It's Thursday, and on Thursdays on The Daily Grateful with Michael Crouse, oh yeah, that's me, we talk about podcasting. So, golly gee willikers, why don't we do that? Well, how's your week going? You know, I hope it's going great.
Things are happy-dappy. It's really warm here in West Central Florida, really warm, but you know, we're gonna get through it. We get through everything because that's what we are. That's who we are.
So, you want to start a podcast. I teach podcasting at the Tampa Bay Technology Center and I work with new podcasters. I do this on a volunteer basis. I don't do this for money.
I just do this because that's what I do. And that's why I do this thing on Thursdays for you. And I got some emails and I've got people requesting, what do I need? What is the bare minimum things I need to start a podcast?
Well, we're gonna talk about that just a little bit and we're gonna get into it a little deeper. By the way, I've done zero preparation for this. I'm just talking right off the top of my head. But the first thing you're going to need is a microphone.
You're gonna hear people saying, oh, you can use your iPhone. No, no. If you're gonna start a podcast, you need a microphone. So there's two types of microphones that we use.
There's the dynamic microphone, which is what I'm talking to you in right now. And then there's the condenser microphone. The condenser microphone I do not recommend to you. Have you seen the Blue Yeti microphone?
I bet you're looking at this all. You've seen the Blue Yeti microphone. It's a cool looking microphone. I'm just going to tell you what I tell people when I give talks.
Friends do not let friends podcast on a Blue Yeti microphone because these types of microphones pick up all the sound all the way around you, everywhere that you are at, these pick up the sound. So I don't like them for that reason and that reason alone. And I also don't like the tonal quality and there's just, I don't like those. But, but a dynamic microphone, you can get a pretty good dynamic microphone.
Now I'm talking to you in a broadcast quality, expensive dynamic microphone. You don't need this to start. You probably don't ever need this. I'm just kind of crazy about stuff like this.
But you can get a good dynamic microphone like the Audio-Technica AT2020. That's one. I like the Samsung Q2U. That's about $65.
You have to buy a microphone stand. It comes with one. Do not use that one. Spend 15, 18 bucks and get a desktop stand that you will use.
But other than that, especially with that Samsung, it comes with everything you need. It's got, you know, the USB cord. It's got everything. You need that.
You need your computer. All right. Your laptop, preferably. And then you need software.
And you can buy software. There's some pretty expensive software out there. For years, I used a very high-end piece of software called Adobe Audition. I don't use that anymore.
I have a piece of equipment that does just about all of my editing. And there's a free piece of software out there that I use if I have to clip things out of here. And it's called Audacity. And it's free.
You can go on the internet and download it. So you've got your microphone. You've got your software. You're going to need a set of headphones so you can hear yourself.
And that way, you know, you've got just a really, really, you know, you can plug the headphones, by the way, directly into most of the dynamic microphones like that Samsung or even the Audio-Technica. You can plug that microphone directly or the headphones directly into the back of the microphone, which comes in handy and you can monitor yourself. It's very, very nice. So you've got everything you need right there.
Boom goes the dynamite. Everything's good. And there you are. Now it's starting to get complicated.
OK. Now it's starting to get complicated. What are you gonna do a podcast about? All right.
That's the other thing. I do a daily podcast. It's usually 7 to 10 to 12 to 15 minutes long, depending upon how I'm feeling. And it's about gratitude.
And I talk mostly, except on Thursdays, I still, I'm very grateful that I'm able to talk to you today. But I tell stories and I bring those back into gratitude. I'm a solo podcast. It's just me.
I don't do guests. That is just me. Now my daughter does a couple of podcasts and she has guests on all of her podcasts. So you have to decide if you're going to do that.
If you're going to have guests, then you have the guest on the best way is over the Internet using something like Zoom. Now, Zoom is the cheap way to go, but there's a lot of other things out there that you can use. But I would start with Zoom. And here's a pro tip.
If you're not going to do video, shut the video off while you're recording with Zoom and the audio quality from the other end gets better. OK. And then you've got to drag that audio into Audacity and edit it into a podcast. Now, if you're going to do video, there's other things that you can use that other pieces of software that you can use or services that you can use.
And I, you know, that's a good idea if you're going to do that. We're getting way ahead of ourselves. So now you're going to decide what you're going to do a podcast about. Oh, the next thing you're going to need after that is hosting.
Where are you going to host your podcast? Well, you know, there's a ton of them out there, a ton of host podcast hosts out there that are really good companies. I could sit here and name a bunch. I'll just tell you what I'm using.
I'm using Spotify for podcasters. You know why I'm using it? Because it's free. I like it.
I can record all the podcast I want and it's right there. And people in Spotify, you know, it's good. They get your podcast out there. So that's very, very, very good.
So that's important. So you need your host. You've got your equipment. You've got everything you need.
You've got a host to put this down. You've got the software to edit your podcast. You may or may not need opening and closing music. Do not think for even a second that you can use a Beatles song as your opening because you can't.
You have to have music that you own. Now, the music that you hear on my podcast, I own it. OK, this music that you just just heard here a second ago. This one, that one.
I own that. I bought that from somebody. My closing music was created for me from a Nashville, a Nashville, a Nashville musician by the name of Mike Stewart. I don't think he's doing this anymore, but he created my closing music, which I can't play for you right now.
You'll hear it when I close. And I use that. But that's just me. I'm not telling you, you have to do that.
You don't have to do that. If you don't want to do that, you don't have to do that. Everybody's different. Now, here's the thing.
Show notes. You have to, if you're going to publicize your podcast and I'm just gonna make this up as we go along. Let's pretend that you're going to do a weekly podcast about fake diamonds. There you go.
Just read an article about fake diamonds, about them being ethical and all of this and their sourcing. And there's all kinds of new technology where you can get fake diamonds. And there's all this controversy about, you know, real diamonds and slave labor and all. Anyway, you're going to do the fake diamond podcast and it's going to be a series.
You're gonna have guests on every week and you're going to talk about that. So there you go. You got that. So let's say you record your podcast.
You've got a guest. You do that. Then you need to get that out into the world to where people know that you're existing. And there are people who go on that internet thingy and they look up fake diamonds and you've got to be on the Google to where they know that.
So one of the ways that you do that is in your show notes and the name and the title for your podcast or for the episode of your podcast. You have to be very mindful of that. I'm going to give you a trade secret. I don't write my show notes.
I don't haven't in a long time. Once in a while, I do. I have ChatGPT do it. Now, if I was doing the diamond show and we were doing a show about fake diamonds that are manufactured in Singapore, how's that?
Fake diamonds manufactured in Singapore. I have no idea if they make them there, but I'm just making this up as I go along. In my show notes, I would go to ChatGPT and I would type in, write me a 70 word blog post about fake diamonds from Singapore and why they're so good and use hashtags. And boom goes the dynamite.
It will write that out. And then also in your instructions, say, make it SEO, very SEO friendly. And ChatGPT, yeah, ChatGPT knows how to do that. So they will zap that thing right out for you and there'll be hashtags on the bottom of it.
So when you publish your podcast onto your hosting service and it goes out into the world, Google's going to pick that up and somebody is going to be saying, what are those fake diamonds from Singapore? And by the way, I have no idea about any of this. I don't know if fake diamonds are made in Singapore. I'm just, just understand what