Podcasting, step-by-step

Here's a simple and free way to podcast, using our Living Water podcast as the example. (Also see this earlier post when we were first learning how to do this.) If you're new to the idea of podcasting, it's simply a way to allow people to subscribe so they automatically get your new MP3 files after you upload them, without having to visit your site every time to see if a new file has been posted.

This recipe assumes you already have the audio in MP3 format. (If not ... well, that's an entirely different post.)

1. Get a free blog on Blogger (or MSN Spaces, or any similar service).

2. Create a blog post for each sermon, so that your blog looks like this: http://lwccpodcast.blogspot.com/. Note that the title of each post is linked to the MP3 file on your server.

3. Get a free account on Feedburner.

4. Run the Blogger feed (http://lwccpodcast.blogspot.com/atom.xml) through Feedburner. When you're setting up the feed in Feedburner, enable the "SmartCast" option. This will tell Feedburner to modify the Blogger feed by inserting XML enclosure tags around the MP3 links. You'll end up with a podcast feed that looks like this: http://feeds.feedburner.com/LWCC_Podcast. Podcatchers such as iPodder and iTunes will be able to subscribe to this feed.

5. Put the podcast link on your website. I do it by linking to the blog from the church web site, and then providing the XML feed link on the blog page. This is what it looks like on the Living Water site.

Presto! A simple procedure for creating a podcast using free tools.