Step By Step Tutorial To Produce Podcast

There are 4 steps to produce your podcasts.Ofcourse these are just the basic steps for you to have an idea about what podcasts are all about!

1. Record Your Audio and Create Your MP3 File

You can record your audio in a free software program called Audacity which is quite simple to use.You can download it from here.

Audacity is available for the Windows, Mac OS 9 or X, and Linux/Unix versions. You will also have to download the LAME MP3 encoder in order to export MP3 files. You can find the link on the same page as the Audacity download.

There is another easy method to record your audio! Use the Sound Recorder which comes with Windows.The Basic tutorial to record using the sound recorder is here.

When your audio is done - Save it and Note the size of the file.
To note the size of the file-
1. Right click on the .mp3 file you created
2. Click “properties” and note the size.


2. CreateYour RSS Feed File

An RSS feed is in fact a text file with the extension .rss . Name it whatever but it should end with .rss . You will have to write a RSS file with XML or Extensible Markup Language which is similar to HTML or HyperText Markup Language .Both XML and HTML use similar tag system inside the RSS file. The good news is, you can copy another RSS file as your template and then modify it as needed.
The other option is to sign in to certain sites, so that you need not do the coding.

ClickCaster and MyRSSCreator are two such sites which offer no-coding!

You can also make use of some free and fee-based RSS file generators like –

Podcast RSS feed generator
Simple RSS File Generator
ListGarden RSS Feed Generator Program

3. Write the XML Inside the RSS File

Now write the XML..which begins with – title
It goes something like this..
The title of it:
The description:
The publish date
The mp3 file itself:
The exact location
The exact length of file:
And the type of file it is:

There! You’ve created the code needed for a podcast! Now, name your RSS file and save it to your desktop or a directory .
Example: MyPodcast.rss

4. Upload the .MP3 File, RSS File, and Validate It

An RSS file must stay inside a server. If you have your own website then you do already have a server hosting your website. Use that server!
You upload your RSS file along with the mp3s for your podcast using either any free FTP (File Transfer Protocol) program like CoffeeCup Free FTP or any other webpage upload software your hosting company provided.

To Validate or Check Your RSS File is Correct

You can type in the address of where you uploaded your RSS file a to a RSS Validators site like : http://validator.w3.org/ ,type your url and press check
Now all that you do is to provide the address of your RSS file to anyone who wants to subscriber to your podcast.
For example:http://www.yourwebsite.com/MyPodcast.rss

For people to receive your podcast, there are many free software programs.
Don’t forget to advertise your podcast by listing it in many of the directories available on the Internet .

Copyright © 2008-2009 Laila Rajaratnam. All Rights Reserved.