First session this morning is “Interlocking Stones : Decisions, Techniques and Styles to turn daily downloads from 20 to 2000″ with Mark Blevis, find a write up at http://podcampmontreal.org/2008/09/mark-blevis/

Bob Goyetche welcomes us to PodCamp, giving the “unconference” talk to the necomers. Mostly the law of two feet rule. At any point you can get up and leave, there’s no obligation to stay in a session.

Sponsors: Canoe.ca, Radio Canada, Twist Image, Blubrry are the larger sponsors for the event.

Plays a clip from Arrested Development frm season 3 when the word “podcast” is mentioned.

Interlocking stones: there are many shapes, some are orderly, some leave space for things to grow in the grass. They mold to the world around them.

You can’t expect a community by just throwing your show out there. You also cant spread yourself too thin either. Remember that Mark’s taken two and a half years to get to where he is.

There are always books on display in the front of a book store. Lots of people look at those books, but don’t explore the spines in the store.

Know your audience.

Link to Mark’s kids book podcast: http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?id=172818756

Back in 2005, there were a lot of librarians who were not technical.

That’s changed, not they are online blogging and have a presence.

the challenge was to find parents who were connected. Podcasting directories that were general were pretty much useless.

They emailed parents directly to get them interested.

Build your podcast into your routine. Mark records in a cofee shop, despite the noise because of the environment’s condusiveness to conversation.

Interviews: When you interview someone, it pretty much stays on the net. Most interviews have the same questions. What’s the point of doing the same interview that already exists? It’s probably already online.

research your interviewees. spend time not asking the sae questions that have been asked before. Your interviews are about your guests, not you.

You are a matchmaker between the guests and your listeners.

Good interviews will get your word of mouth out. If you’re memorable, your interviewees will talk about you.

Media attention does help. General interest podcasters at a disadvantage when it comes to media attention. In some cases they don’t want you to be known because they see you as competition, so they won’t mention you in order to not help you grow. They were such a niche show that they got some interest from traditional media.

In Mark’s case, there aren’t a whole lot of kids books podcasts two and a half years ago, so they managed to get attention because of how niche they were. espeically in books and parenting magazines.

Never turn down an opportunity for publicity. Never.

Go to industry events. Your face becomes known by people and that leads to opportunity.

If you travel, meet people wherever you go. Meetups, Tweetups, just phone calls, whatever it is

Send out a mass mailing. Instead of saying that you want people to listen, invite them to get involved in your show.

Get a phone line for people to contribute to the show. Include the phone number in your mass mailing.

Launch a newsletter. Let people know where you are and what you’re up to.

Also include auxiliary information in your newsletter, add vaalue to it.

Everything has to fit into place. Each piece mkes something beautiful together.

Q: Isn’t sending out mass mailing spam?
A: They only sent one mailing and got names and emails addresses that were readily available. Only 3 of 18,000 asked where they got their e-mail addresses, while hundreds of people sent it on to friends. There’s no law against it in Canada, but in the US you need to include a physical address. It was a struggle to send out the email at first, but a jump in daily downloads was around 150. Small numbers, but it worked.

Q: There’s potential for a comemrcial path to this. Is there a plan for it?
A: We want it to be free. When money’s involved, public schools and libraries won’t embrace it as easily. If sponsorships are going to come on board, it has to be significant. They’re currently doing it with their passion, rather than making money.

Q: How are you earning money if this is free?
A: This just talks a small amoutn of time out of the day. It’s a fulltime passion. But they have full time jobs.

Q: What do you use for your newsletter?
A: My Emma.

Q: How do you deal with Facebook, Myspace, etc..
A: They aren’t one of the interlocking stones. Everything they do is on the site. Make sure people go to your site. There’s a barrier to entry on Facebook and MySpace.

Q: Your podcast helps your consulting business. This is being used as a client example and proof of concept. Do you show consulting clients your work with this?
A: Not right away. People don’t get it right away. But when people get it, it works as a promotional tool.

Also, the target audience in non-technical for the kids books podcast.

Q: Who came up with the title?
A: Mark! He holds this a a source of pride.