It takes more than a bit of snow...or does it?

It's ages since I updated the blog but with good reason - Podcats have been busy!

Just before Christmas we landed a contract with the NHS to produce a series of video podcasts for their Clinical Leaders Network project in London and a series of Master Classes. So it's full steam ahead.

Well - I say full steam ahead because the weather has caused a slight hiccup in the Masterclass series. The first event was on Monday February 2nd in central London and that day has now gone down in the history of British weather as the first time that London buses have been unable to take to the streets since....well since before the war and that includes the Blitz.

We had travelled to the venue the night before having seen the weather forecast and not wishing to be stuck in a snowdrift on the M40 at five in the morning on the day of the shoot....

Suffice it to say that the event was ready to roll - the set, the PA and the lights from the COI, the cameras from Podcats, the speaker from the US - but most of the delegates (250 were expected) were unable to get there and it had to be called off.

So we packed our kit and headed out of town again through a winter wonderland. They hope to reschedule the class for later in the year.

The first Clinical Leaders Network event however was snow free and the first episode is now published - episode two is due to be shot next week. Could someone inform the weather please!?

The RSC Transformation

The heart of Shakespeare's home town is a building site at the moment! The iconic Royal Shakespeare Theatre is closed for modernisation.....and some. The site is undergoing transformation and in a couple of years will re open in its new guise.

It will retain some of the listed 1930's architecture by Elizabeth Scott which includes the foyer and the fountain staircase - otherwise it will be completely new. New that is apart from the fact that it will be drawing on some elements that would have been familiar to Shakespeare himself, namely a thrust stage that takes the actors out into the auditorium rather than keeping them safely behind the proscenium arch that framed them in the previous Royal Shakespeare Theatre.

On Friday I will be kitted out with boots, safety helmet and high visibility gear and go on site to record the next in a series of podcasts for the project. It has reached an interesting stage with one of the new features - the tower is taking shape.

Let's hope the weather is clement - I can't wait to see behind those hoardings.

This audio is the most recent podcast in the series and goes behind the scenes of the temporary Courtyard Theatre a space that is drawing plaudits in its own right. And rightly so - it's a great space in which to experience Shakespeare. And there's lots more audio and video on the part of the RSC's website dedicated to this transformation.

Ice Cream Walks...

Podcats has got the green light from Henley in Arden to start work on the next Talking the Walk. I am delighted that this lovely ancient town, just a few miles from Stratford Upon Avon, is to be next on the TTW list as it is brimming with possibilities.


Henley's High Street is a mile long - and in that mile there are at least 150 buildings listed as being of special architectural or historical interest - so there'll be plenty to talk about. And that's not counting the local Henley Ice Cream which will have to be sampled during the recording!



The'Forest of Arden' features in Shakespeare's 'As You Like It' and many of those buildings would have been there in Shakespeare's time. It is only 7 miles from Stratford so one of the goals of this episode will be to encourage more of the people who visit Shakespeare's birthplace (which they do in their hundreds of thousands) to venture out to Henley. It is considerably less crowded than Stratford which also adds to its charm.



While we are making the audio - sometime this autumn - the town's website is being redesigned to make the most of it. At the same time we will be making a 'taster' version for YouTube. The audio version will be around half and hour long so that people can download it to an mp3 player to use in conjunction with a map and to listen to while they walk. It will also have a listen now button on the website so that people can continue browsing while they listen.

The YouTube video will be much shorter - probably less than 5 minutes but the plan is that it works to drive traffic to the website and the audio and the town!


If all goes to plan the new episode will be published as a Podcast, online at the Henley in Arden website and of course as a download at Shakespeare Country who are contributing a third of the cost of production later this autumn.

Is Podcasting dead?

The question I am being asked more and more by my regular, and prospective, clients is - is podcasting dead? Has YouTube usurped audio's place on the net?

My answer is yes and no.  'Yes', in that YouTube is a great method of delivery for video and there isn't an equivalent for audio when it comes to ease of use, but 'no', in that audio reaches parts other media cannot reach...and just like the old video killed the radio star debate....audio is holding its own! 

Plus - the fact that 'Podcasting' is simply a means of distributing audio - it has nothing to do with content. It's a useful option for people who understand rss feeds or who are good at organising their audio from sites like iTunes and Juice but it is only one means of distributing and promoting audio. With the rise of social networking and online advertising coupled with 'listen now' and 'streaming' from websites on mobile phones and other devices audio is definitely here to stay!

Where audio wins: 

 1) You can't watch video while you are driving, running, or multi tasking (not even doing the ironing!)

 

2) You can listen to audio while you are browsing the internet - and if for example you were to be listening to the piece I am making at the moment for the next RSPB Nature's Voice Podcast and hearing about the remarkable nesting habits of Hornbills in the the Harapan Rainforest of Sumatra - you could also be browsing their Save the Sumatran Rainforest web page and signing up to support it at the same time. 

While you are there you can watch the YouTube videos of the forest and see pictures of the colourful Rhinoceros Hornbill. I've nothing against video - in fact at Podcats we also make video! 

The future, I'm sure, is the full integration of text, audio and video and using each to its best advantage: 

Text - because it is easy and quick to scan. It gets you to precisely the information you need. It can also add extra information or underline the key points of audio and video options.

Video - to add powerful moving images. See the Tiger shot in the Sumatran Forest video and the image stays with you. 

Audio - to bring characters to life (like Pak Zubarin who featured in Nature's Voice 4 the first visit to the Harapan Forest a year ago and will be back with an update in the next episode, Nature's Voice 16 - due for publication on September 23rd 2008). 

And audio is also a cost effective way to add an extra dimension to a campaign like the Harapan Rainforest project. The audio is gathered by RSPB staff who are on the ground anyway using a Flashmic - so there are no extra flights to take into account. It is then ftp'd to Podcats where we produce the feature.  The cost of getting a reporter or a film crew to Indonesia - twice in a year - would have been prohibitive. 

Podcasting is dead .... long live Podcasting!

B2B - Pitching it right...

There's a whole new sub genre of books out there, advising businesses on how to make podcasts for their marketing and PR offerings. Some companies do-it-themselves and get it so right. One of my favourites is still Wiggly Wigglers (who started off marketing wormories!). But there are others who, in my opinion, get it so wrong and compromise their brand image by releasing sloppy sub standard audio.

Then there is the 'research' that says podcasts don't 'work'. And I agree that if you don't get the content right they won't. Plus, once upon a time (about a year ago) simply having a 'podcast' was enough to flag up that you were at the cutting edge and automatically brought you kudos. That is now a quaint old fashioned attitude! It's also vital that it integrates with your website and all the other aspects of your marketing strategy, but that is too big a subject for the scope of this post. We'll come back to that one at a later date...

The Podcats audio in the business to business category that I have been most pleased with recently is the piece we made for eglue.

eglue is a global business technologies company that - and I quote from their website - ' provides uniquely effective real-time customer interaction management solutions that are enabling customer-facing mass-market corporations to do just that'.

They have a very specific target audience - considerably fewer people than those interested in the success of this year's peregrine breeding season of this month's Nature's Voice. And every person who is interested enough to listen to the audio may have the buying power to be very interesting indeed to eglue!


eglue are clients of Penknife Design - with whom Podcats has worked on similar projects in the past. And this new commission from Penknife has kept me on my toes in that I am working with subject matter that is way over my head. I have had to draw on all my experience as a journalist in order to pitch it right. Simplifying it so much that I can understand every word would be dumbing it down too much for the people eglue are interested in attracting so deciding the level of complexity of the conversation is crucial.

In this case Peter Hurst - eglue's marketing consultant in the UK - who is the interviewee put up to take part, is pivotal in advising me on what needs explanation and what doesn't. Once we've established that my job is to package it into a format that makes it a 'good listen'.

It will be interesting to see how well it works for them.

Talking the Walk

So which town will be the next in line for a 'Talking the Walk'? At the moment the front runner is Henley in Arden a gem of a town near Stratford Upon Avon and in the ancient Forest of Arden mentioned in Shakespeare's As You Like It...

I'm very proud of this series - and was even more proud when it won a silver medal in the Excellence in Tourism awards. They are made for the south Warwickshire tourism website Shakespeare Country in conjunction with local councils, charities and town centre companies. 

There are lots of cheap and cheerful audio guides out there but our aim with Talking the Walk is go a step beyond them by offering audio that is as interesting to listen to at your computer while you browse as it is to have with you on your mp3 player while you are walking the talked walk! We use local people with a love and a knowledge of their town and that I hope comes across.

They are more expensive to make than a script read in a studio with some atmos and music laid on, but they are built to last! With regular downloads over several years they increasingly become a good investment. And the beauty of audio is that it is very easy to update should anything change.  

The most recent addition to the series wasn't for a town at all but for Compton Verney - an 18th century Stately home with a remarkable art collection. The walk however is in the, often overlooked, Capability Brown grounds with the head groundsman of 30 years John Schumann and garden historian John Phibbs...

Others in the series include Shipston on Stour, Warwick and Southam. 

You can also find them on the Podcats website and at Visit Britain  the official British Tourism website. 

For a taster see the YouTube promo below....

Daniel and the Chichester Peregrines...

Podcats have been producing this 20 minute magazine based podcast for the RSPB for just over a year - it is published monthly and we are making episode 15 at the moment.  

One of the stars of this month's episode has to be Daniel. At just 10 years old he is the youngest RSPB volunteer and when I interviewed him on the phone this week I found that he is also one of the most articulate!