, then make sure you subscribe to this podcast for weekly new episodes.

In today’s episode, I’ll be discussing podcasting. If you are a complete beginner who knows nothing about the podcast, stick around and I promise you’ll walk away with a handful of knowledge, and will be able to confidently say that now I know what is a podcast and how podcasting works.

So, the idea of this episode came to my mind when one of my dear friends asked me,

Rahul, recently I have heard a lot about the podcast, what the heck this podcasting thing is?

And I was like, simply ...record audio and publish it on your server ( I mean podcasting server, not web hosting server). Your podcasting server will provide you an RSS feed URL. You can submit it to all podcast directories like iTunes, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Anchor, JioSaavn, etc. many others.

Once approved, they automatically fetch your feed every now and then to look for new content or any changes made to previous content.

And if you have published new content or made any changes to your already published content, they’ll fetch it from the RSS feed and update everywhere accordingly.

So you basically have to publish on your podcast server, and the rest of the process is automated.

And this is how I explained it. But I know, there are many terms that may be complex for a beginner, and that’s why I thought that I need to simplify it for someone who is a complete beginner.

So without any further delay, let’s first talk about what is a podcast. In other words, what the heck is this podcast thing?

Well, if you recall, some of the biggest achievements of human beings during the 18th century were the ability to communicate using radio signal transmission, and during the early 19th century, humans became able to broadcast the radio as well television.

In the mid 19th century, electronic mails came into existence, and towards the end of the last century, we witnessed the dotcom industry booming.

Well, after that I have witnessed everything with my eyes. Currently, I’m in my early 20s and during the last 20 years, I have witnessed the rise of one after another many social media platforms.

Then the last decade was huge for video-based platforms, and this current decade is the era of podcasting.

But podcasting is not a new thing.

What is a Podcast?

Podcast is basically an audible form of marketing.

What is Podcasting?

Podcasting is just another way to communicate using audio - just like the radio broadcast that we have been knowing for several years.

Back in 2005, Steve Jobs introduced podcasts on iTunes and this was that revolutionary idea that took radio broadcasting to the new level.

In fact, podcasting is the modern form of radio broadcasting but the only difference is: A podcast show is more centric to a specific niche, unlike radio where you get everything under one umbrella.

Apart from that, listeners can actually subscribe to their favorite podcast show and by the way, the subscription is free.

This means if you as a listener subscribe to any podcast show, you won’t be charged anything, and every time a new episode is added to the podcast show, your podcast app like iTunes (which is now Apple Podcasts) will automatically download it.

And the good thing is: it’s like an archive of episodes which you can access anytime from anywhere just with the tap on your phone which otherwise wouldn’t have been possible on radio stations.

Because on the radio, if you miss the broadcast of your favorite show, you missed it and will not be able to catch it later. So, this is the modern state of radio and this idea has been now adopted by other apps, and brands as well.

Nowadays, you can see many podcasting apps and services on the web. And the trend for podcasting is increasing.

Although it took more than a decade since it was first introduced in 2005, yet podcasting is a very hot trend right now.

Well, this was about what basically podcasting is. But this is from the listener's point of view. And as you know, I always say, Don’t just be a consumer, be a creator as well.

Because if you think it from a digital marketer’s point of view, or simply as a business owner’s perspective, you’ll notice that as the trend for podcasting is increasing that means there is no shortage of listeners or say, consumers, at least that’s why so many creators are creating new content, right?

So why not become a creator and start creating podcast contents?

Because that’s how you’ll be able to reach to a new group of audiences, serve them, and make a personal level deep connection as well, and that will ultimately help your business grow.

Yes, there are many benefits of having a podcast show and I’m not going to go into details about that in this episode. Maybe I’ll discuss that in the next episode, but for now, let’s discuss how podcasting works.

To explain the working and process of podcasting, let me tell you my way of explaining it which is basically understanding the working of 4 catalysts and 1 agent.

In podcasting, there are four catalysts: 1) You, the podcast creator

2) Your podcast hosting server where you upload and host podcast episode content mp3 file

3) Podcast apps and directories like iTunes, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Anchor, Stitcher, and many others.

And the 4) Audience or Listeners who listen to your podcast show.

So these are the 4 catalysts that come into direct action, while there is one agent that makes it all happen and that is your podcast RSS feed URL which is provided by your hosting service provider and it’s unique. It’s just like your website hosting server’s IP address and is very crucial.

So the entire process starts with you as creator creating the podcast episode by recording an mp3 file on your computer or phone.

Once you get your audio file ready, you upload it on your podcast hosting server and listen I said podcast hosting server, not your regular web hosting server. Because both are somewhat different and I’ll discuss more that in the upcoming episode. So make sure you subscribe.

Alright! Once you create a show and upload the audio file to your podcast hosting server, half of your job is done. And your podcast hosting server will provide an RSS feed URL for your show.

Now, you can submit this RSS feed URL to all the podcast directories like iTunes which is now Apple Podcasts, along with Spotify, Google Podcasts and many more.

Once you submit the RSS feed of your podcast show on these directories, it might take up to 12 to 24 hours to get your podcast show listed on these platforms considering if everything is right.

If there is any error, they’ll let you know via the email that you provided while submitting. And by the way, you can always fix the errors and resubmit until you get published on these platforms.

Alright! Now that your podcast show is published and live, all you have to do is: find listeners. Share your content everywhere and get listeners just like you put your efforts in increasing blog traffic or video views on YouTube.

The more people subscribe and rate or review, the higher you’ll rank in these directories. That’s why you’ll often see people like me saying this a lot: Please rate and review this podcast with 5-star ratings because this helps a lot in gaining more listeners through the iTunes algorithms.

So this is the whole process of podcasting. And every time you need to publish a new episode, you simply log into your podcast hosting service, upload the recorded mp3 file, and publish the new audio content.

And as soon as you hit the publish button, the new content will be automatically live on all other platforms within a few minutes without you having to manually upload everywhere.

This is an automated process and all these directories fetch the new episodes through your RSS feed.

I hope this explained everything you needed to know about podcasting for beginners. And if you ever forget this, always remember my theory of 4 catalysts and 1 agent.

So let’s wrap up this episode and if you still have any questions, you may leave me a voice message or ask me in the LearnDigitalwithRahul official Facebook group.

You’ll find the link to both of these and all other resources in the show notes below. The show notes for this episode which happens to be the 7th episode of Digital Marketing Made Easy podcast, can also be found on LearnDigitalwithRahul.com/007

And hey, if you enjoyed listening to this episode or you found any value out of this, be sure to leave a review with 5-star ratings on iTunes, it would mean a world for me.

And by the way, when you do that, please take a screenshot and post it on Instagram tagging me @LearnDigitalwithRahul - I would love to reshare it and feature you on my profile.

With that being said, I’m Rahul signing off and I’ll talk to you in the next one, until then stay motivated, stay creative, and feel proud to be #DigitalLearner.