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Last year’s inaugural Blogworld & New Media Expo was a success. This year, things should be even better. The organizers have one year under their belt and know what did and didn’t work. They’re working hard to provide more podcast/new media coverage.

I’m glad to announce that I have again been asked to speak at the show. My pal Leo Laporte will join me along with several other new media luminaries. As more details become available, I’ll post them here. You won’t want to miss it.

We’re going to build a podcast stage like none other you’ve ever seen at a trade show. That alone will be worth the trip.

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1) New research involving podcast advertising show podcast audiences retain more information about advertisers than TV audiences.

2) The ADM has released its proposed standards for advertising and measurement. I was happily surprised that they did very little damage to the way I work. I was pretty worried that these so-called standards would be something that would get in the way of the successful methods I use to sell ads without such standards. While there are some things in there that could hurt, it’s not fatal.

I should mention that Michael Geoghegan wrote up a review of the new standards on his blog. I usually agree with him on just about everything related to new media. He knows his stuff. But I think he missed something here.

Michael is concerned that the ADM didn’t show enough leadership to tackle tough issues like what constitutes a download. I say - thank goodness they didn’t. I prefer that if any organization is going to take that on, it would be one that actually represents the entire podcasting industry, not just a fraction of one percent of it. And also, I have a basic fundamental problem with the question - as in why are we addressing it?
Radio gets sold based on a handful of diaries submitted to each market by Arbitron. Nobody asks radio sales people, “How do I know my ad got listened to? -  How do I know people listened to the entire ad?” etc.

Why do podcasters seem Hell-bent on putting themselves in the position of having to provide information our competitors don’t? Why are we willing to be held to a higher standard than our competition? When I ask some podcasters they tell me that’s just the way it has to be. Maybe - if you have no sales skills.
I’ve sold tens of millions of dollars worth of radio advertising in my career and hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of podcasting advertising. I’ve done it without having to deal with that question and want to keep it that way.

3) Podshow recently fired a large number of staff people and now they’re changing their name to Mevio - okay.

4) Lastly, recent radio research from Jacobs says that the audience for podcasting audiences are up. Now what are we going to do about it?

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The Association for Downloadable Media is presenting its proposed “standards” for our industry this week at Ad-Tech here in San Francisco. All podcasters and new media producers who hope to make money at this craft should pay very careful attention to these so-called “standards.” If they are well done - they could end up helping many producers. If they are NOT well-crafted - these “standards” will cost some or all of us money and deals we could have made without them.

My experience with the ADM has not been at all positive. I am concerned that the organization as a whole, does not have the best interests of all new media producers at heart. While I believe there are some talented, sincere people associated with the ADM, I am not sure their effort will be sufficient to override the people who are most interested in self-aggrandizement.

Look at these standards carefully when they are released. Feel free to use the comments section here to tell us what you do and don’t like about them, and whether or not they might help or hinder (in your opinion) your efforts to gain advertising support for your show.

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One of my new shows, This Week in Photography, co-hosted by Alex Lindsay of Pixelcorps - has just been added to Alltop.com.

The blog really drives traffic to the podcast. And that’s one of the things I’ll be talking about at NAB next week. If you are a podcaster, you need to be a blogger too.

Hope to see you there.

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NAB has posted the entire schedule for their New Media 2.0 track.
I’ll be speaking at four times during these sessions. Hope to see you there.

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