One of the key insights I’ve learned from our COM597 class is that while the podcast audience is growing, it’s a slow growth. Podcasting hasn’t seen the meteoric rise of other new media tools like blogging or social networking sites. Yet even without a mass audience, podcasting can be just as effective for building a strong — and even passionate — fan base.
One way to increase your audience is to consider a video version of your podcast. If Robert Scoble’s evidence of the power of video blogging is any indication, video podcasts will increase links to your site, and improve listener/viewer rates.
I believe the next big boost for podcasting will be the migration of video to the mobile space. I know, you’re thinking, “Hold on, we’ve been able to upload video podcasts to our ipods for awhile now. That’s nothing new.” True, but most of us still depend on our desktop to update podcasts for our phones or ipods. iTunes for iphone currently doesn’t offer any tools for managing podcasts — users are still tethered to their computers to do this.
Thankfully, smart third-party clients are filling the void. Flytunes recently added video podcasts such as The Anderson Coopers 360 Daily Podcast to its services, and Podcast Pickle has customized its directory of hundreds of video podcasts for mobile devices. With these new services, we can catch the latest podcast updates, manage playlists, and even write reviews directly from our handhelds.
In the next few years, as mobile video continues to improve from a novelty to a high quality, empowering feature, video podcasts should see a surge and garner a much wider audience.
